The Moon glowed in the sky, already as bright as a new sun; even the darkened crescent to its western limb was clearly visible. It was almost featureless, so bright was it now; but Jays thought he could make out a bright triangle in the south-east — the old highland area, poking above much of the new atmosphere — and perhaps dim shadows of the old maria. Here and there on the new, bland face of the Moon, he could see the crackle of lightning: gigantic storms which must have straddled hundreds of miles, with lightning leaping between clouds, illuminating them from beneath, as if the planet’s surface itself was cracking.

Some vapour hung away from the Moon, in a thin cloud, trails of it hovering over the South Pole. The Moon floated within its wreath of air, like a huge lantern. And he thought he could see structure in that escaped cloud: shadows cast upward by the new, brighter Moonlight. Maybe those escaped volatiles would ultimately form some kind of ring—

The ground lurched. The telescope seemed to come alive, and the eyepiece ground into his eye socket, and he fell.

He was on his back, in the ruins of Hubble’s chair.

He’d heard a cracking sound. Maybe it was the dome. Or maybe it was the bones of his skull.

He couldn’t see too well. That eye, poked by the eyepiece, didn’t seem to be functioning at all. There was no pain, though.

Here was Sixt, hovering over him, his face a blurry Moon shape.

“We’ve got to get out of here,” Sixt said. “My God. Your eye.”

Sixt tried to lift him to his feet. Jays had never felt so old.

“Can you see?”

“Not so well,” he said. But he didn’t think it would matter, very much longer.

The ground quivered again, and he heard a metallic crash, as some piece of equipment or other came shearing off its mount.

“What do you think?” he asked. “Richter seven? Eight?”

“It’s the fucking San Andreas,” Sixt said. “Half of Los Angeles is on fire. A hell of a view…”

“The San Andreas,” Jays said. “It took its own sweet time to join the party.”

“We have to get out of here.”

“And,” said Jays calmly, “go where, exactly?”

“Jays—”

“Can you still see the Moon?”

“Yes. Yes, Jays, I see the Moon.”

“Then tell me,” he whispered. “Tell me what’s happening up there.”

At least, he thought, I got to see this. This and Aristarchus: maybe that’s enough, for one lifetime.

But he wished he’d had a chance to say goodbye to Tracy and the boys.