The silence was deafening, the breathing the only clue as to whether or not you were alive, most would listen to that breathing fading away half conscious that the ship was all around them, scattered in pieces of all sizes, like a puzzle that had been thrown away by a toddler frustrated because of the intricacy of the game, it was as if the creator intended for this puzzle to never be solved.
The breathing faded away for many until a last gasp turned the beacon off to prevent the batteries in the suit to die and give chance to a wandering castoff to recover them and maybe use them as an extended lease on life in the long trip to a base, or to nowhere.
Half of the 18 members of the expedition had presumably perished from the moment the ship entered the atmosphere to the final destination as the ship crashed and drifted off in the sand and rocks until it stopped. Enough people alive to barely justify a rescue mission, a mission that could probably suffer the same consequences, a reason to not stand around and hope for the best... in mars the best seldom comes.
The captain was nowhere to be seen and 3 of the engineers were up and trying to reason what was next, nobody was a fool, this was not desired but never unexpected, training kicked in and salvaging was already on its way: 2 containers full of first aid kits and oxygen-conversion cells, enough to last a full year to a party of 2, in this case it would last only about a week. Suits' batteries started piling up nearby, recovered carts full of wires and control panels with radio systems on them began rolling under part of the fuselage that provided some refuge against the sand and heat.
-"Lieutenant!" - A voice trembled inside his brain, making sense of noise was already hard enough, to listen to words and understand them was something different and much harder to do.
-"I'm OK!" - His voice was forced, he answered as clearly as possible making it an effort to actually produce a sound, for months his lips had moved incessantly giving directions and addressing others without actually producing a sound, now he had to give in to that old communication habit: make the vocal chords resonate.
The breathing faded away for many until a last gasp turned the beacon off to prevent the batteries in the suit to die and give chance to a wandering castoff to recover them and maybe use them as an extended lease on life in the long trip to a base, or to nowhere.
Half of the 18 members of the expedition had presumably perished from the moment the ship entered the atmosphere to the final destination as the ship crashed and drifted off in the sand and rocks until it stopped. Enough people alive to barely justify a rescue mission, a mission that could probably suffer the same consequences, a reason to not stand around and hope for the best... in mars the best seldom comes.
The captain was nowhere to be seen and 3 of the engineers were up and trying to reason what was next, nobody was a fool, this was not desired but never unexpected, training kicked in and salvaging was already on its way: 2 containers full of first aid kits and oxygen-conversion cells, enough to last a full year to a party of 2, in this case it would last only about a week. Suits' batteries started piling up nearby, recovered carts full of wires and control panels with radio systems on them began rolling under part of the fuselage that provided some refuge against the sand and heat.
-"Lieutenant!" - A voice trembled inside his brain, making sense of noise was already hard enough, to listen to words and understand them was something different and much harder to do.
-"I'm OK!" - His voice was forced, he answered as clearly as possible making it an effort to actually produce a sound, for months his lips had moved incessantly giving directions and addressing others without actually producing a sound, now he had to give in to that old communication habit: make the vocal chords resonate.
