Silent Running by Harlan Thompson

HUH?”
    Suddenly there was Anderson’s voice, full of the usual Anderson bogus cheeriness:
    “LOWELL . . . ! HA! HA! I’M MIGHTY GLAD TO SEE YOU, BOY!”
    Lowell stood over the radio, incredulously. He clicked on the mike, his mind racing, while the whole recent past crashed in upon him: Wolf’s death and his body buried in Dome One. Keenan’s and Barker’s blowing up in Dome Two to be explained. Worse, Neal was back. Neal who had been up in space so long that all he wanted was to go home, to obey orders. Dome One with its forest would be blown up. It would be the end of his beloved garden, the end of his dream for Earth.
    Finally, Lowell managed to speak: “Who, who is this?”
    “ THIS IS ANDERSON, LOWELL. MY GOD, WE’VE LOOKED HIGH AND LOW FOR YOU, BOY.”
    Lowell could hardly speak. His voice came weakly, almost in a whisper: “How did you find me . . . why did you even try?”
    Anderson’s chuckle crackled in:
    “HEY! YOU MUST BE KIDDING, WE COULDN’T LET YOU GO WITHOUT AT LEAST TRYING TO FIND YOU. WE SAID WE’D SEND OUT A SEARCH PARTY.”
    Lowell swallowed, and managed some intelligible sounds. All the time, his mind kept saying, “They’ll cock and blow it. They’ll blow Dome One.”
    Anderson’s voice went on and on:
    “IT WASN’T EASY FINDING YOU, EITHER. EVEN WITH OUR DEEP SPACE TRACK.”
    Lowell murmured, “Guess not . . .”
    Then Anderson’s voice came in with authority: “FREEMAN!” His voice was flat, final. “WE’LL HAVE TO FIND SOME WAY TO JETTISON THE DOME!”
    Lowell gulped.
    Anderson plowed on:
    “AND IT’S AWFULLY DARK OUT HERE, YOU’RE SO FAR FROM THE SUN . . .”
    Suddenly Lowell’s head jerked up. It was dark. Valley Forge was dark. Dome one was dark, with no sunshine!
    Then it hit him. He leaped to his feet.
    “The sun—! That’s what it is—the sun! Did you hear what he just said? It’s being so far from the sun! That’s why my forest is dying.”
    “WHAT . . . ?”
    Anderson’s voice came flatly.
    Lowell at a loss for a moment, finally said, “Aah, nothing. I was just saying that, that . . . everything is all right.”
    Anderson took a new tack:
    “SAY, WHERE WAS YOUR BIG EXPLOSION, THE ONE REPORTED TO US BEFORE WE LOST CONTROL, BEFORE YOU WENT THROUGH SATURN’S RINGS?”
    “Oh, the explosion. On the other side of the ship.”
    “THE OTHER SIDE . . .” Anderson came back. “WE’LL BE INSTRUMENT DOCKING AT YOUR PORT SIDE IN ABOUT SIX HOURS . . .”
    The word “docking” hit Lowell like the blow of a fist, swinging him around. “Six hours!” Lowell exclaimed. “Huey, Dewey, c’mon. We can still save the forest.”
    He barged toward the corridor, wondering why he hadn’t thought of the forest dying for lack of sunshine. And it had to be Anderson who had pointed it out.

 ELEVEN 
    W ith Anderson’s “Six hours, six hours,” beating at his brain, Lowell led the way from Main Control to the immense cargo hold below. With Huey and Dewey trailing him, he raced to inspect row on row of stacked cargo modules, looking for the right ones. At length, he paused before a group of strange angular-shaped crates or modules.
    “Here they are, Dewey,” he said. “Give me a hand.” Lowell began breaking open the modules that had stenciled on their sides:
    (20) HIGH INTENSITY SOLAR LAMPS
AND STANDS
    Lowell ripped open module after module and started to remove the contents. Inspecting them, he could see that the solar energy devices resembled very small compact light sources. At length all of the modules lay opened.
    “Now to get them to the forest,” Lowell declared. Swinging around, his eyes lighted on the three cargo vehicles. He ran to one and drove it back to where the modules stood.
    “Dewey,” he ordered, slipping from behind the wheel, “start loading all the agricultural cargo onto the other cars.”
    Dewey’s engine whirred. He waddled across to select a car and began to load it.
    Lowell got behind the wheel of his car and edged it closer to the