(continued)
“What?! No moon?” I was shocked. “What are you talking about?! How could there be no moon?” I was angry now, that this batty old man was wasting my time.

He cocked his head in mock surprise “Oh, of course! And how could there be no unicorn-goblins, as well? They just have to exist, is that it?” He laughed again, and stirred his drink. I was speechless, as my anger melted into confusion. No moon? It seemed too terrible to ponder.

“Well then what is it?” I blurted finally. “I mean, good god, I can see something up there in the sky! I’m not… I’m not hallucinating it!” Suddenly panic tore through me like a rollercoaster careening off the track. “Am I hallucinating it??”

“No, no” he said, stirring his drink and staring at the table. “There’s something up there alright. It’s just not what they say it is” He cleared his throat. “When I was a military scientist, I had access to thousands of top secret documents… stuff that would blow your mind. But there were also thousands of top secret documents I didn’t have access to. Stuff that would blow my mind” he took a sip of his drink “Anyway, one day I brought a crowbar to work and bashed open a secret file cabinet. Inside were hundreds of documents detailing the truth about the ‘moon” – he made little quotation gestures as he said this – “and everything to do with it. Devastating stuff. Here’s just three of the many documents” he slid a manila envelope towards me “Don’t spill anything on them”

I looked at the envelope, and then back up at him. He nodded. “Go ahead. Take a look”

I slowly slid out the three pages – yellowed and worn, blacked out in places —- and began reading. They are reproduced in the following pages.

(click on the memos above for larger versions)

CONTINUED