In the history of space travel, there had only been a single flight quieter than the current one: Soyuz XI. That flight was quiet because the capsule had suffered a decompression on its return to Earth while reentering the atmosphere and all three cosmonauts had died. However, these five astronauts traveling from Mars to their interplanetary vessel - Hermes, were very quiet. All aboard were alive, however, unlike that ill-fated Soyuz, and the MAV wasn't completely silent for the over twenty minutes that it took to reach orbit. While not one word was said, quiet crying could be heard. Four of the five astronauts sat staring straight ahead, seeming to see nothing before them. The lone exception was the pilot who was focusing so hard on the screen before him that he seemed to be just as frozen and unaware as the rest.

As they neared Hermes and the proximity alarm chimed, the youngest and smallest of them, Johanssen, sat up straighter in her seat, sniffled one last time, wiped her eyes, and then turned them to her screen. It was time to get back to work. The professional in her, drilled time and time again in procedures, took over.

"One hundred meters," she said, voice wavering, then cleared her throat.

The others stirred in their seats suddenly as if awoken from a trance. Each looked at their screens.

"Seventy-five meters," she said. The pilot shifted so that he could better see the docking alignment.

"Fifty meters."

"Hermes is in standard orbit, no change from when we left," Vogel said.

"Twenty-five meters."

"Once docked we need to proceed to the bridge within an hour to prepare for deorbit," Commander Lewis said.

"Twenty meters."

Then "15" "10" Johanssen's countdown continued as they neared docking, but no one else spoke.

The sound of the docking latches echoed through the MAV and Hermes. They were once again safely attached to the large vessel.

As if on automatic, Martinez pressed a button on the console in front of him and reported, "Houston, MAV, and Hermes hard dock achieved."

While that message was carried on the radio waves back to NASA, several light minutes away, the occupants once again sat silently.

Dr. Christopher Beck began scrolling through his computer, checking numbers, and making notes. "Life support on Hermes is nominal. We're free to enter without suiting up," he told his crewmates.

Slowly they unbuckled from their seats and allowed themselves to float. Vogel moved to the airlock, tapping the pad next to it he said, "Pressure is equal." He looked back at Lewis.

With a nod from the commander, Vogel opened the door.

One by one they crossed from the MAV into Hermes, their home for the return trip to Earth. The astronauts began to drift off each in their own direction to begin their assigned duties so they could meet back on the bridge and buckle in to leave orbit and begin the nearly year-long trip home.

Beck watched his crewmates float away then followed Lewis, "Commander," he said.

She did not respond, just kept floating along.

"Commander," he said again, after pushing off the wall to gain the momentum to catch up to her. This time he put a hand on her shoulder.

"Yes," she replied, looking over at him.

"We have to report to NASA about..." he hesitated for a second, "Watney."

"I'm well aware of that, Dr. Beck," she said. "I'm headed to my quarters to do that now. I'll send them a short message and start writing my full report. I'll expect reports from all of you to go along with that. We can discuss that after we deorbit."

Beck squinted and cocked his head to the side "Are you reporting via text?"

"Yes. I will not have Timothy and Grace find out about their son's death through the broadcast or from some reporter. Mission Control can handle it circumspectly if we notify them that way."

He nodded, glad that this wasn't his job. As a doctor, he'd had to be the one to tell families before that they'd lost someone but it had always been direct. He didn't know that he would have thought about the results of reporting Mark's loss over the standard comms channel. He gave a moment's thought to his friend's parents, and how he could have hurt them had he made that call, and for at least the tenth time since the mission again thanked his lucky stars that he wasn't the commander.

"Wait, Mission Control has our bio-monitor data."

"They might but when the comms dish flew it interrupted all communication. Not all of it returned immediately."

He looked at her curiously, wondering but not wanting to ask and he knew she wouldn't tell him if what he suspected was true. He could and should go to the med bay and check the console. It was part of his duty after all to check the crew's stats from launch to now: their heart rate, blood pressure, blood ox levels, skin temp, and breathing rate. He didn't though, instead he went to his quarters to change out of his surface clothing into his NASA sweats, purposefully ignoring the computer.

—-

Mission control was anything but silent. The call to evacuate due to the severity of the storm had come right as the primary shift was ending. Every station had two controllers sharing information, preparing for the evening shift.

Technically Mission Control shifts were eight hours long, with three shifts scheduled throughout the day. Occasionally, there was a change in shift order due to specific events in the mission schedule. In actuality, the shifts were more like nine to ten hours as flight controllers reported early to their station to be filled in by their counterparts and then stayed after to fill in their replacements. Since a sol on Mars was longer than a day on Earth, it also meant that their duties shifted over time as NASA wasn't about to ask three shifts of people to constantly drift their day by those extra thirty-nine minutes every day for the entirety of the mission. It was simpler for everyone to know all of the routines for the entire sol so they could handle all of it no matter what time it was on Earth when compared to Mars.

The call for evacuation had come close to the end of the primary shift. Mitch Henderson, lead flight director for Ares III, had called for his team to stay until the crew was aboard Hermes. The noise in the room had stopped nearly instantly as all controllers took seats at their consoles and watched the data. It would be several minutes before the crew received the message and the data they were looking at was equally as old. Every spare headset was picked up, turned on, plugged in, and put on. Call-outs came as the storm reports continued. Status updates on the MAV and Hab were also shared.

"Flight, Telmu."

"Go Telmu,"

"We've lost status on the MAV.."

"Flight, Surgeon, I'm getting no data from the bio-monitors."

The screens in front of the controllers had gone blank.

Voices carried out through the room again.

"Calm down," Mitch called out. "Enough. There are any number of reasons that the comms are out and the storm is the primary reason, it could just be blocking the signal. Just watch your monitors and preserve the last data you received."

Twenty minutes later screens began to flicker with new information.

"Flight, surgeon."

"Go surgeon."

"I still have no data."

"Priority would be for telemetry data to come through. Give it time." Mitch said it with authority but felt dread in his chest. This could be the worst loss in NASA's history, the worst loss in the history of space travel. If they'd lost the entire crew on Mars, it might be the end of NASA entirely. He shook his head hard once, attempting to shake the thoughts away. It would do no good to speculate.

"Houston, MAV and Hermes hard dock achieved."

It was as though a soft breeze had blown through the room taking with it the tension that had built up. Smiles appeared, hands were shaken, and headsets were removed. The primary crew made their final notes and exchanged places with their replacements though no one left. They would all wait for Hermes to leave orbit before leaving themselves. No one wanted to go home without knowing that the crew was safely on their way back to Earth.

Turner Matthews and Kayla Jones, both members of the Ares II crew, sat at the CapCom console talking. Being a CapCom for the Ares missions was very different from being CapCom for the ISS2 or the new Moon missions. Much of the time there was very little to do and all communication was minutes apart rather than seconds.

Communication with Hermes and the Mars surface missions also meant more typing and less talking. It wasn't that voice communication didn't happen at all. During the active surface time, the crew needed to hear one another which had been discovered during the Apollo missions. Specifically during Apollo XII when trying to communicate with Dick Gordon in the capsule orbiting the moon while Pete Conrad and Al Bean had been talking to each other on the surface. Dick couldn't hear the Capcom and he couldn't hear them. They'd had to switch to a different radio band. That was harder to do when it took longer to reply. When Mars surface missions began, it was decided that at least one astronaut would be in the Hab at all times to stay in contact with Mission Control. There would be two channels, one for communication back to Houston and one for only the crew. After Ares I, that policy changed to text communication only with the Hab duty astronaut.

This had led NASA to add an alert tone to the console that sounded when a message was received, not that anyone sitting there would miss a message that suddenly flashed up on the screen and the message stayed there until it was acknowledged by the capcom on duty but the alert was an extra level of security to be sure all messages were read promptly.

Urgent communication regularly came through voice messages even with the time delay, so when the tone sounded, neither Matthews nor Jones thought anything about it. Martinez had been able to send a voice communication after all, but they immediately opened the file per the procedure.

Be advised during the evacuation Mark Watney was struck by flying debris from the communications array. It carried him away from the crew. We were unable to locate Watney. Upon reviewing the last stats received from Watney's bio-monitor and taking into consideration that Watney's decompression alarm went off after he was carried away, Dr. Beck declared him dead. We left him on the surface. The rest of the crew is safe aboard Hermes. Reports with more details will follow after we have left orbit.

The two astronauts turned to look at each other, Kayla's eyes shining, a nanosecond passed before Turner flipped a switch and said, "Flight, Capcom."

"Go CapCom," Brendan Hutch responded.

"Flight we have a message from Commander Lewis."

"Read it out."

Turner hesitated and glanced at Kayla who shook her head once.

"Flight, I think you should come see this yourself."

This time it was Brendan and Mitch who exchanged a look before both moved to stand behind the two astronauts and read over their shoulders.

"GC, Flight," Mitch said sharply.

"Flight, GC."

"Lock the doors."

Every controller not already looking at the capcom station turned there now, eyes wide, faces frozen at the sound of that phrase, one only uttered during the worst accidents in NASA history. Each time it had been uttered in this building before, the crew was lost. Dr. Keller, already on alert due to the missing biomonitor data, stood from the flight surgeon's console and joined the group at capcom.

"Freeze the data on your screens," Mitch said to the controllers as Brendan turned and caught the eye of Venkat Kapoor when he looked up from his phone.

Kapoor had been sitting in the viewing room. He'd come down to Mission Control when meteorology had sent the warning to the crew about the storm. Annie Montrose, NASA's public relations director, and frequent press secretary pulling double duty because the agency had to be very careful where they spent the money Congress sent their way had come to sit next to him. Reporters weren't allowed in the visitor's room, so it was the best place for her to get updates and not have to answer questions. The reporters assigned to the space beat were either in the press office or in the press briefing room waiting for her to come to brief them. In the meantime, they listened to reports from the public affairs officer assigned to Mission Control.

Annie and Venkat sat listening as the evacuation began. She stood and began to pace when communications and status were lost. Fortunately, the only other people in the visitor's room at the time were other JSC personnel familiar with her, which was especially fortunate as she muttered continuously and several of the words she used were not professional. Venkat admired her ability to completely turn on the professional demeanor for the reporters and cameras. None of them would ever suspect she had a mouth worse than any astronaut. They also had the ability to turn on absolute professionalism at the flick of a switch. If they didn't they would never have been chosen for the program. Professionalism was a key characteristic of astronauts.

At Martinez's report of the hard dock, Annie had stopped and closed her eyes briefly before nodding to Venkat and rushing out of the room to make a statement. He considered leaving as well. There were at least a dozen things on his desk that needed attention but he, like the flight controllers, didn't want to leave until the crew was out of orbit and headed home.

When the call came to lock the doors he stood and strode to the door into Mission Control, stopping to send a quick text to Annie.

Do NOT proceed with the press conference. Go straight to your office. Do NOT talk to anyone. I will be there shortly to brief you.

Annie, striding down the hall when her phone buzzed, looked down at it without stopping. People in the hall dodged as she continued moving, then watched her, confused as she cursed, spun on her heel, and nearly ran in the other direction. Reaching her office she turned on the live feed. Daniel Webb was the PAO on duty. He was running through the stats on Hermes for anyone who hadn't already heard them on the previous two missions or this one, explaining the procedures the crew would now be following as they prepared to deorbit.

Satisfied that whatever was happening, he was handling the flow of information, she pulled up the live feed on her computer, scrolled back a few minutes, and hit play. The reported hard dock, Keller worrying about data, Mitch reassuring him, CapCom calling Flight then-

"Lock the doors."

"Shit!" I should never have left that room, she thought, and now all I can do is wait like everyone else.

Venkat joined the crowd at the capcom console. "What happened?"

Mitch just pointed to the screen as Brendan moved around the room speaking to each set of controllers in turn explaining and telling them what to do with their data from the previous hour.

"What the hell happened? How in the hell could this have happened?" Venkat asked.

"We're going to be figuring that out," Mitch said. "We knew communications were cut out temporarily but we didn't know why. Now we do. Damn it! Annie?"

"I already stopped her," Venkat assured him, holding up his phone.

Venkat turned to the flight surgeon, "Dr. Keller, get Dr. Shields on the phone. We're going to need to consult her about the crew. They're going to need all the support we can give them from here and ways they can support each other. As soon as we can after they deorbit, you and she will need to talk to Dr. Beck."

Brendan returned and asked, "Speaking of support, who is Watney's astronaut liaison?"

"Karen, Karen Rhodes," Turner replied then gestured to Kayla. "She's trying to get a hold of her now. We called and got a message to her about the storm."

"Got a message to her? What do you mean? You didn't just talk to her?" Brendan asked.

"She's in Chicago for the month," Venkat clarified for the others, "not just for speaking engagements at the Museum of Science and Industry and Adler Planetarium, but to be close by for Mark's parents. It was a great way to kill two birds with one stone. She can do her 'time in the barrel' doing public relations for us, as well as being there to talk to them and answer any questions."

"She's at the planetarium today. We tried her phone first and didn't get an answer so we called the director. Now we can't get either of them but we'll keep trying. In the meantime, we'll see if anyone else is up that way."

Venkat nodded, "There's nothing else I can do here. I'm going to tell Annie and call Sanders. He was on his way to the White House to brief the president about the storm and evacuation. Keep me apprised of the situation. I want to know when they have safely left orbit and are on a return trajectory. When you get Karen, tell her to call Annie or me after she talks to Mark's parents so we can schedule the press conference. The sooner that gets done the better. We can't let the media speculate for too long, it's too dangerous."

Kayla nodded as she dialed again.

—-

Annie was pacing the floor, still listening to the live feed when the knock came at her door. She had locked it after hearing the lock the doors call, not wanting any stray reporters to try and get in and corner her. She knew they were waiting for her report and that they were now suspicious but there was nothing she could do. They would have all heard that call go out as well and everyone knew what it meant, or what it had always meant. Now everyone was just waiting to find out which astronaut or astronauts they'd lost. She trusted her assistants to do their absolute best to keep everyone out of the office, but those reporters were vipers. They'd try anything they could to get in.

"Annie it's me, let me in." Venkat's voice was muffled by the door but clear enough that she could hear that it was him.

Quickly she unlocked the door, opened it, let him pass her by, then closed and locked it again.

"What the hell happened, Venk? Who died? Someone's dead right? That's why they locked the doors."

"Call Sanders, I'll tell you both at the same time."

"Oh hell." She dropped heavily into the chair behind her desk and punched numbers into the phone sitting on the desktop. "Someone's definitely dead," she muttered.

The phone rang three times.

"Sanders."

"Teddy, where are you?" Venkat asked.

"Waiting outside the Oval Office. I assume there's an update."

"Can anyone else hear this conversation?"

"Just a moment," he said, then spoke in a more muffled voice clearly to the others he was with, "I'm just going to step into the other room to take this call. Yes, I'll stay there until you come for me… All right. Tell me."

Kapoor shared the news with the other two, everything he had learned, which wasn't much more than that they had lost Mark Watney. Annie cursed again as she was wont to do and Teddy said nothing.

"Every step needing to be taken is being taken. Protocol is being followed. The news is currently locked down," Venkat assured him.

"I'd like to make the announcement myself," Teddy responded. "I'll get on a plane as soon as I'm done here. I can brief Melody and she can stay with the President. We can hold a press conference first thing in the morning, possibly earlier."

"If we can keep it quiet that long," Annie replied. "There are people still interested enough in these missions that they listen to the live feeds online and they'll be wondering what's happening. Daniel is a great public commentator but even he can only BS for so long. The reporters are going to start banging down my door within the hour if I don't give them something and speculation will start to run rampant."

The director sighed, "Issue a press release that the Ares III crew evac'd, the comms array at the site was destroyed, and more information will follow."

"Yeah that's not gonna stop the hounds," she griped, "but I guess I don't have any other choice. F-! Any more and the press will think I'm lying, any less and they'll hound me. It'll have to be a no-questions-asked quick brief. I'll send Marcia to tell them that before I go in, then announce it and get out."

"Good idea. Just a second…"

Muffled talking came from the speaker before Teddy spoke directly to his two subordinates again, "The president is ready for me. I'll call you before I get on the plane and give you my landing time."

"We'll have an escort waiting for you," Venkat told him.

Annie cursed yet again as the call ended.

Venkat sighed and said, "I'm heading back to Mission Control. I'll keep you updated."

"Do that," she said as she opened her laptop to begin crafting the statement for the press. She growled when her phone buzzed but couldn't resist checking the message.

Sounds like something big is happening. We'll push off dinner till tomorrow. If you need any help, let me know.

Of course, she was listening to the live feed. As soon as the abort order had been communicated all the major news channels picked it up, which was the problem. Everyone knew. The previous two Ares missions had been able to stay the entire thirty days. It was bad enough when she was going to have to answer questions about why they had to evacuate and why there wasn't a way for them to stay safely on the surface or a way to get up and back to Hermes more than once in case it was necessary. Those questions might still come but they were a long way off now. Worse, now it would be Congress asking them but she wouldn't have to answer. That would be on Kapoor, Sanders, Henderson, and others. It was a question she'd been asking for years so she'd look forward to the answer. In the meantime...

Thanks, will do. For now, just pray I can find the words I need to satisfy the press until I can give them more details.

Always. You've got this. You're a master with the press.

Annie smiled for a second at the compliment.

I hope you're right.

—-

Teddy Sanders had been in the White House before for a number of meetings with the president's advisors. He'd even been in the Oval Office before when he had been announced as the new director of NASA after the Ares II mission had returned, and before the Ares III launch. He'd never been nervous before. Now his stomach clenched as the door was opened for him and he entered the room.

The president sat in a chair at the head of the seating area, one that had been turned around from facing her desk, with her chief of staff standing next to her. The president-elect sat on the couch to the right with his chief of staff beside him.

"President Schneider, President-elect Young," Teddy said and shook each of their hands when they rose to greet him, then sat down on the other sofa.

"So Mr. Sanders, we had a bit of trouble on Mars, did we," President Schneider commented, her tone making it clear she wasn't asking a question. "The President-elect and I were having a meeting on a few things and as someone would have to provide him with a briefing I invited him to stay. I assume you don't mind."

"No ma'am I don't mind, and yes ma'am we've had trouble on Mars, Madam President. There was a sandstorm of unusual velocity that built much more rapidly than any has before, in the history of our study of the planet. It wasn't even thought that there could be a storm of this magnitude. Commander Lewis was briefed and chose to have the crew suit up and go to the Mars Ascent Vehicle,"

"The MAV?"

"Yes ma'am, the MAV. The crew was to go there to wait for further instructions or for the storm to pass or abate. They were headed there when the call was officially made to abort surface missions and evacuate."

"I assume they have done so and that is why you are here to brief us now."

Teddy nodded, "They have, however, there was an incident during evacuation."

He went on to share what he had been told and answered their questions as best he could. When they were satisfied for the moment he stood to leave.

"Mr. Sanders," the president said. "Hold on a moment."

"Yes ma'am."

Greta Schneider rose from her chair again and stepped to the side of the room with her chief of staff and spoke quietly with him. He pulled out a cell phone and made a call then nodded to her.

"There is a plane waiting for you at Andrews Air Force base, or there will be By the time you get there. I assure you that all of us in this room will keep this information to ourselves until it has been announced officially. Please have someone notify me once the Watneys have been informed so that I may call them."

"Thank you Madam President. I will do that," Teddy responded and walked out of the office followed by several others.

After the room had cleared and only the president and president-elect remained, they sat without talking for several minutes.

"Mark Watney was the epitome of a modern astronaut and immensely popular with the general public. Hell of a way to end your presidency Greta," the president-elect finally said. The two were not friends, and might never be friends but they were now part of an elite co-ed fraternity of those who had held the highest office in the land of the free. While some politicians only wanted to see those on the other side fail, neither of the two in this room had ever been that way. They both wanted to win, no doubt about that, but they wanted to do it on their terms and wanted to try and remain above the fray. Neither had a spotless record in that regard, but then again, no politician did. He honestly felt bad for her. Although she had nothing to do with it, this event would stain the end of her political career. He'd have to speak up on her behalf when the media went after her as they surely would for her continued support of the NASA Mars missions because they both believed in the space program. There would be calls for the Ares missions to end, he knew she would argue to keep them going as he would. Even if he didn't agree with her politically, her legacy shouldn't be based on this tragedy.

"Hell of a way to start yours, Charlie. This is going to be a cloud over both of us. The uproar will start now and not end for months to years."

"Congress will investigate," he said, already dreading the press. Thinking about which Congresspeople or Senators he could get on NASA's side, two immediately jumped to mind.

"They have to, we can't let this go without an investigation."

"It's going to be a circus."

She nodded, "Congressional hearings almost always are, especially when they are about something so well-publicized. The American people are going to want answers. The Watneys, I imagine, will want answers. Speaking of, I assume you stayed so that you can be on the call."

"Yes," the president-elect said and fought not to sigh. "This is the worst part of the job or nearly that."

She nodded again. "And it never gets any easier. Fortunately, I've had fewer calls to make than any other two-term president. I wish you even less. It may be a bit yet, would you like a cup of coffee?"

"Probably shouldn't but yes, please."

—-

Karen Rhodes had been one of the first astronauts to step foot on Mars. She'd been to space three times besides that mission. She was a mechanical engineer. She was supposed to be able to fix anything, but this she couldn't fix. There was nothing she could do but sit with the shocked and grieving parents of her friend and colleague.

There was no easy way to tell someone their child had died. It became even harder when you had to tell them that they wouldn't even be able to bury that child. NASA had trained all those chosen as astronaut liaisons for each mission on how to handle a number of situations and death was one of them, even including the small chance that they would have to leave said dead astronaut behind. However, no training could truly prepare you.

Astronauts telling the family of the victim went back to the Gemini missions. It was a story told in every liaison training. Ted Freeman had been a member of the third class of astronauts. He'd been returning to Houston from St. Louis and the McDonnell training facilities when a goose struck the windshield of his T-38. He ejected but his chute didn't open because he was too low and he died on impact. NASA had no procedures at the time for handling the situation. It honestly wasn't something they had thought to plan for, and the news spread fast. His wife found out from a reporter that came to their house. After that, astronauts' wives were frequently called on to go sit with the wife and/or family of the man who had died and distract her by chatting as they did so often until one of the other astronauts could get to her house to officially inform her.

Starting with the shuttle program, liaisons became standard practice. Each crew member assigned to a flight chose someone from the office not currently assigned to a mission to accompany their family during and through the events of the launch and throughout the mission. Always a big responsibility, it became huge, nearly unmanageable when Ares started. ISS missions had been different as those crew members could call home and talk to their families with very little time delay. Still, someone was chosen and was with the family during the launch and landing. and kept in contact with the family periodically but they were much less involved during the actual mission.

For the Ares missions, it was decided that the liaison would only be needed during critical times: launch to Hermes, Hermes leaving Earth orbit, surface mission, and return to Earth. Efforts were made to match astronauts with those who lived close to the crew member's family or could spend extended time near them so that someone was always there.

Karen had been alerted when the surface mission abort had been called. In the midst of a speaking engagement at the planetarium, she had tried to wrap it up as quickly as she could without raising suspicions. The message about the evac had been delivered to her on paper by the planetarium director, who did his best to help her get out of the room but her phone buzzed in her pocket, repeatedly.

It wasn't until she was sitting in her rental car that she had been able to take it out and answer. The call left her choked up and fighting tears. Mark had become a friend. They had even been out on a few dates before deciding they weren't right for each other in the long run but remained friends. Mark was friends with almost everyone in the astronaut office. He was one of the most affable people to come along in years. He got along with everyone, even those others barely tolerated. It could be annoying at times, how friendly he was except when he realized you were annoyed. Then, he'd tell stupid jokes until you laughed. There was going to be a hole at NASA that wouldn't be filled anytime soon.

She had had to force herself to think of Mark's parents and get the car in gear and drive to their house. During the trip, she called Kayla back and got all the details she could.

The Watneys' front door opened as she closed her car door.

"Karen," Grace said from the door. "Come in."

"We've been waiting for you," Tim Watney said when she walked into the house.

Karen bit her lip and apologized for taking so long to get to them.

"No, no," Grace said. "We know you have other duties."

"We do," Timothy said, a bit chagrined but then his frustration came through again. "Still would have been nice if someone could have told us something. All we've been listening to is that man rambling about stuff everyone should know. What we want to know is what the hell happened!"

"Tim," Grace chided. "I'm sure if it was anything too bad they would have sent someone else or called us."

The words were said but there was no conviction behind them, doubt was leaking through.

"They locked the damned doors!"

Karen sat in the chair they had designated as hers when she began visiting with them. Grace sat down next to her husband.

"They did call for the doors to be locked," Karen acknowledged. She didn't know how to continue but finally decided to start at the beginning.

"You heard about the storm that was headed for the Hab?"

They nodded.

"Ok, so… Commander Lewis called for an abort to be on the safe side. While they were walking from the Hab to the MAV the storm got worse. We think we're pretty sure, or at least Melissa is pretty sure that part of the comms array was blown loose in the storm. It hit Mark."

Grace gasped and paled. Timothy wrapped his arms around her.

"He was carried away. His suit decompression alarm went off. His bio-monitor… Mr. and Mrs. Watney, I'm sorry. Mark's dead. He died during the evacuation. I am so sorry."

She fought back tears of her own as she watched Grace collapse sobbing and Timothy hold her tight with tears trailing down his face. She felt truly helpless.

Several minutes later Grace looked up. "The crew? Are the rest of the crew ok?"

Karen nodded. "They are all aboard Hermes and safe."

It was Grace's turn to nod.

"If you'll excuse me for a moment," Karen said and stood. She walked as quietly as she could through the house and out into the backyard where she sat on the back step and allowed her tears to flow for only a moment before she wiped her eyes and took out her phone.

"Hello."

"Kayla, it's Karen."

"You told them."

"Yeah."

"You ok?"

"Not really but I have to be for now. How 'bout you?"

"Same. Everyone else is pretty much just in shock. Tomorrow is gonna be worse."

"Yeah, I should go back inside."

"Ok. Bye."

"Bye."

—-

The door to the Oval Office opened and the secretary stepped in.

"Madam President," she said.

"The call is ready Nadine?"

"Yes ma'am," the woman replied before stepping back out and closing the door.

Greta stood, brushed down her skirt, and moved to her desk. She looked across at Charlie who had also stood and moved to stand by the desk. He nodded; she took a deep breath, let it out, and then hit the button to put the phone on speaker mode.

"Mr. and Mrs. Watney, this is Greta Schneider. I'm here with Charles Young. We wanted to extend our condolences to you."

Charlie spoke, "Your son has been an inspiration for so many and we have no words to express how sorry we are for your loss."

"Thank you both for the call."

"We'll let you go now," Greta said. "I'm sure you want to be with your family but please know that all of you are in our thoughts and prayers."

"Yes ma'am, thank you. Goodbye."

—-

Annie stood in a small room listening to the clamor next door, knowing it was only going to get worse. She'd avoided any and all reporters since the night before though she wasn't sure how other than barricading herself in her office. She'd finally gotten a few hours of sleep by stretching out on the couch there. Fortunately, she kept extra clothes in her closet and was able to sneak down to the locker rooms by the on-campus gym to get cleaned up that morning.

Sanders strode in the door with a folder in hand.

"Are you ready?" he asked.

She bit her tongue so she wouldn't snap and risk losing her job. No, I'm not ready, you jackwagon. Do you really think anyone is ever ready to announce that someone died? And you only need to make the initial announcement, and then disappear again while I handle press conference after press conference trying to answer questions when I have no answers. Why oh why did I take this job? Why did I think this was such an amazing opportunity? When did I take leave of my senses and decide a public relations job for a governmental organization was better than making six figures at some Fortune 500 company?

She didn't answer him at all and just nodded to her assistant. Marcia went first into the room to the podium.

"Folks, if you would take your seats we can get started," she said loudly. Some reporters listened, and others still milled around talking to one another.

Annie gritted her teeth. Idiots want answers but aren't smart enough to pay attention so they can get them.

Marcia spoke louder and directly into the microphone. "Please take your seats." She waited and said again more forcefully. "Take your seats!"

They're like a bunch of kindergartners and as soon as we step through the door they'll start yelling all at once trying to ask questions.

Annie was exactly right though both she and Sanders ignored them. She stepped to the back of the dais and allowed Teddy to stand at the podium. He opened the folder he carried, removed a paper from inside, laid it out in front of him, and then looked up at the assembled press, waiting like a frustrated teacher for them to stop yelling.

Finally, it was silent.

"At approximately 4:30 a.m. Central Standard Time, our satellites detected a storm approaching the Ares 3 mission site on Mars. By 6:45, the storm had escalated to "severe," and we had no choice but to abort the mission. Thanks to the quick action of Commander Lewis, astronauts Beck, Johanssen, Martinez, Vogel, and the commander herself were all able to reach the Mars Ascent Vehicle and perform an emergency launch at 7:28 central time. Unfortunately, during the evacuation, Astronaut Mark Watney was struck by debris and killed. Commander Lewis and the rest of her team were able to intercept safely with Hermes and are now heading home... But Mark Watney is dead."