"…"
An icy gasp left Commander Mars. Opening her eyes, she was staring directly at a steel-plated ceiling, the rivets coming through in haunting shadows. The whole room seemed to sway in an unearthly light, dim and ethereal.
Grasping at her arms, Mars realized just how cold the room was. Still, she worked herself against her own exhaustion and aching, sitting up in bed. She felt the papery mattress beneath her, thin and uncomfortable. The lone black felt blanket that had been draped over her slid off of her with little resistance, slumping against the reinforced wall her bed was built against. Her compressed shorts bunched up against her legs as she slid forward, dangling her naked legs over the edge of the bed. As she slowly lowered her feet she felt the icy touch of the steel floor on her toes, making her gasp and wince.
Overhead, as her head cleared the low-hanging bunk, her hand reached up blindly, feeling the surface for the control panel built into it. Once she found the opening to the panel, she reached into the dark space, finding a control switch. As soon as she turned it, the lights beneath her bed flickered, turning on. The quiet whine of electrical power being fed filled her senses.
As she put more of her weight on her feet and in turn pressed her feet to the frigid floor, Mars let out a loud groan, suddenly stumbling forward. In the short span from the beds to the opposite wall, Mars made contact with her desk almost immediately, her thighs colliding with it. She let out another loud groan before she fell hard against the small desk chair. She quickly righted herself, sitting down in the chair properly. She rested the stinging heels of her feet on the edges of the swiveling legs, catching her breath.
Before she considered doing anything, she looked up to the bunk just above her bed. It was empty. Not even a mattress had been put there. After considering what it meant, she turned her head to along the wall where the desk was, looking at the scratch-a-day calendar mounted on the wall. Though the day's date was given, 'Day 6' was written below the printed number.
Pushing herself off from the desk, the skittering wheels beneath her chair propelled Mars at a languid pace across the smooth floor. As she glided towards the far end of the bunk bed, Mars reached out, her hand grasping on the end of the bed and using it to slow herself, correcting her angle of trajectory so that she slid between the space of the bed and the closet. Mars stopped herself, opening the narrow closet door.
The wool socks slid satisfyingly up Mars' ankles. Testing her newfound wear, she pressed her feet to the floor, finding that they were satisfying in protecting her. She stood completely up in front of the chair, walking around the chair and grabbing the back of it, dragging it along behind her until she reached the desk.
The desk was sparse. A single, folded computer terminal sat in the center, while a stack of white, printed sheets rested beside it. A couple of loose pens sat atop it. To the right, mounted to the wall, a desk lamp snaked down from the wall on a posable arm. Just beneath it sat a glassy jar with dark red, murky contents.
Mars removed the sculpted lid from the glass jar. She put the inside of it to her nose and breathed it in; cinnamon apple. The wick of the candle was peeling, leaving black flakes along the inside of the waxy surface, where the incredibly thin layer of candle wax lined the walls beside it. Rings of burned wax circled out from the central point of the wick, a depressing sign of disuse on it. As Mars set the candle down, hearing the loud clack against the plastic surface of the desk, Mars scanned the naked surface in the darkness. There wasn't a lighter.
It was a short search. Mars lifted the black sleeve of her wrist-mounted COMM, the communication device she wore so handily on the job. The folded straps that sat beneath the wide LED display unfurled, and the lighter clattered against the desk as it did. Eyeing the lighter, Mars let it be for the time being, bringing around the COMM to her tired eyes and fumbling for the power key on the side of it. Once the dim black display started its boot-up cycle, Mars set it atop the folded screen of her computer terminal.
Mars took the beaten lighter into her hand. The gunmetal surface of it gleamed in the faint light, the familiar scuffs and marks of wear leaving deep grooves on the surface. As she turned it over, feeling the lid of the lighter clack satisfying against her fingers, she gazed upon the engraved words just beneath the lid, etched in a far older font. 'Second Outer League Conflict – 1980-1983' read the label. As she flipped the far end of the lighter so that the bottom shone in the dim light, much of what had been engraved there was now missing, ground away by years of misuse. Though the last name had been worn away until it was now largely unrecognizable, the first name 'Giovanni' was evident on the lighter. The rank of private was visible at the front as well. Under her breath, inaudibly, Mars whispered the last name to herself.
The lid kicked back, the steel wheel clicking in and giving life to a tall, gently wavering flame on the end of it. Mars held the end of the lighter pinched between her two fingers, lowering it into the glass jar on the table and lighting the end of the candle. The dim light emanated from it and spread over the desk, bathing the sparse setup in warm light. Closing the lighter, Mars set it back in its corner.
An electronic, recorded chime played from the tiny pinhole speakers on the COMM. Mars lifted the device up to her blurred, sleepy vision, focusing in on the main screen of the sparse display. On the black and yellow lined text and digitally drawn windows that appeared, a small portioned-off space on the screen displayed the time: '6:02 AM'.
Mars stared off at the wall, contemplating this, slowly setting the COMM down.
The lid to Mars' computer terminal was open, bathing her in the dim light of a mass array of golden-hued lines of text. On the keyboard in the keyboard tray beneath the desk, Mars' fingers hammered away, her eyes tracing the fast-appearing words that scrawled across the display. She paused in her typing to reread what she had written so far. Putting a hand onto the desk, she found the touchpad just beneath the monitor, grabbing the scrolling handle and moving up the many digital pages she had written. All-in-all she counted seven so far. Biting her lip, she looked at the time in the bottom corner of the display, seeing that her time was quickly coming to the end.
At the far end of the room, the touchscreen on the door-mounted console lit up, before playing a small chime. The gentle humming of the outside came through the speaker, moments before the sound of a voice chimed through.
"Commander, it's Geegee. Just making sure you're up."
Taking a short breath, Mars keyed in the 'save' command, watching the loading bar appear and disappear in a flash, just as she keyed in the 'close' command. Before she replied, she took a brief look down at herself; the white t-shirt and compression shorts were not necessarily professional. She hadn't even seen her hair, but running her hand through it she knew it was less than tidy.
Getting to her feet, Mars reached to the same panel beneath the elevated bunk bed she had used to power on the lights beneath her bed, finding the intercom toggle. Just as she cleared her throat, bringing herself close to the steel mesh port in the panel, she toggled the intercom button.
"I'm up, thank you," said Mars, making her exhaustion as little apparent as she could.
"TB has a logistics report for you down in the cargo bay. I'll have breakfast down there for you."
Mars nodded to herself softly, heading away from the intercom panel and down towards the desk. On her monitor, she cued up her email, scanning through anything new that might've appeared.
"Commander, may I come in?"
Mars paused from where she was, stooped over her desk, raising her head in response to the intercom's call. It was still Geegee, and though she looked in confusion to the panel beneath the top bunk and then over to the control panel in the door, Mars' expression faded. She seemingly expected it. She straightened herself, meandering back towards the panel beneath the bed and pressing the intercom button again.
"Yes, Geegee."
Beneath the steel plate of the door, the electronic beeps of a passcode being put in came through the door in muffled sequences. After a moment, the metal door slid to the right, hissing as it disappeared beneath the wall and Mars' narrow closet. The hallway was brightly lit, the hum of large electrical systems and engineered systems apparent in a dull rumble. The dark figure of Geegee seemed to hesitate, her shorter stature peering into the dark of Mars' quarters. She rested a hand against the opening of the door as she took a step in, her eyes eventually where Mars hid in the corner. It made her pause for a moment, but she relaxed moments later. Taking another step in, she reached to the console of the door beside her, keying up a command and closing the door in two taps.
"Is everything okay?" Geegee asked, tentative. Beside her, hidden from Mars' sight, she carried a clipboard. She clutched the clipboard with both hands, watching Mars with mild hesitation. Her nose wrinkled, smelling something unsavory hidden beneath the wafting smell of burning wax and cinnamon apple.
Mars nodded softly. After a moment, she stood up, crossing the room in front of Geegee and opening up her narrow closet. She passed over one set of her uniform, instead opting for the one hanging behind it.
"You weren't at the showers today," said Geegee.
"I showered last night," said Mars.
Beneath the uniform she had worn, signs of wear on the white breastplate on the front, there were two more uniforms. Mars pulled out the first one on top, a plastic sheet fitted for it resting over it, as wide as the shoulders and as long as her legs went. Beneath the plastic covering, a fresh, clean uniform hung inside.
Geegee, keeping her eyes focused off Mars, wandered languidly towards the bed, taking a moment to keep hand maintain her silence as she walked. She held the clipboard, looking at it in the dim lighting, reading the preliminary reports.
"Mars, I know that you are my superior in this situation…" Geegee began, carefully. When she looked to Mars, she averted her eyes.
Mars had removed the white t-shirt, her naked back facing Geegee as she faced the wall. Wadding up the white shirt and tossing it aside, she reached for a black bra atop a stack of boxes, throwing it over her arms and tossing the other one aside.
As Mars began to remove her shorts, Geegee turned away, focusing on her report, even though she was saying something completely different.
"… But you know I consider you the most important friend I have ever had," Geegee continued. "If something is wrong, just know you can bounce something off of me."
Mars faced the wall. With the faintly-striped leggings of her uniform sitting comfortably on her legs, Mars took the long black stockings and, one foot at a time, removed the sock and pulled the long black sock up over her leg and pulled it tightly, wiggling her toes through the slack of the sock until it hugged the curvature of her foot perfectly. She then grasped for where her uniform's undershirt hung off the stacked boxes, pulling out the sleeves and sliding it over her head.
She said nothing, instead crossing the short space of her quarters and walked past Geegee, opening up the door to it. Stepping out into the lengthy, futuristic hallway, she signaled for Geegee to follow. Just several feet down the way from the exit to Mars' quarters, past several other doors to other sets of sleeping quarters, Mars entered the dark entrance of a bathroom, heading inside and walking past several of the stalls.
Geegee followed, hanging in the entrance. As Mars wordlessly dipped down over the counter of a sink, her head approaching the faucet as it kicked on and dispensed a trickle of recycled water, she leaned against the doorway, watching Mars through the mirror. Mars collected the water in her hand and smoothed down the curling, bedheaded mess of her hair, paying little attention to Geegee, smoothing out her hair into the bombshell shape it usually retained, not bothering to style the three points of hair that stuck up in the front, even if the shapes naturally materialized and formed on their own.
After a long pause of sculpting her hair into a more natural shape, Mars sighed quietly, looking at her own reflection.
"This mission is just going a little long," said Mars. "That's all."
