Sadly I don't own Space 1999.
After Earthbound, the Irony.
John Koenig rubbed his face, occasionally glancing at the slip of computer readout which had Simmond's name printed on it before he looked away again.
Nobody deserved that, starving and perhaps suffocating to death inside one of those suspended animation berths onboard the Kaldorian spaceship, not even someone like Simmonds.
When everyone on the Moon had learnt the Kaldorians were travelling to Earth although their computers would need a change in programming to take into account the moon being torn out of orbit, Simmonds had immediately tried to take advantage of the opportunity presented. Simmonds had never really fit in on Alpha. No, that was too kind. The Commissioner had been unwilling to accept the reality the entire population on the moonbase had to look to the future, and there was no way they could return to Earth. Worse, he had continued to act as a visiting dignitary, but Koenig had made sure to restrict the amount of authority he had in case the political idiot made some stupid mistake. It was no wonder so many in the base disliked the man, but he didn't deserve his fate.
Simmonds had tried to urge Koenig and the others to seize the spaceship, but he had been shot down. The Kaldorians were more advanced than them and it wasn't large enough for such a large population, and besides what Simmonds was proposing was beyond barbaric. The Kaldorians had every reason to despise the Alphans and attack the base when they came out of suspended animation when Helena, Victor and himself tried to crack open one of the berths on their ship, convinced the Kaldorian within was dead but not understanding it was a perfectly normal function of the technology.
Their actions led to the poor person in the berth dying. Zantor and the others could have done anything, but it was only because of their good nature nothing had happened, and they recognised the Alphans had made a simple mistake.
The Kaldorians were members of a race from a dying world, and they were travelling to Earth in the hopes of finding aid and a new place to live.
But what they would find on Earth, John didn't know but he wished them well. He only hoped that if there were any people still there, they would be treated with the dignity and respect they deserved.
If there was still an Earth. Zantor was given the entire picture of how the moon was torn away from Earth's orbit and as a result, anything could have happened. The alien captain understood the risks but was willing to take them, as was Simmonds.
Simmonds continually refused to listen to Kano or Victor about how the Earth might've been severely damaged by the moon being torn out, and John himself didn't like to reflect on what could have happened.
The Earth could have undergone terrible atmospheric disruption. Earthquakes, volcanic eruptions and tsunamis would have washed over the planet. Hell, there might not be a planet for them or the Kaldorians.
It was hard to believe Simmonds had sentenced himself to a death sentence, but the Commissioner had never really bothered to listen to those around him, preferring to listen and focus on his own ideas than in his good sense. But now the Commissioner was paying the price for his arrogance, but he was doing it in a way that was worse than death. Koenig shuddered at the thought; as a space pilot, an experienced astronaut, he could count and list on both hands the myriad of ways someone could die.
You could be shot.
You could be stabbed.
You could drown.
You could suffocate.
You could starve or die of thirst.
You could be killed in a vehicle accident or a crash.
In space, the number of ways you could die only grew, and since his experiences on Moonbase Alpha since Breakaway, that list had only grown, but there was a huge tragedy in Simmond's fate even if Koenig could see reasons for the idiot deserving it. Simmonds had known Computer was being precisely programmed to look for the right person to send back home, and truthfully it made sense now he had the piece of readout paper with the idiot's name on it, and he could see the quality of Kano's skill.
Simmonds was not a scientist. He wasn't interested in physics, mathematics, he knew little of biology or chemistry. The Alphans needed experts right now, which was why every loss was a blow. Victor was a genius and Helena was a doctor, their loss would cause problems in the long term. Simmond's only talent was politics. He was out of his depth here on the moon, and he didn't bring anything to the table. Koenig was tempted to ask Kano if he had purposefully programmed Computer to find the most useless member of the community, but he decided against it since it brought up too many issues he didn't want to address and besides he wouldn't miss Simmonds himself; he had been on the outs with the man ever since discovering the scale of the mess caused by the Meta Probe launch.
But Simmonds didn't deserve what had happened, did he?
Yes, he had snatched Koenig's comm-lock off the desk when he had his back turned, gone on a rampage, stunned a number of people to get hold of an important part of the power system, threatened Zantor into giving him a place on their ship without realising the Kaldorians needed time to program their computer to accept their brain and biology. Victor didn't seem convinced Zantor had purposefully forgotten to reprogram the berth prepared for Helena in order for the Kaldorians to understand human biology, but Koenig wasn't so sure. He had a feeling the tall and quiet and calmly composed Kaldorian captain had done it on purpose because he knew Simmonds was dangerous. Realistically Simmonds should have seen and recognised the danger, but nobody had ever said Simmonds was smart and aware of events, he had merely seen the Kaldorians as a way out.
Koenig merely found it tragically ironic that Simmonds had just refused to wait for the Computer to get back to him with the name. If he had then he might have been in for the delight of his life. But now all Gerald Simmonds had to look forward to now were the Alphans looking back on him, and feeling nothing but contempt while the people he'd attacked today would have darker memories of the man.
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