Arkady sailed over the Moon’s North Pole. The flat sunlight picked up particles swimming along with the Soyuz — flakes of paint or insulation — and if he banged his fist on the wall a whole shoal of them would be born. They seemed to sparkle as they moved away from Soyuz, but some of them floated nearby, as if tracking a current through water.

Three, two, one.

There was no noise. Not even a vibration. Just a gentle, steady, push in the back.

Good engineering, he thought.

Soon it was over.

He had lost velocity, and the orbit of the Soyuz had become an ellipse. As he sailed around the Moon, he would come gradually lower, until — as he approached the South Pole, all of halfway around the Moon — he would reach his new orbit’s lowest point, which would graze the surface itself.

So he was committed. His only regret was that he would die alone, without so much as touching another human being again.

But then he would not be alone, on the Moon. Geena was there.

In the dark, the attitude system fired. He could hear the hollow rumble of the vernier rockets, like somebody dragging a chain across the hull of the ship. The Soyuz was automatically turning itself around, for it must come down nose-first. Through his portholes he could see flashes, a pinkish spray of particles from the reaction control nozzles, like sparks from a fire.

And then he flew into sunlight, without warning, as he had every two hours since entering this lunar orbit. As the light flooded over him, and the sun’s heat sank into the fabric of the ship, making the hull tick and expand, he felt a surge of renewal, of rebirth. He basked in the light, like a cat on a zavalinka, the earthen wall of a peasant’s house.

Coupled by the emergency hoses like Siamese twins, moving awkwardly, clumsily, constantly fearful of breaking their contact, ever aware of the way their time on the Moon’s surface was diminishing…

Thus, Henry and Geena laboured to collapse their shelter, their only home on the Moon, and to load up the old Apollo Rover with their survival gear.

When they were done the Rover was piled high with equipment. The collapsed shelter, a big pie-dish, was tied to the back by nylon rope.

“Like something out of The Beverly Hillbillies,” said Henry.

“I always hated that show.”

They clambered onto the Rover, and Geena pushed at the joystick.

The Rover lumbered forward.

It was a rocking and rolling ride, all the way to the rille complex. Every time it hit a mound or a depression or a crater rim — which was every few seconds — the Rover teetered precariously, obviously top-heavy.

Geena followed yesterday’s tracks, but today they rolled right past the point where they’d parked.

They approached the rim of a side rille, much smaller than Schröter’s Valley.