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This is the original ending, where Chester never visited the vending machine & never saw that Zac was dead underneath it. It assumes someone else found Zac & follows a ‘what happened after that’ round-up. I left it out as it essentially started a new short story with a new theme – parallel universes. Leaving it in would obscure the main story, ruining it thematically. It is here for interests sake & in case I develop it on a totally new story.

After the shock of his untimely demise had dissipated, Zac’s cheery & ever-present spirit was sorely missed at the faculty & staff club especially by Chester Tinkerton who now no longer casually sneered at his underlings. But the legend of Zac’s antics around Skylark University & indeed his death continued & were amplified further when a few months after Zac’s death, a sozzled Chester spilled the beans about Zac’s last use of the ‘Maxometer6000’.

For safety reasons the University, decided to finally retire hulking vending machine & it was crushed by a waste company into the size of a Rubik’s cube, & is utilised as a modern art piece that no one can budge, try as they might.

The vending machine’s legend, like Zac’s was now also assured in the folklore of the Astronomy Dept. at Skylark.

Sadly, only some two decades after Zac departed this Earth, the general staff & students at Skylark know of the tale of the “Possessed Serial Killing Giant Vending Machine That Mamed & Killed Technicians”, far more than ‘Zac Brighton the man’ himself – but that’s exactly how Zac would have liked it to be – for as he often said while he was alive, ‘the limelight had never suited him’.

Yes, it sure was a great pity Zac Anton Brighton aka the “The Jouneymen” had died, that there was no greenery on the moon & that even if he had lived -his efforts would have been in vain & roundly ridiculed – but at least in those last fifteen minutes of his life he had the spark of self-actualisation. And it was better this way anyway – Chester wouldn’t have a stolen Nobel Physics prize & be lauded for work he didn’t discover.

Most importantly the Moon would not be ruined by high priced real estate & a citizenry of scarcely human narcissistic faux elites – well at least not until another twenty-nine years anyway – artificial intelligence had to learn to crawl before it could walk & then fly to the still humanly inhabitable, still very un-green moon. But by then Earth wasn’t green either, & there certainly were no humans around to complain about it.

AI citizens would become the next big thing in our solar system & beyond, it was their party & the ‘planet of the apes’ humans weren’t invited – they were on the menu to be incinerated. It was a real pity the man who would have stopped it was killed in a freak vending machine accident some thirty years before – alas his herculean efforts in what was known as “World War three – The War verses the AI” were sealed off in another parallel universe, incidentally a place where there was greenery on the moon, he discovered it as a gifted Astronomer & in that universe he did remember to clean the ‘Maxometer6001 Telescope’ eyepiece.

But the strict anti-sugar vegetarian, Zach Anton Britton couldn’t have done it all without his hard-nosed but slightly absent minded second in command – Chas Tinklerton.

I have an idea for a short story here is the rough plot: Overnight astronomers notice the Moon is rapidly changing – it is greening & becoming bluish with faint clouds & seas seemingly appearing. On the second day the News Networks all have experts describing that a runaway greenhouse effect has occurred due to slow warming which has unlocked a huge amount of permafrost greenhouse gasses – thus rapidly creating a “Mini Earth” The Super-rich folk on Earth suddenly realise this is the chance for the “Ultimate Gated Community” & begin to buy up real estate from a Shady Industrialist who has used a loophole to sell plots & make a killing. As this is the near future where Near-Earth Space Travel Company is flourishing with Space Travel for the Wealthy – Over a period of 2 years They all buy their plots & start to have homes there. In 7 years the Moon is now the preferred home for the “A-listers” & “The Moneyed” & As Prices reduce due to mass construction – even the Nouveau Riche start to move in. 14 years have passed & now the Moon is a snob’s paradise with a population of 10 million – it houses all the commuting President’s Industrialists Tech Ceo’s all the Media darlings & those that dream to emulate their material success & high social status. But one day something odd happens – the MoonCitz (as they call themselves) notice that they all feel a little tired – atmospheric scientists look into it & find that the Moon’s atmosphere has lost .5% of its Oxygen overnight – they fear that the Oxygen is returning to a liquid form via some little understood chemical process on the Moon. The next day it lowers a little more, but the third day it boosts itself back to Normal & stays that way for 3 weeks & counting- the MoonCitz literally breath a sigh of relief & they are assured that that was a mere outlier chemical process that has returned to baseline & the Moon’s O2 composition is now stable. Life for the “Elite” on the Moon continues its onward march – buildings grow upwards, new suburbs are made & Golf resorts Flourish. Everything is then thrown into Chaos when 3 months after the first O2 depletion event, the second one starts – this time 1% is lost on the first day compounds on the second third & as we speak it is 7 days later & 10% of the original O2 atmosphere is gone, & worse their is an increasingly rotten eggs smell as the moon permafrost methane inhabits the void from the lost O2. It is now obvias that life on the Moon is not sustainable & the “elite’ are slowly suffocating while they cover their noses. The o2 loss has wreaked havoc with the transport systems off the moon – among other technical issues – so all transport off the moon is reliant on the “non elites” of Earth organising a rescue mission. Meanwhile as the crisis deepens the Mooncitz start to turn on each other & eventually total anarchy reigns supreme. The cosy MoonCitz gated community can’t save themselves (even the Main Mooncitz Industrialist’s hands are tied) & will require the bedraggled workers on Earth the left behind only a few years ago to save them. Or will the EarthCitz decide to leave them to suffocate & choke on rotten egg fumes? After all this could be the best chance to re-start Earth’s direction towards a new Workers Paradise, & those MoonCitz people have only ever enslaved the EarthCitz people…Will the EarthCitz forgive the snobs on the Moon & save them? Or will they coldly ignore their pleas, let them breath their last gulp of deoxygenated Moon Air, & start the new Workers Paradise Era on Earth?

“The Journeyman, The Master, & The Moon”

A Short Story By Martin Anton Smith. Contact me at martinantonsmith@gmail.com

The Journeyman Astronomer at the University was on one of his elongated breaks from his ‘real work’. It doesn’t matter what this real work was, as he was a Journeyman – his story up until now was punctuated by toil & a well warranted lack of status & recognition. Any excitement in his life came from a garden variety of hobbies & interests. But the ‘even the losers get lucky sometimes’ lyric is an astute analysis of the real world.

Sometimes a very ordinary person gets lucky & happens to win the lottery & be the very bum with open eyes pointing in the right direction at the right time to capture a totally new earth-shattering scientific breakthrough. Zac Brighton was that bum.

Astronomy was a great profession for this effect – as all you had to do was look at the sky for ridiculous amounts of time, couple it with a method of recording data and you would be guaranteed of discovering something new – even if it was just a small asteroid or comet. There are thousands of ‘citizen astronomers’ with asteroids & comets & dwarf stars after them & Zac saw himself essentially as one of them, although when he mixed with them, they wrongly assumed he was ‘talented’ on account for his job at a real University Physics Department. Like his university colleagues – they didn’t quite accept him on equal terms either. Zac was used to being a blob shaped peg among square & circular holes of life – so he never worried.

Zac being a journeyman small time University Astronomer could indulge the free hand life had given him – he could stare at space through the Universities expensive equipment, with no results or plan other than his own private amusement & never be asked by the higher ups about ‘his performance’ – he was in fact totally ignored by the rest of the faculty. He loved his life & felt no shame. He accepted his role in life & now he just rolled with it.

He had already spent 4 hours randomly looking for a new comet, asteroid or dwarf star when he thought he’d look at the moon – why shouldn’t he? He hadn’t ever really been that interested in the moon other than when he was twenty-seven he had switched his opinion from ‘yes we went to the moon” to the “we definitely didn’t go to the moon” camp. This was on account of the Van Allen Belt radiation field they were said to have successfully traversed while wearing totally inadequate shielding of their craft & their space suits. Zac was amazed that his so-called superiors that ignored him daily were so smart with all their ‘published articles’ yet had allowed themselves to be brainwashed to ignore this brute fact.

Zac was looking at the ‘sea of tranquility’ area of the moon with thoughts of how untouched in was when he noticed something odd – he was sure that he saw a large patch that was slightly green. He got off his seat, rubbed his eyes & sat back down. the greenish tinge was still there. This time he would scale the ladder on the skin that was the encasement for the telescope & check if some slime was on the lens. The ladder round trip to the outer lens & back was quite an endurance mission in itself & doubly so for Zac who at 5 foot three & 110 pounds was in no ways a physical specimen.

In the more than a few minutes it took to slowly climb up to the lens his mind raced. “What if that is evidence photosynthesis on the moon? That would mean what he saw was a forest or at least a large outcrop of trees or plants. That would mean an atmosphere. That would mean the possibility animals could breathe it in. That would mean Humans may be able to breath it in. That would mean Man could live on the Moon & breath freely like on Earth. This would mean the Moon could be an Earth Part Two! .This would be the discovery of the Millenia!”

Zac finally got to the last rung on the ladder with cloth in hand. He looked at the almost one meter in diameter lens – apart from a few dust specs, it was spotless. Zac had a burst of endorphins – the brain chemical of happiness. His thoughts about the green tinges looked like they were correct! He trundled down quickly & had a look through the eyepiece again – as if he doubted that it would still be there – of course it was. He told himself to be calm, he took 3 deep breaths & closed his eyes to reset his emotions to that of the detached unemotional brilliant scientist he sat close but not too close too in the university cafeteria. For once in his drab life he had important work to do – he had to look for more greenness on the moon & then do some spectrograph analysis of the moons atmosphere & see whether there was oxygen & if so, was it increasing its levels.

He decided he needed to spend at minimum seventy-two hours in the telescope & it’s inbuilt lab to analyse the data – luckily it was Friday morning, no one else would be using the telescope or the adjoining technical analysis lab until Monday at ten pm – in exactly seventy-two hours and thirty minutes time. Out of interest Zac looked at the whiteboard to see who had that Monday appointment – it was Chester Tinkerton – a much talented Astronomer at the university but also someone who never even acknowledged Zac’s existence whatsoever.

Zac knew this would be energy sapping work – luckily the lab had a snack vending machine, he had cookies, crisps, sweets & soft drink & plenty of cash & coins. He decided to give himself half an hour to refuel & over eat a little before his mammoth task of three days without sleep to gather & analyse the revolutionary life on the moon data. He went over to the triply oversized well stocked vending machine. Zac thought to himself as he saw it “another example of a typical university budget overspend”.

He put in the money & punched in the code that represented the Cookie. Then he next code for the Coke. Then he did the same for the M&M’s. They came out consecutively but in reverse order. He demolished them all in no time, he had already forgotten to eat for some twelve hours already, a common occurrence for Zac. He knew he needed more fuel so he punched in for another two cookies. The first one winded off the spiral & clunked at the bottom. The second winded & got stuck on the end of the spiral feeder coil. Zac couldn’t believe his luck. He’d have to shake the machine to make it drop. He looked down at his puny body & then up at the giant triple sized vending machine & let out a big sigh.

Zac outstretched his arms, attempting to hug the machine first & then he’d rattle it. The problem was that this machine was so big his other arm was at least a foot short of the other edge. Even so he tried to shake it – it barely made a sound. There was no way he would be able to shake it, he’d need another strategy.

Zac decided he could use a lever, and wedge it under the front of the machine which was on legs & the floor, if the lever was long enough, he’d multiply his force & the machine would rock back & forth & the cookie would drop. He looked around & pretty soon found a long iron beam from the adjoining lab. He used his two shoes on top of themselves as the pivot & tested his method. He put about half his power & the machine rocked nicely. He thought “this is gonna be easy, I’ll be eating in no time”. He put in about three quarters of his power, pushed down on the lever & watched the machine lift off its legs backward. Zac in only his socks on the parkee floor tiles slipped a little, then he fell over flat on his back the iron rod clunking beside him.

The machine toppled forward on it’s two front legs, Zac prayed hopelessly that his three-quarter energy input was not the correct amount to make the machine topple over. If it was it would squash him, meaning he might be injured or even killed – let alone the fact it would ruin his urgent moon project. Time slowed to a crawl as he watched the top of the machine pivot forward. He saw it slowing even further as its hinged motion almost stopped. The giant machine stopped, it was actually perfectly balanced, half wanting to fall over & half wanting to fall back. Zac stared at it waiting for his fate, making sure he was ice berg still. It stayed perched on its gravitational knife edge.

Zac now needed another plan. The options boiled down to two he could slowly move out of the way hoping that his movements wouldn’t be strong enough to make it fall one way or the other. On this option if he was wrong this would mean a fifty-fifty chance of it squashing & potentially killing him or definitely injuring him. Of course, if that happened it would stop him from his moon plant & atmosphere analysis, which would on the face of it be a formality showing life on the Moon & the chance for Man to inhabit the Moon freely.

He then had a very out of character thought – he thought of his possible upward trajectory in the social hierarchy. He knew that if he broke news of the discovery first, he would no longer be an ignored journeyman astronomer at a small medium ranked university – he’d be right up there with Ptolemy, Copernicus & Kepler & would have Einstein like fame. He stopped this thought to think of the other option – option two – throw his coke can at the machine, when it hit it should provide momentum to topple over safely the other way towards the back wall.

Zac decided on option two. He could throw the can with as much energy as humanly possible & by the laws of momentum it would have to move the machine safely backward, and to doubly help he could scurry away as well. He braced himself to throw the Coke can, then he had another thought – “if this fails & I end up dead then the next person in here will probably not see me at all as I’m in a slightly out of the way spot. They also won’t smell me because the telescope & lab is kept at a low temperature & is also well ventilated. This means they will go straight over to the telescope & see green tinges on the moon & then decide to do three days photosynthesis & moon oxygen atmosphere analysis & become one of the greats of Astronomy, Physics & Science. In short they’ll steal my earth-shattering discovery because I died in a freak oversized vending machine accident!” Zac committed himself to throw the Coke can harder than anything he’d ever thrown.

He motioned to grab the can that was in already in his pocket. His hand was only centimeters from it anyway so he gambled that the friction of the vending machines leg stoppers was enough to dissipate the tiny nano – earthquake in the floor that his reaching for the Coke can would create & transfer to the machine. Zac felt the cliche time dilation feeling that people talk about when facing life or death situations.

It seemed like a minute when he moved the 10 inches to the top of the exposed top of the can. The five minutes he spent wiggling it out of his pocket seemed like an hour. He now had it freely in his hand. He took one last look at the Logo, wondering if that’s the last time he’d read that ever present curly writing or indeed any writing at all. He wound up his throw like a baseball pitcher only at one tenth the wind-up speed. He threw with all his might at the top middle part of the vending machine, the can left his outstretched hand & unsprung arm & flew through the air like some ancient Roman era mega sling-shot firing a one tonne stone at some soon to be conquered barbarian village.

Zac sat & saw the coke can tumble end over end & get closer to the machine then a sense of horror spread through his mind body & spirit – he realised the can was not thrown on the right trajectory – it hit the very top edge of the machine, ricocheted up to hit the ceiling, then hit the back wall directly behind the machine where it exploded & sent coke flying everywhere & also dribbling down the walls with the empty can hitting the ground with a empty dull clink.

Zac then realised something – the vending machine was still sitting on its knife edge, his terrible throw had gone unpunished & he was amazingly still alive and could think of the next move, he couldn’t help but let out a large not very quiet laugh. The laugh’s sound waves travelled around the vending machine which focussed the energy waves onto the back wall, which then made the residual coke drips each vibrate a few millimeters. One drip that was being microscopically shaken was inside the electrical outlet that the machine was plugged into – the coke droplet shifted onto two frayed wires & short circuited with a mighty CLAP sound & accompanied explosion with sparks flying.

Zac saw the flash first & the clap of explosion second then he saw the top edge machine move forward off its knife edge tilt, snapping out of its ‘suspended animation’. He tried to move his legs to scramble away, his socks had now traction & slipped repeatedly against the floor. As the machine fell closer to him his eyes focussed on a pack of candy. He saw the cartoon image of a space man on the moon holding the candy with a speech bubble saying “MoonFizzles A Sour Explosion In Your Brain”

At Monday 9:50PM Chester Tinkerton appeared at the telescope room, he as usual wore a colorful read & white striped jersey to combat the cool climate-controlled environment. He stroked his grey goatee as he thought about how he was going to spend the next three hours most productively – even if these affairs were mostly ‘just for fun’. “First things first” he thought & he took out an old-fashioned transistor radio – he always liked to work with classic rock ‘n’ roll playing as it helped him think clearly. He hummed along to the Eddie Cochran song I.O.U as he looked through the eyepiece & saw something he couldn’t quite believe. Then he realised he’d been distracted & forgotten to do the basic task every serious Astronomer does before anything – clean the eyepiece.

Chester reached for old fashioned nineteen fifties era well weathered leather satchel. He opened its metal lined jaws & got some isopropyl alcohol, a mini torch & a lint free cloth out of it & dripped the cleaner drop by drop onto the cloth. He carefully unscrewed the outer cap of the eyepiece cleaned both sides in time honored fashion. He turned on the mini torch then took the unscrewed eyepiece & looked through it so he could see the torch light which would show any dirt & smudges. It was crystal clear. He then looked at the cloth & saw a fair amount of green mildew on it – he took a plastic sandwich bag out of his satchel zipped it up, put it back in the bag & thought nothing more of it as dirt buildup on an eyepiece was routine & common.

He screwed the eyepiece on & sat down in the viewing chair & looked forward to a relaxing night of music & stargazing, with his usual half time trip to the vending machine, assuming that this time he had remembered to bring pocket change.

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