Mark Watney
Mission Day 687

I'm fucking back.

I'm standing in the airlock, hunched over from my broken ribs, screaming dying down in my throat (from the pain) and also crying more than I'd like to admit. Everyone is cheering into my helmet at a volume that will definitely give me a migraine, and I could listen to it forever.

I'm not on Mars anymore.

For the first time in a long time, I'm not on Mars. I feel displaced, like I'm in a different world. A much better one.

"Are you okay?" Beck asked, as everyone else's whooping died down.

I'm struggling to catch a good breath. Between the crying and the screaming and the 12gs, I'm exhausted.

I flip my radio on. "Uh, no, my chest really hurts," I pant. Suddenly, in stark contrast to Beck's voice, I can hear how strained mine is. Beck's voice is smooth and comforting, and mine is ragged and broken.

"Go limp, I'll push you to my quarters," Beck commanded. Standard procedure on the Hermes; injured people go limp and others get them to safety, to avoid further injury. Serious injury on a spacecraft (away from a hospital) can be disastrous.

"Try not to talk or move, you don't want to strain anything. You just pulled 12gs," he says. I'm aware I just pulled 12gs, everyone has made it a point to inform me multiple times. Fastest man in the history of space travel. There's a reason we don't shoot people into space that fast.

I'm in a different world, and this different world has humans other than me. I'm not alone.

Being pushed through the Hermes is a spiritual experience. My eyes are drinking in the sight, memorizing every detail in a way they never did on Mars. Who cares about Mars? It's literally just a pile of dust so big it got it's own gravity. The real action is on Earth, with plants and mountains and rivers, where someone can be stranded naked in a forest and still somehow survive. A planet that needs billions of dollars of life-support is no planet at all.

I can feel myself getting lightheaded as he pushes me through the ship. My eyes are roving around, but I'm unable to properly focus on anything. I'm glad Beck is pushing me and I don't have to actually pull my sorry ass through the ship. It's been a really exhausting Sol.

Once Beck and I got to his quarters, we waited for the ship to repressurize. Hermes had enough spare air to refill the ship two more times if needed. It'd be a pretty shitty long-range ship if it couldn't recover from a decompression.

Repressurizing takes a while, though. It was easy enough (close the outside airlock door with one button, repressurize with the other). Gotta pump a lot of air into the entire thing, and while it's happening everyone has to go check over the ship for air leaks and structural integrity. There's a procedure for that, and we all know it, and it includes everyone suiting up and floating around the ship to inspect every little damn thing.

"Wait, if everyone's busy doing inspections…" I say, "Who's flying the ship?"

Everyone explodes into laugher, and the sound is too perfect to describe, tinkling like a waterfall of light. I'm so happy I don't even stop to reflect on how gay that feeling is.

"Before you start wondering, Beck and Johanssen are an item now and yes, everyone on the ship is aware," Lewis's voice says, and I can hear the smile in her tone.

"Million mile high club, nice," I say.

I can practically feel the eyeroll he gives me. "Martinez said the same thing."

They're all still laughing. It's a beautiful sound.

So, Beck listened to my advice. I'm not dead, but the fact that they listened to my last-words slash advice puts a warm feeling in the center of my chest. I'm glad they did, they're perfect for each other, somehow. "Gross," I quip.

"I know," Martinez agreed. "They, like, publicly display affection. It's nasty."

"He tries to," Johanssen says in a very businesslike tone. "Honestly, usually I'm busy."

"It is rather funny," Vogel admits, now visible floating behind Beck in his quarters. "She will push him away, but he always tries again."

I knew what he meant; Johanssen was not a woman easily distracted from her work, and I'm sure Beck comes up and bothers her while she's trying to get work done. Beck was a professional dewey-eyed star-crossed lover, but Johanssen was a pile of workaholism and confusion. That's how she managed to become an astronaut at 26, and that's how they managed not to confess their feelings for each other for 4 years of training.

But, I was going to give Beck shit about it all the same. "Already regretting it, Johanssen?" I laugh.

"Are we sure we should have came back for him?" Beck says, not a second later.

It's been less than ten minutes since I got back, and they're already cracking jokes about it. I love these guys.

I laugh with them this time. It's the first time I am around people again, so I listen to the sound, and it's… really rough, and sort of frightening, so I stop. Hearing myself gave me an unsettling feeling in the pit of my stomach.

I want to be out of this space suit, god damn it. I want to actually see them, not just Beck and Vogel's space suits hovering in his quarters, everyone else a voice in my ear. He's got photos everywhere, but they're not anything I haven't seen before. I want to see people.

"ETA?" I say. Again, my voice sounds ragged. I must have forgotten what real people sound like on Mars, because I sound awful.

"Twenty minutes," Johanssen's reassuring voice filters in through the radio.

"Ughhh," Martinez says, as if he's filling in for me. Shit, he's probably been filling in for all my shit comments while I was gone, I know he could predict what I would say in any given situation with an alarming degree of accuracy.

"It's kind of weird just looking at your spacesuit," Beck admits. "I know you're in there, but you're just floating there."

We are both floating in Beck's quarters, because nobody has turned the gravity back on yet (i.e. made the spaceship spin). I just look like an empty spacesuit to them, limp because I'm injured and the reflective glass hiding my face. I'm an unwrapped package, and nobody knows what's inside.

Except me. I know what's inside. A disaster.

"The EVA suit is also weird," Vogel joins in. "The green looks strange in the Hermes." The martian EVA suits were sent beforehand in the supply missions, due to their much larger mass and loads of redundant science equipment. We were never supposed to see a Mars EVA suit on board the Hermes. I'll bet it gives them the same wrong feeling the empty landing struts gave me, but with a lot less suicide.

"It is an awful color of green," I agree. "I spent a lot of time thinking about that, actually."

"You don't need to spend time thinking to know that that's puke-green," Martinez joins in.

"I mean, I'm glad it's green. Kind of reminded me of Earth."

Their voices go awkwardly silent. Did I say something weird?

Upon reflection, my tone was kind of desperate. Everything I'm saying right now is kind of desperate. I feel a little high, like I'm not all there. I mean, I am high, I took a respectable amount of opiates and got shot into the upper martian atmosphere at 12gs.

"Sorry guys," I laugh nervously. "I haven't talked to anyone in a while."

"It's all right," Beck reassures me. He's got a good reassurance-voice, all smooth and calming. Good ship doctor voice.

I clear my throat. "Social skills are rusty."

"I'm surprised your voice is even working," Beck said, in a making-conversation tone of voice.

I'm sure the next thing I want to say is weird, so I try to couch it in a joke. "I talk to myself a lot now. Wanted to make sure that when I got back I seemed extra crazy."

Nobody gave me a joking response, though. Ugh.

"That's some surprisingly forward thinking," Beck says after a beat, clearly trying to recover.

Yeah, but it wasn't because I was trying to preserve my voice. More to hear the sound of something other than beeping machinery. But even I realize that's a little too heavy to say.

"You're the first people I've seen in 543 sols, the least you can do is pretend my jokes are funny," I say. They laugh, not out of pity (I think), but because that actually was a good joke.

"Pressurization complete!" Johanssen's voice rings out. "All clear. Remove your flight suits."

"Let me get yours after I get mine," Beck says, taking the helmet off his suit. Vogel, too, begins to take his off.

I'm content to sit and wait limply. I'm fucking exhausted. Did I mention that before? I'm so aware of how hard I was working down there. Even on my days off, I was brutally fucking exhausted. My back has hurt like someone stuck a knife in it for the last six months, but somehow I stopped noticing. My stomach is a cavern, it's larger and emptier than Lewis Valley. My chest is hurting like I've been trampled, my entire body hurts like somebody set my blood on fire.

Man, I feel like total shit. I'd like to lay in a bed until next year, and that's saying a lot, because I spent most of my time on Mars laying in bed.

Beck's got his entire spacesuit off now, and I can see his body. He's wearing the standard issue NASA jumpsuit, and it outlines his entire natural human physical form. I can see muscles, sinew, and can practically see the human warmth and life. Of course, I start crying again. Human body, human muscles, the sounds of breath and life are all so near me. It's been so long since I've seen a normal fucking human. I'm more dewey-eyed than Beck is when he sees Johanssen in a dress.

When Beck takes my helmet off, he just looks shocked.

"I look that bad?" I laugh, motioning with my gloved hand towards the red watery mess I know my face is. "There aren't any tissues in a spacesuit."

"No," he says, shaking his head back and forth rigidly. "It's…" He pulls a face, smiling even while cringing. "you smell, dude."

The inanity of the comment made me laugh, kind of hard. Then I gasped, because that hurt.

"What?" He said, working on getting the suit off.

"I forgot!" I said, still laughing shallowly. "I just got so used to it."

I realize a second later what that statement implies, but Beck just resolutely ignores it.

For a second, I think about what I must look like. Red faced, crying, eyes wide, skeletally thin, bruised, deranged haircut, laughing. I fall silent.

I see Martinez floating by the door. "Well you better get un-used to it," Martinez says gamely, waving his hand in front of his face from the smell. "Dude, oh my lord. The Hermes is going to be working for days filtering this air."

I wonder if they all got together beforehand and agreed on how to treat me when I got back. I bet they did, because the fact that they're cracking jokes and treating everything normally is exactly what I need right now.

I see people lingering at the door, eyes peeking in. They're all trying to keep the… shock, I think, their faces are all twisted. Whatever it is, they're trying to keep it off their faces with varying degrees of success.

"Come in, guys," I say. They all float in, too, pulling faces but saying nothing. "Yeah, yeah, Beck already told me. Mars doesn't have showers, okay?"

"No, they can't come in yet," Beck says. "Medical crap comes first."

They look forlorn, and I shrug. "Sorry guys, doctor says," I say. As they leave, I feel like my heart is being ripped out all fucking over again, but I know they'll be there when we're done so I just bite my tongue until it bleeds.

I'm just so elated to see their normal, human bodies, their human hair, their funny faces and the sounds of voices in my ear. Real voices, not through a radio or a computer but their real voices.Nobody tells you how musical real voices sound, all beautiful notes blending together.

Beck gets me all the way out of the suit, and the first thing he notices is how limply my clothes hang off of my form.

"Whose clothes are these?" Beck asked, astonished.

He already knew the answer. The names are printed on the sides. Beth Johanssen.

After the RTG baths, I ditched my clothes because they had become so disgusting they were irredeemable, and I had started to fit Johanssen's clothes better anyways. I would have just went without, except that you pretty much have to wear something under the EVA suit due to the fact that the padding on the inside is scratchy and uncomfortable. I… didn't think of the fact that I would need clothes on the MAV before I left, so I'm glad I happened to bring the jumpsuit along. Beck's probably going to cut it off anyways though, in the name of a physical exam or whatever.

I cast my eyes down, somehow ashamed. I'm not modest by any stretch, but something about the disgusting, sorry state I'm in makes me upset. It's not that I don't want to be seen this way; it's that I don't want Beck to have to see it. Nobody should have to see this.

"Hey, it's all right," he said mildly, shoving the EVA suit out the door so that someone else can put it away. "Don't worry, I've seen a lot worse."

There's just no way that's not a lie. Beck is a flight surgeon who spends more half his time as a biologist. He hasn't seen shit. A few broken bones maybe, dissected cadavers, but I look like… one of those starving African children. Worse.

"Don't we need gravity to do medical crap?" I ask, grasping for something to fill the awkward silence.

Beck shakes his head, pointing towards the examination table. "Nope, we can just tie you to the table." True to his word there are wrist, torso and ankle straps, presumably for using the ultrasound or other tools that require pressure. In 0g, if you poke someone with something, they just float away.

"Fun," I say dryly, as he pushes me to the table and straps me in.

Inside of ten minutes, my x-ray is done. Turns out I've only got two broken ribs, and there's not much you can do for a broken rib.

"I'm going to bandage it," Beck declares.

"Why? You just said there isn't anything you can do about a broken rib," I said.

"The pressure of the bandages will help keep everything in place. It'll make you feel better," he insists. That sounds like a load crap to me, but he's the doctor.

Beck's face turns soft. "Mark, I know you probably won't like this, but NASA insisted I do a full physical before you shower, or sleep, or do anything else."

NASA considered it unnecessary to send along those paper robes doctors normally have, so I'll be completely naked. That isn't a problem in and of itself; we were naked in front of each other tons of times during training. One, we had small shared locker rooms, two, lots of the training involved emergency situations and cutting off clothes, and three, they didn't want us to make stupid mistakes in space because we were abashed so created excuses for us to be naked more than once. Hell, Beck's our primary doctor while we're on board and most of us are over 40, so he has the dubious privilege of doing all our regular physicals.

But back then, I was healthy. Whole.

"Really? Why?" I protest.

"Because if you have internal bleeding, something else broken, or any of the other complications a 12g launch might have, the pressure of a shower or the time it takes to sleep could kill you."

He was right, I knew he was right, if any of my organs were upset about that convertible launch then they could kill me and it would be incredibly stupid to die right after I got on board.

I nodded my assent, closed my eyes, and unzipped the jumpsuit. If my eyes are closed, I can't see Beck's horrified face.

It feels like my suffering is on display.

Beck's a good doctor, sees my situation, and immediately starts up a stream of endless chatter to fill the air. "Tell me on a scale of 0 to 10 if it hurts," he says.

First, a general pain inventory. My back, my stomach, my feet, my knees, how much does everything hurt? I'm talking, and for now Beck isn't asking how all these things happened, just how badly they hurt now, and I don't offer any explanations, I'm talking and still talking and by the end it feels like I've described every part of my body because every single part of my body hurts. As I talk he runs his hands over injuries, poking and prodding and checking for deeper problems, holding up his stethoscope and listening.

Beck keeps up the steady stream of chatter as he asks me to raise my arms as much as I can (which isn't much), runs his hands over my sides, pokes me everywhere with his gloved fingers asking if this hurts, and that hurts, "How badly does it hurt on a scale of 1 to 10 when I poke?" My answers are minimal, mumbled, and I open my eyes but keep them downcast, away from Beck and whatever he's doing. A 3 there, a 5 there, "Jesus fucking christ, 7" right in the small of my back, and it turns out I'm partially numb in some of my toes. This goes on forever, it hurts everywhere he pokes, and by the end I just want it to be over.

It's over soon enough, and Beck hits the wall radio, "Johanssen, get a sweatshirt and one of your sweatpants?" he says. As he turns away, I look up, catch the sight of myself in a wall mirror.

My ribcage, collarbone, shoulderblades, everything is sticking out of everywhere by now. I'm more skeleton than man. I quickly look away.

"Time for bandages," he says, and he keeps chattering as he practically mummifies me with expensive NASA wraps.

His hands touch me as he wraps the bandage around me, and I do my damnedest to hide how it makes the inside of my chest tear with something hot and new. I settle for biting my tongue to stop my breath from catching, and I'm praying to God that Beck will take mercy on me and just let his hand linger on me.

An old me might have just leapt at him to hug him, but something in me was stopping me.

As Johanssen arrives with the clothes, a crack in the door allows her to get a look at me, and all I see is her eyes bulge as the door is closed. Beck hands me the clothes, turning away to busy himself and give me some privacy.

As I put them on, I think they must be all huddled by the door, because Beck stares at the closed door for a minute, opens it to stare at what's on the other side for another minute, sighs, and then throws the door open.

"Mark!" Johanssen says as she enters the room, arms already up for a hug.

It pains me to say it, but I say "Don't hug me," sort-of holding a hand up. "My ribs are broken." But it's not that, not just that that stops me.

I want to leap at them, hug them all, but all of a sudden I can't.

She rolls her eyes and sort of holds her hand up.

For a moment, I'm confused. She's holding her hand out, her face is completely even, so I can't read it. What the fuck does she want with my hand?

I just sort of… high-five it.

She looks at me like I've lost my mind, and everyone else does, and I realized that she wanted to hold my hand. She and I both start laughing at the stupidity, everyone starts laughing, laughing because oh God I'm rescued,we're all laughing as they high five me.

God, their laugher hasn't stopped being beautiful, I'm staring at their faces, I didn't think I'd ever see a human face again, they're alive and here and talking to me. I'm not dead anymore, I'm alive, I'm alive and finally with my crew. The urge to cry bursts into my chest, strong and hot.

Do not cry Watney you are Not in your spacesuit they can all See You.

I cry anyways. What the fuck do you want from me?

Beck hands me a towel, which I'm thankful for, because even before the crying my face is a mess from all the screaming I did in the EVA suit.

Everyone else high fives me while I'm holding the towel up to my face with the other hand, hiding tears leaking out of my eyes. "Sorry about…" I say, gesturing to myself. "It's been a hard two years." My voice is thick holding back emotion, and I'm laughing through it. It's positively cliche.

"But it's over now," Martinez says. "You're with us now." The smile on his face is warm and soft, and everyone else's faces light up with the same soft smile, all directed at me. My eyes water anew.

Martinez, Beck, Johanssen are at the forefront, eyes bright and shining and happy and trying to talk animatedly to me. Vogel stands back, smiling wider than I've ever seen and standing next to Lewis, who looks like she's in pain. Johanssen wasn't kidding about her taking this hard.

"All right, everyone out, the guy needs rest," Beck commandeered after a beat. "Watney, as soon as you can move your arms, shower. Then call for one of us, we'll bring you food."

I'd forgotten I was literally starving to death until he said that, but then the ferocious hunger hit me and I realize it felt like someone roundhouse kicked me in the stomach, and I'm surprised I didn't literally fall into the bed in pain.

I had maybe two months left when they rescued me, and I'd started getting antsy about things and eating 1/2 rations whenever I could. Hey, 3/4 rations did nothing to ease the shredding pain in my stomach, so I might as well eat 1/2 and save some food just in case…

It was getting milder by the second, though, because after the physical Beck poked me with a needle and now I realize that needle probably was full of Oxycodone.

I collapsed on Beck's cot as everyone else filed out. It's cold, so I nestle under the blankets. I'm probably dirtying Beck's nice clean sheets but I don't care; I'll trade him out if he cares so much.

By the time the painkillers allow me to move my arms, I'm asleep.

—

Mark Watney
Mission Day 687

I blink my eyes open, crusted and exhausted. My entire body is sore, a standard Martian morning. I lay there for a moment, because on Mars there is absolutely no reason I need to force myself to get up at a particular time.

As soon as I'm ready for the day, I open my eyes.

As soon I open my eyes, I realize I'm on the fucking Hermes.

OH MY GOD, I think, sitting up quickly, gasping rather loudly. But that turns out to be a mistake, and I feel stabbing in my abdomen, so my gasp turns into a grunt of pain as I jerk forward, hissing through my teeth.

"Jesus, Watney!" Beck says, startling. His jerking motion surprised me, and then I jerked back in surprise too, which a second later left both of us feeling really stupid as we blinked at each other.

He seems to have taken up a chair next to my bed, reading something on his laptop. I thought they left their laptops down there? Maybe they had spares on the Hermes.

"Watching me sleep? Kinky motherfucker," I say, hunching over my middle.

Beck shakes his head at me. "Go get a shower, Watney. You're rank." He snaps shut the laptop and bounces out of the quarters, presumably escaping eau de Mars.

I don't need told twice. I haul myself out of the cot and go for a shower. While I was asleep, the gravity was turned up, but not more than 0.2g by my estimation. I can walk fine and my body can mostly hold it's own weight, so the low gravity amble to the shower was doable. The shower was also in the 1g zone, because it wouldn't be much of a shower if the water couldn't fall.

Bouncing through the hall was surreal. I could see everyone else's personal effects, could see where they'd pinned photos up. Could see the blackness of space out of the windows. It isn't Mars. This isn't Mars. I'm not on Mars. I've escaped. I literally can't believe it. It feels like a dream.

This shower, this, my first shower back, was a downright spiritual experience. I've always been one to prefer baths, but there was something about the light pressure of water against my back that made my head and my heart light. Not to mention all the drugs made everything feel amazing.

Beck got me really high. I'm not arguing.

I very shamelessly take a long shower, going well over our personal time limit of ten minutes. I haven't had a shower in a year and a half, and I figured I was doing the crew a service as much as I was doing myself one, so that justified taking up an entire forty minutes to shower. No one knocked at the door to stop me, which only serves as further justification.

Very early on, I ran out of toilet paper. And paper towels. And paper. And small hand towels, and clothes. So, there was a massive amount of dirt and other nasty shit in the shower, pooling at the drain like brown sludge. After I stepped out, I just let the shower run another couple seconds until it all went down the drain. Gonna have to tell someone that the Hermes water reclaimer will need to deal with that. But if I recall correctly, unlike my water reclaimer, The Hermes' is actually capable of dealing with mineral water and contamination. Man, life on the Hermes is all luxury.

I get out of the shower, and look on the shelves. Toothpaste, toothbrushes and floss have been set out for me, my brands. Must have been sent up with the Taiyang Shen. Wait, I was gone, I never used up my entire allotment, so I still have all of that for the trip home. I brush my teeth, but mostly because I haven't brushed my teeth for months and I'll feel disgusting if I don't at least try. But I don't put a lot of energy into the effort, because I used to like mint toothpaste but as I put the toothbrush in my mouth I discover it's way too strong and bitter, and I almost spit it out in disgust.

I bounced back to Beck's quarters, to find him instead standing in the hall as if he were waiting for me. He probably was.

"You might like your quarters better, they're warmer," he said in a sort of strangled voice, pointing down the hall.

I'm thinking he probably wants his own quarters back. The Hermes has separate bunk rooms, because NASA headshrinks decided it was better for astronauts and worth the multi-million-dollar expense. They're tiny, but they're separate, and they even have doors and everything (doors that don't lock, but beggars can't be choosers).

As soon as I walk through the door, I understand why Beck's voice was strangled.

My photographs are all over the wall. So many photographs, I didn't realize I own so much. All the people I've ever loved. I'm floored, looking at the room I haven't seen in over a year and a half, all the photos of my loved ones staring back at me.

I walk towards the wall, pick one of the family down. My mother's face is so beautiful.

I didn't have anything but the memory of their faces. Human brains aren't perfect, and they don't remember details. They don't remember faces. I came to the horrifying realization down there that I was forgetting everyone's face. My mom's perfect eyes were sparkling out of the photograph, specially printed on photo paper for my room. I thought I would die before I ever saw it again.

"The heating system is malfunctioning," Beck offered as explanation for the heat, his voice distant in my ear. "But your body weight is so low I figured you'd appreciate it."

My laptop, media stick and personal effects are sitting on the bed in their box, where I packed them. Vogel wanted my help with something right before launch, and it ended up taking so long that I had to leave them behind. I didn't care at the time, because it was only 31 Sols. I even remember callously thinking 'It's not like I'll die without it.'

Beck is still talking, but I don't hear him. That stupid media stick could have changed my entire life there. As it is, the only thing I ever hear in my head anymore is Stayin Alive by the Bee Gees and I Will Survive by Gloria Gaynor. Okay, that's a little dramatic. The media stick wouldn't have really mattered in the end, and even with my music and tv it would have still been Mars.

But the photos… those would have actually changed my life.

Choked up, I turn to address Beck, but he's disappeared. It's a little alarming to me that I didn't notice him disappearing.

I hit the wall radio button instead. "I want food," I say, knowing it will echo in the whole ship.

"Any particular kind of food?" It's Johanssen who answers.

My voice still has that slightly hysterical edge. "Not potatoes!"

"Got it," came Beck's voice from the radio, presumably in the rec room.

Soon, Beck was back with the food. He stood there and watched me eat it, although I barely sat down before all the food was gone. I barely noticed what it was, something easy on the stomach like rice or reconstituted bread or I don't know what. It could have been mush, for all I care. I inhaled it like I've never seen food in my life, because I haven't seen food in a long fucking time.

"Where's the rest?" I say, holding up the plate.

Beck gave me a regretful look. "You can't overfeed victims of starvation. It's fatal."

My voice is whiny like a child's. "I was only at 3/4 rations! I wasn't starving!" Beck turns a piercing doctorly eye on me, sensing the lie in my voice. "…most of the time."

He gestures with his arm, as if to say 'can you believe this guy?' is Beck Italian? Could he even say it with the accent? "Are you Italian?" I snicker.

Well, it would seem I don't have a brain-mouth filter anymore. Hardly surprising.

"What?" Beck just asks blankly, and I laugh with relief.

The food hits my stomach, I'm freaking exhausted again. I flop back into my bed. "Beck, I'm gonna take a nap," I say, already feeling sleepiness pull at my eyelids.

Beck just nods, and I'm asleep before he shuts the door.

—

Chris Beck
Mission Day 687

A Little Earlier

Beck is sitting in a chair next to Watney, who is asleep so deeply Beck wondered at least twice whether he had fallen into a light coma. But using his very doctorly doctoring, he poked Watney, and determined that no, he's just asleep.

Beck is typing away on his laptop, and has resolved that if Watney doesn't wake up in the next two hours, Beck is going to wake him up and make him take that shower. The stench is impossible, and he doesn't want the Hermes filters to have to work too hard getting rid of it.

But Watney hasn't had a chance to rest in so long, Beck can't bring himself to take it from him over a smell. So Beck gets past it, wrinkling his nose and sitting in the room with the door closed, hoping that will at least contain it to this bunk room.

Suddenly Watney jerks, slamming his body forward out of bed, and the motion is so sudden Beck starts in his chair. Beck hears his hiss of pain as he sits up. "Jesus, Watney!" Beck blinked at Watney, and Watney blinked back at Beck.

"Watching me sleep? Kinky motherfucker," He pants, hand still at his side. He gives a grin to go with the joke, yellowed and toothy and 100% Mark Watney.

"Go get a shower, Watney. You're rank." Beck says, snapping the laptop shut and reading. Watney doesn't need babysat to get a shower, and Beck wants a moment away from the smell.

But after Watney left for the shower, Beck didn't leave the quarters hallway. He floated there, standing where Watney had retreated from.

Out of the corner of his eye, Watney's quarters lingered.

None of them had gone in there, not even after Watney had been declared alive again. The separate bunk rooms were private spaces, and nothing short of a life or death situation was enough to overcome the door being left in the Do Not Enter position. No one wanted to go in there, even when they discovered Watney was alive, knowing he might not ever make it back.

Beck decided that Watney should be in his own quarters again.

It took him about half an hour to pack up all the emergency medical supplies into a few boxes, and put them in the hall to move into the room. He wasn't going to go into Watney's bunkroom without his permission. After he finished this task, he waited.

He didn't have to wait long for Watney to reappear, complete with wild hair and bony shoulders.

"You might like your quarters better, they're warmer," Beck said, voice thick. Watney gives him a strange look, but opens the door and walks in.

Watney completely misses the significance as he steps in casually, uncaring. Mark's home,coming home so casually like it's nothing, like he wasn't dead, like he wasn't dying and gone, steps into his quarters easily like it isn't a fucking miracle that he's here at all.

The moment Watney steps through his door, he comes to a halt. Beck sees his eyes, roving over the photographs Watney had pinned all over his wall, mouth open in a small 'o.'

It doesn't take Beck long to move the boxes into Watney's room while he stands there, staring at he photos. Beck stands and looks at Watney, just as Watney picks a photograph from the wall. He brings his other hand over the photograph, fingers gently tracing the outline of his mother's face.

"The heating system is malfunctioning," Beck offers quietly. "But your body weight is so low I figured you'd appreciate it."

Watney gives no indication that he can hear Beck, still absorbed in the heavy color print photo that he's holding.

He didn't have any personal effects on Mars, Beck realizes, and he immediately backs out of the room and shuts the door. Beck couldn't deny the cold feeling drenching him, like ice being poured over his shoulders. He didn't have any photographs.

Beck has retreated to the rec room by the time the radio comes on. "I want food," Watney's whining into the comm.

"Any particular kind of food?" Johanssen answers, before Beck.

"Not potatoes." Beck doesn't miss the hysterical edge.

"Got it," Beck says. He makes something not potatoes, and hurriedly brings it to Watney.

—

Log Entry
Mission Day 687

I'm so elated I think I might float away. I'm elated like when I was accepted into the Ares III mission - that had been my only goal for six years of my life. It was an amazing feeling. Except I'm more elated, far more, because escaping has been the only thing I've been thinking about for the past 18 months, and achieving this goal means I get to live. It's making my heart bubble up in my chest every time I think about it.

I might also be high from Beck's drugs, but I am Mark Watney - Space Pirate, I can do what I want.

This feels like a cross between a hallucinogenic dream and a vacation. The situation is different, the environment is different, it's a different bed, I'm being taken care of, and part of me is waiting for it all to be over and to be time to go home (back to Mars) again.

I'm telling myself "You're not going back, you're not going back" but I can't convince myself. There's a knot in my chest that is just so fucking sure it's all a dream.

I'm not getting ahead of myself. I could die on the way back to Earth, too. I still might never see Earth.

But it's not dying on Mars, and frankly that thrills me to pieces all on it's own. Fuck you, Mars. Man I am so glad… I'm so glad I didn't just kneel into the dirt. It was worth it, all of it, just to see my crew again. Easy for me to say now that it's in the past, yeah yeah I know.

I'm exhausted, and that hot shower made me feel even more so. And my stomach is finally full, I finally am not hungry, which is just making me more sleepy. I'm sleeping, and I'm sleeping a long time because I don't have to get up and do anything tomorrow. Or the next day, or the next day, or any day until I tell Lewis I want to, because I don't care what they think and they can't make me do shit.

—

Crew
Mission Day 688

The crew, sans Watney, were in the rec room eating their lunch. Watney was missed at breakfast, which was entirely expected. Beck had informed the crew in broad terms that he was very tired, and malnourished, and would be sleeping a very long time. But he'd been back for hours, and the crew hadn't seen him yet, and were beginning to get antsy.

"He still isn't awake?" Johanssen said, stirring her oatmeal listlessly.

"Nope," Beck said. "Guy's tired." Beck had been poking his head in on Watney every few hours. He was sleeping every time, sleeping so heavily it amazed Beck.

"He's been asleep for, like, seventeen hours!" Johanssen protested, as if this would change the situation.

Back shrugged. "He should be. Three days ago he was half starved, half crazy, solo, pulling Hull Panel 19 off of the Mav. That's 400kg. Even in Martian gravity, that ain't light."

The image of Watney, starved, teeth bared, yelling, using his skeletal frame to rip Hull Panel 19 off flashed through everyone's minds.

"All right," she relented. "I'm just… Eager to see him, that's all."

"We all are," Lewis says quietly.

They sit at the table silently, eating their lunch.

"Anyone thought about what they're gonna say?" Martinez said.

"You sound like you have something in mind," Lewis remarked.

Martinez grinned. "I prepared some puns."

Everyone else groaned as Martinez whipped out his tablet and started reading.

"What do you give an alien? Some space." Martinez waggled his eyebrows. "What do you call a crazy spaceman? An astro-nut. What did the doctor say to the rocket? Time to get your booster shot. Because, you know, Beck has to give him -"

"We get it, Martinez," Johanssen said dryly, a smile playing on her face.

Martinez continues. "How do astronauts serve dinner? On flying saucers. I'll like actually toss him the plate in 0g too so it's spinning."

Everyone's groaning by now, but Martinez has a prepared list. "What do you think of that restaurant on Mars? The food had a little bit too much potato, but really it just had no atmosphere."

"Okay, that one is just bad," Vogel said.

Martinez shrugged. "They are works in progress, okay?"

"I'll be damned if you get to use even one of those, Martinez," Beck laughs.

"There's a few more -" swiping at his tablet. "Why does NASA think there's life on Mars? Because they saw a Mark in the sand."

"You know, for a second, I thought you might say something touching when this conversation started," Lewis said, shaking her head.

—

Melissa Lewis
Mission Day 689

Lewis vowed to herself she wouldn't do this, feet padding through the bunk room hallway. She just couldn't pace around the Hermes anymore, coming up with excuses to walk through the quarters wing several times an hour only to stare at the door to Watney's room.

She came to Watney's door, and grabbed the handle, set to green for Enter. She snuck in easily, knowing she wouldn't be interrupted because everyone else was off doing work she assigned them.

Beck reported that Watney's sleep was deep and unnaturally still, but that's not the sight that greeted the commander. She was met with the image of Mark Watney, breath hitching as he turned, pulling and twisting the covers. Every few minutes he would murmur something that Lewis couldn't make out, hands knotted in the thin fabric. She wasn't sure if he'd woken up in all these hours.

Lewis knew, from the Missed Orbit Training, that Mark Watney used to sleep the sleep of the dead. He'd go and go and go until he was exhausted, and then he'd fall asleep face first wherever he ended up and be as good as dead. He'd gotten good sleep in some truly weird situations before, curled up between seats of the model rover they trained in.

The sight of his face pulled in pain, frowning even in sleep, tore at her heart.

—

Chris Beck

"Commander," Beck's voice rang out. "Watney's dead."

"What the fuck, man?" Martinez exclaimed, turning around.

"We just lost Mark. I don't want to lose the Commander too." His voice is ringing, everywhere in his won head.

Beck swivels his head around to the window and Mark is lying, prone, in the Martian sand, totally alive. "Commander!" He tries to yell, but Lewis is already climbing into the MAV with them. His mouth is open but he can't get a sound out, oh god oh god he's right fucking there -

He fights the straps as the MAV lifts off but it's too late, he feels the thrust press him into his seat. As he pull away he can see Mark open his eyes, can see Mark get up, reaching out for them, screaming for them toSTOP-

—

Chris Beck
Mission Day 690

He sat up abruptly in bed, gasping.

"Chris?" Johanssen mumbled. "Nightmare?"

He looked down at Johanssen's sleepy form. "Yeah."

He'd been getting them on and off since Mark died. When he was just dead, they left his body behind, dead, lying in the sand. But since they found out Mark was alive, Mark's eyes always watched them leave, Mark was always crying, begging for Beck to stop.

Her sleepy hand reached up to his back, as it always did. "It's okay, Chris. We got him." She used to say 'we're getting him.' Now they succeeded, and she could say 'we got him.'

Beck was struck with the urge to check Mark. He was just across the ship now, not abandoned on a desolate world, and he could go lay eyes on him right this second. He threw off the covers and slipped out of the bunk. He knew Beth would wonder about it, but Beth was half robot, so he didn't expect there would be any interrogations about it.

He got to his own quarters to find Watney sleeping. Unlike earlier his sleep wasn't peaceful, and he was turning gently in his sleep. For a moment, Beck stood and watched Watney's head jerk where he lay every few seconds. His thin and wrinkled hands gripped the covers, then relaxed. After a few more pained seconds, he fell still.

Beck collapsed into the chair by Watney's bed. Watney's bones were poking out of his shoulders, his entire skeleton outlined for anyone to see. He was curled on his side, his breath catching, cringing in his sleep. Beck kept giving him IV painkillers, and knew he should be so high that his sleep should be dreamless.

Watney's condition had been worse than anticipated. Beck didn't tell Watney this, to keep morale up, but Watney's body was on the point of complete collapse. He was surprised Watney hadn't collapsed already. His body weight was dangerously low, and all his nutritional levels were low despite the vitamin supplements. There was only so much artificial vitamins could do, and while they kept full-blown scurvy at bay, Watney's muscles and organs were beginning to degrade. His pulse was irregular, the beat off-time, his blood pressure wacked out and different every time Beck took it.

Beck doubted this had a solely physical cause. Watney's body was degrading faster than it should have given his caloric intake, far faster. Beck was not a psychiatrist, but all doctors had to take basic psychiatric medicine at some point. Those psychiatric courses often included the prison treatment reform of the 2020s. The reform was characterized by ending solitary confinement as a form of punishment and restraint. The medical case studies were of victims of solitary confinement, and it was shown that - in addition to a collection of psychiatric conditions - solitary confinement alone could actually cause someone's physical body to stop functioning properly.

At this moment, though, Beck wasn't thinking of it in such clinical terms. Beck was looking at Watney's sallow skin, his disturbed sleep, and felt like it would be better to throw himself out the airlock than to have done this to one of his closest friends. But throwing himself out the airlock wouldn't help Watney; the only way he could help Watney now was by helping him recover.

So Beck sat in the chair, watched Watney sleep, and wished there were something he could give him to help.

—

Log Entry
Mission Day 691

I was really fucking tired. I slept clear through the rest of the day, and the next day, and finally woke up with everyone else today for the 7:00 alarm. I mean slept, like didn't-wake-up-once the entire time, dead-to-the-world sleep. I did get that tired on Mars, when I exhausted myself to the point of passing out hauling dirt or other stupid shit. I guess being crushed by 12gs is tiring.

The cot in the Hab (which was really two cots piled on top of each other), after a while, was a good bed. I never had any disagreements with it. But after sleeping on an honest-to-god mattress, the Hab bed is certifiably shit. This mattress is the best thing that's ever happened to me, an unrealistically perfect featherbed. I literally can't imagine what Earth mattresses feel like.

I even woke up feeling pasty, like I took an ill-advised midday nap, and all my muscles are locked up in response. It's like I got on the Hermes, my body shouted MISSION ACCOMPLISHED and now I'm fucking falling apart. I'm sore all over, all my muscles are on fire, and I don't think I could move a single solar panel in the condition I'm in.

So, it's 7am, just in time for the morning alarm, but I didn't wake up because of the alarm. I woke up because I could hear everyone else from across the ship. They turned off the alarm in my room, but I'm so used to the silence of Mars that I can hear people making food across the ship now, which is how I know it's breakfast time. Mars was silent. Mars wasn't dead silent, it was just silent except for the noises of machines and any noises I made. Nothing unexpected. Unexpected noises could kill me.

Could have, because I'm not on Mars anymore! Now unexpected noises are people. Real people, too, not 'complicated psychiatric conditions!'

So, my first day of rescue. What am I going to do today?

The crew are going to want to cry over me, probably. We high-fived and hugged for like, a minute, but I fell asleep before anyone could really come talk to me. What should I say to them? 'Hey, thanks for doubling your trip time and volunteering to die in space to come rescue me.' There's nothing I could possibly do to repay them for making it so that I didn't have to kill myself on Mars.

I'M NOT ON MARS!

—

Mark Watney
Mission Day 691

I shut the laptop and crawled out of bed. Shit, my ribs still hurt bad, but I don't care. Really bad too, like they're piercing into my sides. I want to see my crewmates. I've been alone for 18 months, a little back pain didn't stop me from hauling all that dirt and it isn't gonna stop me getting to my crew. A little back pain, a little ribs-are-stabbing-me-on-the-inside pain, a little starvation pain, who's keeping track?

Beck, Beck is keeping track, I can tell because of how high I still am. Everything is soft and warm and it's great.

Luckily the ship hasn't gotten all the way to full speed rotation, meaning the gravity isn't all the way on, so it isn't hard to get to the rec room. I can just push myself off of the bars in the walls and bounce myself there. I'm going to go see my crewmates, because they rescued me from Mars! I'M NOT ON MARS!

I can feel myself saying it out loud, and I make sure to keep the volume down. "Not on Mars, not on Mars, not on Mars…" I feel giddy, like kids do the night before Christmas.

That's my first hint. The fact that I actually have to physically contain myself from talking to myself at full volume. Hey, at least that little habit kept my voice usable. That would be kind of hilarious if I was mute-upon-rescue. There would be no end to the amount of shit from Martinez.

I float to the ladder and slide down, and god fucking damnit do these broken ribs hurt. This is annoying.

Aha, they were all there. They're even sitting at the rec room table, in a semi-organized fashion, like they're doing something productive, having already finished breakfast. Probably waiting on me. Or talking about me. I don't care.

"I'm not on Mars!" I yell, and dryness rips through my throat. As I double over coughing, it occurs to me that one can't drink water while asleep, and I've been asleep for days. At least I never lacked for water on Mars, only my potatoes did. Johanssen immediately gets up to get a packet of water (because it would float right out of a glass in 0g) and I suck it down greedily.

Okay, clear my throat again. Drink some more water. Try again.

"I'M NOT ON MARS!" There, I really got some volume now, the noise echoing slightly off of the thick composite walls.

Their faces break out into smiles, damn right they do, and then they start cheering. I join them, fist pumping just like when I got to the MAV, and of course my biceps are already sore. They're getting up from the table now, excited by how excited I am, and I'm glad they are. This is the time for hugs and cheering.

I haven't touched another human in 18 months, and Johanssen is the one standing nearest me, so I envelop her in a hug, blowing past the uncomfortable tearing sensation in my chest.

"Johanssen, you're so warm," I say, burying my head in her shoulder that is four inches below me. She seems very tall. Am I shorter? I think I'm just smaller. I notice how muscle-bound she is, and I remember that it's not her that's muscle-bound, but me that is all skin and bones.

Only now, on the Hermes, in contrast to everyone else, do I notice just how skeletal I am. I saw myself in the mirror on Mars and in Beck's quarters, but now I really see it. I feel how her shoulder blades don't stick out like mine, how you can't feel her spine all the way down her back, how her hips don't jut out of her sides. My fingers feel the thick muscles on her body. The observation puts ice in my gut.

She happily returns the contact, the warmth from her body reaching my bones. Honestly, I want a group hug. If she's warm they've gotta be warm too. God, I've been so alone, I don't want to be alone anymore. "Guys, come on, group hug time."

Lewis acted like she was waiting for permission because she nearly rushes at me, and fuck she's warm too. Beck, Martinez and even Vogel are a part of the party, and I find myself in the middle of an Ares III huddle. It's warm, but not like RTG warm, more like 'I'm not alone on a planet anymore' warm.

"Oh fuck, I was alone on that planet for so long," my mouth says on behalf of my brain, in that slightly desperate tone I've been trying to ignore for years. I've been talking that way for years. Another ice cube falls into my stomach.

How many things did I ignore because I had to?

"You're not alone anymore," came Lewis's muffled voice from somewhere. Wow, cliche, like a teen movie, but I wasn't going to argue because the words made my chest feel impossibly warm.

Christ, here come the waterworks again. "Jesus Fuck," I say. It's only because I've been through so much shit with these guys that I wasn't ashamed to start crying, right in the middle of that group hug. Really, though, I don't think I could have stopped myself if I wanted to.

But of course, they felt my chest jerk and immediately gave me space, and I didn't want that yet so my hand grabbed at someone as they all broke apart. The arm I ended up grabbing belonged to Martinez. I think it's probably awkward as hell, but, it happened, I'm not going back on it.

Martinez looked at me in the eye, and put his hand on my shoulder comfortingly.

I'm not particularly emotionally backwards, as far as men go, but I always preferred a joke and reassurances to touchy-feely-look-me-in-the-eyes comfort. I'm glad Martinez has been married since college, so he knows how to talk to provide touchy feely comfort when the situation calls for it.

Although, I'm getting the feeling that Mars changed that about me. For the first time since high school, I find myself wanting look-me-in-the-eyes comfort.

It's been so long since another human has looked at me, so of course my chest jerks again as soon as his eyes connect. I bring my hands up to cover my face, which is getting gross again really fast. "Sorry, sorry, I just haven't -"

"We know, Watney," was Martinez's amused and slightly exasperated reply, gripping me back tightly.

"We rescued you," Johanssen said again, a soft smile on her face. "You're safe with us."

My chest jerks again. "Johanssen, stop it." Every word she says, the tone she uses, makes me want to sob for ten years. Looking at her soft smile melted my heart.

Instead of crying more, though, I wiped my face off with my shirt (because I'm childish that way) and sat down.

They all looked at me and sat down too, clearly letting me lead this interaction. But now that my body had that little emotional upheaval, it's making it's will known to me, painfully. "Shit, I'm hungry," I began to say, but the words weren't out of my mouth before Beck was making something. "Beck, you're my hero."

Beck puffs up, and says "I am the one who tethered you in, after all," in a false self-important voice.

"But really, guys," I supply. "You're all-"

"We know, we know" Johanssen said, again, smiling.

They're all sitting around the table, warm eyes looking at me, everyone is looking right at me and is here with me, smiling at me, and there's something hot and warm in my chest that I can't quite get a hold of. I can feel my throat making that tearing feeling, too many emotions jammed in my body all at once.

But then I notice Lewis's face, the way it's strained, the way something about her seems held back. Lewis is a good commander, and I'll bet you any money she's blamed herself this whole time. And I look like a pretty sorry sack of shit, so she's probably feeling even more guilty just looking at me. I'm the victim here, I'm not supposed to be handling their emotional baggage.

I wave my hand in her face. "Stop that," I say, waving it indistinctly. "You're ruining my moment."

Lewis just raised her eyebrow, pressing her lips together thinly. Is she trying not to cry? I've never seen the commander cry.

I wave indistinctly again in her direction, with more energy. "Feeling guilty. Stop feeling guilty for the state I'm in, it's not your fault," I say.

The moment I made first contact, I always led with 'don't blame the crew.' I wrote them letters that said 'don't blame yourselves.' I wrote a general message to the ship that says 'don't blame yourselves.' I would have written it in Morse fucking Code, and they still don't get it.

I turned my head to look at everyone else. "That goes for all of you. Don't feel guilty. You did nothing wrong, you were following protocol, and by all rights I was dead. It was perfectly reasonable to think I was dead." A pause. "And also, I'm selfish, remember? I don't want to deal with your guilt."

That last sentence got half a laugh from them, so I felt confident I'd made my point.

It didn't matter if I actually did because the food was put under my nose, and I made it my job to get it in my stomach as fast as possible. I had to eat bland food with tiny bites or I'd get sick, but I was going to eat those tiny bites as fast as I humanly could.

I only used a utensil out of habit, and as I was inhaling food it occurred to me it might be easier to tip the plate toward my face. I actually consider doing that for a second, but then I remember there are people around to see. People! I'm not alone!

"Mark?" Lewis asked, slightly concerned. Oh, right, I'm just laughing to myself without explaining.

"I turned into a bit of a caveman while I was away," I laugh. "I just considered tipping the plate into my mouth, but then I remembered I can't do that where people can see. And then I realized that people are here! I'm not alone!" I say, looking up at her.

They all looked upset for a moment, before smiling uncertainly. Another accidentally heavy statement from Mark Watney. Points for effort, I guess.

I can practically hear the cooing in their thoughts. He's been alone for so long.

And then I remembered I've been alone for so fucking long. So alone.

At the word 'alone,' the empty MAV landing struts flash in my mind, lightning fast and barely there. The emptiness seeps into my chest like poison.

"Don't - don't do that," I mumble. "Don't look all… traumatized, or whatever. It's okay."

"Are we supposed to not be bothered?" Lewis asked, almost defensively. She was the voice of the team, I could hear it.

The team, not including me. A wall slams down, suddenly I'm not a part of this crew anymore, and I feel the emptiness crackle through my chest like flash frozen ice.

"No, but…" I sighed. "I want to be able to say whatever I want to say, but I can't if anything I might say might make you guys… It's bad, yeah, but it is what it is, so just…" I trailed off, gesturing. I'm not sure how to articulate what I'm asking. What is it I'm asking? For them to just not make a big deal of it, I guess.

They all furrowed their brows and said nothing, so I figured 'fuck it' and got back to my meal. But they all kept staring at me, even as I continued to eat.

Given that I'm wearing Johanssen's clothes and they're loose, shoveling food into my mouth with all the manners of a dog, it didn't take a genius to figure out why.

"Guys, guys," I joked. "I know I'm attractive, no need to stare."

"I've just never seen someone eat that fast," Vogel said. That was his humor - sardonic.

I nod, thanking him for the normalcy.

He nods back. Weird German guy always has your back.

Martinez was quick with a joke. "Yeah Watney, you're not gonna be underweight anymore if you keep that up." Trust Martinez to mock the starving guy. He must think he's hilarious. Privately, I do too.

"You're one to talk, Martinez," I said through my food, mouth open and everything. It was very mature of me.

Martinez raised his eyebrows, grinning.

"But really, I've been on 3/4 rations for… like, the whole time I was gone It's not like it was 1/2, but…" stop to inhale more food. "I didn't feel any more hungry than usual until Beck gave me a full meal, and now it's like my body remembered I'm starving."

After a minute, I look up and see all their aghast faces, again. What - oh yeah, living on 3/4 rations is considered a Bad Thing. But I'm on the Hermes now. There's enough food here.

The part of my ration that I can't eat is staring at me, I can't look away. My stomach is shredding my insides, and I feel like the last meal I ate must have been a meal of knives. I'm not doing any manual labor today, so I limit myself to a half-ration.

"It's okay," I tell myself, forcing myself to cover it with a bowl and putting it back in the fridge. "It's okay," I say, looking down at the food I do have. "You have plenty of food. Watney, you're lucky you even get to eat." My insides feel shredded, decimated. "Look, you get to eat and lay around and watch tv. You don't have to lift jack shit, you can just lay down and put a pillow under your back and watch Dukes of Hazzard." My voice is shaky but I don't notice.

Walking away from the fridge is physically painful, the blackness in my chest growing and growing.

The memory slams into me out of nowhere. The emptiness exploded in my chest but I'm able to breathe through my nose and divert the shaking in my chest to a deep, shaky breath. I must be doing an okay job hiding what happened, because no one seemed to notice anything changed. Or maybe they're just politely ignoring it.

Martinez is still talking. "I can tell you're starving, dude, because you're eating this shitty rehydrated food like it's the best thing that's ever happened to you."

"Dude, it is." I meant for the words to come out conversational, but they must have come out heavy, because even Martinez looked like someone killed his puppy.

"I'm just doing a fucking terrible job at this," is my prompt follow-up. "Guess I've been away a while."

Lewis shakes her head. I can't read her emotions. "No, we're the ones who are supposed to be understanding."

"But how can you understand?" I respond plaintively.

In an instant, Lewis looked like she'd been struck. Oh shit, she thought that was some sort of snippy comeback.

"Shit! sorry, I didn't mean it like…" is my hastily mumbled response. I just meant it like 'I get why you guys are being weird, because you have no context, it's okay.' I put my head in my hands, and make an obnoxious, groaning noise for effect.

How do people even talk to each other? I've only been gone a year and a half, not three decades, I shouldn't have the social skills of a mountain hermit.

That seems to relieve her sense of hurt, as her gaze softens and she smiles at me. Her hurt visibly, instantly morphs back to guilt.

I'm dozens of pounds underweight, haggard, inhaling reconstituted food, talking blithely about that time they abandoned me on a desolate, lifeless planet to die.

Okay Watney, pull it together.

I'm trying to think - how would I have reacted to someone else in my position two years ago? I honestly don't know. I haven't really been around bad things. I've had family members pass away, but that's natural. When your grandparents die you're bereft, but ultimately you knew it was going to happen. I moved on. I've never been around people who were legitimately damaged. I don't even know how to handle myself - how can I ask them to know?

I put the fork down, and mumble in the table's direction. "I know I've been gone a while, and things are going to be different now. Just please remember, I don't blame you. It isn't your fault. It isn't personal." Lewis looked at me with her sparkling blue eyes, and nodded gently. Everyone else did the same after a beat. The way things are going, they're going to need to keep that in mind.

"'Sides," I say. "I'm finally back. I'm Mark Watney, juinormost member of Ares III, I'm a dick who makes everything into a joke, and I'm back." I don't really know how to smile, but I think the moment calls for it, so I grin and crinkle my eyes to add realism. "Can I just be that guy again?"

Lewis sighs and dips her head, nodding. "Of course, Mark, you're right."

"If Lewis tries to take anything personally I'll make fun of her for it," Martinez assured me, nodding solemnly.

Great. I can go back to inhaling my food now. "The only reason you like that shit is because it's not potatoes," Martinez says, trying heroically to get everything back to normal. I admire his determination.

"Don't knock my potatoes," I said, feeling the weight of the food settle in my stomach. "Yeah, I'm never eating potatoes again, but there was only good bacteria on mars, and they were completely organic and GMO. I gave each plant individual care. They were the best baked potatoes anyone's ever had."

"I can't imagine," he says, laughing, "Only eating baked fucking potatoes for a solid year."

"I mashed them once or twice," I said conversationally, "But it took a lot of effort and I didn't really have any clean utensils, so I stopped doing that."

"How did you wash things?" Beck asked curiously.

"I made 600L of water. I had plenty of water to wash stuff; just had to dump it back into the reclaimer after. But with all the dirt on the floor, things never stayed clean long."

"How did you make 600L of water?" Vogel asked, eyes blown. He's the chemist, after all.

"You'll like this, Vogel," I am out and out laughing now. "I lit the hydrazine from the MDV on fire. Turns it right to water."

They aren't laughing. They are staring at me. They don't seem to think it's funny.

My laughing dies down awkwardly when their expressions don't change. Their eyes are round, actually, like I just told them something disastrous.

I needed water; that's how you get water. What was I supposed to do?

Their shocked faces kept staring at me, mouths dropping open. I kept staring at them, trying to see what it is they were seeing.

Suddenly, I saw. Suddenly, off of Mars, Mars was much more terrifying. Setting hydrazine on fire can blow you up so fast you won't even know you died. I remembered my training, my fear of hydrazine, my deadly fear of fire on the Hermes. I remembered the fear of everything exploding, everyone dying by explosion. The way we trained and trained and trained and trained to avoid fire. NASA's safety rules and guidelines weren't them being fucking annoying nannies; they were designed to keep us alive.

If you ask NASA what the worst case scenario is, they say "fire." If you ask them what happens, they'd answer "death by fire."

But I knew the risks, didn't I? I knew what I was doing when I lit rocket fuel on fire. I knew I would probably die by fire. It didn't matter. One, had I not done it, I would have starved to death before anyone could rescue me. Two… I didn't care if I died.

A different sort of cavern opened up in my chest, seemingly out of nowhere, consuming me. My chest physically hurt as if elephants have been rampaging across my sternum.

No, it's not out of nowhere, it's the cavern that's been there since Sol 6. But I'm rescued. I'm on the Hermes. Why the fuck was it here?

"Mark?" Lewis tried, and I was yanked back into the present. They were still all staring at me, in varying states of horror. I shored up my emotional reserves and tried to explain myself.

"Look, I had to do a lot of stupid shit to survive," I said quietly. "I'm laughing about it now because I lived. If I didn't get that water, I was going to starve to death. I couldn't delay it, either; I had to start growing the potatoes immediately, in order to have time for them to grow. I needed that water right then. Yeah, I could have exploded, but it was maybe explode now versus definitely starve to death later." I neglected to mention that I really didn't care if it went wrong.

Ok, there's those dreadful facial expressions again. That means what I said was Bad. All right, official goals: 1) Rebuild the brain-mouth filter. 2) Stop saying Bad Things like it's no big deal because it makes them upset.

"We know, Watney, just…" Lewis rubbed her face like she was a million years old. "We worried a lot about you."

I quirk a half-smile. "Well you don't need to worry anymore, because I could have died from all the stupid stuff I did, but I didn't." I'm pointing at them for the joke.

Yeah, fuck you Mars. You didn't kill me, I win. A grin split my face as I finished the last of my food. Okay, I'm going to say that out loud. "Yeah fuck you Mars, I win."

"You are the King of Mars," Beck quipped with half a grin.

The very concept makes me shiver. "Not anymore. I don't want anything to do with that god forsaken hellscape anymore."

"No can do, pal," Martinez shook his head. "You're gonna be the guy that survived 549 Sols for the rest of your life, and people are gonna be asking about Mars until the day you die."

I'm finally out of food, and my stomach is so full that I can physically feel it stretching. I'm also exhausted. I could feel myself sinking down at the table, ready to put my face in my arms. "I'll tell them fuck Mars, I beat Mars."

"He needs to be put down for a nap," Beck laughed. "Get up, Watney, go to bed," he said, shoving my shoulder. The moment his hand landed, I wished he wouldn't lift it.

New Mark Watney Personality Trait: Touchy-feely.

I don't want to get up, I want to sit here with my head in my hands and listen to them talk. But Beck pushes me gently until I get up, so I get on my stabby feeling ribs as Beck floats with me to my quarters.

"Do you need anything?" was Beck's question from behind me.

"Are you putting me to bed?" My voice is mocking, and I'm glad I can still pull that off.

"Yes, because I'm a doctor, and you're my patient who broke two ribs in a 12g convertible launch, damaged their back and legs from almost constant physical activity and cramped living conditions, and has been a victim of starvation for a year and a half. I am personally putting you to bed."

I briefly entertained the notion of demanding independence, but decided against it. If Beck kept checking up on me, I'd have company (a huge plus) and I'd have Beck stepping and fetching shit for me (another huge plus).

Beck was still talking. "In fact, I'm inclined to put you on forced bedrest for a few days to heal."

I shrugged. "That's fine, honestly, as long as you losers come visit me in here."

Beck rolled his eyes. "Let me be right back, I'm going to go grab you some meds," he said, and he shut the door.

The moment I was alone in the room with the shut door, my body went rigid. I felt my muscles thrumming, felt time slow down, and it took me by surprise. This is what happened when something bad was about to happen.

Had I noticed something wrong? Was something bad about to happen?

Fuck, no, I'm on the Hermes, not Mars, please don't let anything bad happen.

I stood there on high alert, straining my ears.

Nothing happened.

Beck was back as soon as he left, and when he opened the door it startled the shit out of me. I jerked backwards, so much so that I almost fell over.

"Watney!" Beck exclaimed. "You all right?"

As soon as I adjusted to the fact that he was back in the room, my stress level dropped significantly and I didn't think twice about it.

"Yeah, yeah," I said, collapsing onto the bed. "Gimme the drugs."

He did, and I downed them greedily, and fell back on the bed. I would have liked to stay awake longer and look at all the photos I put on my wall, but I fell asleep before I even knew it happened.

—

Crew
Mission Day 691

Earlier That Day

"All right," Beck said. "NASA has compiled a report on the possible physical and psychological effects of his time on Mars. They want me to talk you guys through how we should treat him on the ship, as in how we should behave around him. Although, I gotta say," he said, swiping on the tablet, "It isn't a very helpful report."

"So like every NASA report?" Martinez asked.

"No, this one is worse. I think they just googled 'solitary confinement,' and included every bad thing that's ever happened to someone from isolation. In addition to the usual anxiety, depression, PTSD, mood dysregulation, personality changes, dissociation -"

"These are the usual things?" Johanssen cut in.

"-They included inability to sleep, as in at all,complex hallucinations,specific hallucinations 'such as dancing apples,' inability to speak, loss of object permanence - the inability to remember that things he can't see still exist - loss of object permanence with respect to people is a big concern of theirs -"

"So he might just forget we're all on this ship with him if he can't see us?" Lewis said.

Beck nods. "Yes. Uh, they've also listed anorexia, bulimia, various other behavioral problems, and a high probability of never successfully reintegrating with the human population at large."

Everyone pauses for a moment, swallowing.

"It's really not gonna be that bad," Beck says, trying to be reassuring. "This is everything that could happen. I highly doubt all of these things will happen."

"Beck, you're the only one whose really talked to him," Lewis says. "What do you think is the likelihood of any of these things?"

Beck raises his eyebrows. "Uh, well, he seems to remember that we all exist when we're not around, which is good -"

Suddenly Watney thrusts himself into the rec room, and everyone's mouths snap shut.

He's in a sorry state. He's wearing the sweat clothes that belong to Johanssen, and everyone notices how they hang off of his skeletal frame, draping where his shoulders poke through his shirt. His skin is unevenly colored, red blotches visible on his face and hands, bruses on his arms, dirt embedded under his fingernails. His skin was wrinkled and leathery on his face, tan from solar radiation. His hair is cut in a somewhat organized fashion, but they can tell he did it himself with an electric razor and one mirror, and his bedhead makes it look like a mess. He's lost a ton of muscle, and bears more resemblance to a starving child in a Sarah McLaughlin commercial then he does to an astronaut. They can see the strain in his movements, too, flinching visibly whenever he has to push off of a surface, panting hard with the exertion of making it to the rec room.

Mark Watney used to have bright eyes. Bright, blue, full of laughter, probably mocking someone nearby, always ready to give someone a hug. The most cheerful person in any room.

The Mark Watney that stood in front of them had the same hopeful eyes, but there was years and years of suffering that weren't there before. There was a heaviness in his gaze that floored them all. His eyes were sunken, exhausted,open just a little too wide for comfort. His gaze flicked around in an agitated fashion. He looked torn.

He didn't seem to notice any of this, though, as he righted himself in the low gravity. He charged in, completely unaware of the situation, intent on saying whatever it is he was gonna say. That, at least, was the same Mark Watney they'd always known

"I'm not on Mars!" He yells, but immediately doubles over hacking and coughing. The sight of his thin frame bent over is unsettling. Johanssen rushes to get him a packet of water, and he stands there for a moment sucking it up like a child with a juicebox.

But after some water and throat clearing, he yells again. "I'M NOT ON MARS!"

He yells loud enough that it hurts their ear drums, but the crew starts smiling. Watney, skeletal, malnourished and closer to death than life, is standing tall in front of them with a shit-eating grin on his face, and they're so damn proud of him that all they can do is cheer along with him.

He begins to fist pump, looking around to an imaginary crowd of onlookers, and the crew is laughing and standing up to greet him. After his fist pumping, his eyes land on Johanssen, and he immediately pulls her into a crushing hug.

"Johanssen, you're so warm," he mumbles, snuggling with Johanssen, who unabashedly snuggles right back. The entire crew is aware of how tightly he is hugging her, aware that Watney is burying his face in her shoulder even though she's the shorter one, watching Johanssen bring her hand up to Watney's hair.

"Guys, come on, group hug time," Watney mumbles in her shoulder. Lewis rushes at the both of them, taller than either, then Beck and Martinez and Vogel join on all sides.

For a perfect moment, the six of them just stand there, together again.

"Oh fuck, I was alone on that planet for so long," Comes Watney's voice from somewhere in the middle of the hug.

"You're not alone anymore," came Lewis's choked voice from above, tallest of them all.

Watney's voice comes from the middle of the hug again. "Jesus fuck," he pants.

But from the middle of the group hug they felt Watney's chest jerk, and instinctively break apart to give him space. As soon as it's happening, they think that might not have been the right thing to do, just as Watney's hand chases Martinez's and grabs on.

Martinez, the most fifteen year old person to ever live, just looks him in the eye and puts his hand on Watney's shoulder.

In response, Watney instantly slams his eyes shut, brings his hands up to cover his face, hiding tears. "Sorry, sorry, I just haven't -" he starts thickly.

"We know, Watney," was Martinez's amused and slightly exasperated reply, gripping him back.

"We rescued you," Johanssen said again, a soft smile on her face. "You're safe with us."

"Johanssen, stop it," is Watney's thick and joking reply as he collapses into his seat. Everyone else follows suit, sitting around the rec table.

Everyone always sits in the same seat at the rec table. Lewis, with Beck on one side and Watney on the other, Watney next to Martinez, next to Vogel, next to Johanssen, next to Beck.

The second Watney collapses into his seat, something in the world is put right again. They've been staring at that empty seat for far too long.

Watney looks around for a moment distractedly, just taking in the sight of the Hermes. The rest of the crew just looks at him, waiting.

"Shit, I'm hungry," was what he says after a moment, but Beck's already on his feet making him food. "Beck, you're my hero," he says, sighting the food.

Beck puffs up, and says "I am the one who tethered you in, after all," with false self-importance.

"But really, guys," He says, looking up. "You're all-"

"We know, we know" Johanssen said, again, smiling.

Watney looks around the table again for a moment distantly. Just as the crew wonders what he's thinking, he waves his hand in Lewis's face "Stop that. You're ruining my moment."

They'd all been ignoring the stiff way she'd been sitting. Lewis just raised her eyebrow, pressing her lips together thinly, pretending she didn't know what he was talking about.

He waves his arm again. "Feeling guilty. Stop feeling guilty for the state I'm in, it's not your fault. That goes for all of you. Don't feel guilty. You did nothing wrong, you were following protocol, and by all rights I was dead. It was perfectly reasonable to think I was dead." A pause. "And also, I'm selfish, remember? I don't want to deal with your guilt."

That last sentence got half a laugh from everyone at the table.

But as soon as the food was under Watney's nose, he stopped talking to everyone else in favor of shoving it in his face as fast as possible. Although, it wasn't too fast, considering Watney was taking tiny bites and using extra care to chew each one thoroughly. He looked like he was having trouble with the utensil, as if he hadn't used one in a while.

Watney's laughing to himself while he's eating. They wait on him to provide an explanation, but he doesn't.

"Mark?"

Watney looked up and they could swear he looked startled before his eyes focused on them. "I turned into a bit of a caveman while I was away. I just considered tipping the plate into my mouth, but then I remembered I can't do that where people can see. And then I realized that people are here! I'm not alone!" His voice sounded a bit disconnected, artificially cheerful.

By the time anyone can respond, he's returned to staring at his food lovingly. No one knew quite how to react, and settled for smiling uncertainly.

Watney's eating slows down, and he looks up at the group. "Don't - don't do that," He mumbles. "Don't look all… traumatized, or whatever. It's okay."

What the fuck kind of request is that? "Are we supposed to not be bothered?" Lewis asked defensively.

"No, but…" He looks down at the table. "I want to be able to say whatever I want to say, but I can't if anything I might say might make you guys…" he waves his hand, as if to say 'make you guys like this.' "It's bad, yeah, but it is what it is, so just…"

Just what? Don't react? Nobody knows what to say, and everyone just looks at Watney blankly.

He goes back to shoveling food into his mouth at the speed of light, and no one has the heart to talk to him, which would make him stop eating.

"Guys, guys," He jokes, in between bites. "I know I'm attractive, no need to stare."

Martinez immediately snorts.

"I've just never seen someone eat that fast," Vogel says lightly.

"Yeah Watney, you're not gonna be underweight anymore if you keep that up," was Martinez's sensitive comment.

"You're one to talk, Martinez," Watney says, mouth full of food. Johanssen groans, and puts a hand between her and Watney. Martinez raised his eyebrows, grinning.

"But really," Watney says, mouth still fill "I've been on 3/4 rations for… like, the whole time I was gone It's not like it was 1/2, but…" stop to inhale more food. "I didn't feel any more hungry than usual until Beck gave me a full meal, and now it's like my body remembered I'm starving," cocking half a smile.

Ha ha. I remembered I'm literally starving to death. The cavalier attitude with which he said that bothered everyone more than they'd like to admit.

Watney takes an awkward pause from his food, breathing deeply through his nose, eyes unfocused. Probably gathering steam to dive back into his food.

"I can tell you're starving, dude, because you're eating this shitty rehydrated food like it's the best thing that's ever happened to you," is Martinez's chosen response.

Watney's not resumed eating yet, still staring at his food oddly. "Dude, it is."

For a third time, the crew just doesn't know what to say in response.

He takes another bite, but then looks up at the crew. He puts down the fork, and sighs. "I'm just doing a fucking terrible job at this. Guess I've been away a while."

Lewis laughs. "No, we're the ones who are supposed to be understanding."

"But how can you understand?" His eyes are looking at us, plain. He didn't mean it as an insult, he just meant it as a question, and everyone at the table knows, but the reality of it slams into them like a train. How can we possibly understand what he's gone through?

"Shit! sorry, I didn't mean it like…" is his hasty apology. He puts his head in his hands, groaning dramatically.

After a moment, he says "I know I've been gone a while, and things are going to be different now. Just please remember, I don't blame you. It isn't your fault. It isn't personal. 'Sides, I'm finally back. I'm Mark Watney, juinormost member of Ares III, I'm a dick who makes everything into a joke, and I'm back. Can I just be that guy again?"

He's grinning, eyes crinkling, but the smile looks weary and tired. "Of course, Mark, you're right," Lewis says.

"If Lewis tries to take anything personally I'll make fun of her for it," Martinez assures Watney, nodding solemnly.

Watney seems to find this adequate, because he goes back to inhaling his food. It's a bit of a spectacle, really, the gusto with which he eats.

"The only reason you like that shit is because it's not potatoes," Martinez says, working hard to get everything back to normal.

"Don't knock my potatoes. Yeah, I'm never eating potatoes again, but there was only good bacteria on mars, and they were completely organic and GMO. I gave each plant individual care. They were the best baked potatoes anyone's ever had."

"I can't imagine only eating baked fucking potatoes for a solid year."

"I mashed them once or twice, but it took a lot of effort and I didn't really have any clean utensils, so I stopped doing that."

"How did you wash things?" Beck asked curiously.

Watney shrugs. "I made 600L of water. I had plenty of water to wash stuff; just had to dump it back into the reclaimer after. But with all the dirt on the floor, things never stayed clean long."

"How did you make 600L of water?" Vogel asked, eyes blown. He's the chemist, after all.

Watney starts laughing. "You'll like this, Vogel. I lit the hydrazine from the MDV on fire." He snaps, for added effect. "Turns it right to water."

Everyone feels like they've been drenched in ice, but he's still laughing like it's a funny joke.

He lit the hydrazine on fire. First, he took the hydrazine into the Hab, his only safe haven. He looked for something flammable in the Hab. He created an open spark with electrical equipment, in the Hab. And then he used it to light rocket fuel on fire, in the Hab.

The worst part of all of this is that Watney thinks this is hilarious, still laughing to himself like it's just a funny story.

His laughing dies down n the face of their silence. For a moment he narrowed his eyes at them, eyebrows raised, confused.

But after a moment, he looks down. He doesn't look confused anymore, he looks ashamed, he's looking at his food but he's staring past it. Nobody is saying anything, and they're beginning to feel guilty for their reactions making him feel this way. What else was he supposed to do?

"Mark?" Lewis tried.

Watney jerks, looks up at them, and starts mumbling.

"Look, I had to do a lot of stupid shit to survive," he's murmuring. "I'm laughing about it now because I lived. If I didn't get that water, I was going to starve to death. I couldn't delay it, either; I had to start growing the potatoes immediately, in order to have time for them to grow. I needed that water right then. Yeah, I could have exploded, but it was maybe explode now versus definitely starve to death later."

He's looking around the table at everyone in turn, with an expression somewhere between defiance and pleading, eyebrows drawn together but eyes searching for something.

"We know, Watney, just…" Lewis rubbed her face like she was a million years old. "We worried a lot about you."

He quirks a grin. "Well you don't need to worry anymore, because I could have died from all the stupid stuff I did, but I didn't." He grins, widely. "Fuck you Mars, I win."

"You are the King of Mars," Beck quipped with half a grin.

Watney physically shivers. "Not anymore. I don't want anything to do with that god forsaken hellscape anymore."

"No can do, pal," Martinez shook his head. "You're gonna be the guy that survived 549 Sols for the rest of your life, and people are gonna be asking about Mars until the day you die."

Watney's out of food and slumps down at the table, into his arms. "I'll tell them fuck Mars, I beat Mars."

"He needs to be put down for a nap," Beck laughed. "Get up, Watney, go to bed," he said, shoving Watney's shoulder. "Do you need anything?"

"Are you putting me to bed?" Watney's voice is a cross between joking and whining.

"Yes, because I'm a doctor, and you're my patient who broke two ribs in a 12g convertible launch…" they continue talking as they both bounce out of the rec room.

In their wake, everyone looks at each other awkwardly. No one knows what to say.

"Am I the only one who noticed how often he spaced out?" Martinez ventures. "Not once, but twice he spaced out so hard that he jerked when we said his name."

"NASA did warn us," Lewis said, shrugging.

Martinez shook his head. "It's weird to see in person."

"Also, he would look no one in the eye," Vogel observed. "I wonder what NASA will make of this."

It was at this moment that Beck returned to the room. "I put him to bed," he offered. "He's probably going to be asleep three more days."

"Did you see the way he kept just… spacing out?" Martinez asked Beck. "Every other sentence, it's like he forgot we were here. Staring at the wall."

Beck spread his arms out. "NASA warned us."

"Lewis said," Martinez rolled his eyes.

"Based on that interaction, can you reassess what you think Watney's situation is?" Lewis said. "You were just telling us you have no idea."

Beck sighs for a moment. "Well, he carried on a cogent conversation, cracked jokes, picked up on social cues, so that's all promising. He doesn't seem to have a sense for his own pain, but he's probably just in the habit of ignoring it…" Beck picks up his tablet again, swiping. "We'll just have to wait and see. Any suspicions I have now are covered under doctor-patient confidentiality."

"We all released that when we went on this mission," Lewis said.

Beck shrugged. "If I think you need to know, I'll tell you. For now, I'm going to keep my suspicions private, out of respect for his privacy."

Lewis frowned, but nodded.

"Okay, NASA's recommendations for his care. Physiological is my department, but behavioral will need all of your help. Basically, NASA thinks normalcy and routine will help minimize the after-effects of Mars."

"In other words, he's been on his own too long, make a routine and stick to it with him," Lewis agreed. "That's what I was thinking. We already have a routine, so we just have to make sure we actually stick to it."

Lewis turned her piercing eye around the table. In the last hundred days, they had gotten less than rigorous about sticking to the NASA schedule, because they were anxious about Watney's rescue and almost ten light-minutes away from Earth. NASA had no power to make them stick to any routine.

"Yes Commander," Johanssen said guiltily. It was, of course, her and Beck who were doing the worst job sticking to the curfew.

"I know you two like spending time in the rec room after-hours -" Lewis began,

"But you have to keep your canoodling to yourselves now, do you hear?" Martinez laughed. "In other words, get a room."

"We have a room, a tiny room with a twin bed and about ten square feet of walking space," Johanssen said.

Martinez waggled his eyebrows. "I'm sure you two will find a way."

"We're not -" Beck said in a stilted voice. "It's -" He tried again. "This ship isn't soundproof, and besides, we wouldn't…"

Lewis frowned, not wanting to appear as if she approved of the line of joking, but privately enjoying Beck's struggle.

"This true?" Martinez asked Johanssen.

She shrugged. "For the most part."

Vogel shook his head. "For the most part," he repeated in his thick accent.

"Anyways," Beck said loudly, "The geniuses at NASA also said that Watney will probably be lonely and wanting contact with other humans, so pending Watney's feelings on the matter, we should spend time with him and, basically, touch him a lot. We all saw the way he hung on to Martinez."

"Oh, the wisdom of NASA," Martinez shook his head. "Telling us shit we already know."

Commander Lewis privately agreed.

"Oh, and one more thing," Beck said. "NASA included a bunch of warning symptoms we should all be on the lookout for. If you see any of the following, let me know within 24 hours: extreme mood swings, failure to get his attention after yelling his name in his face, inability to wake him up, insomnia, uh…" more swiping. "If you observe any of the following, let me know immediately: talking or yelling at things that aren't there, failure to acknowledge things that are there."

"Is there a reason we need to tell you if we think he's not sleeping? Can't he do that himself?" Martinez asked.

Beck frowned at him. "NASA is worried he's going to hide things from us, or lie about it to us."

"I feel like they're convicting him before he's even done anything," Johanssen said. "I know, 'be prepared for every eventuality,' but I just can't believe Mark Watney would lie to us."

"People are more willing to lie about things that they think they shouldn't have to talk about," Lewis said. "We're not supposed to lie on the ship, but if someone asked me what losing my virginity was like, I would hardly be inclined to give a helpful answer. Watney may consider his mental health under that category."

"We already know what you losing your virginity was like," Martinez said unhelpfully. "We've gossiped about everything on this ship."

Lewis rolls her eyes. "You know what I'm trying to say."

—

Mark Watney
Mission Day 692

I was yanked into consciousness by a loud banging on my door, and it woke me up as suddenly as it were gunfire. Jesus Christ my heart is pounding as hard as… well, as it was pretty much the whole time I was on Mars.

The door opened to reveal Lewis, and I sat up, pulling myself together.

"What are you doing?" she asked.

What kind of question is that? I was sleeping!

She was standing next to a photo of my parents, and the words left my mouth very suddenly. "I want to talk to my parents."

Now that I was awake, and mostly functional, and I'd talked to the crew, I needed to talk to my mom and dad. I'd been emailing them, but now I could have something resembling a real time conversation. I need my mom and dad.

Lewis smiled, as if she'd been expecting that. "I've been waiting for you to ask; I'll set up a time tomorrow."

She made to leave, so I said "Wait, that's it?" You came just to hear me demand to talk to my mommy and daddy?

She cocked her head. "Well if you want to actually talk to your parents, I need to let NASA know ASAP."

That made sense, I supposed, as she closed the door again. They need to be flown to Houston to get the quickest communication, and I suppose when NASA accidentally leaves you on Mars they roll out the red carpet for you.

Well I wasn't going to be able to go right back to sleep, because the adrenaline shot she gave me would power me through the apocalypse. Instead I stared at my photos, memorizing my mom and dad's faces.

Is it just me, or is my body heavier?

I roll over to the radio in my room. "What's the gravity in the quarters?"

"0.5gs" Johanssen answers. Is all she do hide in the comm room? "We're working back up to 1."

The Hermes keeps the quarters and the fitness room in 1g, so that our bodies don't deteriorate from too long in space. Sleeping in gravity goes a long way toward people not dying.

But I haven't been in 1g in years. I'm starved out and weak. I'm not sure my body could handle the strain. This seems like a major oversight on their part.

"You should ask Beck if I can handle that," I groggily mumble.

"Shit, yeah," Johanssen said, voice tight. "Sorry, forgot." I'm jealous. I'd love to forget.

There's a knock at the door. "Come in," I yell, as loudly as I can manage.

It's Lewis, back again. "I was nearest you. Beck says that we're just going to move your cot to a 0.4g area."

"Where would that be?" I ask. The 0.4g area were the labs, kept at martian gravity for obvious reasons. "Also, that's gonna be cold."

"The lab area," she said. "I was thinking we'd put you in an unused lab."

"Can I request my lab?" I ask. "I can keep the temp up with the life support systems for the plants."

She tilts her head. "That's a decent idea. Now get up."

I can tell I'm heavier as I drag my battered and broken body out of that mattress. I feel barely strong enough to stand on my own two legs, and I lean against the wall for support.

"Any longer and I would have suffocated from the gravity," I joked weakly.

In retrospect, that was in poor taste; they view me as a failure of their's, and joking about my condition just rubs it in their face. It isn't supposed my job to be strong for them and help them get over their grief, but somehow in 5 days the responsibility has already fallen to me whether I like it or not.

She's got my mattress and sheets piled up and is holding the door open for me. She doesn't even pretend to laugh at my joke, and her face is stiff. I'm sorry I said anything.

Getting to my lab is a sullen affair, because I don't ask for help and she seems too stiff to offer it. I want her to offer help, but I can't shore up the emotional reserves to ask.

There are empty tables and lab carts everywhere, so they are swept aside in one motion by Lewis as she plops the bedding down and spreads it out.

She frowns, looking at her creation, which amounts to a nest of blankets on top of a thin mattress on the floor. "It just seems cruel to tell the guy we just rescued that he has to sleep on the floor," she admitted.

I shrug, now more able to stand in the lighter gravity, around 0.2g at the moment. "It's a lot better than where I was, let me tell you."

For one, this lab is positively spacious. I can lay down in both directions with half a foot of room to stretch. Not like the fucking rover. For two, I am not worried I'm going to pop like a grape in the night.

She gives me a warm look. "Try to get some sleep."

I nod as I ease myself onto the floor. What do you know, the Hermes mattress is just as amazingly comfortable in the lab, too. Still a featherbed after all.

—

Log Entry
Mission Day 692

You know, we never drilled for if someone got left behind.

If someone was outside, like me, and their suit got breached, like me, it would have been impossible to get me into the Hab or the MAV in time for me not to suffocate. Theoretically, if my suit was breached, either I could fix it with my resin, or the hole was so large I popped like a grape. There would be no time for someone else to get to me with their resin, and there's little chance their resin would make any difference anyways.

According to NASA, they did the right thing. My suit was depressurized, and I would have been dead in minutes. No time to save me.

If I hadn't depressurized, and the biomonitor hadn't been stabbed, though, I might have been unconscious and injured. Then again, no injury wouldn't have depressurized the suit, and without the insane luck to land obliquely, I would have still died in minutes. So really, there was no conceivable circumstance where someone would be injured and unable to get to the MAV.

I know that's not how it would have worked in reality, though. They would have known to home in on my suit, and I'm not sure how they would have gotten my body onto the MAV, but I know Lewis would have tried her damndest.

Then again, had Lewis found me, she would have been without recourse. It's really not that inconceivable that someone would be alive and unable to move themselves into the MAV, now that I think about it. What if a man was injured inside the Hab and unable to move to the MAV? What if someone was in the Hab but we have to launch now or the MAV breaks?

I guess NASA just figured any conditions that would require leaving a man behind alive would be the sort of conditions where that man was going to die anyways. The kind of serious injury that would ground someone is the kind that would kill them in ascent. But shouldn't NASA have known to provide emergency rations?

Then again, NASA doesn't have the money for 4 years worth of provisions, or they would probably make us do two year stays. And until me, we had no idea Mars soil was even appropriate for cultivation. So I guess the situation wouldn't have changed for the trapped man; best to proceed as if they died already.

NASA is a bit dystopian that way. Best to leave one man for dead and save the whole of space flight than set science back fifty years over one life. Before I left I agreed with that philosophy and… honestly, if it were a case of me just dying outright, I'd still agree. But instead of dying outright, I got a lot of suffering and probable death, which for some reason is a lot worse.

But I did say NASA is a bit dystopian. The people who set these policies probably just expected a man in my position to kneel into the dirt and die. Part of me still thinks I should have.

Not that I think Lewis would have ever left me behind alive. Luckily for the crew, they thought I was dead. I say luckily for the crew, because it meant they lifted off the MAV before it tipped and we were all stranded. Although, maybe if the MAV tipped, we could have all gone to Schiaparelli together and taken that MAV (intact) to the Hermes, which would have still been orbiting (so no terrifying modifications), and we wouldn't have been stranded more than 100 days. We'd starve a bit, but be better off than I am now.

No, we couldn't have, because we would not have all fit in the rover. I don't know, though; when you have literally no other options, you find a way to make things work. We could have found a way to shove everything into the trailer.

I'm glad that's not what happened, though. I don't want the rest of the crew to have gone through such a horrid experience just so I could avoid pain.

Yeah, NASA prepared all they could, but I'm a little hurt that their preparation in this situation turned out to be "fuck, he'll probably die anyways."

Don't get me wrong - I'm thrilled not to be on Mars, and that's the work of NASA. It's my favorite thing in the world, looking at my quarters and thinking "not Mars." I don't think I'm ever really going to hate a situation again, because if I hate what's going on I can just think 'not Mars' and it's put into perspective.

But… you know what, no use for man pride here. I feel like a victim. I feel like a victim of Mars, and I feel like a victim of NASA. If anyone had been better prepared, I wouldn't have had to suffer 549 days of holocaust-quality lifestyle. Yeah, I just said my lifestyle was like the holocaust. Starvation, mandatory backbreaking labor, brutal injuries, constant pain, cramped conditions, and living in my own shit.

Well, it wasn't as bad as the holocaust, because 1) I had disco, tv and baths, and 2) I didn't get raped and shoved into a gas chamber in the end.