EXPLORING THE FAR SIDE

By Clement Masloff

Xexun Kuon was from childhood aflame with fascinated curiosity about the concealed, unseen opposite side of the satellite body revolving around his planet Farmer. As a university student, he is encouraged to fly there to explore and study these unknown countries. After contact with tribes on the near side, he travels to three lands on the far si

• Language: English
• Publisher: The Mulberry Books
• Release date: Jun 28, 2019
• ISBN: 9781950850068

Clement Masloff

The author has been involved with science fiction and speculative literature since teaching himself to read in 1941-1942. He served in the Army as a linguist and translator in four Balkan Slavic languages. For several decades, he taught sociology in Ohio after graduating research in Russian social history. In his retirement years, he has been writing science fiction, a return to dreams of the early 1940s.

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Copyright © 2019 by Clement Masloff.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher and author, except by reviewers, who may quote brief passages in a review.

This publication contains the opinions and ideas of its author. It is intended to provide helpful and informative material on the subjects addressed in the publication. The authors and publisher specifically disclaim all responsibility for any liability, loss, or risk, personal or otherwise, which is incurred as a consequence, directly or indirectly, of the use and application of any of the contents of this book.

ISBN:

978-1-950850-07-5 [Paperback Edition]

978-1-950850-06-8 [eBook Edition]

Printed and bound in The United States of America.

Published by

The Mulberry Books, LLC.

8330 E Quincy Avenue, Denver CO 80237

themulberrybooks.com

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Part I.

I.

Xexun Kuom had from his earliest years held a deep interest in the geography of both his native Primary and the satellite Secondary which rotated around it in a circle that took two weeks to complete.

Before he began to attend grammar school, Xexun was more familiar with the features of the Secondary than with the layout of his own gigantic planet, the largest in area and volume of any other body in the solar system of the star that went by the name of Marifet.

The intelligent, mentally bright boy came to know the names of the main mountains, rivers, and urban centers of the visible side of the Secondary long before his study of books and maps of the moon rotating about his own Primary.

That was a common occurrence for many intellectually gifted young Primians, since they enjoyed leisure experience gazing up at the features of the Secondary in the sky above them. It was a beautiful sight to see both at night and during the day.

One of Xexun’s best school subjects was Primary geography, since he was able to make use of his early watching of the Secondary as a basis from which to compare what his school taught him about his own world with the his knowledge of its single satellite.

As he grew older and advanced through school grades year-by-year, his interest in geography grew greater until it began to entrance and fascinate him. Yet it was not so much the topography of his Primary that enchanted and attracted him, but rather the layout of the Secondary. Although half of the satellite body was visible from the planet, the back side was not. The latter continued to be referred to as the dark side and the far side.

His father and mother often asked their only child What do you want to do when you grow up, Xexun? His reply was a repeated, predictable one.

I wish to become a geographic explorer, the large lad with curly black hair would answer every time. Yet no one ever learned what it was, in his innermost thoughts, he dreamed of exploring.

Fearing laughter, criticism, and humiliation, Xexun never dared reveal his bold, exciting desire to map out the mostly unknown and unexplored regions of the rear of the Secondary, the side impossible to see from the Primary.

He learned that he had to conceal his wild ambition, his unspoken dream of finding out the contours of the unknown, unmapped realms of the Outer Secondary. It was his innermost private secret.

How am I ever to participate in the final, definitive exploration of those invisible lands? he asked himself with growing doubt and pessimism. Is it at all possible or practical for me to try to accomplish?

There had to be a way for him to go up onto the Secondary, into lands that remained concealed under clouds of ignorance. But what could it be?

As he became a young adult, Xexun searched and hoped for a pathway into the territories that drew and fascinated him and his imagination.

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Xexun went on to the University in the Primary city of Lachrid.

His mentor and career advisor was the Professor of Geography named Hono Spostro. In his eighties and close to retirement, the latter seemed to possess growing personal traits that were childlike. He is becoming a young person, laughed many of his professorial colleagues. His physical age is increasing, while his emotional age is in rapid decline. It is a second version of childhood for him.

Old Hono was, of course, a favorite teacher and companion of bright young students like Xexun. They were emboldened to reveal their dreams and ambitions to the sympathetic scholar who had taught many generations of Primians.

Xexun grew accustomed to talking with Hono Spostro in the quiet study of the old bachelor’s spacious apartment between the university’s campus and the bohemian sector of Lachrid. It was a quiet, comfortable place for the youth.

The student from a country village was not intimidated at all to describe his secret dream to the old man.

"I have always looked with awe at the Secondary and wished to explore and study its towns and forests, its hamlets and countryside. But how could I ever arrange to get there and carry out studies on the surface of the satellite?

It must be a possibility, yet I still do not see the specific way there, the many details that would be involved, Professor. It overwhelms me.

The two sat on bamboo easy chairs on the balcony porch of Hono’s apartment.

The old man with snow white hair and sky blue eyes made a kindly smile. "There is always a way to do something, Xexun, although we may not yet see or recognize what it is. We have not had too many students interested in Secondary geography. Most of the satellite remains unexplored and unknown, especially the side pointed away from us on the Primary. There has never been much attention given to it by academics here.

"I myself have always nursed a dream of exploring the dark sections of the back of the Secondary. But I allowed the years to slip past me and today I am too old and exhausted to tangle with the unfamiliar forests of that enormous world facing us every day and night.

"But you are at a very early stage of life, my boy. There is so much lying ahead for you, if you reach for it!

"I wish to give you a hand of help, and I surely can.

"You must apply for a full research grant. It will enable you to fly up to the Secondary on one of the mercantile gas-ships that journey there on a regular schedule. I know individuals who as teachers are involved in Secondary geography, to the extent it exists in quite primitive form. If I request their aid, they will help guide your exploration. That would be a marvelous favor for you to make use of.

"I surmise that you have deep interest in the far side countries. Few geographers have any familiarity with that dark part of the moon body. But young cartographers can win reputation and professional standing if they take on the risks and dangers of journeying through the unexplored woodlands and plains of that region.

"As far as it is known, that isolated part of the Secondary is technically backward, without the scientific applications that we enjoy here on the Primary. The population there lacks our advanced magneto-electronics, gas hydraulics, plasma energy, genetic computing and memory, and photonic batteries. Their technology is quite primitive, we believe. They are ages behind us in science, it is said.

"Yes, Xexun, I will make a sincere effort to obtain financing and support for you. I wish you favorable luck in such a research enterprise.

My believe in you and your dedication makes me certain you shall complete such exploration with marvelous success, he muttered, smiling with youthful exuberance.

II.

Weekly flights of nitrogen-gas balloons fueled by photonic engines were the means for public transportation between the Primary and the Secondary in both directions. Their schedules were not busy or crowded. They were a convenient way to get to the opposite body.

Xexun was assigned a seat in a compartment filled with tourists, officials, and commercial agents of various sorts. He sat next to a silicon window that permitted him to observe the departure of the gas-ship from the air dome outside the great city of Lachrid. His eyes took in the departure with satisfaction and interest.

A friendly spinster who worked as a kindergarten teacher in the Secondary center called Antique City sat across from Xexun and seemed to be talking without rest or pause as the space voyage began.

You have never been on the Secondary before, young man? she asked with a short laugh. Yes, I can always tell. There are signs that indicate who is a newcomer on a first-time visit. What do you wish to see? Our magnificent deciduous forests? They are so beautiful that they inspire those who see them for the first time to compose verses of poetry. There is always something to write about in our world up above. Nature has been generous to us Secondaries, indeed.

I plan to make a geographic survey of areas of the farside, revealed Xexun. Scholars have mostly neglected mapping out those areas.

The teacher made a bitter grimace. Few except for traveling traders ever go into the back countries, she generalized. The forests back there cannot be too different from those on our side this way. What else can they consist of but the very same cedars, oaks, maples, and pine trees? Wild woods are the same all over our Secondary. There are said to be only very slight differences from the Primary.

The young scholar smiled pleasantly. "I have been reading a number of surveys and studies of your forests. I remember how they described the dogwood, the beech, the magnolia, the tyme, hornbeam, tupelo, boxelder, ash, basswood, aspen, butternut, sweetgum, and the paper birch. And I was able to see the color photos showing most of those kinds of trees.

It is amazing, even astounding, how many different species of trees exist on this world of yours. I can barely wait to see the real things.

The nitrogen gas-ship started its descent toward Antique City.

Xexun turned his head so as to look out the window on his right. He was able to make out the geometric system of squares, triangles, circles, and polygons that composed the grid patterns of the political and economic metropolis of the near side of the Secondary.

I will soon have my feet on the ground of the satellite that I have dreamed of reaching and becoming acquainted with, he told himself with unconcealed joy.

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The gravity of this satellite body feels almost exactly like that at home on the Primary, Xexun told himself once he had left the gas-ship and was on his own.

He took from the upper pocket of his coffee-colored tunic jacket the name and the address of the local person with whom Professor Spestro had arranged for him to stay.

Demih Laitme, a successful and prosperous merchant active for many decades in trade with the back side, had promised to house and guide the young student who had journeyed from Lachrid on the Primary.

Xexun hailed an empty cycle-car with its for-hire sign out and gave the driver in leather uniform the note with the name and address on it.

Get in, mumbled the cabbie. As soon as the traveler had thrown his two cloth bags into the space indicated for possessions, the mano-alkyl ester engine was revved up and began rolling down the stone-cobble street at a moderate clip.

The stranger to Antique City viewed through the windows on both sides the fleeting images of luxury houses, apartment buildings, shops and offices, and the occasional open spaces of public parks. The variety was constant, but an ever-changing one.

I like this first taste of the cityscape here