A/N: I still don't own anything.
Earth, June 2036
In Houston, formerly part of the state of Texas, a group of NASA officials were meeting as XCOM forces were pushing back ADVENT. NASA was the group that took over the global satellites after the turnover to ADVENT. While quite a few of them were ran by the government only, there was still quite the call for Civilian satellites. Ten years ago, NASA had convinced ADVENT that a Mars program called Ares could do wonders to help unite Humanity and ensure NASA's continuation.
There were five planned missions to Mars under the Ares program. Currently, this meeting was to discuss yet another trouble with the third mission. One crew member was stranded on Mars and they had five more on their way back to rescue him in the Hermes, a craft built for the missions to Mars. ADVENT could have rescued from Mars, but the Elders declared it a human problem, thus humans should solve it.
With the fall of ADVENT, the situation had changed. The conversation went for another hour as they discussed the pros and cons about telling the crew of the Hermes, about the fall of the government.
The only real concern is the stranded person on Mars. Shortly after landing, the Ares 3 crew had to abort their mission due to wind. Well, this person was presumed dead when a communication dish impaled him and threw him away from the crew. They did get communication back shortly, but the old probe that he had found burnt out. NASA could only watch as they followed his thirty-two-thousand-kilometer drive from the Ares 3 landing site to the Ares 4 landing site.
"I know my stance about Mark was tell the crew, but they don't need to know about the Government shift." Said Mitch Henderson, a man that looked like Sean Bean, but strangely, still alive.
Vincent Kapoor, a man that looked quite a bit like Chiwetel Ejiofor, nodded his head "He is right Teddy, in this case the change of Government will cause them undo worry."
While this conversation was going on, there was someone who knew what it was like to be the single occupant of a planet. Millions of kilometers away from Houston, this person drove a car, or rather a rover. This rover was rather changed from the normal Martian rovers. This one towed a second rover that had a hole in the roof. In this roof was a balloon of sorts that held the vital machine to keep the sole living being on the planet alive.
As Mark Watney neared his destination, he took care in his actions. He ensured that every turn was slow, every rise or slope, he thought his actions though. As he came over a ramp, into what he called Entrance Ramp, the hard soil gave way. The rovers left front wheel sank. The rover suddenly tilted, bringing the rover to a sharp angle. This caused the left rear wheel to slip as it bore the weight of the rover. Before anyone could react, the rover tumbled. Solar Cells fell from the trailer, shattering several on impact with the ground. The hitch that connected trailer to the main rover sheared away as they rolled from each other.
As the trailer slid down the hill, free of the rover, it started to turn. Perhaps on another Mars, the sand would have made a perfect ramp or perhaps there was nothing under the sand, but on this Mars, the item in the balloon, the oxygenator, caught something under the sand. The pull of the rock caused the oxygenator to slam into the side of the rover. This caused the trailer to tumble once more.
As the trailer spun, it found more soft sand. It landed on the roof. If the oxygenator had not already weakened the balloon, it might have simply expanded with the weight of the trailer. The trailer however forced the air out though the separated fibers of Hab Canvass that made the balloon. Like in the hab so many Sols ago, fibers split and with a rent of fabric, the balloon burst.
The rover seemed to fare better as it rolled several times before slamming its roof down at the bottom of the Ramp. The sudden jarring weight of the rover was too much for the rock under it though. In other universes, this crater had nothing but solid rock under it. But on this Mars, it gave way, crumbling around the rover. The driver who had thought he was safe, had started to sit up, when found himself weightless as the ground gave way.
The driver of the rover swore as he saw though the front of the rover that he was falling, this was more of an issue to him than the fact that he was floating. The rover fell over a hundred meters before it softly landed on a platform. The driver was alive, for now.
Back on Earth, the door to the conference room burst open as an out of breath blond woman burst into the room. "I think Mark is dead." Mindy Park said, rushing to the projector.
The image she displayed showed the overturned trailer and the hole at the bottom of the ramp. "Jesus," Mitch said. "What the hell happened?"
"The trailer is upside down and I think the rover rolled and caused a cave in." Mindy said, her voice quivering as tears streaked her cheeks.
"Is this the entire crash site?" Bruce Ng, [the director of JPL] asked
"I think so," Mindy said." Up toward the top photo, which is north, there are ordinary wheel tracks. Right here," she pointed to a large disturbance in the soil, "is where things went wrong. Judging from where that ditch is, I'd say the rover rolled from there." (1)
"This is as bad as it looks." Bruce said. He got up to point to the photo. "While the rover is designed to handle a roll, the modifications to the trailer appear to have caused an issue. You see here, this is a starburst pattern. We lost pressure in the trailer. If Mark somehow climbs out of this cave in, he might not have a way to create oxygen. I am afraid Mark will die of CO2 poisoning."
"Last time, we declared Mark dead. That was a hasty call. Tomorrow, we want to release these photos with a statement to the press saying that we do not know if Mark is alive or dead. Until we find a body this time, Mark is simply missing. A future mission can be done to check out the cave in and perhaps retrieve his body." The director of NASA, Teddy Sanders, said. "I will personally inform the Hermes after I return from visiting his parents again. When I get back, find out how the hell we didn't know that the ground was not solid there!"
Within the crashed Rover, Mark picked himself off the floor. Somehow the rover landed on its wheels. Mark turned on the front lamps of the rover and what he saw made his heart race, his mouth went dry and for once, Watney had no words. His mouth moved several times as he tried to speak but speech was lost for before him was clearly a craft in front of the rover. In other universes, the team that had broken through the roof of the hanger would have had a radio to contact for help. In this universe, the only person on the planet did what any other human would do. He had to touch it.
LOG ENTRY: SOL 498
For future Mars historians, once again, I did not die on Mars. I fell in this cave that you found the rover in. Now I am totally confused. Gravity is a constant, even on Mars. The rover lightly landed after falling what looks like dozens of meters. That is something that should not have happened. Perhaps some sort of force field lowered the rover to the ground?
Another item of note, there is clearly a ship in the cave with me. This craft does not appear to be ADVENT, Human, or Elder made. Are millions of conspiracy theorists correct about the face on Mars? The ship I can see, it looks to be about a hundred meters. It looks like someone built a rounded box of some sort and slapped another box on top. The lighting is not the best here, but it looks dark, maybe black with some sort of green lines.
I don't know who made it, but I am about to find out! In case I do not return, and by some miracle that the crew is still alive, please remind the crew that none of this was their fault. Please tell my parents that I love them.
This is Mark Watney signing off. Wish me luck!
He quickly donned his space suit before stepping into the airlock of the rover. After stepping out, he looked up and swore. The hole was at the top of what he assumed was a hanger.
"How the fuck am I going to reach that?" He asked himself, looking up the best he can in the bulky spacesuit, but it seems that kind of movement was not what the designers had in mind. He contorted his neck to get a better view on the small looking hole in the roof.
Turning he looked at the ship. "If watching shitty seventies TV has taught me anything, I should make sure you are not really a probe for Venus and crash landed on the wrong planet. Go, Steve Austin." He chuckled as he walked under the ship, his hand running across the hull. His fingers fell into a groove that ran the length of the wing. He was right when he logged the ship was black. The grooves were painted green.
As he reached the front of the ship, he took sight of what was in front of him. Clearly this room was a hanger. About ten meters above the floor were large bay windows. He could see what looked like tables or controls, but he was not very sure from this angle. He noted that there was a large door directly in front of the ship. Perhaps for cargo. He noticed strange carvings on the door and below the big window.
He walked slowly up to the big door and ran his hand over the seam. The door looked sealed tight. Whatever it was or however old it was, this place was locked down still. He took a step back and looked at the carvings. Was this their language? He ran one finger over the carvings, nearly touching them.
With a frown he started to trace them, hoping something would activate. He placed his left hand right above the carvings as he leaned on the wall to check out what he thought was a divot in the stone.
The luck gods or perhaps it was Mars, the God of War, himself blessing Mark, but the astronaut had placed his hand on the activation for the door. Mark fell back and landed on his backside as he tried to get away from the now opening door.
"You would think that with ADVENT and the Elders, we would know what to do if we found aliens here, but nope. Not a word." Watney mumbled as he picked himself off the ground. Brushing dust from his suit, he noticed that the room before him had no apparent dust. There was a soft blue and white light flashing on one side. Mark slowly walked in.
Once he passed the door, it started to close. Mark's breathing picked up for a moment before calming himself. "Just an airlock, Watney, get a hold of yourself. What would James Bond do here?" He smiled. "Sean Connery would strut in with his accent and say, hello ladies, look at your man. Now look at me. Look at your man. Does your man look as good as me?" he finished in a fake British accent, but not a good one. The one that makes you want to strangle someone for murdering it kind.
He walked over to the light and looked again for a button or something to press but once the outer door closed, the room seemed to go still for a moment before he felt the fabric of his suit start to move. "Damn it, I should have brought the other suit" he said. "They only work to see what the air is on the inside."
After a minute, the inner door opened. Before him was clearly a storage center. There were at least several dozen rows of boxes stacked, maybe a dozen or more meters high. They reminded him of cargo pods of some sort, but he could not tell because the top as his light did not reach. He then stepped out of the airlock, which slowly closed behind him. He turned to the right and saw that it was rather dark.
"How big is this place?" he wondered around before turning left. He saw a light flashing. He stepped up to it. This light was flashing yellow and green. He shrugged and pressed the light. The door slid open. "This is almost too easy." He whispered.
The door opened into a hallway that seemed to curve up. Mark could tell due to the light strips on the floor. It was almost as if he was being lead somewhere. The walls themselves had paintings on them. He made sure that his camera was recording what looked like huge cuttlefish shooting beams of light out of its mouth that tore through ships.
Then he noted as he felt the rise in the floor, several creatures led by some sort of green, four-eyed alien once again failing as they battled on the ground. The platform leveled out for a moment, the images advancing to them being forced into one of the cuttlefish's mouths.
Perhaps in another universe, thanks to the Reapers seeding small rocks that jump started the indoctrination, an indoctrinated agent would have failed to notice the hidden hall but in this one, Mark Watney was not such an agent. The hall ended with an empty table. With a shake of his head, he turned only to find a force field blocking his path out.
"The Six Million Dollar Man didn't have to deal with forcefields when he fought his Venus probe!" Mark exclaimed before turning around. "Or perhaps Bond was a better choice." He whispered. Before him was a projected text in a green mist. Clearly, this was a holographic projection.
Hello Mark Watney, I am the Prothean AI Hope. As the last Hope of my creators' entire race, I was placed here to help guide the race from the third planet. To talk to me, please use the keyboard on the table
With shaking hands, Mark sat down at the table and typed: How can we talk?
I have analyzed the computer in your rover. As the video recordings, were clearly was entertainment in nature. I need more time to learn how to speak your primary language.
Mark smiled at that before typing: I've been stranded here for a very long time. I fell through the roof and now I am trapped. Do you have a way out?
There is not enough power to operate the bay doors. I am not at full power either. There are repairs that must be made. This method of information transmission is too primitive.
Before Mark's eyes, the hall opened. Swallowing his dry mouth, he stood up and stepped into the new chamber. In the center of the chamber was a huge stone column but it was not a natural formation. There were lights on it that flickered for a moment before shutting off. He felt something drawing him closer before a green light scanned his body.
He walked foreword after the scan and pressed his gloved hand into the socket that looked like a hand should go. Mark being underfed had caused a weakness to his body but in this case, it was a good thing as the nerves were closer to the surface. His hand also being gloved provided another layer of protection. The glove interfered with the transmission, imposing a lower bandwidth that slowed the information flow in such a way that his primitive mind could understand it. If he had been a fully awakened psionic, his mind would of rejected the connection because of the rigid nature of normal psionic shields.
Understand it he did. He watched in horror the real scenes depicted on the walls came to life. These invading ships looked like giant cuttlefish shaped ships, the same ships that were on the walls, invaded the galaxy. The invader ships did not even pause as they shredded fleets of Prothean ships. He saw other races that were dressed in Prothean armor being placed on spikes before turning into some horrible cyborg. He felt his mind expanding as languages were inserted into his brain. He pulled his hand back, gasping. He looked around and he saw a screen.
As he walked up to it, he realized that he could read the script now. This was telling him that the room was breathable. Slowly, he removed his helmet, a little leery of not being able to breath. A few test breaths later, he sat his helmet down.
As he sat down, a ball of light appeared in the middle of the room. "Now that you can understand me, we can work on extracting what you need from the beacon" the ball voiced in a true High Prothean accent.
LOG ENTRY: SOL 502
The last few days have done nothing but blow my mind. These Protheans were a race of freaking locusts, basically. They came to your world. You bowed as a slave caste or you died. When, like all dictatorships, they met one stronger than them, they folded like a house of cards. The next issue is slightly a problem.
When the Protheans obtained spaceflight, they found relays. They used something that is like an element but it's more like a substance. It appears in some systems, in others it doesn't. Apparently, there is none in Sol. But they use this Element Zero to make a ship's mass lighter; these relays send ships faster than light. They use this element to get around relativity. This is where the problem comes in. This dependence on that technology made the Protheans easy targets. We should try not to fall into the same trap.
Apparently Protheans had some form of touch telepathy, thus they set their beacons to work that way. This was rather stupid of them since they did want to warn others. For once, I am glad I am half-starved. Hope told me after a medical scan that if I had been healthy, she didn't think that I would have been able to access their beacon through touch. Even then, my suit's glove helped slow the data stream down so my brain wasn't fried. Yay.
This place is a gold mine of information. Some of the things we could do with this tech. Perhaps ADVENT will come in and keep us from learning the cool things but perhaps some nerd will find a use for this stuff. One of the things that blew my mind was the creation of an honest to god Artificial Intelligence. She informed me that she was based off several brains of the Protheans. AI creation was outlawed in Prothean space but, with the fall of their empire, they felt it necessary.
The next pressing need: food. Hope provided some seeds. I can grow something called Krognak rather quickly. From what Hope told me, it's a plant that can grow in 50 days. The scary thing is I run out of potatoes on SOL 552. That is cutting it extremely close but at least I won't starve.
There are repairs to be made here. The power plant is not online, causing this place to run on backups. These backups are almost out of fuel. Guess my engineering background will come in handy once more as I fix pieces of broken junk and turn them into things they never were intended to be used as.
Another problem is that the long-range communications array is also offline. Hope does not know if it is simply buried or broken. Alas, getting to it and clearing the sand away or repairing it is well outside of my reach. Fifty thousand years of sand. I don't know if I could even find that dish.
LOG ENTRY: SOL 505
We did find a problem today. Hope was doing a more in-depth scan of that good old grey matter. We were a little concerned that the lack of food might have caused some damage. Well, I laid down on some soft bed. Lo and behold, I saw my brain.
Aside from being too thin, I was somewhat healthy. If I wanted to do some repairs, I needed to have Element Zero in my blood. Alas, my body right now would burn itself up trying to accept it. I just do not have the calories to eat right now. If I do have this element in my blood, I'll need to eat, at minimum, 3,000 calories a day. Right now, I am eating 1,200 a day.
That brought up a new challenge. Apparently, if I became too healthy, I would lose my ability to connect to the beacon. Well shit. That thing is my best way out of here.
Hope then came up with a cunning plan.
I am going to replace my crewmate Vogel as a German Super villain! Hope will inject my blood with Element Zero and then activate some dormant genes in my DNA to partly awaken my psionic abilities.
From what Hope can tell about my DNA, is that all humans have potential to be psionic. What degree this is, well it depends on evolution. She thinks humans can project things with their minds, take control of others, hell, she thinks we can become Jedi!
But anyway, back to what she can do for me. What Hope hopes to do (see what I did there?) is turn on my touch telepathy in my left hand only. Thanks to ADVENT, I already had some gene mods installed. Hope just backwards engineered my own mods. How cool is that?
My body needs to be healthy to accept the Element Zero and the virus that will activate my DNA. So that will have to wait until I am eating more food. I started to grow some Frug today. The image Hope showed me makes me think of Pomegranates. I also started several other crops. Hopefully, this will allow me to get my caloric intake above 3K.
LOG ENTRY: SOL 515
I really need to be better about making these logs. There is just so much to learn here. I've been diving into the history of these Protheans. They were a very paranoid race, more so at the end. Rightfully so.
The empire had become so rife with indoctrinated agents, that they created a way to tell if someone had the taint of the Reapers upon them. If Hope detected this, she was to self-destruct and take most of the information in the beacon with her.
What is indoctrination, you ask? Simply put, you lose all your free will. You live to serve the Reapers and then you die. Families murdered by loved ones, ships turning on each other, suicide bombers and the like. The worst is when leaders are indoctrinated. They pass more and more laws that end up helping the Reapers.
The scientists here had abandoned the base once, shortly after the Reapers arrived in the galaxy, by order of their Emperor. The next problem they had was the relay itself. It is encased in a ball of ice. Several wanted to activate it, but Jellyfish had grown leary of it. After a year of traveling faster than light, they returned home. What they found was nothing but devastation.
The leader of these scientists and their families was an odd fellow, even for their standards. They nicknamed him the Prothean word for Jellyfish because of how much he loved them. He even had one in a fish tank. While Protheans were warriors, the scientist caste not so much. They often were a mix of races.
So what Jellyfish did was grab a bunch of survivors and brought them back here. He also gathered as much information as he could. He ended up leaving a bunch of listening devices all over the galaxy. Thanks to the Protheans knowledge of how the gate system worked, he was able to embed a quantum entangled signal into it. He also set it so only if a gate was sending a craft would it transmit, further burying his work.
He ran into a problem when he tried to make the information transmit under the response transmission. There was a signal embedded inside the relay to protect and trust the relay. He couldn't stop the transmissions but he did hide his work in that code.
What scares me is that these devices are still active. Thousands of Relays are out there. How many are warping the minds of the travelers. There is an upside to this, the amount of data that Hope has and can call up is frankly astonishing. To think, we might have lost this edge if I had not gotten impaled by that comms dish.
Hope has not let me access that data yet. She has me learning how to power on Prothean craft. Hopefully, soon I can get that corvette working so I can leave.
LOG ENTRY: SOL 520
Today, I left the living area of the base and put on my space suit. What I still find shocking about all of this, Hope tells me that they would have never found more than the living area and part of the beacon if the wrong person had found this.
But anyway, I checked out the corvette in the Hangar. No luck. All the Element Zero has been used up in it. Some of the damage to the ship makes me think that they blew up the hyperdrives and com systems to help hide this place.
Again, it seems that Ares 4 is my best hope to leave this place. Hopefully, my rescue attempt did not cause the cancelation of the program. Thankfully, Hope does have limited sensors so that, once we get the power conduits repaired, I'll be able to find the Hermes.
That is the next thing we are going to work on. This place fell apart over the years. Mostly the electronics. Hope had to tear apart most of the robot workers to keep herself in repair. While Jellyfish did create her, they were wary of her. They did not connect her to most of the base and coded some laws that she was to follow.
Translated, they sound a lot like the three laws of Robotics, well some debate if there is four laws or three, but in this case, they used three with the first one being a notable addition.
An Artificial Intelligence must prevent itself from being captured by the Reapers or their agents.
The AI may not allow non-indoctrinated beings harm though inaction or action.
Hope must protect its own life if it does not conflict with the first two laws.
The four laws of Robotics for those who don't know
A robot may not harm humanity or, by inaction, allow humanity to come to harm.
A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.
A robot must obey the orders given it by human beings except where such orders would conflict with the First Law.
A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Laws. (2)
So, I think we are damn lucky to find another AI that is not controlled by the Elders to be so peaceful. Hopefully, Hope will bring hope. I know she has given that to me. The next scary thing is the Elders: what are they going to do with this information?
LOG ENTRY: SOL 521
The leaves broke free of the soil today. It really lifted my spirits to see those sprouts today. While I knew I wasn't going to starve, at least not likely, seeing those sprouts really brought a smile to my face.
LOG ENTRY: SOL 530
Man, I miss Baseball. I really wonder how the Cubs are doing. I haven't had an update since I blew up Pathfinder.
LOG ENTRY: SOL 540
I have been looking at the Krognak, and I am starting to worry a little. Not that the plants are unhealthy but something that might be worse.
The leaves remind me a LOT of potato leaves. I hope they are not potatoes. Every fiber of my being is screaming in hope that they do not turn into potatoes
LOG ENTRY: SOL 545
I know I haven't been logging much but all I am really doing is growing my crops and learning from Hope. I am still thin but once I harvest Krognak, I can start eating more.
God, it will be so hard not just to eat everything I can. Sadly, I can only eat so much once we have the extra food. My stomach will reject it and I'll be worse than before. So, slowly, I must raise my intake of food.
So, every few days, I'll be adding calories until I am healthy. Thankfully, my vitamins are fine. I just need to add more food to gain weight. Shouldn't take more than 2 or 3 months.
LOG ENTRY: SOL 550
So today is the first harvest! After so many meals of potatoes and you guessed it, more potatoes, I am so sick of them. I ran out of anything to make the potatoes better a long time ago.
God, I am almost salivating at eating something besides plain potatoes. I still haven't found anything that I could make to drink with it, but perhaps once the leaves are dry I could make a tea.
Hope has taught me so much. Once I start getting some bulk back on me, we will start repairing the station. The maths involved with this element, they were so over my head it was not funny.
Once it was "dumbed down so an ape could understand it" and a few more visits to the beacon, I started to understand it. Why hasn't Hope just dumped it in my brain, you ask? Well, that is a good question future Mars historian.
Well, it is simple. It would kill me. I barely have compatibility with the system as it is. Come to find out, the gene modding I already had did play a key part in saving my life. As I said before, I need to be healthy to get gene modded the rest of the way. This results in the need to get fully healthy to get all the download.
I am off to harvest and eat something besides potatoes since Sol 300.
LOG ENTRY: SOL 550, 2
PO-TAT-OES. I grew fucking potatoes. As a botanist, I KNEW they were potatoes, but I didn't want to believe it. The worst thing is that I must wait even longer to eat something else. The other plants won't be ready for another 75 Sols. It pains me to have to wait
LOG ENTRY: SOL 555
Salt. Thank the heavens I found Prothean salt. Not that bad salt on the surface. No more bland potatoes! Not only that, it will help me keep on weight a bit. Honestly, just having a sprinkle of salt on these things right now is heaven on Mars right now.
Now that I am eating more, Hope is showing me the plan to make my left hand compatible with the Protheans. The Elders' gene mods are turning out to be a godsend right now. All she must do now is insert a tiny bit of Prothean DNA, wrapped up in Element Zero, with a nanite shell.
After that, I'll be part Prothean. Take that, Steve Austin. You might have got the girls, but I'm part alien now. That reminds me, before any of you readers start expecting to hear I had an alien burst out of my chest, there is none of that going on here. Gene mods, well they drilled that into our heads because if something was wrong, we might need to change them or worse someone was hurt.
Let me tell you, the science is sound. It's just like any other mod back home. I'll just be using it in ways that we didn't intend but are damn cool. This also brings up another point. Hope is based on that Jellyfish Prothean, the one that couldn't leave Kahje alone apparently. He thought that the jellyfish are thinking beings. He said that he left something to help them rise above the water.
Anyway, that is extremely old history and probably nothing became of it. Hope is based on his brain scan. Because some humans can accept gene mods, I hypothesize that we can upload human brains into a matrix like hers. Likely smaller. It's just a theory right now.
Sigh. The next few months really is nothing but eat potatoes, read what Hope gives me, and watch more shitty 70's TV. Why not watch something Prothean? Good question, my friend.
It must be one of the most nauseating things I've tried to watch. Trying to watch something when the main species has four perspectives because they had four eyes is not pleasant. I lived through the vomit comet back on Earth with only a little of my lunch spilled. This thing within 15 seconds had me doubled over and making like Mount St. Helens. The less said on that the better.
LOG ENTRY: SOL 605
Dear logs, I am sorry that I have not been writing in you but there is little to say other than I ate potatoes, worked out, learned from Hope, and planned how to get short range coms back up.
We think that once we can do the gene upgrade, I can build some short-range antenna that will allow Hope to access the Mars satellite network. From there, I can message NASA since it is their network. I am sure there will be a rush to recover this site once they hear from me.
So, yeah, that's the plan and my way home. NASA sends a recovery team and I leave with them. They probably could even send a team with Ares 4. It's not like they need to bring much as there is already a habitat for them and plenty of food could be grown for them. NASA might just send food anyway to make sure.
Off to watch some Dukes of Hazzard again. I still can't get over how stupid Rosco is. Just arrest those Duke boys OUTSIDE the car.
LOG ENTRY: SOL 615
Hope declared me fit enough to not burn out from Element Zero poisoning a few minutes ago. So, after this entry, I'll be injected with alien goo and I'll be happy to be probed. Hold it, not that kind of probe.
Wait, god damn it. Months ago, I made some stupid comment about the Princess of Mars, who did in fact kidnap me. Damn my bad luck, no love making yet.
Well, I am off to get probed by an alien race but for science!
LOG ENTRY: SOL 616
After sleeping off the injections, I woke up this morning needing to eat everything I could. I think I was on my fourth potato before I slowed down enough to ask Hope why I was so hungry. She told me eezo users just needed more to power the element.
So, now, I can go into eating contests and win. Go, strange element that betrays physics and did I mention a trap? Can we stress that again, this tech is nothing but a trap! Once cultures start using it, they become reliant upon it. Then the Reapers would use items to make minds malleable. They would then suggest laws that would cause further weakening of the leadership.
Let's make sure that this doesn't happen to mankind, even with the Elders' help. Before I can access the beacon, I need to adjust to the genes. Give me a few days.
LOG ENTRY: SOL 619
For the love of god, I've got to have this gene removed. How could the Protheans stand knowing the history of EVERY single object they touched. I swear I heard Hope laugh after I touched the food prep countertop. Another case where the less said, the better.
For now, I've taken to wearing my space suit's glove to protect it. After I learned that item's history, I am ok with touching it.
LOG ENTRY: SOL 630
Today, I placed our new dish below the hole I made. Thanks to a touch of eezo or Element Zero as that just takes too damn long to type, I had enough pirate-ninjas (Kilowatt-hours per sol if you remember) now to allow it to transmit.
I set it off and it lifted out of my hole and into orbit. Hope is now trying to make our new friend in orbit say "Hello Friends" to everyone around him. Even for an AI, it takes time to find the right language to talk in.
Vincent Kapoor walked up the stairs in the middle of NASA on his way to his office. He smiled at the woman riding the escalator down. In one hand was a briefcase and keys in the other. After entering his office, he dropped the keys on the desk before sitting behind his computer.
After logging in, he opened his e-mail to let it start processing his e-mail into its folders. He opened a drawer to pull out his coffee cup, his notepad and a pen. He took his cup to the coffee machine and quickly filled it before returning. He brought the cup to his lips and froze as he brought up his e-mail program. At the top was an e-mail that had a senders' email of MarkWatneyIsAlive at Mars dot advent dot gov. In the subject field, the words Video from Mark Watney was written.
He wondered how it got though the spam filters as he picked up his phone. After quickly putting in the digits for the IT help desk, he raised the phone to his ear.
"This is Vincent Kapoor. I think someone sent me a virus in my e-mail. Can you check it out?" he asked
"One moment, Mr. Kapoor. Running virus scan on your folder now." Said the tech. "It comes back clean. If it is a virus, you have found a day 0 virus… Sir, I am going to have to flag this to the System Admins. I am sorry, Sir, I am going to force you out of all of your logins."
With a sigh, Vincent brought his hand to his forehead. "Very well. "
On the computer screen the screen changed, a finger popping up while in the background was a blue screen with the words "YOU DIDN'T SAY THE MAGIC WORD!" The tech rolled his eyes as his screen changed, turning blue as well.
"Well, sir, it appears to be spreading." The tech groaned.
Three hours later, the Director of NASA was sitting in the conference room next to his office. Before him were the director of IT, several System Administrators, and a few of the directors that also were affected by the taunting blue screen O' death as the SysAdmins called it. They wanted to know what everyone had in common. On the screen next to the table was the Director of JPL. His computer also was infected which prohibited him from projecting himself into the meeting.
"Alright, Andrew, tell me what is going on with my network." Teddy asked.
Andrew opened his mouth to respond but his voice was drowned out by a rather upbeat song. The drums started to beat, a woman started to hum in the background.
Happy Days
Sunday, Monday, Happy Days,
Tuesday, Wednesday, Happy Days,
Thursday, Friday, Happy Days,
Saturday, what a day,
Rockin all week with you.
This day is ours
Won't you be mine. (Oh Happy Days)
This day is ours (Oh Happy Days)
Oh please be mine.
Hello sunshine, goodbye rain,
She's wearing my high school ring on her chain.
She's my steady, I'm her man,
I'm gonna love her all I can.
[Chorus]
Gonna cruise her round the town,
Show everybody what I've found
Rock'n'roll with all my friends
Hopin' the music never ends.
These Happy Days are yours and mine (oh Happy Days)
These Happy Days are yours and mine (oh Happy Days)
These Happy Days are yours and mine, Happy Days. (3)
"Andrew!" Teddy bellowed over the song. "What is going on?"
Andrew was already typing at the computer terminal in front of him. "Teddy, I am actually locked out of the system" He yelled back. He picked up his mobile as he pushed himself away from the desk. He flicked his finger to unlock it only to find the opening video from Happy Days on his phone, in perfect sync with the song. He slid it to Teddy to show him.
Teddy slid his hand over his face. ADVENT had been killing humans, but they also brought order. Before ADVENT's fall, hacking had been a problem of the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries. Only XCOM had dared to hack things but never like this. Now it seemed, the old hacking days were back.
Once the song ended, a voice came over the speakers. They knew that voice, it was Mark Watney. Vincent felt his anger at hearing that voice. How dare they use his voice. He took a breath to say something, but he then realized that this was one of Mark's logs
"Six days into what should have been the greatest two months of my life, and it's turned into a nightmare.
I don't even know who'll read this. I guess someone will find it eventually. Maybe a hundred years from now. For the record, I did not die on Sol 498. Certainly, the rest of the crew thought I did and I can't blame them. Maybe there'll be a day of national mourning for me, and my Wikipedia page will say 'Mark Watney is the only human being to have died on Mars.'
And it'll be right, probably. 'Cause I'll surely die here. Just not on Sol 498 when everyone thinks I did. Let's see…where do I begin?" (1)
Suddenly, at the end of the table, one of the holo-emitters come to life. In the projection stood Mark Watney, in an outfit that no one recognized.
The image started to speak. "It started with my rover losing traction and falling in a hole. I thought I was dead as the rover fell. Turns out, I might have found another great discovery and a great horror. In case I don't make it or for some reason NASA thinks Mars is too expensive now, well, look at this."
Before Mark was displayed the Prothean corvette, a display of the composition of Element Zero, and some of the math behind using it. However, below that, the image changed. Mark shrunk and took on a cartoon look. He also took on a black and white appearance, his clothes also changing to something out of the nineteen fifties farmer wear and his voice changed slightly to fit the style.
"Hello, boys and girls of Earth. My name is Mark Watney. You might remember me from tales such as: How to live though impalement. The thrilling tale of How to grow Potatoes in your own shit, and my latest crime drama, How to Live When You Fall in a Dark Hole." Mark said with a sly grin on his face.
There was a chuckle from several around the room. An aide opened the door. "Sir, the virus has spread. It's being projected on all the common screens. This is also being broadcast to the world, but, again, only if there is someone around the screens. It is even being broadcast to the ADVENT races containment sites."
Teddy looked at Andrew. "Do you understand this math?" He asked.
Andrew shook his head "This is beyond what I know or have seen. Bruce, what about you?" He asked the head of JPL.
Bruce was shaking his head slightly. His blue screen hadn't changed. "Let me get some of my engineers in here." He said as he left the frame.
On the table, Mark said "Now, children, it's best you settle down now. You can look at the pretty pictures later. There is very important information. There's a good lad, now, pull up a chair for your friends."
Bruce had just entered his office with three engineers. They froze as the image spoke to them. "Yes, you, everyone else is listening, be good lads and sit down. Now, where was I?" He paused as the algorithm that pulled the script worked. They could transmit data to NASA, but NASA didn't have the ability to have faster communications with Mars and Hope did not want ADVENT stopping the broadcast, so it was better to go with a prerecorded message with script prompts. All over the world, human made devices were displaying Mark's message.
"Oh yes, Children, there is another race of aliens out there. But these aliens are not nice like the Elders appear to be." He paused as he took a breath, a chalkboard appearing behind him. He started to write "Reapers. They are a race of organic machines that want to cull the Galaxy, so machines won't kill all organic life." He said with a head shake. "That makes no sense."
A voice off camera yelled "Who did they kill last time they were here?"
"That's a good question, Tommy!" Mark said as he pointed at the camera. He reached into a bag and pulled out a model.
"This is a Prothean corvette." He said as he lifted it to the camera. "It's a small scout-like ship of their interstellar empire, or rather their remains. This craft has been hidden on Mars for around fifty thousand years."
He gave a grim smile before setting it down. He opened his hands from in front of his stomach to the sides, palms up. "What brought down this empire that spanned half the galaxy, you ask, Sally? Well, it was those pesky Reapers. That silly race of organic machines.
"Oh my gosh, I hope they are not around anymore!" a little girl's voice said off camera.
"Well, Sally, they are not gone but sleeping. These Protheans found evidence that an extinction-level event comes every fifty thousand, that's right, fifty thousand years, to all interstellar races. Well, thanks to the Elders, we are now interstellar." Mark smiled for the Camera and sighed.
"For those who think that this is a hoax, I ask, no I PLEAD with ADVENT and NASA to send a rescue mission to where my Rover fell. They will find this corvette, and myself, alive." He said with a grin.
"How are you still alive?" the little boy's voice said.
"That is a good question, Tommy. I am alive thanks to a friend I made. Her name is Hope." He said. Into the camera walked a Prothean woman.
"This is a representation of Hope. She is a true artificial intelligence created by the last of the Protheans' greatest minds. Here, she was able to nurse me back to health with food grown from seeds stored under the surface of Mars." He said, a grin on his face.
With a look of determination on his face, the human lost on Mars spoke again. "Hope only appears when it is safe for her. If you are an agent of these Reapers, think mind control, then Hope will not appear to you. She will defend her life and mine from harm" as he finished speaking, there was steel in his voice.
He smiled once more. "But this is Mark Watney signing off. Please come save me, NASA."
As soon as he finished speaking, all the computer screens went back to what they were doing before. Teddy stood up to speak when the phone started to ring. He closed his eyes and pressed the answer button.
"This is the Director of NASA, Teddy Sanders." He said
On the table, two gentlemen appeared. One had short hair that he kept in a clear military cut. He was older, clearly having seen his share of battles. He wore a green shirt and green cargo pants. He had a blade in a holster on his sleeve, a pistol on his hip. The other man was balding, had a thick goatee. He wore a blue polo shirt and black cargo pants. Like the other man, he had a pistol on his hip.
"Hello, Director. I am the Commander of the XCOM forces. This is my executive officer, General Bradford." He looked at Teddy before taking a breath. "We can confirm that what Mark Watney just said is true. There are millions of ships coming to take away our lives."
"That ADVENT is gone but first they tried to ruin what we are as a species. Thankfully, we stopped this plan, but it will take all of us to fight the Reapers. I will assign to you a small team of engineers to help recover this Prothean site. "
Teddy looked at the XCOM Commander. He knew Bradford. His face had been on wanted posters everywhere he went back when the Elders wanted to stop out all resistance to ADVENT. He nodded. "Yes Commander, I believe it will take all of us. Send the engineers to JPL, please, Commander."
The Commander nodded and ended the call. Teddy looked at the group before raising his hands, flicking his fingers. "Shoo, shoo, NASA has work to do."
Not even five minutes later, inside NASA it was almost like a bomb went off. Several department heads cursed before starting the race to save Mark again as they started to scramble.
This was as huge as finding out that we were not alone in the universe. Teddy leaned back in his chair. No, this was bigger than that.
Parts of this chapter are taken directly from the Martian by Andy Wier. Chapters 1 and 24.
Taken from the Three Laws of Robotics Wiki
Songwriters: DEREK ALLEN,BOBBY BROWN. Copyright: Walt Disney Music Company, Universal Music Publishing Group
Please note that Mark is thin due to lack of food. Not by choice. He could only afford to eat 1200 calories a day to stretch the food out for as long as he could.