Rough Landing

Chapter One: The beginning

Chapter One: The Beginning

"Now, if you would, press that button right..." A green light flickers to life on the button ridden control panel just below the window. The same window I've been looking out of for the last three months of my life.

"There," he finishes, pointing at the button that had started glowing just moments before. Almost instantly, I reach my hand out to press it. The cold plastic button sends a small chill through my fingers, making me shiver.

I take my hand off of the button, and the bright green is replaced with a dull grey. I turn towards Marcus, his long blond hair floating freely around his well structured face, reminding me that my hair is loose as well.

"I miss salons," I laugh, grabbing a pink hair tie from my pocket. "Can you help me?" I ask, handing him the tie.

"Sure," he says reaching up to gather the floating strands of dark brown hair. I can't feel him touching my hair, until he tugs on my hair to put it through the tie.

"There," he says, his slightly nerdy voice wavering. He quickly gets back to work, hitting buttons on the control panel like a mad man. Numbers keep changing on the large blue screen in the middle of the panel.

I look out the window. "It was barely visible at first, and now... It's huge," I say, looking back at him. His sandy yellow eyes glance away from the screen, looking out of the window for a split second, before going back to the panel.

"That's Mars for you, I suppose," he sighs, sounding uninterested. I admire the sniper shaped canyon that lies across the surface of the red planet, taking in the beautiful scene, knowing here in a few hours we will be on the surface, with solid ground under our feet.

"Press that," he says interrupting my observations, pointing towards a button that's glowing yellow. My finger rises instantly to meet the cold, plastic surface of yet another button.

"What does that do?" I ask, lacing my voice with curiosity, hoping he'll give a straight forward answer.

"That, my friend," he says, stopping for a brief moment as a loud screeching noise pierces the air, "does that."

I look around anxiously, hoping to see a change in this boring scenery. I notice something sliding over the edges of the window.

"Marcus!" I turn towards him, frightened, the cabin already getting darker by the second. I can feel claustrophobia starting to take a hold as fear of the window starts to get smaller at a faster rate.

"Everything is going to be all right," he says lacing his voice with honey, winking at me.

"What in the bloody hell is going on!" shouts Captain Nelson as he floats into the cabin from the beds. In one hand, he clutches tightly to a metal bar, pulling himself towards us. In the other... A half empty bottle of Jack.

"We're nearing entry, Sir,If we leave the windows open, none of us would even be able to see this new land," Marcus says, running his hand through his hair. "So, if I were you guys, I'd buckle in, and prepare for a rough landing." Mindlessly, he dives right back into work.

Rough landing. Those two words repeat in my mind as the window keeps disappearing behind the thin piece of metal.

"Are you sure everything is alright?" I ask nervously as I strap the harness around my waist, and then my shoulders. Captain Nelson does the same, taking up the seat to my right.

"It had better be, or else I'll have his head," the Captain chuckles, scratching his scruffy face.

I look to Marcus and give a nervous laugh, hoping that it's not a legitimate threat.

As I watch the last visible strip of glass fade away behind the metal layer, I catch the reflection of a scared little girl staring at herself, hoping that the worst is over and that she can finally live in one of the many forms of peace that was denied to her most of her life.

I miss home... Pushing those thoughts out of my head, I watch as the metal sheet makes its way across the glass, engulfing what used to be a window, my sharp green eyes no longer reflecting off of it. The sound of the Captain snoring fills the air. How did he get to be captain? I don't know.

I try to get a sense of my surroundings, but the darkness blanketing the cabin is to thick to see through. A radio crackles to life.

"This is Athena Three," Marcus says, ignoring the fact that we're in complete blackness, other than the few flickering lights on the control panel, which he is quick to press, turning them off.

"We are nearing entry," he says with pride coating his strange voice. Athena One had landed three days prior, making us the second to make it here. I turn towards him.

"Marcus!?" I ask with a shaky voice, as a thought suddenly dawns on me.

"What?" He asks annoyed.

"How... How are you going to know where we are going to land, if you can't even see?" By now my eyes have adjusted enough to make out a smirk that stretches across his face.

"Calculations," he says, pointing to his head. I look ahead; Although the window is gone, I can still picture the large, red planet that had recently gotten larger as we neared our approach.

"What do you think it will be like?" I ask, turning towards him again. "The martian land."

"Dry, and cold, I'd assume," he says with a sigh. I give him with a funny stare, and we both start to laugh. "It's going to be different, for sure," he says with a hint of sadness lingering in his voice.

"How so?" I ask, dumbly, feeding into his enjoyment of explaining things.

"Do you mean besides the fact that we're going to be wearing oxygen tanks for a large portion of what's left of our lives?" he says coldly.

The interior starts to warm up as our acceleration increases. The shaking begins not long after. I grip the sides of my chair tightly. And before I know it, I'm back on earth, hiding from all of my fears.