Date: Sun, 13 Sep 2009 05:49:38 +0000 (GMT) From: Jonas Henley Subject: Moon River, Ch 01 (Revised) Moon River By Jonas Henley Chapter 01 "Now, everyone buckle in good and snug." "Mom . . . ," 12 year old River bemoaned quietly, shaking his head in dismay, hoping the Boy in Red two seats up didn't hear her. But who couldn't hear the take-charge, everyone-on-board voice of his mom, though? It was finally their trip to the moon, still hard enough to come by that even back home among friends and acquaintances there was a celebrity status to his vacation. He didn't want his family, therefore, looking like backwards hicks on some new fangled contraption. "There are inertial dampeners on this ship," he tried again explaining to her, "They control artificial gravity and acceleration/deceleration effects." I mean, come on, he thought, full-cabin inertial dampening was perfected, well, nearly so, almost seven years ago, and before that suborbital flights had been using modified Basic Inertial Dampening (mBID) for ages. It seemed like ages, at least. Unidirectional Basic was first developed and run on the Concordes. His parents still talked about how they met on the last Concorde flight, and that was years before he was even born. The Concorde company had had a rebirth with the development of suborbital flight; they even bought the rights to the name of 'France' from the Bonaparte family, who in turn had acquired it when the original country was dissolved in the Regionalization Wars of 2020. The revived Concorde of Nouveau Air France had a good run of it - almost 20 years - before it folded with an aging fleet, surpassed by the likes of Nimbus and AetherEire. By that point, MPV (or multi-point variable) inertial dampening was already being tested with some success. "I mean it, River Dawson, you better cinch that harness down tight." Ten years ago, Lycan Thrust Division came up with Minimal Attunement All Point Inertial Dampening. Ships using this technology were referred to as being 'fully mapped'; the biggest downside being that although you felt perfectly comfortable sitting still in your seat, weird and diametric forces would gently tug on you if you got up, or moved around excessively. Then it was sudden onset Nausea, and possibly vomiting, unless you were a thrill ride freak, then you might think it was cool. And what 12 year old wouldn't think that was cool? River still thought it was cool to take bets on who would eat the biggest booger. It was so totally gross, but he would still half-watch one of his friends do it. But there would be no nausea or weird grav-tugs in this cabin. He just couldn't get his mom to see that. Full mapping a ship worked great for the relatively short duration planetary excursion models; but thanks to the development of the Rolls-Saab planet-to-planet sublight thrust engines, the last few years had seen Lunar traffic picking up across the planet, and an even better dampening system was developed. The R-S P2P engines also made it possible for a more complete Martian International Relay station, also known as MIR 7, and the expansion of the existing Lunar Bases, both Near and Far sides to include some conference facilities and Dark and Light resort getaways. All of which fueled the hopes and dreams of 12 year old boys everywhere to ready adventures in space. If only their mom's would quit trying to tuck them in their seats. "Dad!" River pined for his dad to please intercede. His thoughts had been roaming again to the Boy in Red, just two rows up, and also in an aisle seat. He could see the side of his boyish face, the strong teen arms, and legs longer, more powerful than his, but not much more so, for though the boy looked about 2 years older, in some ways he didn't seem that much farther along than River. Well, not TOO much more - perhaps he would be in the realm of at least acknowledging River's presence. Ahhh, who was he kidding? River felt he was still a little kid, and his mother was making him seem even littler. "He's right, dear," His father still somewhat distracted by the remaining preparations on the launch pad. He had, like a little kid, called 'shotgun', which in old American Subsonic slang meant 'window seat'. Finally, thanks to transparent aluminum, a Hebridean invention, the windows on space modules were now 50x50 cm with relatively low distortion, albeit only every third row. "The Caufield Full-Cabin Inertial Dampening System," his dad continued, "is state of the art and has been in continuous operation aboard all Lunar passenger transports for more than five years, and without a single failure in the last three, I might add." "But it has failed before, and now you've proven my point." His mother said stiffly. She did not like to be argued with. "And if it should fail again, however unlikely, there are Lycan mBID's in every seat section. You might get a bit nauseous, but you won't go floating about." He answered his wife, his hands waving in the mysterious zero-gravity threatening air, his mind knowing it was fruitless to present the point. "But there is always a chance that could fail as well, and if and when it does, I won't have my children floating about improperly and getting in the crew's way. That could be dangerous for the ship and every passenger on it." "Well, IF, by some wild chance both systems should fail, they wouldn't get in the crew's way. This section would be sealed and the crew would use the Jefferies tubes above and below us to bypass the cabin until artificial gravity could be restored. And, I should point out, it would be restored gradually so as to avoid anything but the most minimal of trauma." "I do not like your attitude on the word 'minimal' John Taylor Dawson. Now, I won't tell you again River, be an appropriate role model for your brother and sister and cinch those down." To be fair, his younger brother and sister had already been strapped in across the aisle in the midsection of the passenger cabin, so it didn't really matter if he was being a role model or not. But his mother did not wait for a reply and pulled his harness snug at all points, eliciting a grunt from the boy at several junctures, one being his waist, The thigh straps, which were supposed to be phased out this year anyway, came well up his thighs and threatened his nutsack, which in the last few moths had begun to significantly relax, making room for his growing testicles and hanging down like a bigger boy's should. The belt strap, when tightened forced his erection, the result of staring dreamily at the Boy in Red, downward and outward, now obscenely tenting his pants with an obvious single pole lift. Ahh man. This was so embarrassing on so many levels. His dad looked over to check if River could still breathe. His glance couldn't help but take in the evident rise in his oldest son's uncomfortably presented package. He caught River's eye, who was blushing terminally, and winked at his son, before going back to looking out the window. They were already retracting the injector fuel refill tubes, as well as the Terrabound Life Support tubes. He could see the air-conditioned humidified air escaping as they pulled back. From here onward it was all scrubbed O2, though Luna Prime was developing some impressive indoor gardens in recent years that were generating fresh O2. "Have you noticed recently," his wife leaned in, talking low, but unfortunately not escaping River's hearing. "that YOUR son has seemed to be in a constant randy state of late. He's worse than you were when we first got married. I'm surprised it hasn't ripped out the zipper of his dress pants on certain occasions." Somewhere in the bank of seats directly behind them a woman began laughing, though obviously trying to cover up the fact that she was. River turned even redder and closed his eyes, wanting to die right there. His mom lowered her voice more, or at least thought she did. "I haven't seen it directly in a while, but I did see him come out of the shower infuser on Monday with just a towel wrapped around him. His body is definitely developing into a young older boy, and the front of that towel - you should have seen the way it was tenting out. We're going to have to watch him with the girls, I tell you." The giggling in the seat behind reached an even higher, albeit still muffled, pitch, and was now joined by a couple of quieter and deeper guffaws. 'Oh God, just let the rocket ship explode on take-off!' he thought to himself, pushing backward into the seat as though it might absorb him entirely and remove him from the humiliation this woman was heaping on him. Of course, it was a totally anachronistic term to call it a rocket ship. Strictly speaking, pure rockets had not been used in transport vessels for over 22 years. Rocket-assist, maybe. John Dawson felt bad for River in this state. It was a part of growing up, both the erections and the embarrassment heaped on by an unwitting mother, and neither could be helped. He reached over and patted his son's knee. "It'll be OK. Four or five more hours and you can run free AND at 1/6 Earth Gravity." "Well," his mother amended, "Not quite in 4 or 5 hours and not quite free. We still have to clear Luna customs, get a ground transport, and check in to the hotel. Once there, we have to check in with our agent and review our itineraries. I suppose that IF you behave, you can play some in the inner courtyard with your brother and sister." "Mom! That's only 2/3 Earth Gravity. The Hyatt has a fully domed Lunawalk almost as long as two pitches, and it's on the REAL Moon surface - real moonrocks, 1/6 gravity and ALL." "Absolutely not!" "But you don't even have to be suited!" "I said no, at least not until I have had a chance to fully evaluate its safety. And you can forget about ANYTHING that requires a suit. I am not having you out in space. Maybe on our last day you can try the Lunawalk for a few minutes. If you behave." River's face was completely crestfallen. He sank back into his chair, this time with misery. This vacation was going to suck. "You know, dear," her husband said quietly, so no-one else could hear, "this is a vacation, not a school outing, not homework, not even Household chores day. I just want to make sure you're aware of that." "Well, of course I'm aware of that. I'm here." "Well, physically, yes, but mentally I don't think you are ready for vacation." "I'm having a wonderful vacation, John. After all, we've been awaiting it for two years now." "Well, I was just wondering . . . . because you are doing an absolutely spectacular job of completely destroying River's vacation." "Oh, don't be silly." She said and looked over at her son. River was staring blankly across the cabin to the other side, one tear rolling silently down his cheek and another building up to follow. "Ohh . . . " River's mom gave a sigh, giving in, and feeling somewhat ashamed that she made her son cry. He had after all been the almost perfect son the last few days, so excited he was about going to the moon. He had been telling his classmates for two years now. If it wasn't for the fact the they were also so excited to hear what happened when he got back, they would have long since tired of hearing it. "Sweetie, you look dreadfully uncomfortable." She said with another sigh, making up her mind to forcibly be on vacation. "That won't do for five hours, and I don't see why we need these if they're phasing them out anyway, as you told me earlier." She took off the thigh restraints and began loosening up the rest of the harness. "You should know all about this anyway; you've been researching it for years now. There, that looks comfortable enough. When the green light comes on, how about I take you to the observation deck, if your brother and sister fall asleep, which they should since they were up so late last night. I can't afford to take all three of you; it's an extra 20 q per person. But I think you'll enjoy it." She kept fussing with the straps, more to reassure herself that this was going to be OK to do than just to make him comfortable. River looked at his mom and wiped the tears from his eyes. He wasn't sure why this sudden switch back to the old mom had occurred, but things were looking up. "Thanks," he said quietly with a slight crack to his throat. "There is going to be that All-Cabin-whatever in the observation deck as well?" She asked, a bit worried still about floating off. "Um, sorta, it has a gravity grid floor and a MPV failsafe, but it's only supposed to be used during cruising speed, and we're only at cruising speed for 2.3 hours after the second green light comes on." How did her son become so smart all of a sudden? Where was her little boy? "Just say Yes, sweetie, that way I'll feel comfortable about taking you." "Yes." He said with a big smile. "Well," his dad interjected. "I get to go on the way back." "Oh, hush up, you. You get to play space golf over at Trump Luna. That's your treat of the week." River laughed as his mom smiled over at his dad. Then she turned back to River and added: "And you, as soon as we get to the hotel, I want you to give your things to your dad and run down and check out that Lunawalk. Make sure it is safe for your brother and sister, and come back after half an hour; and then maybe we will all go down there after supper. Sound fair?" He didn't answer, but he leaned in and hugged his mother, at least as much as the restraints would allow. Still, he hadn't forgotten completely about the Boy in Red and back in his mind was hoping the older boy didn't see him hugging his mother. The engines hummed alive and everyone leaned back for 15 sec of 30 G's, which thanks to the dampeners translated to an average of 1.37 G's across all areas of the body and the cabin, in general. The window light faded and soon an ethereal blue just out of sight faded into darkness. The cabin lights dimmed and the shipped leaned to port on it's trajectory to the moon, revealing in the window the large blue and green planet below. 'Wow,' River thought. 'I'm really in space.' It only took a few more moments being transfixed by the Earth before he remembered that he still had an erection, or at least that it had fired back up again from the enormity of seeing the whole world - his world, actually - literally just outside his window. His mind began to wander, and he began to wonder, what would those new powerful feelings he's been having at the end of his shower wankings feel like up here in space? What would it feel like if the inertial dampeners and artificial gravity were turned off once they were cruising, if he could be in private and play with himself all the way to the end, when the clear stuff shot out, as it had over the last month? Would the orgasm and that somewhat similar feeling that he got just as the roller coaster drops somehow amplify each other? How cool would that feel? It was a nice thought to close his eyes to, as he drifted off to sleep. For two years, this boy, now sleeping peacefully as the ship lumbered through space, had anxiously awaited this day. He had studied the moon's history, geology, and stations in detail, learned about the technologies that would get him there, near about drove some of his friends crazy talking about it, endured paperwork, essays, security questions, and pre-flight physicals. Was it all worth it? Oh yeah, it was all worth it. Well . . . . . maybe not ALL worth it, perhaps not the last visit to the doctor. He still wasn't sure what would be worth that.