Chapter Text
It takes six days for everything to go wrong.
The mission known as Ares III starts out perfectly normal. They have their crew- led by Commander Technoblade (first name redacted), they’re practically unstoppable. They spent months training for this, getting to know each other; they spent even longer on the spaceship Hermes travelling to their destination. They have complete faith in their flight coordinators on the ground, and they have complete faith in each other.
Faith isn’t enough to stop a storm, especially on a desolate planet.
Their surface habitat- the Hab- isn’t enough to withstand a dust storm, and they know it isn’t. Not to mention the fact that the MAV- their only way off the planet- is on the verge of toppling. It’s Techno who makes the decision to abandon the mission, and his crew follows him.
They don their suits and begin the dangerous trek to the MAV. The wind is positively screaming; they can barely hear each other over their comms. Major Nick Sapnap leads the hike; he’s their pilot, their second-in-command, and without him there’s no way they’re getting off the planet. He’s followed by Doctor Niki Nihachu, their surgeon, the only medical doctor in the crew. Right behind her is Captain Cara Puffy, systems operator, and Doctor Clay Bloque, nicknamed Dream, their navigator and chemist. After that is Doctor George Davidson, their botanist, and at the back of the pack is the Commander himself.
They’re all clinging to each other, the wind threatening to tear them apart. The MAV creaks restlessly, dangerously, tilting to one side. Sapnap is the first to reach it and pull the ladder down- he stops to make sure the rest of the crew is behind him before climbing aboard. He’s made it to his seat and Niki’s began her ascent when everything goes wrong.
A satellite comes flying out of nowhere. Dream ducks underneath it, pulling Puffy down with him. There’s a crackle of static, Puffy screaming over the comms, and then the resolute thud of the metal hitting something else.
And then George goes flying.
He disappears into the dust storm before any of them can do so much as blink, torn away from the group. Dream is screaming, Techno is half turning around, ready to go back, and everyone is yelling at each other. Puffy manages to get ahold of Techno’s arm and pull him toward the MAV, shoving Dream up the ladder even as he resists and tries to get back into the storm. Everyone is screaming George’s name, but things happened so fast-
“Niki!” Techno yells. “Vitals!”
“I’m not getting a read,” Niki says breathlessly. “I’m-”
“No,” Dream says insistently. “No, no way-”
Puffy shoves Dream down into his seat.
“There’s still nothing,” Niki says, shaking her head. “I- I think-” She can’t even bring herself to say it. George is dead.
Techno is seated next to Sapnap, now, and they’re ready for takeoff. Everyone is still talking over each other. Sapnap turns to the Commander.
“We’re ready to go,” he says. “Commander.”
Techno is staring, like wishful thinking will bring George back. Slowly, he nods.
“ No -” Dream starts.
“Commander, I need verbal confirmation,” Sapnap says, looking terrified.
“Go,” Techno chokes out.
“ NO! ” Dream cries again. Sapnap hits the button, and the MAV shoots off into the sky.
George wakes up with his entire body on fire and an incessant beeping in his ears.
The events of the previous… whatever, day, night, he doesn’t know, come back to him slowly, then all at once. Holy shit. Holy shit-
He sits up and his torso screams in pain. He looks down and oh, that’s a piece of metal embedded in his stomach, tearing through his suit. The MAV is gone. The Hab is, somehow, still standing.
“Oxygen levels low,” the voice in his ear says. His head is fucking pounding. He pulls himself up, using some of the debris around him as leverage, and manages to stumble his way over to the Hab. He rips off his suit and oxygen has never tasted so good. He’s alive. He’s alive, and his situation is sinking in as he realizes oh, fuck, his crew is gone, they probably think he’s dead, and he’s stranded on Mars.
Huh. He did not expect this mission to go like this.
He’s fucked.
The first order of business: documenting the fact that he’s still alive. He has no idea how long he’ll last, but for now, he’s going to need some proof that he didn’t die in that storm. A video diary, then, because it’s a hell of a lot faster than writing and maybe someday, when they come looking for his body, his crew will be happy to hear his voice.
“I’m fucked,” is the first thing he says when he starts the recording. Then he glances down at the piece of metal still embedded in his stomach. “I should probably do something about that before I explain everything else, though, so. If you’re watching this, I’d probably look away right about now. I’m no medical doctor, so- Niki, don’t yell at me for how horrible this goes.”
He’s never performed surgery on anyone else before, let alone on himself. After the first scream, he decides to pause the recording while he stitches himself up. When he hits play again, he’s sitting in an oversized sweatshirt that may or may not belong to Dream and he looks a little less worse for wear.
“Okay,” he says, and he pulls the sweatshirt up to reveal the nice new line of stitches going diagonally across his stomach. “I lost, frankly, a lot of blood, but I’m alive. Surprise!”
He takes a deep breath and runs a hand through his hair.
“So. Sol 6. We got our shit rocked by a dust storm, I must’ve got hit by something, and the telemetry on my suit was totally fucked, meaning the crew likely thought I was dead on impact. Surprise, I’m not! I’m here and kicking, and not very pleased about the situation.
“Not at my crew- they did their best. I’m not very pleased with Mars. Which sucks, because I’m gonna be here probably for the rest of my life. Go me!”
He pauses. “That is kind of cool, though- I’m currently the only person on this entire planet. I’m currently the only botanist on this entire planet, which means, logically, I’m the best botanist in the world. Suck it, Dream. He can’t say the same because even though he’s our chemist, I still don’t know how he got his degree. Not to mention the fact that Sapnap is probably a better navigator than him. So, I’m just sort of better by default.”
He runs a hand through his hair again. “I don’t even know what I’m saying. I’m just rambling. Dear diary, today I almost died and then got abandoned on a hostile planet.”
He stops.
“Fuck. I need to figure out how I’m going to survive.”
He pauses the recording again. Okay, George, you can do this, he thinks. He has to do it. For his crew, if not for anyone else. He is not going to be the first person to die on Mars. He is not going to be the first person to die on Mars.
There’s enough food for six people for fifty days. That’s three hundred days of food, which he can easily stretch out by just eating less. There, one problem solved. There are plenty of EVA suits for when he inevitably needs to leave the Hab and go out on the planet. Okay, fine. Water- water is going to be a more difficult problem to solve, but it’ll be okay. It’ll be fine. Communications-
He checks everything. It’s all down. There’s literally no way to get in contact with Earth, no way to get in contact with the Hermes, no way for anyone to know that he’s still alive and kicking.
Well. Fuck.
“Sol 7!” George announces to his new best friend, his video diary. He’s still wearing Dream’s sweatshirt. There’s a bit of a manic look in his eyes. “Guess what? I’m literally a botanist, and we have a shit ton of potatoes here! Commander, I take back everything I’ve ever said about you and your potatoes, because these babies are going to save my fucking life. I’m going to figure out how to farm on Mars. I’m going to fucking colonize Mars!”
“Sol 8. This is going to be harder than I thought.”
“Sol 10. I need to figure out how to get the damn radio working. I need to figure out a way to tell everyone I’m still alive. My whole life literally relies on it. Listen- Ares IV touches down thirty-two hundred kilometers away, four years from now. If I can get myself over there by that time, they’ll be able to pick me up and rescue me. So I just need to survive until then.
“The oxygenator is fine, so I’m not going to suffocate. The water reclaimer is fine, so I won’t die of thirst. I think- and thank you, Dream, for saving my life here- I think I figured out a way to manufacture water from leftover rocket fuel. I take back everything I’ve ever said about you being a horrible chemist. So I won’t starve to death. My only issue is that I can’t fucking communicate with Earth, and I’d really like to be able to do that.”
“Sol 26. A very productive day, if I do say so myself. I’ve got a shit ton of soil in the Hab so I can grow my damn potatoes. Mars is a lot nicer when it’s not trying to kill you, I think. I’ve also started modifying our rover so it’s able to get me over to the Ares IV landing site.
“And… I miss my crew. Jesus, I miss them so much. I miss Sapnap’s stupid jokes, I miss Puffy and Niki’s mothering, I miss Techno’s death stares, I miss Dream’s… I miss Dream. I miss them so fucking much, and I can’t even imagine what they’re going through, thinking they left me for dead here. I can practically imagine them losing it when they find out I made it twenty sols past what they thought. At least. I’m planning on making it a lot longer.”
“Sol 27. I don’t know how much longer I’m going to last. Pigstep, Techno, really? The only music you brought was Pigstep? If I have to listen to this song one more time-”
Pigstep plays in the background. George sighs and looks at all he’s done. In a few short weeks, he’s gone from the brink of death to mostly self-sufficient. He did blow himself up once trying to convert the rocket fuel into water, but that one really wasn’t his fault. He blames Dream and his stupid chemistry equations.
Jesus. Dream. He misses Dream. He knows that they had their little game for such a long time, dancing around each other, pretending they weren’t hopelessly in love, because two crew members together could endanger the mission. They all just suffered through listening to Sapnap talk about his boyfriend-turned-husband, while Dream bumped his shoulder against George’s.
He takes a few deep breaths in, then out. He needs to keep himself calm. He’s had enough panic over the past few weeks, always when the cameras are off, because he’s not going to let his crew see him cry. Hell, he’s not going to let the rest of the world see him cry, because God knows how many people NASA’s going to release his video logs to when they eventually find them.
Unless they just cover it up. He wouldn’t put it past them to do that, either.
He wonders how Bad is handling it, the Hermes flight director, one of his best friends. Probably not well. Fundy’s probably having a field day with the media. Wilbur’s probably fending off how many reporters trying to cancel any other Ares missions.
No. Ares IV is going to land, and they’re going to pick George up, and he’ll be reunited with his crew back on Earth. Everything is going to be fine.
That’s what he keeps telling himself. This is fine. He’s going to be fine. He’s going to make it.
He doesn’t have any other choice.