Chapter1:

Conflict

“Conflict begins with miscommunication and often ends with calamity.” —Journal of KohlrabiTrust

Commander Choi disregarded the Japanese astronaut’s hand signals motioning him to slow his approach from the cupola windows on dock 7 of the International Space Station (ISS). After a thousand simulations, today he would become the first North Korean pilot to dock at the ISS. Uttering a racial slur under his breath, he mocked their waving arms. His decision to come in hot to make them a little scared caused them to motion him away frantically. Realizing his mistake too late, he heard the scream of his copilot as he fired his reverse thrusters. White hands gripped the throttle as his eyes opened wide with fear, then regret and resignation. The jolting impact against his restraints and the deafening crunch of metal told him he was still alive. He looked over at his copilot to see a bulkhead truss had pierced his suit, and he was writhing in pain. “I’m sorry,” he said in Korean, the last words on the recording before the explosion ended all their lives, leaving the ISS module ripped andcontorted.

***

Dr. Kohlrabi Trust awoke with a start, sure that something was wrong, sat up in his bed, and listened to the quiet hum of the air scrubbers and creaks in the ducting on Moonbase Verity space station. Nothing sounded out of the ordinary. Turning on the light panel beside his bed, he looked slowly around the room. Nothing seemed out of place. He walked across the floor out into his office near the top of the dome and peered down the two flights of stairs to the main galley; a whiff of olive cooking oil and garlic spices from the evening meal was stillpresent.

He swiped his hand across his holodesk, activating the displays in the room. Images on the wall from the central domes and access ports were all devoid of action except for a few scientists playing a card game in the lounge. The system monitors showing air pressure, temperature, and dozens of other parameters were all nominal, but he couldn’t shake the feeling that something waswrong.

He tapped his news feed, looking for alerts from any of the fourteen countries represented on Moonbase Verity. An urgent symbol rotated by the NASA feed labeledCrash atISS.

That must be it, he thought. Tapping the symbol, he was given direct access to the video feed from the North Korean ship’s cockpit as it crashed only moments earlier. He watched the different views, the frantic Japanese signals, the smug expression on Commander Choi’s face changing to alarm, fear, regret, and finally, resignation. He wrote his observations carefully in his Journal. Finally, he sat up straight, looked up toward the ceiling, and breathed in and out in a practiced Zen breathing technique, the beginning of his morning meditationroutine.