The Last Word. Seeking

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"Eva continues to consolidate the infrastructure. It is hard work given the temperature and higher gravity, and she often ends up sweating.

One particularly hard day, she decides to finish her work a little earlier to avoid consuming the oxygen bottle and refresh herself in the water of the lake. She does not dare to go in too far because although she can take off her boots and almost all her clothes, she cannot get rid of the backpack containing the oxygen. But she finds it pleasant to cool off a bit, even though the water is actually warm and she would have preferred it colder.

At night, she prepares the second oxygen bottle so that she can hang it directly with some straps the next day without the backpack.

The next day, when she finishes her work, she takes off the backpack and hangs the oxygen bottle that she had prepared the night before. This time she goes a little further into the water, but she does not dare swim or dive with the oxygen bottle, aware that if she had an accident, no one could help her. For example, the flexible hose that carries the oxygen from the bottle to the mask could break. And if something like this happens, she would not be safe just by getting out of the water, she would have to climb up to the promontory where Module 1 is and enter the module to have access to oxygen. Therefore, Eva wets herself on the surface and even dips her head underwater, but she does not venture to swim. She thinks about maybe doing it another day, leaving the other oxygen bottle prepared on the shore as a backup."

THE LAST WORD. Seeking.
by JuanFran G. Molina

https://a.co/d/g3w2EY1

"Eva sigue afianzando la infraestructura. Es un trabajo duro dada la temperatura y la mayor gravedad, y suele acabar sudando.

Un día especialmente duro opta por finalizar su trabajo un poco antes de consumir la botella de oxígeno y decide refrescarse en el agua del lago. No se atreve a meterse mucho, porque aunque puede quitarse las botas y casi todas las prendas, no puede deshacerse de la mochila que contiene el oxígeno. Pero le resulta agradable refrescarse un poco, aunque el agua en realidad está tibia y ella la hubiese preferido más fría.

Por la noche, acondiciona la segunda botella de oxígeno para el día siguiente poder colgársela con unas correas, directamente sin mochila.

Al día siguiente cuando acaba de trabajar, se quita la mochila y se cuelga la botella de oxígeno que había preparado la noche anterior. Esta vez se mete un poco más en el agua, pero no se atreve a nadar ni bucear con la botella de oxígeno, consciente de que si tuviese algún accidente nadie podría ayudarla. Podría, por ejemplo, rompérsele la goma flexible que lleva el oxígeno desde la botella a la máscara. Y si algo de esto sucede, para estar a salvo no le bastaría con salir del agua, sino que tendría que subir al promontorio donde está el Módulo 1 y entrar al módulo para disponer de oxígeno. Por ello, Eva se moja en la superficie e incluso sumerge la cabeza, pero no se aventura a nadar. Piensa en quizás hacerlo otro día, dejando previamente preparada en la orilla, la otra botella con oxígeno, a modo de repuesto."

LA ÚLTIMA PALABRA. Travesía hacia lo desconocido
de JUANFRAN G. MOLINA

ISBN978-84-19970-25-1

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THE LAST WORD. Seeking
by Juan Francisco Gonzalez Molina

In an era where Earth teeters on the brink of climatic collapse and desperation for resources, Eva emerges as a determined commander. Confronting formidable challenges, she stands as a beacon of courage for humanity, leading an unprecedented mission to unknown worlds.

Driven by the thirst for the unexplored and wielding antimatter technology as her shield, she invites us to witness the birth of a new era.

JOIN THIS INTERSTELLAR ODYSSEY THAT COULD REDEFINE OUR PLACE IN THE UNIVERSE.

ARE YOU READY TO BE PART OF THIS FASCINATING JOURNEY THAT WILL OPEN NEW HORIZONS FOR HUMANITY?

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As it heads towards Archinaut 5 with its approach course, Eva searches with her gaze for the hangar where the ship she will inhabit for the next few years is located. But she has no visibility over that area, which is hidden behind the large rest module located at one end of the A 5 axis; a module that everyone informally refers to as “The Wheel”, and which, as the name suggests, is a rotating module whose axis of rotation connects with the rest of the immobile Archinaut 5.

Certainly, the rest module resembles the tire of an enormous rotating wheel almost 500 meters in diameter. While the rest of A 5 is in a state of weightlessness, in the Wheel, due to centrifugal force, the diverse workers of A 5 enjoy artificial gravity similar to that of Earth. https://youtu.be/iiPmgW21rwY?feature=shared So life can be normal and restful in the Wheel, after having worked in the weightlessness that exists in the rest of the space station.

Thanks to staying during their free time in the gravity of the Wheel, the inhabitants of A 5 prevent the loss of bone density that would weaken their bones, and the muscular atrophy that would appear in their bodies if they lived 24 hours in weightlessness for long periods of time.

Due to rotation, a centrifugal force is produced that displaces any object of the Wheel outwards, a force that experiences a push like the gravitational one but directed outwards. Although the effect is the same, in reality in the Wheel there is technically no force of gravity, but a centrifugal force designed to have the same magnitude G as the force of gravity on the surface of the Earth, centrifugal force that is achieved thanks to a precise speed of rotation for the dimensions of the Wheel. Thus, for the 225-meter radius, completing one lap every 30 seconds achieves the expected thrust.

If we imagine the rest module, called the Wheel, the narrow inner tube of a bicycle wheel, its inhabitants would be in the space occupied by the air that would inflate that wheel inner tube.

As we said, when you are inside the Wheel, the centrifugal force pushes you outwards, away from the center of rotation, and therefore your body is projected towards what would be the rolling surface of the wheel, and more specifically towards the inner face of that imaginary rolling surface, which is the floor on which the people who inhabit the Wheel walk.

Eva smiles looking at the Wheel, imagining its inhabitants walking inside it like a hamster when it walks or runs inside the wheel of its cage. Of course, this is a much larger wheel, and always in motion.

Eva has been there before, during her training. The first time, everyone feels very strange inside the Wheel. On Earth, we walk on a surface with a concave curvature that is clearly visible from airplanes and aircraft. When we stand on Earth, our feet point towards the center of the Earth and our head is the farthest part from the center of the Earth. On the contrary, inside the Wheel, it is as if we were upside down. Our head points towards the center of that wheel, and our feet are the farthest part from the center of the Wheel, with our soles resting on the internal face of its inner tube.

Perhaps when you imagine it, your intuition would make you think that you would fall towards the center of the Wheel, as would happen on Earth. But the opposite happens. The Wheel does not have enough mass to attract you gravitationally, and in fact, you would float weightlessly if the wheel were not spinning. But it is due to its rotation that you fall outwards, propelled by the centrifugal force, the same centrifugal force that on Earth, when you take a turn in a car, pushes you towards the outside of the curve.

Inside the Wheel, you can walk or do sports. The perimeter of the Wheel is quite long, so you run a kilometer and a half before returning to the starting point. In fact, there is a long uninterrupted corridor on one side of the Wheel, a corridor that the workers usually run along to maintain their muscles, thus taking advantage of their free time in the artificial gravity of the Wheel.

On one side of this corridor, there is a succession of rooms with different uses: bedrooms, dining rooms, gyms, kitchens, offices, and common rest and leisure areas, all located on the same side of the corridor. And on the opposite wall of these doors, there are only a few scattered porthole windows facing towards space, through which, if you look out, you can see the stars spinning and spinning, making two turns per minute. Too fast to enjoy looking at them. That is why these few windows usually keep their blinds closed.

Inside the Wheel, while we step on inner tread, the ground looks like a convex surface (unlike on Earth); on the contrary, the ceiling is concave. Eva, from the Shuttle, recalls the feeling of being inside. She remembers that it is like being in a long tube three meters high and twice as wide, whose length is one and a half kilometers. Inside this corridor, if you look into the distance, the effect of perspective makes the corridor narrower. And in turn, the floor appears as if there were a gentle slope that curves upward into the distance, until finally your own ceiling no longer allows you to see the farthest part of the corridor. She recalls how curious it is to see that when someone approaches you from a distance, the first thing you see is their feet and then their legs, since the ceiling covers the rest. And gradually, as they approach, the rest of the person's body appears, with their head appearing last. And it is at that moment when you can finally recognize who it is. Eva remembers how to be able to see further without the ceiling obstructing your view, or to anticipate the face of the person approaching, you tilt your neck to one side or even crouch a little to increase your length of vision.

In fact, in military exercises in the Wheel, you lie down on the ground to achieve maximum vision. And to avoid having to raise your chin too much while lying down, you immediately rotate your body, lying on your back. You should not remain in that position for too long during military exercises, as, apart from being able to see further, in that position, you offer a larger target.

Obviously, the human body is bipedal, with the head at the highest point. This is because it evolved to walk on the savannas of Earth, where having the eyes at a greater height provides a greater range of vision. (Eva reflects on this from her seat in the shuttle). If life had evolved inside the Wheel, primates, which were initially quadrupedal, would tend to stand up, leaning on their front legs to improve their vision. While walking upright in this way, these primates would have to manipulate objects and tools with their hind hands. As a result, their front legs would evolve into legs and feet, and they would now use shoes on them. Eva smiles as she imagines humans doing a handstand, wearing shoes in their hands and holding tools on their feet.

Eva is aware that on this visit to the Wheel, she will not experience the perspectives of the corridor, as she will not have access to it due to her quarantine.

She brings her mind back to the present, where she remains seated in the shuttle. And even though she is not piloting it this time, she watches the maneuver as if she were doing it.

The shuttle is positioning itself below the Wheel and is turning around it, keeping the shuttle's ceiling always oriented towards the Wheel during the maneuver.

As it turns, it gradually approaches the Wheel in a dance-like manner. Turning at an increasingly synchronized speed with the Wheel's rotation, the shuttle approaches its ceiling closer and closer to the Wheel, preparing for coupling.

With the shuttle's ceiling fuselage already close to the external surface of the Wheel, and already rotating at the same speed as it, Eva, who once again feels the gravity and weight of her body on the seat, tilts the backrest a little more to be able to direct her gaze upwards, to the ceiling window, through which she sees the docking port of the Wheel, where the upper hatch of the shuttle will connect. Due to the perfect synchronization in rotation and the already short distance to the Wheel, Eva only sees a fixed area through this window.

Shuttle and Wheel are now perfectly synchronized, maintaining the same angular velocity. With the hatches aligned and counting on the shuttle's computer assistance, contact is established. Eva hears the corresponding metallic clicks as the shuttle anchors itself to the surface of the Wheel.

With the shuttle now attached to the Wheel, both rotate as a single unit. As if seen from a distance, the shuttle would be like a tiny fly that had landed on the rotating Wheel. And inside that supposed fly would be Eva. But Eva would be upside down inside the supposed fly, with her head pointing towards the Wheel where the Shuttle is anchored. In any case, inside the shuttle, what Eva feels is that the centrifugal force pushes her weight outwards from the Wheel.

A few minutes later, the hatch in the shuttle's ceiling is hermetically connected to the square entrance gate of the Wheel located on its tread.

As we mentioned, the Wheel completes one revolution every 30 seconds, a speed that, given the Wheel's radius, is just what is needed to provide a similar acceleration to that of Earth's gravity. The shuttle, which is already rotating at the same speed but with a radius of just a few meters larger, also has a similar gravity. Only slightly higher than Earth's gravity, a difference that Eva does notice after unfastening her safety harness and sitting up. Once the ladder leading to the hatch is deployed, Eva proceeds to climb it. Reaching the top of the shuttle ladder and already sticking her head out of the hatch, she takes a look at the Wheel's inner tube.

The gate through which Eva sticks her head, looks like a trapdoor in the floor when viewed from inside the Wheel. Around three of the four sides of the trapdoor, there are safety railings to prevent accidental falls from the Wheel to the attached shuttle below.

The gate through which Eva sticks her head, viewed from inside the Wheel, looks like a trapdoor in the floor. And around three of the four sides of that trapdoor, there are safety railings to prevent accidental falls from the Wheel to the shuttle attached below.

The shuttle ladder joins towards the only side without a railing on the trapdoor, and Eva completes her ascent by advancing towards the arrival area.

Minutes later, the trapdoor is closed, hiding the shuttle ladder. And with the trapdoor closed, the safety railing is also retracted, leaving the floor completely uniform.

The Last Word: Seeking
by Juan Francisco Gonzalez Molina

Available on Amazon https://a.co/d/0v6yo6h

ONE REVOLUTION PER MINUTE - a short film by Erik Wernquist ONE REVOLUTION PER MINUTE is a short film I made to explore my fascination with artificial gravity in space. It takes place aboard the "SSPO Esperanta" - a p...

"THE LAST WORD" by Juan Francisco González Molina
https://a.co/d/aBBOkbk

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Uncover the future's delicate balance in "The Last Word: Seeking" by JUAN FRANCISCO GONZALEZ MOLINA. As climate change ravages Earth, nations crumble, and water scarcity drives up food prices. South America's glacier water offers newfound power amid global chaos. Join our protagonist on an extraordinary mission beyond the Solar System, fueled by groundbreaking antimatter propulsion. Prepare for an immersive journey into the unknown, where challenges await. Experience the gripping allure of this science fiction tale by Juan Francisco González Molina, enticing book lovers and adventure seekers alike. Get your copy of "The Last Word: Seeking" [Book Link: https://bit.ly/3qSrygM ] and step into a world of suspense, exploration, and limitless imagination.

The Last Word. Seeking
by Juan Francisco González Molina

https://a.co/d/gxwaj24
Get your copy on Amazon

The Last Word: Seeking, by Juan Francisco González Molina:
--------------------------
Eva, like she has been doing for years, heads to the Chamical Center at the first hour to complete her training.
Upon entering, she puts on her mask, an item that her generation has assumed as a regular garment after the successive pandemics of this 21st century and it is consolidated culturally. People feel ashamed when they do not wear it in public, feeling like they are naked. They even wear it in video conferences or they pixel that part of the face.
With the mask on, Eva passes the security filters. First, they check her vehicle to make sure it does not have explosives or spy devices. Then, after parking, Eva goes through the personal security filter for employees, which she accesses through biometric recognition. After passing an X-ray scanner, she finally has access to the so-called clean area.
Eva boards the driverless train that takes her to her training area. The security guard who knows her greets her by name and welcomes her. Nevertheless, he still scans her manually. And then she opens the door equipped with facial recognition, recording her access time in the database, which is important for security and control in cases of emergency.
Today she has to work inside the pool equipped with a space suit. She has done it before. In fact, today is her last exercise of this kind before takeoff.
It is tiring because the space suit restricts her mobility. Additionally, the suit has built-in flotation devices, the contents of which are dynamically regulated to counteract the force of gravity. Eva ends up exhausted. But she remembers with a sigh that this is her last session, as the D-day of her departure will arrive in two weeks.
After the training session is over, she returns home. It is Friday, and hours later she is going to travel to see her parents in Cordoba, a 4-hour overnight bus trip
After returning to her apartment and packing a small knapsack (she does not need more for the short weekend), she takes a shared car that she locates near her house and heads to the bus station, where she leaves it charging in the guarded parking lot
She gets on the bus located on the -4 floor and settles in her window seat. As soon as the bus starts moving, Eva, exhausted from the training, falls asleep and wakes up almost at arrival time
After getting off the bus, she takes a taxi and goes to her parents' house. She opens the door carefully so as not to wake them up, but they hear her and both get up to greet her, embracing each other. It is very early, and thinking about her, her parents encourage her to sleep for a few hours, indicating that they will talk at breakfast
She lays down in her old bed, but she can no longer fall asleep. After this weekend, she will be without her family for too long. She cannot get out of her head that after lunch on Sunday, she will return to Chamical, and days later she will leave the planet towards the Archinaut 5 space station, located in Earth orbit, where the assembly of the Tempo8 spaceship that Eva will command has already been completed, and that will be her home for more than three years on the first manned trip that will leave behind the Solar System.
In the morning, when she hears her parents have woken up and are moving quietly around the house to avoid waking her up, Eva also gets up. She warmly greets her parents and they have breakfast together and talk about her departure.
- We are proud that you are the chosen person, but we would have preferred it to be someone else. We find it hard to accept that after this weekend we may not see you again. -Her father says, his voice breaking at the end of the sentence.
- I know dad. But I think I have to go -Eva says as she embraces him.- I'll be traveling for more than 3 years. But moving at 83 percent of the speed of light, you know that the theory of relativity tells us that there will be a time dilation and that those three and a half years on my ship, in reality, on Earth will be even more time. It will be five years here.
- We know daughter..., but it's hard to accept. When you get there I'll be 80 years old. -Her mother says.
Eva nods unable to say anything.
- And we won't even be able to make video calls -her mother continues.
- I'm afraid not. Although we can communicate via maser (which is like a laser but of microwaves). Transmitted at the speed of light, which is the maximum speed, messages will take almost four and a half years to arrive. And the response will take another four and a half years.
Her mother sighs, and after a brief silence says:
- Your first message from there, will reach us when I’m 85 years old. And to the news that we tell you after that message, your response will catch me at 94 years old, and dad with 93 if we're still alive
- Sure you will -Eva says, although she also doubts it.- But don't think about that. I will also send you messages during the trip. And new messages, without waiting for your response -she says as the three of them embrace.
Eva barely visits anyone else in Cordoba that weekend, as she wants to spend as much time as possible with her parents. Her brother is in Paraná and they will not be able to see each other this weekend. She will talk to him later by videoconferencing.
On Sunday afternoon, after eating and chatting a while at the table, she heads to the bus station. She cannot fall asleep this time, and spends the four hours watching the endless desert of National Route 38.
She arrives belatedly and tired, snacking on something from the fridge and immediately goes to bed. In the week that is about to start she has many meetings with the scientific team and will begin a quarantine in which she will be isolated to avoid any possible last-minute infection that could frustrate her departure. This time she sleeps soundly all night
The next morning at first light, already at the space center, she has a medical checkup and everything is in order. After the checkup, when she moves away, she sees her colleague Pablo from a distance who is also heading to his own checkup, and they greet each other from a distance. She will talk to him on the phone later, aware that she will not be able to do so in person.
The next day they have a meeting with the scientific team via video conference. Both Eva and Pablo are alone, each in an individual study within the Chamical Space Center, where they will spend the quarantine. Pablo is an intelligent boy from Tocopilla, on the Pacific coast, from whom she has learned many things during the training period. Eva, for her part, has also tried to contribute everything she could to Pablo. Both are engineers and have many things in common. Before being selected and meeting each other, they already had extensive background, not only in science, but also in humanities.
The trip is scheduled for only one person. And just a month ago, the mission's monitoring committee selected Eva as the main candidate, making Pablo the alternate candidate. But as an alternate, he also has to undergo quarantine, which in his case will end once Eva's spacecraft is already en route.
The quarantine feels short to Eva as she studies and delves into the structure of the electronic library that will accompany her during the long journey.

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As it heads towards Archinaut 5 with its approach course, Eva searches with her gaze for the hangar where the ship she will inhabit for the next few years is located. But she has no visibility over that area, which is hidden behind the large rest module located at one end of the A 5 axis; a module that everyone informally refers to as “The Wheel”, and which, as the name suggests, is a rotating module whose axis of rotation connects with the rest of the immobile Archinaut 5.

Certainly, the rest module resembles the tire of an enormous rotating wheel almost 500 meters in diameter. While the rest of A 5 is in a state of weightlessness, in the Wheel, due to centrifugal force, the diverse workers of A 5 enjoy artificial gravity similar to that of Earth. So life can be normal and restful in the Wheel, after having worked in the weightlessness that exists in the rest of the space station.

Thanks to staying during their free time in the gravity of the Wheel, the inhabitants of A 5 prevent the loss of bone density that would weaken their bones, and the muscular atrophy that would appear in their bodies if they lived 24 hours in weightlessness for long periods of time.

Due to rotation, a centrifugal force is produced that displaces any object of the Wheel outwards, a force that experiences a push like the gravitational one but directed outwards. Although the effect is the same, in reality in the Wheel there is technically no force of gravity, but a centrifugal force designed to have the same magnitude G as the force of gravity on the surface of the Earth, centrifugal force that is achieved thanks to a precise speed of rotation for the dimensions of the Wheel. Thus, for the 225-meter radius, completing one lap every 30 seconds achieves the expected thrust.

If we imagine the rest module, called the Wheel, the narrow inner tube of a bicycle wheel, its inhabitants would be in the space occupied by the air that would inflate that wheel inner tube.

As we said, when you are inside the Wheel, the centrifugal force pushes you outwards, away from the center of rotation, and therefore your body is projected towards what would be the rolling surface of the wheel, and more specifically towards the inner face of that imaginary rolling surface, which is the floor on which the people who inhabit the Wheel walk.

Eva smiles looking at the Wheel, imagining its inhabitants walking inside it like a hamster when it walks or runs inside the wheel of its cage. Of course, this is a much larger wheel, and always in motion.
Eva has been there before, during her training. The first time, everyone feels very strange inside the Wheel. On Earth, we walk on a surface with a concave curvature that is clearly visible from airplanes and aircraft. When we stand on Earth, our feet point towards the center of the Earth and our head is the farthest part from the center of the Earth. On the contrary, inside the Wheel, it is as if we were upside down. Our head points towards the center of that wheel, and our feet are the farthest part from the center of the Wheel, with our soles resting on the internal face of its inner tube.

Perhaps when you imagine it, your intuition would make you think that you would fall towards the center of the Wheel, as would happen on Earth. But the opposite happens. The Wheel does not have enough mass to attract you gravitationally, and in fact, you would float weightlessly if the wheel were not spinning. But it is due to its rotation that you fall outwards, propelled by the centrifugal force, the same centrifugal force that on Earth, when you take a turn in a car, pushes you towards the outside of the curve.

Inside the Wheel, you can walk or do sports. The perimeter of the Wheel is quite long, so you run a kilometer and a half before returning to the starting point. In fact, there is a long uninterrupted corridor on one side of the Wheel, a corridor that the workers usually run along to maintain their muscles, thus taking advantage of their free time in the artificial gravity of the Wheel.

On one side of this corridor, there is a succession of rooms with different uses: bedrooms, dining rooms, gyms, kitchens, offices, and common rest and leisure areas, all located on the same side of the corridor. And on the opposite wall of these doors, there are only a few scattered porthole windows facing towards space, through which, if you look out, you can see the stars spinning and spinning, making two turns per minute. Too fast to enjoy looking at them. That is why these few windows usually keep their blinds closed.

Inside the Wheel, while we step on inner tread, the ground looks like a convex surface (unlike on Earth); on the contrary, the ceiling is concave. Eva, from the Shuttle, recalls the feeling of being inside. She remembers that it is like being in a long tube three meters high and twice as wide, whose length is one and a half kilometers. Inside this corridor, if you look into the distance, the effect of perspective makes the corridor narrower. And in turn, the floor appears as if there were a gentle slope that curves upward into the distance, until finally your own ceiling no longer allows you to see the farthest part of the corridor. She recalls how curious it is to see that when someone approaches you from a distance, the first thing you see is their feet and then their legs, since the ceiling covers the rest. And gradually, as they approach, the rest of the person's body appears, with their head appearing last. And it is at that moment when you can finally recognize who it is. Eva remembers how to be able to see further without the ceiling obstructing your view, or to anticipate the face of the person approaching, you tilt your neck to one side or even crouch a little to increase your length of vision.

In fact, in military exercises in the Wheel, you lie down on the ground to achieve maximum vision. And to avoid having to raise your chin too much while lying down, you immediately rotate your body, lying on your back. You should not remain in that position for too long during military exercises, as, apart from being able to see further, in that position, you offer a larger target.

Obviously, the human body is bipedal, with the head at the highest point. This is because it evolved to walk on the savannas of Earth, where having the eyes at a greater height provides a greater range of vision. (Eva reflects on this from her seat in the shuttle). If life had evolved inside the Wheel, primates, which were initially quadrupedal, would tend to stand up, leaning on their front legs to improve their vision. While walking upright in this way, these primates would have to manipulate objects and tools with their hind hands. As a result, their front legs would evolve into legs and feet, and they would now use shoes on them. Eva smiles as she imagines humans doing a handstand, wearing shoes in their hands and holding tools on their feet.

Eva is aware that on this visit to the Wheel, she will not experience the perspectives of the corridor, as she will not have access to it due to her quarantine.

She brings her mind back to the present, where she remains seated in the shuttle. And even though she is not piloting it this time, she watches the maneuver as if she were doing it.

The shuttle is positioning itself below the Wheel and is turning around it, keeping the shuttle's ceiling always oriented towards the Wheel during the maneuver.

As it turns, it gradually approaches the Wheel in a dance-like manner. Turning at an increasingly synchronized speed with the Wheel's rotation, the shuttle approaches its ceiling closer and closer to the Wheel, preparing for coupling.

With the shuttle's ceiling fuselage already close to the external surface of the Wheel, and already rotating at the same speed as it, Eva, who once again feels the gravity and weight of her body on the seat, tilts the backrest a little more to be able to direct her gaze upwards, to the ceiling window, through which she sees the docking port of the Wheel, where the upper hatch of the shuttle will connect. Due to the perfect synchronization in rotation and the already short distance to the Wheel, Eva only sees a fixed area through this window.

Shuttle and Wheel are now perfectly synchronized, maintaining the same angular velocity. With the hatches aligned and counting on the shuttle's computer assistance, contact is established. Eva hears the corresponding metallic clicks as the shuttle anchors itself to the surface of the Wheel.

With the shuttle now attached to the Wheel, both rotate as a single unit. As if seen from a distance, the shuttle would be like a tiny fly that had landed on the rotating Wheel. And inside that supposed fly would be Eva. But Eva would be upside down inside the supposed fly, with her head pointing towards the Wheel where the Shuttle is anchored. In any case, inside the shuttle, what Eva feels is that the centrifugal force pushes her weight outwards from the Wheel.

A few minutes later, the hatch in the shuttle's ceiling is hermetically connected to the square entrance gate of the Wheel located on its tread.

As we mentioned, the Wheel completes one revolution every 30 seconds, a speed that, given the Wheel's radius, is just what is needed to provide a similar acceleration to that of Earth's gravity. The shuttle, which is already rotating at the same speed but with a radius of just a few meters larger, also has a similar gravity. Only slightly higher than Earth's gravity, a difference that Eva does notice after unfastening her safety harness and sitting up. Once the ladder leading to the hatch is deployed, Eva proceeds to climb it. Reaching the top of the shuttle ladder and already sticking her head out of the hatch, she takes a look at the Wheel's inner tube.

The gate through which Eva sticks her head, looks like a trapdoor in the floor when viewed from inside the Wheel. Around three of the four sides of the trapdoor, there are safety railings to prevent accidental falls from the Wheel to the attached shuttle below.

The gate through which Eva sticks her head, viewed from inside the Wheel, looks like a trapdoor in the floor. And around three of the four sides of that trapdoor, there are safety railings to prevent accidental falls from the Wheel to the shuttle attached below.

The shuttle ladder joins towards the only side without a railing on the trapdoor, and Eva completes her ascent by advancing towards the arrival area.

Minutes later, the trapdoor is closed, hiding the shuttle ladder. And with the trapdoor closed, the safety railing is also retracted, leaving the floor completely uniform.

The Last Word by Juan Francisco Gonzalez Molina