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By that last day on Mars we had our shift change routines down.
For our final transfer, Chuck trekked first over the dune to the landed
ship, meeting an already suited-up Liam in the airlock and trading
places. I watched on the monitor as Liam skipped over the pebbled
sand toward me. Even in my exhaustion, I smiled. There was no
arguing it was the fastest way to travel by foot in lighter gravity, but
with Liam the skipping seemed comical.
I helped Liam from the airlock, unfastened his helmet. We took
our time double checking, triple checking all my hoses and
connections, knowing Chuck did the same for Jabril in the ship across
the dune. Since the fight they'd been cordial but distant--and not just
with each other: they both seemed to have retreated to places Liam
and I couldn't follow.
Idly, we watched the monitor with the exterior camera feed,
waiting. Shift change procedure was a bit unwieldy, but with such a
small crew and the need to have a partner check one's suit
connections, it seemed the safest maneuver. Jabril was only halfway
across the rise when he collapsed on the reddish dirt.
It wasn't a collapse so much as a slow crumpling, like a ball
of tinfoil wadded in a tightening fist. Since I was the only one fully
suited, Liam pushed me into the airlock without speaking, punching
the release sequence into the airlock control even before the hatch
shut all the way.
Nonsensically, my fingers scrabbled at the rim of the exterior
door, as though I could hasten its process. I skipped in great bounds
across the sand toward the bundle of foil paper I knew was Jabril.
Even with my space-atrophied muscles, lifting him in thirty-eight
percent Earth gravity was doable. I battled the panic rising in my
throat like bile. My bladder clamped with the thought that I might not
be able to get Jabril to the ship by myself.
I scooped him onto my shoulder, lifting him in a fireman's
carry. I trotted across the red emptiness, small puffs of dust rising at
my every footfall. It was the first time I'd walked on the surface of
this place and not felt the wonder of it. There was no room in my
mind for anything but fear for the man whose curved faceplate banged
jarringly against my air tank as I jogged.
I waited what seemed an eon for the airlock indicator to turn
green. My breath rang inside the hollows of my suit, fogging slightly
against my supposedly fog-proof faceplate. When the hatch slid aside
Chuck leapt forward to roll the deadweight of the man from my
shoulder. My fingers fumbled with my helmet latches, too clumsy in
gloves to make quick work of it. By the time I got the thing off and
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