18 BAD ROBOT

18 BAD ROBOT Lunar day 190 Possibly the last minutes of my life "Run!" I ordered Kira. At the exact same moment, she yelled at me to do the same thing. Her scream echoed so loudly in my helmet that my ears rang. Meanwhile the robot arm was bizarrely silent as it rose above us. It was kind of like watching an action movie with the sound off—only I was in it. The arm stretched to its full hundred feet and the hand made a fist. A fist the size of a small car. Which then

swung down toward us. Kira and I were already moving. In our fear we hadn't thought to coordinate. Each of us went a different way. I bolted back the way we'd come, while Kira plunged deeper into the forest of solar panels. The robot fist thudded down right where we'd been, shattering several more solar panels. Glass exploded into the air and sailed far and wide in the low gravity, the shards sparkling in the sunlight as they rained down around me. "Where are you going?" Kira screamed at me. "Back to the air lock!" I yelled. "Where are you going?" "Where there's cover! You're right out in the open!" She was right. There was nowhere for me to hide on the route to the air lock—and the robot could reach me anywhere on the way. I'd planned on outrunning it, but I'd forgotten something very important: It's very hard to run on the surface of the moon. I could only bound along, like I was in slow motion. It was like one of those nightmares where someone's coming after you, and no matter how

hard you try to run, you can't. Only it was real. And now that I'd made the decision, there was no way to double back. The robot arm reared up again between me and the solar panels, its giant fist blotting out the sun. It was only about fifty yards from the solar array to the air lock. But despite my best attempts to run, I'd only covered a third of the distance. On earth the sound of the robot arm would have told me where it was—and whether it was going for me or Kira. On the stupid, soundless moon I had to watch it, and with a space suit on I couldn't just glance back over my shoulder. I had to turn my whole body, which wasn't exactly conducive to speed either. Behind me the arm pivoted downward. It was coming for me, not Kira. I suddenly wished I'd worn that space diaper. Though somehow, despite the fear of being pounded into paste, I managed not to evacuate my bladder. "Look out!" Kira cried. I couldn't outrun the giant fist. I had to try to dodge it. I watched as it arced downward, then sprang as it

came in, using the low gravity to my advantage. This time, however, whoever was controlling the robot had changed their attack. Instead of simply trying to squash me flat, the hand suddenly extended its fingers and swooped in sideways. It was like being slapped by King Kong. One of the huge metal digits caught me flush in the chest and I went flying. I tumbled through the air, soaring so high that I cleared the rover garage. For a moment I feared I might actually break free of the moon's weak gravity and go into orbit. I found myself high enough to see the roof of MBA and the blinding panels of Solar Array 1 on the far side of the base. But then, thankfully, I began to arc downward again. Gravity yanked me back and I face-planted on the lunar surface. In low gravity you don't come down that fast, but I still landed hard. Every part of my body felt like it had been punched at once, and the wind was knocked out of me. I skidded across the surface, leaving a deep trough through the moon dust, until I slammed helmet-first into a large rock, which stopped me dead. There was a soft, terrifying clink inside my helmet.

I'd closed my eyes as I'd braced for impact. Now I opened them to have my worst fears confirmed. The glass of my helmet had cracked. A tiny web of fractures had appeared where I'd impacted the rock, looking like the divot a stone leaves in a windshield. But the cracks were spreading. My helmet wouldn't be able to take another hit. The glass would go—and I'd suffocate in seconds. "Dash!" Kira's terrified voice rang inside my helmet. "Are you all right?" I rolled over and took stock of where I was. The robot arm had knocked me thirty yards, so I was now on the opposite side of the air lock from where I'd started. The rover garage was between me and the field of solar panels; I could no longer see Kira over there. By the garage, the robot arm reared up on its pivot again. The hand swiveled back and forth, the palm angled at the ground. I realized it was looking for me. Whoever was controlling the robot had to watch me on the cameras, but the arm had swatted me so far I'd flown out of sight. There were several cameras mounted on the arm itself, though, and

now my attacker was using them to scan the area to see where I'd landed. The air lock wasn't too far away now, only a bit more than ten yards. Temptingly close. But I didn't run for it. Instead I stayed where I was, not moving an inch. The lunar surface was gray and white. My suit was gray and white—and it now had a layer of moon dust coating it. Hopefully, I'd blend right into the surface. I wasn't going to disappear completely, like a chameleon changing color, but on the monitors I'd be much harder to spot lying still than I would moving. "Dash!" Kira screamed again. It sounded like she was crying. "Are you okay? Answer me!" "I'm okay," I told her. "Thank goodness! Where are you?" "By the launchpad," I lied. The robot hand immediately swiveled that way. Which meant the killer was eavesdropping on our transmissions. But I'd figured as much. And now I'd diverted them and bought a few seconds. There was another clink from my helmet. A small crack extended from the impact point, spreading across the glass like the fissure of a miniature