Today's Reading
When the hatch was secured, I activated the suction fans that pulled the worst of the Martian dust off our suits. Our suit techs would get the rest. Suit techs. A luxury we hadn't had when I'd started going into space.
When the cleaning cycle ended, the airlock automatically began to pressurize.
A part of me had expected Bradbury to be as rustic as the original lunar base, but on the First Expedition, my teammates had spent thirteen months working on the surface and had built this habitat to be ready for shirtsleeve levels of casual living. Assuming that nothing went wrong.
If I knew anything about space, it was that something always went wrong.
The green light lit, and I checked the gauge anyway. Pressure normalized, I released the valve on the side of my suit, feeling the slight pop as the pressure inflating it relaxed and fabric settled against my undergarments. Hands aching from a sol in the suit, I pulled off my gloves and tucked them under my right arm in a way I absolutely could not while it was pressurized. I had my helmet off while Nathaniel was still fidgeting with his left glove.
"Need help?" I reached for the latch to open the interior airlock.
"I can get it." His words echoed, coming through the comm earpiece and muffled by the glass of his helmet.
Nodding, I inhaled and stopped. A scent of sulfur with a chalky sweet overtone filled the airlock, in a combination unlike anything I'd smelled before. On the Moon, when you came back in, you got a scent of gunpowder and old campfire that was the weird but unmistakable smell of lunar regolith.
This was Mars.
This was what Mars smelled like. I let go of the handle and turned back to Nathaniel, waiting for the moment when he had his helmet off. The second glove was clear. Grinning, I bounded over to him, so that I was directly in front of him when he removed his helmet.
"Breathe in." I bounced on my toes.
His nose wrinkled. "I know. It smells like rotten eggs."
"That's Mars." I grinned at him. "The folks who got to go down to the surface during the First Mars Expedition said it smelled like rotten eggs. That's Mars. We're smelling Mars."
"You are very excited about rotten eggs."
I leaned forward and kissed him. "I am." I kissed him again. "It's a whole new planet."
The door to the airlock gave plenty of warning that it was opening, as the fifteen latches released in their distinctive ripple-bang and Leonard poked his head in. "Are we already going to have to have a conversation about appropriate use of airlocks?"
"We can smell Mars!" I beckoned to our mission commander before remembering that he'd been here before as one of the geologists on the First Mars Expedition. "Oh. I guess...I guess that's old hat for you."
Leonard grinned. "True story. When we were back on Earth, my mom cracked an egg that was rotten. Stunk up the house but the first thought that went through my head was, home."
A little flush of excited reality went through my body because until I heard him say "home" it hadn't really sunk in that we were here to stay. Every mission before this had been a stepping stone making sure that humanity wasn't trapped on a single dying planet. But every mission before this had also been finite. Establishing a permanent colony was why I was here, and also...Earth was still home to me.
I think Leonard must have seen some of that on my face, because he pulled the airlock door wider and stepped back. "You get used to it."
I squinted at our mission commander. My hands and shoulders ached from being in the suit all sol. I wanted to relish the memory of flying in a red-hot slice through the atmosphere, but also, Leonard shouldn't be meeting us at the door. I wanted to retreat to the ship so I didn't have to shift to my administrative duties so fast.
I followed him out of the airlock into the long hallway that connected to the main dome. "Aren't you scheduled to be in comms now? What's up?"
"The engineering team needs Nathaniel." He held up his hands. "Nothing urgent. Everything is under control. It's just that Reynard has questions about the defaults on the life support."
Nathaniel looked down at his suit as if he wanted to run straight there. "Be there as soon as I change."
...
