Free The Eye With Which The Universe Beholds Itself (Apollo Quartet) by Ian Sales

who knows for a cold hard fact there is life elsewhere in the universe. He is the only man to have seen the evidence. It was just a disc covered in alien writing and it was billions of years old, but he knows it was real because it gave the US the Serpo engine. He wouldn’t be here now on an exoplanet orbiting Gliese 876 if it hadn’t been real.
    But he doesn’t think aliens have done this, he doesn’t think the disappearance of Phaeton Base was caused by aliens.
    Brigadier General Bradley Elliott, USAF, lifts a hand to his brow and gazes toward the setting sun. As Gliese 876 falls on the hills lining the horizon, streaks of blood-red spread out across the bottoms of clouds, and he can’t help thinking it may be an omen. The light creates a bowl of hues across the sky, mauve above the horizon, through carmine, crimson, ruby, amaranth and magenta. The topmost layer, a pale coral colour, fades away to black. The temperature has dropped but it’s still very warm. He’s not going to freeze tonight. Or any night.
    It’s dark now, the profound darkness that exists only in deserts far from light pollution. Some stars have appeared and their light is enough to see by. They sparkle like diamonds, flashing and blinking, scintillating . It’s a weird effect, an alien effect. Elliott unrolls his sleeping bag and lays it on the ground. This world is dead, there is nothing that can do him injury while he sleeps. He has more than enough oxygen in his bottle, and a spare in the rucksack should it run out. Despite the discomfort of the mask, he falls asleep quickly, and only wakes when red sunlight creeps across the land. He is hungry and very thirsty.
    After a chocolate bar and plenty of water, he packs up his sleeping bag, shrugs his rucksack onto his back, and returns to the CM. Once he has loaded himself up with supplies, he will start walking. Any direction is as good as another. He has enough food and water and oxygen to last him a while yet. He turns and scans the crimson sky, trying to figure out where Earth is. At fifteen light years’ distance, the Sun is just another star. When he thinks he’s looking in the right direction, he mouths a silent farewell to Judy.
    This time, he is not going home.
     
    GLOSSARY
    Apollo 1 Intended to be the first manned Apollo mission, it never left the launch-pad when a fire in the Command Module during a plugs-out test resulted in the deaths of all three crew. Crew: Virgil ‘Gus’ Grissom (CDR), Edward H White (senior pilot) and Roger Chaffee (pilot).
     
    Apollo 4 to 6 These three launches were unmanned tests of the hardware: the Saturn V launch vehicle, Lunar Module and Command Module.
     
    Apollo 7 This was the first manned Apollo mission, although it used a Saturn IB as a launch vehicle rather than the Saturn V needed for missions to lunar orbit. The crew spent eleven days in LEO. Crew: Walter M Schirra (CDR), Walter Cunningham (LMP) and Donn Eisele (CMP). Command Module no callsign (CM-101). Launched 11 October 1968.
     
    Apollo 8 Rumours of a possible Soviet attempt to send a cosmonaut round the Moon, and the delay of a Lunar Module for testing in LEO, prompted NASA to re-task Apollo 8 and send it to orbit the Moon. This made its crew the first human beings to leave Earth orbit. Crew: Frank Borman (CDR), William Anders (LMP) and James Lovell (CMP). Command Module no callsign (CM-103). Launched 21 December 1968.
     
    Apollo 9 The first Apollo mission with a Lunar Module, and so tasked with testing rendezvous and docking procedures between the two spacecraft in LEO. Crew: James McDivitt (CDR), Russell ‘Rusty’ Schweickart (LMP) and David Scott (CMP). Callsigns: Command Module Gumdrop (CM-104), Lunar Module Spider (LM-3). Launched 3 March 1969.
     
    Apollo 10 A “dry run” mission for the first lunar landing, Apollo 10 flew to the Moon and its Lunar Module descended to within ten miles of the lunar surface but did not land. Crew: Thomas P Stafford (CDR), Eugene Cernan (LMP) and