“Don’t tell us you’ve already voyaged to another planet and brought back an inhabitant!” Ken Horton remarked.
Tom removed the monkey’s helmet. “Meet Nick, our space simian!”
The crewmen grinned halfheartedly, but Tom noticed an awkward silence.
“Anything wrong?” he asked Horton.
“Bad news, skipper,” Ken replied glumly. “We picked up a Brungarian broadcast just before you got here. They announced that their moon rocket has already taken off.”
The group from the Challenger were stunned. “Then they’ve beaten us before we even start,” Bud groaned. “They’ll grab those sick animals, and they’ll also claim the moon for the Brungarian government!”
His words drove home the seriousness of the situation. But Tom refused to be stampeded.
MOON HO! 141
“They’ve issued fake claims before,” he pointed out. “Let’s check on that announcement before we start tossing in the towel.”
He hurried into the radio compartment and ordered the operator to signal Fearing Island. When Billing responded, Tom asked him to contact Harlan Ames at Enterprises.
“Wilco,” Billing acknowledged.
In a few minutes Ames’s voice was relayed to the space station.
“Bid you catch that Brungarian announcement?” Tom asked the security chief.
“We certainly did,” Ames said. “But I’m fairly sure there’s nothing to it.”
“How come?”
“I checked with United States Intelligence in Washington, and they have no knowledge of a Brungarian space rocket being launched,” Ames explained. “We asked Warturo too, via our secret contact. He says Jantree seems to know nothing about the rocket, either. So it’s probably all a hoax.”