Thanks for the feedback in reviews and PMs, it's much appreciated. Honestly, I wasn't planning to continue this story, due to a lack of interest. But a couple of people seem to like it, so I'll keep it going.

So, there are some issues with the story, I know that. My writing is super rusty, just because I haven't done much of it in so long. It's slowly getting better as I get back into it, so I will try to go back and fix some of the issues with that. As for the amount of science as one reviewer noted, that's just not my strong point here, but I try to include what I can and will continue to do so. As far as the story goes, it's only been two days with many more to come - so you can expect more science in future chapters I hope!

This story just started for me as a bit of fun as I try to get back into writing, but I definitely want to write something people enjoy, so I'll certainly pay attention to your feedback and do the best I can! Is it overly cute and fluffy, yeah, probably, but it's relaxing to write - there will be some drama and painful choices ahead though.

Thanks for reading.

Sol 20

"That felt good," Lewis said after Beck had signed off. She turned to her crew and gave them a warm smile. There was still a lot to do, but it was a good moment for all of them. "That felt damn good. Good job, guys."

"We wouldn't make it anywhere without our fearless leader," Martinez assured her.

"Well, not a moment's rest. Let's get back to work. Watney, I believe you have a chat coming up with Miss Park?" she said.

Watney nodded. "Yep, I've got a video to watch, then we have a text chat scheduled. You know how I love those long distance conversations."

"I know it's a pain," Lewis admitted, "but it could help."

"Sorry, really didn't mean to complain, Commander."

"Yeah, since when?" Martinez asked.

She made a dismissive face. "Please, Watney, compared to what I'm used to from you, that's hardly complaining."

"Oh, the commander strikes again," Martinez chuckled.

"Yeah, yeah," Watney chuckled.

Ten minutes later Watney was settled on a couch in the common room with his laptop to watch the video Mindy had sent him to help orient him on their new project. Once it finished downloading he immediately hit play, prepared to be pretty bored with some detailed technical explanation about satellites, but he was quite surprised. Mindy Park was… cute. Really cute. Not exactly what he expected from a sat tech, though he didn't really know what to expect.

"Hi, Mar… sorry, I mean Dr. Watney," she said awkwardly with a slight blush. "I'm Mindy Park."

"Well hello there, Miss Park," he muttered to himself, sitting up a bit straighter.

"I just want to start off by saying that I'm really excited to be working with you. I think we're going to make a great team. I know the communication is a bit awkward, but we'll do our best. So, you're probably wondering what we're working on." She held up a map of Mars and pointed to a speck on it. "So, here is the hab, then way over here is the crater. You and I will be working to help NASA plot the safest route from the hab to the crater, in case they figure out how to get them to the crater. Then once they head to the crater, you'll be out of communication with them, so I'll keep track of them through the satellites and keep the Hermes up to date on their status. It looks like for now they are requesting us to have daily briefings, just to make sure you guys stay in the loop."

"That sounds awesome," he said dreamily then shook his head. He needed to control himself; she was millions of miles away and he hadn't even met her in person, but admittedly, this was the closest he'd come in a long time to talking to cute girl who wasn't already spoken for or in love with someone else. He continued to watch as she discussed the distance to the crater and how long it could reasonably take for them to reach it. He didn't even notice when Martinez walked up behind him.

"Is that your satellite girl?" he asked with a whistle.

Watney glanced up, a slight blush in his cheeks. "Um yeah, Mindy Park."

"She's cute. You should ask her out," Martinez joked.

"Hard to do from orbit," Watney replied and paused the video.

"You got cameras right? There's always cybersex," he chuckled.

"With a twelve minute lag time?"

Martinez patted him on the shoulder. "Yeah, you're right, buddy. You'd be done by the time she downloaded the first frame."

"That's hilarious," Watney deadpanned.

"That's why they hired me," Martinez replied. "Commander's about to hit the sack, you need to head up to the bridge, if you're monitoring comms."

"No problem," he said and closed his laptop. "Maybe I can do my work without constant interruption."

"You know you'd die of boredom if I wasn't around," he said with a large grin.

Watney chuckled and stood up from the couch. "Well, I guess they have to keep someone around to fly the national treasure that is Mark Watney back to Earth."

"Wow, you don't even have to go to space to experience weightlessness do you? With that much hot air, I'm not sure how you didn't float away already."

"It's a skill," Watney said with a slight bow at the waist. "Have a good night, Martinez."

He slapped him on the shoulder. "Yeah, you too, buddy."

Once he'd settled in on the bridge, and after finishing Mindy's video, he turned on his webcam to record a return message. He waved to the camera and smiled. "Hey, Mindy, nice to meet you. Please, call me Mark and not Dr. Watney. Look forward to working with you as well." He turned the laptop around to show her the bridge and the view of the stars before turning the camera back on himself. "Just relaxing here on the bridge watching your first video. Quite a view. Wish you could see it in person. Fortunately for you, you just missed Martinez. Anyway, sorry you got stuck working with the botanist of the group. I will try to make it as not boring as possible. Maybe on another video I'll show you around the ship. I would take you back to my room, but we just met and I don't want to overstep any boundaries. So, our job. This sounds like a great idea. Getting them to the crater is the best option, so plotting out a route for them sounds like a good use of time, unlike most of the things NASA does. Just don't tell them I said that. Is NASA screening these calls?" He gave a roguish grin.

Mindy Park took a sip of coffee as she took a seat at her console in Mission Control. It was late, just after 11:00 p.m., and she was one of only a few people currently working in the large room. Despite the longer hours it was going to bring her, she was excited about her new project. She loved her job as a sat tech, but this was on a whole other level. When Vincent Kapoor had called her and told her she would be working with the rescue, she nearly passed out in terror, but the fear had quickly been replaced with a warm feeling of pride – Vincent had chosen her. She was getting to work with and directly communicate with the Hermes crew; she was a part of the mission now to rescue Beck and Johanssen, and she was eager to not let anyone down. She was also excited to learn that Lewis had paired her up to work with Mark Watney. Though it was more than a little intimidating. The Hermes crew were heroes and adventurers. She was Mindy Park, a sat tech who liked to walk her dog and whose idea of adventure was an extra hot cup of tea while reading a trashy book about alien invaders while relaxing on her couch with the aforementioned dog curled up on her feet. Still, her excitement overcame her anxiousness.

Logging into her computer, she let out a yawn. She still wasn't used to working so late, but she would adapt. Once she was logged in, she smiled as she saw a video message from Watney popped up in her inbox. They were scheduled to have a long distance chat, but she hadn't been expecting a reply to her message; surely he'd be too busy to bother.

She watched the video, smiling slightly and unconsciously biting her lower lip when he told her to call him Mark. She of course had seen plenty of interviews of him, but this was something else. And… was he flirting with her? She had a terrible time of picking up on things like that. Once she finished his video, she glanced at the clock. It was only a few minutes until their scheduled text chat. This would be the first time she'd ever chatted with someone and had to wait twenty four minutes to get a response, which would prove to be challenging but certainly did not nothing to dampen her anticipation, which had only increased by seeing that Watney seemed just as eager to work with her; though she couldn't believe that was be possible. He was an astronaut – an American hero, and she was a sat tech whose name few people even at NASA knew. But she could imagine that after being off Earth for a year, chatting with anyone from home could be a refreshing change of pace. Who knows, maybe they'd become friends, as much time as she put into work, she could certainly stand to have a few more of those.

Pushing her musings aside, she logged into the chat program and decided to take the bold move of sending the first message.

Hi, Dr. Watney, errr… Mark. This is Mindy (obviously, who else on Earth would be messaging you at 11:30 at night, not that lots of people wouldn't want to message you of course!). I'm sure you get messages all the time, I didn't mean to imply otherwise. Oh, look there I go rambling. I tend to do that sometimes, especially when I'm nervous, and I never expected to be involved in an interplanetary astronaut rescue! Anyway, sorry to get off topic already, and then I went off topic about going off topic! Just finished watching your video, and I'm looking forward to our project. Go team Watney/Park! Oh, I can't believe I just typed that, please don't think less off me. And why am I using so many exclamation marks? I know, I could've just backspaced it, but if we're going to work together over such a long distance, then we need to cut down on our already sizable communication issues. So, one of the easiest things we can do is just be ourselves and be honest. And I'm something of an awkward dork, so the sooner you get used to that the better, so no use trying to hide it. You might not believe that I'm super-quiet in person. Nice to meet you!

She hit enter before she could stop herself and let out a sigh. Well, there was no going back now, and as she reread what she sent, she was fairly certain it was an unmitigated disaster of awkwardness. Watney was going to think she was insane. She leaned back in her chair, stuck a pencil between her teeth, and pondered what she should write next. Could she still salvage his impression of her? When a message popped up on her screen barely five minutes after she'd sent hers, she leaned forward, dread on her face, eyes narrowing as she focused on the text. How had he responded so quickly she wondered at first, then realized that he had the same idea, that rather than wait for a message from her had gone ahead and sent one early.

Good evening, Miss Park. Mark here from orbit around Mars. Not bragging… just saying. Hope you're having a pleasant evening back on Earth. If you could sometime this week eat an entire can of bbq Pringle's on my behalf, I would appreciate it. A photo of you holding the can would even be helpful. I've been craving those all month, and of course, no one at NASA had the foresight to pack any. Instead I'm sitting here enjoying a pack of something that has been mislabeled as vanilla pudding, when it should've been more accurately labeled as freeze-dried glue. She laughed out loud, and then glanced sheepishly around the room to see if anyone had noticed.

Anyway, enough complaining or NASA will probably start withholding my paychecks. Wait. I am getting paid for this right? Can you check on that for me? And see if I get a bonus for helping plan a Mars rescue mission, as that was definitely not in the job description for this mission. Tell them they can take it out of Beck and Johanssen's pay since this is all their fault. Just kidding! I'm ready to get to work and rescue those two crazy kids. This is really important to me, Mindy. Can I call you Mindy? Beck is my best friend, and Johanssen is great, too, of course. I'm thinking we just start with the hab location and go through the map grid by grid to trace the safest but quickest route. Eager to hear your thoughts!

She placed her fingers on the keyboard, an amused smile on her face, as she tried to decide how to respond.

Mark, that sounds like a good plan that you've put some thought into. Lucky us though, NASA has other people on this problem – trust me, I can barely follow my GPS, so I shouldn't be designing a Martian highway. A group of geologists along with a specialist on the rover (good to know what its capabilities are) on working on designing the route. Our job is a little more simple. As they develop the route, you and are I are to examine the realtime satellite pictures grid by grid and compare them to the database of maps they used to plan the route. We'll update them to any major changes we see in case the route needs to be adjusted. You'll help us use the equipment aboard the Hermes to take additional photos, monitor the weather along the route, and whatever else we can come up with. Sorry, if that's not as exciting as what you were hoping for! I should've been more clear in my first video about what the exact nature of our project is. If it makes you feel better, I am getting paid overtime for staying late to chat with you. I'd be happy to cut you in on some of that if you bring me a Mars rock – I need a new doorstop. And please, call me Mindy.