They Told Us There Was No Risk of Infection
MISSION AUDIO TRANSCRIPT — ODYSSEY EXPEDITION
SOL 16
INTERNAL CHANNEL — CLASSIFIED
“How do we alert the public?”
“Alert the public?”
“Yes. Sergeant Green has to return home at some point. Or at least to the vessel.”
“There’s a good chance he’s infected too.”
“The pilot has no known direct contact.”
“The risk of transmission on the return trip is too high.”
“Sir, the whole world is watching what we choose to do here.”
“I’m not going to mince words, Leonard. The whole world might be watching an accident soon.”
PERSONAL LOG — SGT. MARKUS GREEN
SOL 16
Sixteen days.
I’ve been in isolation for sixteen days. Little to no communication from Control or Mulaney. Jeffords is still in quarantine.
We were supposed to leave in two days. That stopped being realistic after the symptoms started.
At first it was exhaustion. Heavy breathing. Bloody coughing. Then the pressure under the skin started.
That’s what Jeffords called it before they sealed him off.
Pressure.
Like his body was trying to breathe through places it wasn’t supposed to.
Small holes began opening across the surface of his arms and chest. Perfect circles punched clean through flesh like something inside him was boring outward. Around them, swollen boils formed beneath the skin, moving slightly when he breathed.
One hundred and forty million miles from home. From Jessica. From epidemiologists who probably wouldn’t understand a disease from another planet anyway.
The suits were new. NASA contracted them out to a private aerospace company run by some billionaire poster boy selling “the future of humanity” to people already drowning on Earth.
Near open-air pressurized suits. Lightweight. Flexible. Better for mobility and terrain interaction. Better for camera footage.
We joked about still having giant glass fishbowls over our heads while wearing skin-tight leotards underneath. They told us we could even wear civilian clothes inside the habs. Said it would make audiences at home feel connected to us.
Gotta wear your Martian clothes in the common area.
Funny now.
You’d think some of the smartest scientists, engineers, and military personnel ever assembled for a mission like this would’ve followed stricter decontamination procedures returning to the vessel.
Instead we chartered a course across half the planet. Land. Study. Film. Collect samples. Launch back into orbit. Refuel. Repeat.
A reusable propulsion system. Another miracle invention from our generous donor.
Or his team of underpaid engineers.
Now Mulaney is trapped up there in orbit. She can’t refuel without landing.
And I can feel the pressure starting in my chest.
PERSONAL LOG — SGT. MARKUS GREEN
SOL 22
Control says we’re going home.
Nobody says when.
I leave my hab to check on Jeffords after they report him radio silent.
Through the glass, he barely resembles a human anymore.
The boils have spread across nearly every inch of him. The holes in his body are wider now. Some go straight through him. I can see the floor beneath his shoulder through one of them.
His helmet is still sealed over his head.
The rest of him is naked.
Clothes shredded across the room like he tore them off in panic. Like he was trying to claw pressure out from underneath his skin.
Johnson’s body is still in the corner.
Neither of them smell anymore. The filtration system takes care of that.
Control reconnects me with Mulaney for the first time in days.
She asks to switch to a private channel we set up early into the mission. One not being broadcast live to every network back on Earth looking for brave smiling astronauts.
For a minute neither of us says anything.
Just breathing.
Then she tells me there isn’t enough fuel to get home.
Not enough for a return trajectory. Not enough for corrections. Not enough for both of us.
“We’re not going home,” she says.
I ask if Control told her that.
“No,” she says. “They stopped answering my questions.”
She tells me we could still try. Slingshot around Mars. Stretch supplies. Burn slow toward Earth and hope somebody lets us land before we die.
I tell her if they think we’re infected, they’ll destroy the ship long before we reach orbit.
Another long silence.
Then quietly:
“What about Jessica?”
I don’t answer right away.
I had spent sixteen days thinking about quarantine protocols and fuel calculations and blood oxygen readings. Somehow I hadn’t let myself think about her actually hearing the news.
“They’ll tell her I died doing something important,” I say.
Mulaney starts crying.
Not loud. Just small sounds over the radio. Trying not to lose composure.
I joke that she could always nose-dive the ship straight into the landing zone and save everyone the trouble.
She doesn’t laugh.
Neither do I.
After a while she says:
“I’m sorry.”
Then the channel disconnects.
I start preparing for the trip home.
EMERGENCY BROADCAST TRANSCRIPT
27 DAYS AFTER LOSS OF CONTACT
“Twenty-seven days ago, the brave astronaut explorers sent into the wild unknown suffered a catastrophic systems failure while departing Martian orbit.”
“But NASA reports their sacrifice was not in vain.”
“Before communications were lost, Sergeant Markus Green successfully launched a payload from the Odyssey containing invaluable scientific data regarding the future viability of extraterrestrial colonization.”
“Private recovery drones are currently en route to retrieve the package.”
“Officials believe the findings may prove critical in determining whether humanity’s planned evacuation efforts beyond Earth can continue moving forward.”
“No biological contamination risks have been reported at this time.”
“Further questions regarding crew recovery have not yet been answered.”