MICAH’S DREAM

Micah Tomkin was sitting in a small, but busy, pizza parlor that she and her friends frequented at the local Missoula shopping mall. The evening was growing late, but like most people of the world, she was watching the dramatic broadcast on the diner’s small television with her friends. Like many other news agencies, CNN had long distance images of the large winged-spacecraft coming and going through the atmosphere. They had stories and pictures of factories in Jakarta along with interviews with dozens of people about the mysterious space agency. Some of the interviews were with US government officials discussing the many political ramifications of the Indonesian action—none of it good. Other interviews were with an assortment of scientists or anyone else who had a theory or might know something about the large quiet craft that left no pillar of fire behind them. They spoke of such simple things as horizontal-takeoff and landing, single-stage-to-orbit and black zones.

Repeatedly the question of what space junk was being added to the already cluttered Earth orbit was discussed as was the possibility of microbe contamination, both going and coming from the moon. It was obvious from the discussions that despite the mysteries, the Indonesian Space Agency was clearly acting irresponsible.

It had been going on for hours, always the photos, the speculation based on what little the media knew, over and over, as if by repeating the same things a hundred times it would somehow satisfy their need to know. To viewers all over the world, the events brought curiosity and a sense of fear—fear fed by the news media. It was all very serious and dramatic. To Micah the stupid speculations by idiotic reporters were disgusting.

“This is so cool,” exclaimed one of Micah’s friends, “Wouldn’t it be such a trip to fly to the moon?”

“Oh Martha, you’ve never even flown anywhere, not even on a regular plane,” Micah replied in a sigh.

“Yeah, but still, outer space and all. Like wow!”

Micah did not have to hear the melodramatic CNN news report that morning. She already knew what Mr. Lindsay was going to say long before his short speech, before he himself even knew. The events of Indonesia were the talk of her high school all day. Her friend’s reaction was more interesting to her than that of the president or the other world leaders. Most people were shocked that Indonesia could launch anything at all, even with the reclusive billionaire’s billions. She sighed, if only they knew how little Indonesia had to do with it.