The landscape was filled with craters, hills, and spires sticking out of the ground – stalagmites, weren’t they? Richard was surprised that he remembered that. As he walked, it didn’t take him long to realize that he didn’t know where he was going. He was walking away from the cabin – which was good – but what was his final destination?
He stopped and thought. No! He said to himself. I must keep moving! Richard knew that if he stopped, he might not get started again. He made himself think while he walked – something he didn’t do too often.
He didn’t really know where he needed to be, or rather, where to go to help him get off the moon. He’d simply have to pick a destination, and go there. He decided to pick one of the stalagmites.
Heading towards his chosen stalagmite, Richard remembered something else. He had seen it in an old western movie – the main character was an open range cowboy, and he would always make sure he was completely aware of his surroundings. It was a pretty good movie – not one of those cheesy ones, although Richard often liked the cheesy ones too – and the cowboy really seemed to know what he was doing, so Richard decided to put the idea into practice.
After working up his resolve to start walking again, Richard stopped to look around. As he did so, he realized that it would really help if he knew which way was north. Did the moon even have directions like that? Back on earth, they were based on the magnetic poles of the planet – surely the moon had magnetic poles as well? Even if it did, there was really no way to tell where they were, so he decided to make up the directions himself. His stalagmite would be “west,” which would make his cabin in the “southeast” direction. There was a medium-sized crater to the south, a large hill to the east, and a cluster of small stalagmites in the north. If he ever lost sight of his cabin and needed to get back, he could simply head directly in between the medium crater and the large hill.
As soon as he had done all this, Richard promptly began walking again. He took a quick glance back at his cabin to see how far he had gone. It was quite a distance away, but his stalagmite in the east didn’t really seem that much closer. Wait. “His cabin,” he had called it. He thought about this. It seemed wrong – rude, even – to call it “his” cabin. It really didn’t belong to him. Who did it belong to, anyway? The same person – or people, maybe – who put him here?
Did the cabin belong to aliens?
As foolish as the thought sounded to Richard, he simply coudn’t shake the idea of aliens. If there were aliens here, were they watching him now? Was this some sort of terrible experiment, like the kind you see in really bad sci-fi movies?
Before he could pursue this thought any further, Richard slipped and tumbled down a sudden slope, hit his head a rock, and passed out.
