The Original Cyberpunk presents Stupefying Stories Showcase #5, featuring “Space Program” by Lance Mushung:
SPACE PROGRAM
The rover moved at turtle speed over the lifeless powdery dirt. I’d been directing it up a gentle slope for hours. Although it was hard to believe, the scenery of the Moon’s surface was becoming a bit mundane, a bit mind-numbing. That was especially surprising considering how much the mottled gray Moon had beckoned since I was a kid.
Jan and Samir were sitting next to me and watching the camera monitors to make certain the rover didn’t get into trouble. The radio delay of a few seconds between the rover and Earth wasn’t a big problem since the rover was so slow, but caution was the order of the day. I thought of them as backseat drivers.
“Let’s be careful,” Jan said. “We don’t know what’s on the other side of this rise.”
“Thank you,” I said, masking my exasperation as best I could about once again being told something obvious. She was right about the unknowns beyond the rise though. I was hoping for at least a change of scenery.
“Stop for a few minutes next to that rock over there,” Samir said. He pointed to a stone on the monitor. “It’s unusual and I want to take a closer look.” With his wild gray hair, Samir looked like a mad scientist excited about studying some new and different specimen.
Read the rest of the SF short there. It’s nice to see someone is still publishing genuine science fiction these days. “Lance J. Mushung graduated from the Georgia Institute of Technology with an aerospace engineering degree. He worked for over 30 years with NASA contractors in Houston, Texas, performing engineering work on the Space Shuttle and its payloads.”