Self Destruct

         Now was her chance. The guards were on patrol in the civilian areas of the station, and she needed to see him. The hatch that led to his room was at the end of the hall. There were no guards in sight.
         Doctor Lydia Graves was a horticulture specialist. Ever since she was a little girl, Lydia dreamed of working under the tutelage of the renowned Doctor Peter Illyich. Three years ago she got her chance. Right out of college, Lydia was recruited and stationed on Moon Base Alpha, working for Doctor Illyich. He had discovered a procedure that revolutionized the process of growth and the cultivation of plants in sub-temperature climates. This was a monumental find and he was granted lab space on Moon Base Alpha by the Board.
         Lydia made her way to the corridor intersection and peered around the corner from a low vantage point. Three men from the Board had arrived a few months ago at the base with a battalion of soldiers. They began an immediate investigation; confining the doctor to his quarters with guards stationed outside his door then questioning everyone in the station.
         Doctor Illyich was suspected in setting up a secret lab on the base and using the Board’s funding of the sub-temperature horticulture project for human testing. The Board had found out, yet Lydia did not believe a word of it. Doctor Peter Illyich was whom she modeled her own schooling around. She wanted to be like him, study what he studied, all in hopes of getting to work with him. There was no way, in Lydia’s mind, that Doctor Illyich was capable of human testing.
         There were no guards in the corridor, nor was there any sound. She crept across the hallway and knocked on the metal door.
         “Yes, who’s there?” A muffled voice echoed through the black metal.
         “Doctor Illyich, it’s me. Doctor Graves. I need to talk to you about something.” Lydia kept glancing down the three hallways that converged upon her wondering how much time she had until the guards returned.
         “It’s not safe. Not yet. Not here." Doctor Illyich went quiet for a few moments of eternity. "They will leave in 24 hours and I will be released. Meet me on the observation deck six hours after that time.”
         “But, Doctor...”
         “Go, now girl! Return to me at that time.”
         “Yes, sir,” Lydia trusted the good doctor with all of her being. She hurried back down the hall towards another hatch, leading to the plant labs and the scientists’ quarters, where the guards were not allowed.
         The airlock door sealed shut behind her and the disinfecting shower started to spray. The air circulation systems of the labs were seperate from the rest of Moon Base Alpha because the testing being conducted was sensitive to foreign matter found in the normal base air circulations. Lydia sighed as the shower cut off and a far door opened in the shower wall.
         “Thirty hours before getting answers,” Lydia sighed again and entered the horticulture lab. There was still work to be done.
         Lydia watched read outs of lines and graphs as her tests continued to run through the hours. She put her red pencil against the paper to make a circle every few inches. Her face was twisted and distorted with thoughts of her beloved Doctor Illyich and the allegations against him. Time passed and she still did not believe.
         The lab's air conditioner hummed in to life and woke Lydia from a dreamless sleep. The time display read eighteen-twenty-three. It had been sixteen hours since Doctor Illyich had ordered her to wait. She rubbed her eyes to push away the pain that throbbed in her eyeballs. Getting up from her desk she clicked off the light and headed for her assigned sleeping quarters.
         Her room was small enough for a single bed and a small table. There was a florescent strip built in to the wall for lighting. There was no window. The gentle hiss of air lulled her in to a relaxed state. Her worry had been an unconscious distraction and she was more exhausted than had realized. The sweet smell of the pumped in oxygen was intoxicating and Lydia collapsed on to the bed in a deep slumber.
         Awaking to the screeching of alarms, Lydia rushed into the corridor amongst screams of distress. Technicians were running from room to room. Something had gone wrong.
         “Are you okay?” A technician had stopped in front of Lydia, grabbing her by the arms. “Are you okay?”
         “What? I’m fine. What’s going on?” The cacophony added to the confusion that plagued Lydia’s thoughts.
         “Doctor Illyich is dead! Everything was true! They discovered it during the last sleep cycle. Doctor Illyich didn’t have a secret lab, but he was conducting secret tests. It was all in the air. We were the human test subjects.” The technician explained everything.
         “That’s not possible. Why would he do something like that? No! He couldn’t have! There’s no way!” Lydia began to panic under the pressure of proof to Doctor Illyich’s crime.
         “I’m sorry, Lydia. I know how you felt about him.” Trying to comfort, he put his arms around the stricken doctor.
         “What’s going to happen now?”
         “The station is under permanent quarantine. We can’t leave.”
         “Quarantined... Can’t leave... Ever. What are we to do now?” Lydia collapsed into the technician’s arms, sobs choked in her throat.
         “I don’t know.”
         “I can’t believe it. He lied. He lied to me. He lied to us all. We deserve what we get.” Lydia reached a slender hand and touched a panel on the wall. They were all naive. Numbers began ticking down.
         Self destruction sequence commencing.