11 ILLEGAL CONTRABAND

11 ILLEGAL CONTRABAND Lunar day 217 T minus zero to Capsule Drop I found my parents in the common room, along with almost everyone else from MBA. They had all taken a break from searching and measuring to watch the capsule drop on the main SlimScreen. The only people who were missing were the Sjobergs, as usual. The capsule was separating from the delivery rocket as Kira, Violet, and I entered. A camera on the rocket showed it dropping away with the moon behind it. My parents were standing next to Kira's father. Dr. Howard was watching the capsule drop with an

unusual amount of focus. Normally, his mind seemed to be a hundred other places at once. But the capsule's arrival was very important to Dr. Howard, as he was involved with the construction of Moon Base Beta. If anything went wrong, his job would become a whole lot more complicated. My parents looked relieved to see Violet, Kira, and me, as if they'd been worried. It occurred to me only then that this probably wasn't the best day to suddenly go missing. Nina had already vanished; perhaps Mom and Dad thought it had happened to us, too. Dr. Howard didn't even seem to notice us. "Where have you guys been?" Dad asked. "We were looking for you." "We found something in Nina's room," I said, keeping my voice as low as possible. "Something important." "What were you doing in Nina's room?" Mom asked suspiciously. "Trying to figure out what happened to her," Kira replied, before I could. "And I think we've got a clue." "Really?" Dr. Howard asked absently. "That's nice, dear."

On the SlimScreen, the capsule was falling away from the rocket that had delivered it at thousands of miles per hour. The view switched to a camera on the capsule itself, filming the surface of the moon as it came closer and closer. Mom and Dad had already forgotten all about the capsule. And if they'd been annoyed at us for disappearing, they seemed to have forgotten about that, too. Now they were intrigued. "What'd you find?" Dad asked. "You have to come see," I told them. "It's a bunch of rocks!" Violet exclaimed. Kira and I had both told her to keep this a secret —or, if she couldn't do that, to at least whisper it. In her excitement, she had failed on both counts. Luckily, everyone else in the room was too riveted to the SlimScreen to notice. The retro rockets fired on the capsule, slowing its descent. Mom and Dad were even more intrigued after Violet's revelation. "I think we'd better see these rocks," Mom said, while Dad headed over to where Chang was watching the capsule drop. He whispered in Chang's ear. Chang's jaw immediately

fell open in surprise. He forgot about the capsule drop as well and came back across the room toward us. Kira told her father, "I'm going back up to Nina's room." "All right," Dr. Howard replied distantly. "Have fun." On the screen, the capsule was lowering toward the lunar surface. Someone back at NASA Mission Control in Houston was reporting that all systems looked good. Mom, Dad, and Chang led Kira, Violet, and me out of the common room. "You guys found rocks in Nina's room?" Chang asked. He didn't sound angry at all. He sounded stunned. "Like a thousand!" Violet reported. "More like a hundred," I corrected. Chang shared a surprised glance with my parents. We all started up the stairs to the upper residences. "What's wrong?" Kira asked. Instead of answering the question, Chang asked his own. "Did you tell anyone else about these rocks?" "No," Kira replied. "We only found them a few

minutes ago and we came right to you." We reached Nina's residence. Chang paused at the door, then turned back to us. "You kids are aware that all the residences here are private, right?" "Kira made me go in!" Violet announced. "It was all her idea!" Kira shot Violet an annoyed look. "Thanks a lot." "You're welcome," Violet replied. She didn't really understand sarcasm yet. Chang didn't seem very surprised that Kira had been the instigator. He didn't seem that upset, either. "Next time you want to get into someplace up here," he said, "come see me first." "Okay," Kira said, then led the way to the secret compartment we'd found. Chang grew annoyed at himself the moment he saw where it was. "I can't believe I missed that," he sighed. "I'm an idiot." "We weren't looking for a space that small," Mom pointed out. "We were looking for spaces big enough to hold a person." "Even so," Chang said, then peeked into the compartment. Mom and Dad joined him. They all reacted with astonishment. "Those are rocks all right," Dad said.

"You didn't believe us?" Kira asked. "It didn't seem "—Dad paused to search for the right words—"in Nina's character." "What's going on here?" I asked. Chang fished one of the rocks out of the secret compartment. "This is a moon rock—" he began. "We know," Violet taunted. "We're on the moon! Duh!" Mom signaled Violet to be quiet. Chang walked back over to the door of the room, checked the hall to see if anyone was around, then closed it. "The point is, moon rocks are extremely valuable." "Why?" Violet asked, ignoring Mom's warning. "They're everywhere. The whole moon is made of them." "True," Chang admitted. "They're not valuable here. But on earth, they'd be worth a fortune. The total amount of lunar samples that have been brought back to earth over the years is only a few thousand pounds. And those have all been supervised by NASA." Mom said, "No one on earth has a moon rock unless NASA has given it to them, and they've limited those gifts to museums and other