Houston
Hi Mindy, he'd started, as usual. It was his favorite greeting. Because of course it was.
Sorry I have been too busy to write much today. Montrose has been keeping me busy. It's good to have something to do, even if it's just light-duty things.
Enjoyed your letter, yesterday. Would love to hear some more about SatCon, too. Not just the parts that pertain to Mark-watching, either. How did you wind up in charge of satellites, and what were you doing before that?
I'll have to be in better shape before I'm ready for the heavy lifting here on Hermes. The ship is overdue for an EVA to do some inspections and maintenance, but the crew has had a busy week, apparently. Had to stop and pick up a hitchhiker or something.
(Don't they know how dangerous that is?)
Not that I'm keeping track or anything, or that I'm in any way ungrateful to be on this ship, but today makes 207 days until we'll be home. I can't wait to see that blue horizon from our observation window, here. And maybe a day or two after that, I can finally see you again. And spend Christmas with you and Henry and my parents. He's so cute, Mindy, I can't even believe it. I have turned into one of "those" parents that constantly shows off pictures of their kid to everyone he crosses paths with.
Even Martinez runs the other way now when I bring up the pictures of Henry. A fine payback for all the months on the way to Mars when I had to look at pictures of his two-year-old every day. The nerve of some people, I swear.
Did you know that back in the early days of the space program, they used to quarantine those poor fuckers for weeks when they came back from the moon? God, I'm glad they don't do that to astronauts anymore.
More work rears its ugly head and I must go.
Your favorite Martian.
Mindy couldn't help smiling. She was used to getting her daily message from Mars, and now Hermes, but it still gave her a thrill whenever a new one appeared in her inbox.
They'd settled into… how would she describe their relationship, now? Friends with just a hint of something more?
Mark had occasionally strayed into open flirtation, mostly by asking her to send pictures of herself and then complaining that she wore a lot more clothes than he seemed to remember, when she complied. But for the most part, he seemed intent on actually getting to know her. He asked her questions; they were writing prompts, really, about her history, her likes and dislikes, her goals, her beliefs. He was forever asking for details of how she'd done her job; how everything had played out. What kind of decision-making process had gone into the chain of events that had led to his rescue.
Mindy was uniquely qualified, as it turned out. She'd had a good overhead view of the internal mechanics at NASA over the last year, and she recounted events for him as he asked, to the best of her memory.
He had a year and a half of curiosity to satisfy, about NASA, his parents, Henry, current events.
So she wrote. A lot. They both did. And now that Mark was back on Hermes, this thing was starting to feel real. She felt like she had, that evening so long ago, when she'd felt like she'd finally met someone that she could see herself really falling for.
They were more than friends that flirt, if she were being honest with herself.
She'd gotten another chance, they both had. They had to be realistic about this, of course. The innate problem with long-distance romance was, of course, that the couple wouldn't be focused on the real make-or-break factors that would determine whether they could make it together, in the real world.
Mark had told her, even, about his great-grandparents, how they'd courted and fallen in love via snail mail, and Mindy was pretty sure that's what was afoot here, as well. But it was still early, she knew.
Everything would change once he was back on Earth.
Would they fight? Get on each other's nerves? Would Mark even be in any kind of condition, mentally, to even attempt a new relationship?
Mindy didn't know any of the answers. But she knew that she was looking forward to finding out.
Hermes
"No, I am not going to call you Captain Blondebeard. Or Captain anything!" Lewis informed Mark bluntly, over their evening meal in the Rec.
"I was in international waters, though-" he began, about to recount how he'd claimed the title, again, when she shushed him.
"Watney," she pointed out, patiently, "we're all space pirates."
Mark looked at her, baffled.
"Not to take the wind out of your sails, there, matey," she smiled, "but you do know we took a vote and committed mutiny so that we could come back and get you, right?"
"Uh. No. I did not know that." He was certain that she had to be kidding. Because she couldn't really be serious.
Could she?
"Oh yes," she assured him, as his heart skipped a beat. "Sanders decided that the Rich Purnell maneuver was too risky. But someone, probably our flight director, didn't agree with him, and sent it to us, anyway."
Mark was frozen in his seat, struck speechless yet again with what they'd been willing to do to save him. He tried to play it off, but to his mortification, he found that he had a lump in his throat and he couldn't even reply. They'd risked everything to save him. And no doubt Commander Lewis was telling him about it, in this easy, joking manner, so that he wouldn't feel the need to make a big thing of it. He'd have done the same for any one of them, and they all knew it.
"So yeah, since all of us also commandeered a vehicle that doesn't belong to any of us, in international waters," she continued, breezily, "that makes all of us pirates. And we five space pirates have been in the interstellar pirating business for way longer than you have. We have pirate seniority."
"You have pirate seniority." he repeated, trying to get back into the spirit of things. "So, in other words, what you're saying here is, I can't be Captain Blondebeard anymore? Awww. C'mon, Commander."
"Oh, hell no. You're in the clutches of the Red Pirate Lewis, now, " Lewis looked at him, the beginnings of a grin on her face. "I'm the captain. You're the low man on the totem pole."
"I'm the cabin boy?"
"Not even," she deadpanned back, "You're just the swabby."
"Like I'm the guy who mops up puddles on the poop deck?"
"Yep," she agreed. "That sounds about right."
"But no, seriously," Mark argued, pointing at Johanssen. "You're telling me that I'm outranked by a fuckin' software pirate? You've gotta be kidding."
"Seniority," Johanssen smirked at him from behind her coffee. "It's a bitch, huh?"
"Youngest person on the ship," Mark grumbled. "And Vogel? There's not even any such thing as a German pirate!"
"Not true!" Vogel argued.
"Well I've never heard of any."
Vogel looked at him, aghast. "Never? Not even Störtebeker?"
"Nope."
"Was the greatest pirate all-time! Störtebeker, this is pirate name that means Beer Drinker-"
"Okay, now that sounds kind of plausible," Mark was laughing, shaking his head.
"Really!"
"And what did old Captain Beer Drinker do? Please. This I have to hear."
"Well," Vogel paused for a moment, thinking. "Most famous legend of Störtebeker was not about what he did when he lived, but what he did after he was dead. At his, how you say," Vogel drew his finger to his throat and slashed, "His execute?"
"Execution?" Beck suggested.
"Yes. Execution. He was granted one wish from the Mayor of Hamburg, yes? And he wished that after he was dead, he wanted for all his pirate crew to make a line. The executioner would cut off his head, and if Störtebeker was able to walk past any of his pirate crew, without his head, that man would be," he paused again, thinking. "Set free. Not executed. So they do this thing, they cut off his head, and then, Störtebeker rises," Vogel rose from his chair, to illustrate, "and walks past eleven of his men!"
"What-ever," Watney scoffed, rolling his eyes. "So fake!"
"It's legend!" Vogel scolded him, "Is for fun! Hush! So Störtebeker walks past his eleven pirates, and these pirates are so happy, cheering because he keeps on walking, walking, walking! And then the ah, headsman? Who cut off his head? Puts his foot out, and whoops! He trips Störtebeker! Bam, down he goes!"
"Not cool!"
"Yes! Was very uncool. But even more uncool, was when the Mayor of Hamburg, he takes back on his word, and has the eleven pirates executed anyway."
"Geez, Alex, do you tell your kids this as a bedtime story? Such a cheerful little tale!"
"Everybody knows this story, where I am from," Vogel shrugged. "Most famous pirate in Germany. Lots of German pirates, this one was the best."
"Beer-drinking zombie pirates, man," Watney said, "Germans are awesome. Gotta admit."
"Ah, yes!" Vogel said. "That reminds me. The other famous legend of Störtebeker! How he got his name."
"Drinking beer?" Watney guessed.
"He could take a giant mug," Vogel gestured as to the size of his imaginary mug, indicating an absolutely absurdly large one, "One gallon mug, filled with beer, and he would drink it down, like this," he tipped his imaginary mug over, "One gulp!"
"Damn!" Martinez said.
"Okay. I'll have to give you a pass. This guy was obviously a legend. German pirates were definitely the best," Watney conceded. "Ignorance fought."
Vogel grinned and nodded in amused satisfaction.
"But seriously," Mark continued, "I hauled myself halfway across Mars! I did all kinds of insane mods to the rovers and the MAV, and NASA barely helped at all! I grew - my - own - food! I burned rocket fuel into water, and then I drank it and pissed it out, and then I turned my piss back into rocket fuel! That is hardcore space pirate stuff! It should count for something! I shouldn't have to be the lowest-ranked pirate on the ship. Not after all of that. Can't I outrank Beck, at least?"
Watney looked at Lewis, pleadingly.
Martinez shook his head, smirking.
"No way, man. Beck here is the best pirate out of all of us!" Martinez grinned, pausing a beat, waggling his eyebrows. "Cause he gets all the boo-tay!"
"I will code a new game and call it Zombie Space Pirates From Mars and I will make you play it, so help me!" Beth threatened Martinez, as the rest of the crew laughed.
Beck said nothing. He put his head in his hands, closed his eyes, and sighed.