Ring Around the Moon (Space: 1999)  "Ring Around the Moon" is the fourth episode of the first season of "". The screenplay was written by Edward di Lorenzo; the director was Ray Austin. The shooting script is dated 14 December 1973 with green page amendments dated 17 January 1974; the final shooting script is dated 8 February 1974. Live-action filming took place Wednesday 27 February 1974 through Thursday 14 March 1974. Technician Ted Clifford enters to perform a minor maintenance task. As he unpacks his tool kit at an access panel near one of the windows, he fails to notice a sphere of orange light materialising above the lunar horizon. The sphere pulsates and Clifford stiffens as an aura of orange light surrounds his head. Zombie-like, he crosses Main Mission and begins to operate an input terminal on Main Computer with incredible speed. A man possessed, he fends off all attempts to drag him away from the keypad with super-human strength. Suddenly, Clifford backs away from the computer bank. He whimpers "Help me", collapses and dies. Before anyone can react, the Main Mission staff are knocked off their feet by a tremendous jolt—a beam of orange light has reached out from the sphere and enveloped the Moon. Tracking sensors reveal the sphere to be stationary but, from their perspective, it is still getting closer to the Moon's surface; realises that the Moon has been trapped in an orbit around the sphere. An audio signal is received and a sibilant voice announces that they are prisoners of the planet Triton. The staff reviews the damage caused by the Moon's sudden deceleration. The fact that all but four are non-operational and the main generators show no sign of damage but are only putting out minimum power indicates that the sphere's occupants have purposefully compromised Alpha's defences. David Kano reveals that Clifford had accessed and scanned classified information during his mad session with Computer. With no information on Triton available, Koenig feels a reconnaissance flight is in order. Victor Bergman comments that he thinks the aliens will "not" be surprised; he has a nasty feeling they are now being watched. Koenig receives a report on Ted Clifford's autopsy from Doctors Helena Russell and Bob Mathias—a ball of orange light was briefly visible at the base of his brain, with most of the surrounding brain tissue appearing to have melted. Also, his optic nerve had been reconfigured to function like a high-speed camera and the processing speed of his neuronal system having been increased a thousandfold.