Sleeping Gods Read online

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  The Navy PR department cameras were already rolling as the astronauts made their way into the cargo hold to take a look at the Apollo 8 capsule. The crew of the Yorktown had been penned back behind a rope to clear the way. Borman smiled coyly at the expressions of awe on so many of the young sailors’ faces as they made their way toward the gantry platform allowing them to inspect the capsule. They climbed the stairs of the platform to take a closer look.

  “Wow, would you look at that,” said Anders.

  The scorch marks in the steel hull looked like someone had taken a blowtorch to the ship, which was a pretty good description of what had occurred as the capsule hit the upper atmosphere at about 25,000 miles per hour. The temperature outside had hit 5000 degrees Fahrenheit in that furnace. Even now, the capsule looked too hot to touch. Nevertheless, Anders found himself gingerly moving a hand toward its metal skin.

  “Better not touch until the boffins can take a look at her,” Borman cautioned.

  He recognised one of the men standing guard on the platform as the Navy Seal frogman who had greeted them in the water that morning. “Hey Corporal, how’re you doing?”

  “Very well sir, thank you.”

  “You had a real funny look on your face when you stuck your head in the capsule this morning, what was going on there?” Borman asked him.

  “Well to tell you the truth, sir, it was the smell. You stank pretty bad.”

  Borman chuckled. “Yeah, I guess we did.”

  Lovell peered briefly underneath the spacecraft. “Heat shield held together better than I thought it might have.”

  “I was seeing bits of that flying in all directions at one point,” said Anders. “I was just hoping that’s what’s supposed to happen.”

  They had already agreed there was no need for a more detailed inspection at this point, as all the ship’s systems had functioned like they were supposed to, so they hopped down again and walked back to the waiting reporters.

  “How’s she look?” someone yelled.

  “It’s a great ship,” said Borman. “I tell you, that re-entry was really something. Boy, my eyes opened wide on that one.” He paused for a moment in recollection. “It was a beautiful mission.”

  “I’m happy to be back among sailors,” said Lovell. “I’ve been living with two Air Force men for the past week, and it’s great to be aboard.”

  “We heard it was a bit rough out there on the ocean this morning,” another reporter remarked.

  “Yeah, we were bobbing about out there for a while,” said Borman. “I’m no sailor and I got seasick right away.”

  “I had to reassure them. ‘The Navy will be here’, I told them,” said Lovell, grinning.

  “I’m glad to be at sea,” said Anders. “But to tell you the truth, I was just hoping we’d hit any ocean.”

  “And he was the navigator,” Lovell quipped.

  “So is the Moon made of green cheese?”

  “It’s made of American cheese,” Anders returned, earning a laugh from everyone.

  “Congratulations on your promotion, Lieutenant Colonel Anders,” someone else called out.

  “Thank you very much, it’s a great honour,” Anders said sincerely.

  “Would any of you like to go up again?”

  “Well, I tell you, right now I just want to get home and see my beautiful wife and my sons, and eat a home-cooked meal,” said Borman.

  “What was it like out there, Colonel Borman? On the far side of the Moon? What did you see?”

  Borman exchanged glances with the other astronauts and smiled. Lightly, he touched the breast pocket of his jumpsuit, where the Minox camera was stashed, to make sure it was still there. It had remained with him since the Moon because he hadn’t dared to let it out of his sight. He thought about spilling the beans. He was never going to fly again, no matter what. If he spoke now, what could they do to him? Lovell was right, they were heroes.

  But he would be damning Bill and Jim as well. If he spoke up, they would surely be asked about it. And then if they told the truth they were finished. If they denied it, they would be branding their commander a liar or worse — a fantasist. What would that say about NASA, the people who saw fit to launch Colonel Frank Borman into space?

  Menzel was right, the Moon landings hung upon this moment.

  “That far side is a thing of beauty,” said Borman. “I was filled with an incredible sense of awe. Mind you, I couldn’t get these two to keep their minds on the job,” he admitted with a wry smile. “They kept staring on out the window.”

  Lovell smiled and nodded. There was more in his acknowledgement than anyone else would ever know.

  “It’s hard to find words that are adequate. We were so close,” said Anders. “It’s really something when the Earth disappears and all you can see is this massive spread of battered lunar landscape.”

  “Were you ever afraid? Out there all on your own?”

  “No, not afraid,” said Borman. “We had trained hard for this, we knew what to expect. We had plenty of jobs to keep us busy. Bill here was taking photographs on the far side, and the near side, looking for future landing sites.”

  “There’s one in particular you guys are all gonna love,” said Anders. “It’s a shot of the Earth rising up from the Moon. Incredible. It made me realise how fragile the Earth is, hanging out there all alone in the vast emptiness of space.”

  “Sounds incredible. How soon do we get to see that shot?”

  “You’ll have to ask NASA,” said Anders. “A day or two, I guess. We’ll need to get back to Houston and debrief.”

  “How does it feel to be the first men to orbit the Moon?”

  Borman demurred to Lovell. “Jim?”

  “It was humbling. It was also thrilling. Greatest ride of my life. I guess I can thank old Mike Collins for that. If he didn’t have that bone spur in his back, it would have been him up there instead of me. Not that I want to make light of his misfortune.”

  “Who knows, Mike may get another shot at it,” Borman added.

  “So how soon before a Moon landing?”

  “We’ve got a couple more flights before we get that far,” said Borman. “We need to get the lunar module into orbit and test that out, then we’ll probably want to do a test flight in lunar orbit. So at least two more flights before a landing, but it could be more if we’re not quite there on the technical side.”

  “This is a risky business,” said Lovell. “We need to make sure we get it right. Nobody wants anything going wrong on a flight to the Moon.”