"Commander, the training material is now complete," September’s voice murmured in Chase’s ear. Despite her claim of being an AI, its voice sounded unmistakably female, pleasant, even melodic.' An odd thought crossed his mind: what would she look like? Strange, considering he knew it was just a program with a feminine voice.
Chase groaned. "September, that video lasted no more than three hours. That can’t be everything I need to know about surviving on Mars. I’ll admit, learning about space suits and airlocks wasn’t thrilling, but it seemed relevant."
September spoke with an effortless, human-like fluidity. "The material did lack specific details. Would you like a revision?"
"No. Absolutely not. Just let me out of here. I want to feel my actual body for a few days before I die on this frozen planet. Besides, since VORN sealed us in a tunnel, why do we even need space suits? Airlocks?"
"Commander, now that your training is complete, I am authorized to release you. I will administer a solution to reverse paralysis. There is an estimated 80 percent chance you will regain full mobility, as if you were never frozen. Interestingly, you’ve now mentioned space suits and airlocks twice. This Train does not contain either."
Chase stiffened. "Frozen? Frozen!" He swallowed hard. "Did you freeze me? No—wait. Don’t answer that."
“The injection has been administered,” September confirmed. “Expect the paralysis to subside in about three hours, if not a bit longer,” the AI explained. “You might experience some weakness, but Mars’ lower gravity should help mitigate that,” September reassured. “I’ll notify Lieutenant Janette Hawkins that you should be up and running in three hours; I trust the lieutenant is eager to meet her commander,” September added.
Chase raised an eyebrow, disbelief flickering across his face. "Lieutenant Hawkins wasn’t frozen. She’s been awake the whole time?" His body betrayed his turmoil; his foot tapped anxiously, and his fingers twitched at his sides, the only movement he was currently able to make. The revelation that he had been frozen, then thawed, rattled him to his core. He had envisioned something sleek and advanced, a controlled stasis chamber designed for precision, not the grim reality of being reduced to a human popsicle. And now, learning that someone else had remained conscious while he had been suspended sent a fresh surge of irritation clawing through him. He clenched his jaw, forcing himself to steady his breathing. He needed to get a grip, fast.
“No, Commander, that is incorrect,” September corrected. “Lieutenant Hawkins was also frozen, but Mission Control ordered her revival two days ago. She has been listening to our conversation.”
Chase stiffened, his pulse spiking. Betrayal? Surveillance? His mind raced through the implications. “Lock her out of the computer system,” he ordered, his voice cold, clipped, laced with barely contained fury, or was it fear?
“Action complete, Commander,” September confirmed.
Over the next few hours, sensation slowly crept back into Chase’s limbs, an unwelcome, agonizing crawl rather than a relief. It was a brutal, sluggish awakening, each nerve firing back to life like static electricity jolting through his skin. If he could forget this experience entirely, he would. His muscles burned with stiff resistance; his joints ached as though he’d been locked in stone for centuries. With every flicker of movement, exhaustion consumed him, his body heavy with the crushing weight of depletion. It felt like he had run a marathon, several marathons, without ever taking a single step. He barely registered the fact that he was naked; the thought was trivial compared to the war raging inside his body.
Time blurred into a meaningless haze. He gritted his teeth, kneading life into his unwilling muscles, forcing them toward some semblance of function. Sitting up was a battle of sheer willpower. He attempted it again and again, each failure gnawing at his patience, each collapse another reminder of how fragile he had become. On his tenth attempt, he finally steadied himself, but the accomplishment was short-lived. A sickening dizziness washed over him, rolling in relentless waves, threatening to drag him under. He clutched at the edge of the bed, bracing against the nausea that coiled in his stomach, his breath slow and measured as he waited for the world to stop spinning. It took time, more than he felt was healthy, but eventually, equilibrium returned.
With painstaking effort, he swung his legs over the side of the bed and forced himself upright. His movements were sluggish, his body protesting with every step as he made his way toward the folded clothes left for him: blue jeans and a black collared shirt. Nothing sleek, nothing futuristic, just painfully ordinary. Hardly the cutting-edge gear he had envisioned for a mission like this. Disappointment flickered briefly, but he was too drained to dwell on it. By the time he had dressed, fatigue tightened its grip, dragging him back down. He barely made it onto the mattress before sleep swallowed him whole, his mind sinking into darkness without hesitation.
---
"Wake up," a voice commanded, sharp and unyielding.
Chase groaned, dragging himself from the depths of sleep. "Not again. Please tell me this is a dream," he muttered, his voice thick with exhaustion.
"This isn’t a dream. Get up now. The system has locked me out. Do you even understand what you’ve done?"
Chase attempted to lift his head, but his body resisted, sluggish and uncooperative. He exhaled sharply, forcing himself through the haze. "Lieutenant Janette Hawkins, I presume. Nice to meet you." His words carried a slight tinge of sarcasm as he finally pried his eyes open, blinking against the harsh reality before him.
Before him stood Lieutenant Janette Hawkins, a figure as unexpected as she was striking. Though barely in her twenties, her youthful appearance belied the weight of responsibility in her eyes. Her features were sharply defined, framed by almost white, blonde hair that cascaded in soft, ethereal strands, while her eyebrows, a shade darker, lent contrast to her deep brown eyes, which burned with a determined intensity. A perfectly symmetrical nose led the eye gracefully to thin pink lips that held both resolve and vulnerability. Chase closed his eyes for a moment, committing every detail to memory, as though etching her image into his very soul. In that suspended breath of time, he wondered if he was witnessing the semblance of a Hollywood starlet or something even more profound, a raw, breathtaking beauty that made him question whether he had died and ascended to a personal heaven.
"Yeah, great. An honor to meet a murderer," Janette snapped, her voice taut with sarcasm and barely concealed fury. "The system locked me out on your authority. Let’s get this straight: you do not lock me out. I’m probably the only one who will keep you alive."
Her tone was ice-cold, and her expression left no room for comfort, shattering any fleeting illusions of sanctuary Chase had dared to imagine. He exhaled sharply. "And what if I don't?" he retorted. He couldn't fathom why he’d provoked her like this, why he’d let his guard down to jab at the one awake person who was supposed to be his teammate. Perhaps it was her rigid, uncompromising tone or the aura of authority she wielded so forcefully; he had never been a fan of being told what to do. Yet there she was, asserting dominance in a situation where trust should have bound them together.
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Locking eyes with him, Janette continued, "I’m stuck on a planet with a team of murderers. Maybe I’ll join them, after all, at this point, you look like you couldn’t defend yourself against a fly.
She took a deep breath, gathering her composure before speaking again. “Let’s try this again, shall we?” Lieutenant Hawkins’s voice was as sharp as it was measured as she continued, “Mission Control informed me that you’re now the commander of this mission. I’ve reviewed your file, and while it doesn’t spell it out explicitly, every detail leaves little doubt that you’re nothing less than an evil villain. I’ve seen the news, Chase. I know what you’ve done. You’re a murderer. Your presence here baffles me, and the idea that you’re in charge is simply inconceivable. See you here now, you’re just a child. Are you even fourteen?”
Chase sighed internally as his hopes of charming her crumbled; her scornful gaze snuffed out the spark he had hoped to ignite. Her dismissive tone confirmed his suspicion; she saw him as nothing more than a naive child, someone not yet ready for the heavy mantle of responsibility. It stung to be reduced to that, especially when at eighteen he was finally mastering the art of shaving, a small but hard-won symbol of maturity. He briefly considered pointing it out, laying claim to his growing competence, but in that moment, his youthful looks and unrefined demeanor were liabilities rather than assets.
With a reluctant exhale, he said flatly, "I’m eighteen." His tone carried a mix of defiance and weary resignation. "Not that it matters. I don’t mind being labelled a villain, but ‘murderer’ isn’t exactly an affectionate title. People died due to my supposed actions, but I never took a gun and killed anyone; there is a large difference." His eyes searched hers for any sign of understanding, any sign that she might see past the harsh labels. "How about we stick with Chase for now? And seriously, do you even know how we got here? Did you agree to being frozen, or was that all part of this messed-up plan?" The question hung heavy in the charged silence between them, a challenge for her to explain the inexplicable, to acknowledge the absurdity of their situation. The tension crackled in the air, a raw and desperate blend of defiance, hurt, and the unyielding need for some semblance of clarity.
Chase studied her more closely this time, letting his gaze wander over every detail that made up the woman before him. Her crisp white collared shirt, with the top two buttons casually undone, subtly revealed the pallor of her skin. The shirt’s sleeves fell neatly to three-quarter length, emphasizing her elegant, poised manner without saying a word. She was slender and graceful, each measured gesture affirming a quiet confidence that belied the storm of events around them.
Instead of the expected jeans, she wore a long, flowing white skirt that brushed softly against her ankles with every step, lending an unexpected fluidity to her otherwise stately demeanor. The outfit struck a delicate balance between casual comfort and the rigid uniformity of authority, a balance underscored by well-defined epaulets and the sharp collar of her shirt, and the VORN logo.
She caught Chase’s gaze, her eyes cold and unimpressed. "You can call me Lieutenant Hawkins," she said, her tone dry and matter-of-fact. "And no, I never agreed to be frozen. I was working on NASA’s Mars program, and I always dreamed of being an astronaut. My last clear memory is of undergoing testing for the astronaut program." For an instant, a shadow flickered across her expression, hinting at deeper memories she wasn’t ready to share.
She paused, then continued with a reluctant edge in her voice, "Then, next thing I knew, I woke up here, two days ago. The rest of the crew remains frozen, still asleep. Apparently, the system was waiting for you to finish basic training. Honestly, it was a waste of time. We should have woken the crew and started setting things up sooner. There’s so much to do now, so much I still don’t understand." As she spoke, her eyes drifted into the distance, already cataloging a mental checklist of tasks and challenges that lay ahead.
Chase raised a skeptical eyebrow as he scrutinized her expression. "Lieutenant Hawkins, is there any chance we’re not really on Mars?" he asked. "Could this whole setup be some sort of trick, a cave on Earth staged to look like the Martian surface?"
Janette regarded him with a mix of incredulity and irritation. "You think I wouldn’t check?" she snapped. "I'm no idiot. There's a pendulum in the command module. I measured the gravity, and it matches that of Mars. I even ran my own tests."
"Ran tests with what, exactly?" Chase pressed, his tone edged with both curiosity and disbelief.
A slight blush betrayed her composed fa?ade. "The push-up test," she admitted. "Back on Earth, I could hardly complete a proper push-up, let alone launch off the floor, spin mid-air, and land lightly on my hands. That’s not something that can be faked."
Chase nodded slowly, absorbing her explanation. "Okay. That’s one thing confirmed, and easy enough to test" he said, the tension in his voice softening just a bit in the face of undeniable evidence.
He turned his attention to September. "Can you wake the crew one at a time?" he asked, his voice steady but edged with urgency. "I need to speak with each of them as they come out of stasis, their last memories were of dying... because of me. They might not be exactly thrilled to wake up in this situation." He paused, exhaling slowly to steady himself. "Actually, before that, can you show me around? I need to know exactly what we’re dealing with before I address anyone else."
As he spoke, memories of training videos filled his mind. The modules were arranged in a neat, straight line, a far cry from the flimsy tents or sleek futuristic igloos depicted in the movies. This setup was something entirely different: a collection of twenty-five large shipping containers, meticulously transported to Mars and parked deep within a tunnel about 165 feet underground. Each container was chosen for its durability and repurposed to create a robust network of living quarters that defied conventional designs. The concept itself seemed almost simplistic: ship the containers, drill a thousand-foot tunnel, and slot them in, but the reality was astonishing. This wasn’t a temporary shelter; it was a permanent habitat carved directly into the Martian canyon wall, entirely eliminating the risks of surface exposure. By tucking the crew safely away from harsh weather and relentless cosmic radiation, the architects had fashioned a fortress from raw industrial materials. Why compromise with fragile, makeshift structures when you could carve into the planet and seal it off completely? The ingenuity of the design, merging industrial resilience with visionary planning, impressed and unnerved him in equal measure. It spoke of a permanence and protection that went beyond mere survival, a bold statement of humanity’s commitment to thrive on a hostile planet and a testament to innovation in the face of adversity.
Chase recalled the time-lapse video he had seen, which illustrated the sheer brute force required to carve out such a tunnel. It all came down to a heavy-duty driller and an excavator, both engineered for relentless, around-the-clock operation by an advanced AI. Working nonstop for an entire year, that singular pair could shape a thousand-foot tunnel with clinical precision. Yet the true marvel lay not in the excavation itself, but in the logistical feat of transporting such colossal machinery to Mars, a multibillion-dollar challenge that still left him in awe. How had Mission Control managed to pull off such an audacious undertaking? Frustratingly, every time he pressed for details, September remained silent on the subject, leaving him to grapple with both his admiration and his bewilderment over the inexplicable scale of the project. At least the tunnel provided a crucial advantage: protection. Shielded from the harsh, unyielding radiation of Mars, the settlers would be spared the slow poisoning that lingered in open exposure. Even more vital was the tunnel's sealed environment, one that could maintain an atmosphere. This capability not only ensured immediate survival but also laid the foundation for agriculture, a game-changer if they ever hoped to establish a long-term colony.
Chase mused about the tunnel driller that he had seen in the training videos. That powerful driller must still be somewhere on Mars, tirelessly at work. Given more time, they could extend the excavation, first to one mile, then to ten, and perhaps even farther. In that possibility, the dream of colonization shimmered with promise, a beacon of hope for transforming Mars into a livable world.
