First

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Anthony shut his eyes again. It’s always so bright. He knew what he was getting into, but no one really anticipates everything that goes into being broadcast twenty-four, seven. “Can you at least dim the light? I am still trying to sleep,” he implored to the robotic arm extending from the ceiling. The light dimmed in intensity.

A minute later a static infused voice came over the speaker. “Sorry, Anthony. Everyone here is just getting excited, today is the big day.”

They kept earth time, even though out here no one could really tell how long a day was anymore. Alarms set their days. Buzz, get up. Buzz, lunch. Buzz, time for bed. And the lights, it was always light. With the transmission distance increasing, the video sent home got less and less resolution, so the show runners kept bumping the brightness on the lights. At least that was the rumor going around the ship. Anthony suspected living six months in a shielded torpedo made them all more sensitive to the light.

“Wake up, Mars 1."

"Wakey, wakey, eggs and bakey."

"I love you, Gordon! Woo Hoo!” came another, more high-pitched voice.

“Ugh,” groaned Anthony, trying to pull his sleeping bag over his head. The runners warned them about this. As the ship got closer, they would be running contests back home to finance the Mars 2 trip. For most people, this whole thing was just some expensive, worldwide reality show. They probably wondered when they’d be able to vote people off the rocket. “So, you think you can astronaut,” or something.

“Come on, Ant, Sue, time to wet-nap and eat,” Gordon still got up first every day. From the first day in the finalist training, he had always been the first into his sack, and the first out. “Five more minutes, Mom,” Sue mumbled as she tried to roll over.

“We should be over it in about 5 minutes. I want to see The Hotel. Hurry up, the night guys will be hogging the telescope if we don't get up there soon,” Gordon pleaded. Sue and Lisa had spent the first few weeks in space naming everything cutesy names. “The Hotel” was the name they had given the chain of landers-turned-buildings that the first humans on mars would live in. It looked more like a pack of white bonbons to Anthony, but he knew a long trip in a tight space was not the place to start stupid arguments. He unzipped his bag and pushed off toward his bag of clothes. Getting dressed without gravity had been one of the easier things to adapt to since they left earth. He didn't have to worry about falling over putting one leg in his pants at a time and the falls that came along with that anymore.

After putting on his jumpsuit, Anthony flung himself up the ladder after Gordon into the mid-ship. This was ringed in portholes, and three articulating camera arms extended from the center console trying to get good shots of the planet below. Gordon pushed one out of his way to get to the telescope. “It should be right below,” he said as he swung the telescope back and forth hunting for the landing site. Anthony wanted to look too, but a loud buzz came over the speakers.

“Attention crew of Mars Disney 1. Please secure all belongings and lock all hatches. You will begin descent in three orbits.”

Anthony could feel his insides tensing as though he were already about to fall. It’s finally here. I’m going to be one of the first people to walk on mars.

Sue stuck her head through the hatch, “Hey mates, you left your beds a dog’s breakfast, come do it up. Do you ever get shamed dossing all this time in space? You know all this is on the tellie globally right?”

Anthony shrugged. “They have watched me stick my dick in a vacuum hose to piss, then drink it again after going through the recycling system for six months. An unzipped sleeping bag just doesn't hold the same shame anymore.”

“Well you don’t even want to know what they saw me do,” Sue started into one of her I-have-it-so-much-worse-than-you speeches.

“Gordon,” mumbled Anthony back and Sue clamped her mouth shut, blushing.

“It WAS for science. Give it a rest already,” Gordon protested.

Jorge stuck his dead down from the flight room. “Ey, you hear we is landing, no? Come on you, arriba. I’mma strap in now. le’s do it!” His head vanished again.

Anthony propelled himself down to the sleeping chamber again. He’d miss being able to just push off and float to wherever he wanted. Tomorrow would be back to walking; he missed that too. Anthony zipped up his bag and strapped down his bag of clothes. He went down the hatch below to make sure the “facilities” didn't have anything loose. He’d been told in training that “landing” was a nice way of saying falling very fast from very high; anything that was loose could do a lot of damage. He’d had nightmares for the last two nights of a toothbrush shooting through the ship and killing them all after they had come almost 130 million miles safely. He duct-taped the tooth brushes into place, just to be sure, holding the tape roll up to the camera; corporate sponsors loved product placement.

“Prepare for lander disengagement, Mars Disney 1. Your systems should receive the countdown signal about the time this message reaches you.” A buzz throughout the ship confirmed that the signal had indeed reached the ship.

Anthony began to fear he would be sick. Even had there been gravity, his stomach would have been in his throat. Still, he took the chance and flipped the switch to lock all waste systems down. This was his one job for landing, and it was done; time to go to the cockpit and strap himself in.

Gordon was already strapped in behind Jorge, Sue behind Lisa, and only Anthony’s seat behind Lin was open. As Anthony pulled his harness on and checked all the buckles, he could almost hear in his head the speech that been given by Dr. Tyson the day they had left earth. After settling in, Anthony realized that the speech was being pumped over the speakers.

“...Earth’s first multinational permanent colony on another planet. Today we become a true spacefaring planet as we move out into the stars to live and prosper...”

That part always gave Anthony shivers. Being the youngest in a family of six brothers, he had never been first to do anything.

“Prepare to disengage lander in thirty seconds,” the mechanical system voice came over the speakers, cutting off Dr. Tyson’s speech.

Anthony leaned forward to put a hand on Lin’s shoulder. “N-ni hao ma?” he tried to assure her with the only Mandarin he could remember at the moment. Everyone had made an effort to learn each other’s language, but Mandarin still threw Anthony off. Lin looked back over her shoulder and put her hand over his, “Hen hao. Very good, xie xie.”

“...Three, Two, One, Disengage.”

A series of clicks let the crew know that the satellite portion of the ship had been released. A moment later a thruster fired and the lander began to rotate. Jorge and Lin were there to take the controls if something went wrong, but the ship was supposed to handle everything automatically, just as the six un-crewed landers before them had. Those six previous landers were going to be their home. Rovers had done most of the work of setting up the colony housing, now it just needed people.

“Descent thruster burn initiated.”

Anthony sat back in his seat and gripped the arms tightly. There wasn’t much noticeable change in inertia by the time the burn ended, but by looking between Lin and Jorge’s chairs to visualization of the new trajectory Anthony could see they had begun falling to mars. There was no turning around now.

The first turbulence came about half an hour later. Sue had been in the middle of joking about how smoothly things were going when it felt as though something had hit the ship. Everyone’s teeth gritted at once as the sudden air resistance made gravity real again to them for the first time in six months. Lisa went suddenly white and Anthony could tell she was fighting her body’s urge to faint by the way her head kept rolling from side to side.

Outside the small portholes they could see the sky transition from black to yellow. The turbulence increased to a violent shaking. Anthony held on to the arm as tight as his fingers would let him. Heaviness was settling in and Anthony had to fight to keep his weakened neck up and his arms down. He could feel the tunnel vision of a blackout fighting its way over him. Lisa didn't look to be doing any better. Gordon looked as ready to go as ever, only with clenched teeth.

“Parachute deployment in 10...”

At the end of the count down, a sudden jerking let them know the set of parachutes had caught the atmosphere and was slowing their fall. Not even a minute later and the turbulence had lessened considerably. Everyone let out a breath that the felt they had held since earth. Everything had gone according to best estimates and there wasn't much journey left for anything to go wrong in, everyone knew they would be waking up on mars tomorrow alive. Everyone except Lisa; Lisa would be waking up on Mars today since her faint had finally overtaken her, and she probably wasn't feeling any of the relief everyone else was.

The retrorockets fired their burn and still more weight returned to the crew. “Air bag deploy in 30 seconds.” They were close to the ground now. Anthony had to fight the urge to rush to a porthole to look out at the ground around them, not that he could have gotten the harness off before they would be on the ground; the airbags were the last part of the landing and they would be stuck inside without a view until they deflated.

A sudden feeling of falling as the lander released the parachute and deployed the airbags inspired a “Wooah” from everyone in unison before the lander bounced on the ground.

Everyone cheered and began to unbuckle their harnesses as the ship settled. The beacon began reporting their location to the automated rovers that had landed on mars before them. “Aterrizamos a quince kilómetros norte de la colonia.” Jorge announced. When only Sue seemed to understand him, he rephrased, “We wait, fifteen Kilometers from la colonia. The Hotel.”

After she had unbuckled herself, Sue was over to Lisa, trying to gently wake her up. “Wake up Lisa, we are here, we are home now.”

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Read my previously posted fiction:

• The Future
• Awakening of the Thunderbirds
• Valentina's Day