AMICITAS FLIGHT THREE – MISSION DAY 37
ARES III SOL 40
There wasn’t much left.
In four hours of working the pile of perchlorates had been whittled down only as high as Fireball’s hips and only slightly wider than himself from snout to tail. In another two hours the job would no longer be one for shovels so much as brooms and dustpans.
That was a shame, Fireball thought, all of that spicy stuff getting dumped for the thin Martian wind to carry it off. He wanted some for later. All that bland, flavorless plain quartz was going to get really boring, and Mark was stingy with his ketchup supply. He needed something to make the wait for rescue endurable, and this perchlorate sauce looked perfect for the job.
Of course Mark wasn’t going to give up any of his bins or flasks to hold the stuff. He’d made it clear in no uncertain terms he didn’t want this white-and-yellow-striped gunk anywhere near his shelter. But he couldn’t object if Fireball kept it in the Amicitas galley, could he? The lights were back on over there, and some canned air, and even a little heat. He could just eat his meals on his own ship if he wanted to, and what was the monkey going to do about it?
And besides, if nobody else wanted the stuff, why shouldn’t he take it? It was his, if nobody else wanted it.
Yes. It’s yours, Fireball. Just take some.
It was lunchtime, and everyone prepared to return to the rover for lunch. Mark was working at the knots he’d used to harness the bossmare and the bossy mare to their sleds. Dragonfly was hoisting the magic battery onto her back, while Starlight sat down and trembled after four straight hours of telekinetic shoveling. No one was paying any attention to Fireball.
A small part of Fireball shouted, You idiot, if you’re waiting until nobody can stop you to do a thing, it’s a bad idea!! Leave the crap! The unicorn can summon up more if I want it!
But the rest of his mind shouted back Mine, and Mine is a siren song very few dragons can resist. Also (and this is true of most thinking creatures), the worse the idea you have is, the harder it is for you to not follow through on it.
From one of the tool pouches on his space suit Fireball removed the sturdy plastic wrapper of one of his last few meal packs. He’d saved a couple of the packs for when he just couldn’t stand quartz another day, but he’d also saved some of the containers, partly because he was a dragon, partly because it was just barely possible they could be reused somehow.
Like now, as he walked over to the pile to use it as a scoop for a healthy helping of perchlorate powder.
The meal had been prepared by a changeling chef, who answered with equal ill temper to Carapace or Heavy Frosting, at Horseton Space Center. It had been magically vacuum-sealed in a cheap, airtight plastic, produced by the same Manehattan manufacturing firm used by both Changeling Space Program and the Equestrian Space Agency. They had been stored in fireproof lockers, but no thought had been given to making the packets themselves fireproof, on the grounds that, “If those things are on fire in space, you probably have much bigger worries already.”
The National Aeronautics and Space Administration and its hundreds of civilian contractors had employed no such laxness. They had gone to absurd lengths to ensure that nothing short of a welding torch at close range would even cause the carbon-fiber and plastic of the mission’s equipment to smoulder. The off-the-counter food bags used for soil samples would burn, but only reluctantly and only after melting. Despite Mark Watney’s intense worries on the subject, had they used the sample bins to bail the perchlorate out of the cave, likely nothing would have happened.
And, likewise, if the perchlorate had remained the same sub-freezing temperature as the rest of the cave, little would have happened. But it hadn’t. Very slowly the perchlorate had been reclaiming the trace amounts of water in the air around it and the soil beneath it. Absorbing water warms up perchlorate considerably. The upper layers of the pile pressed down on the lower layers, adding a tiny fraction more heat. With every shovel, every scoop of magic, every compacting and disturbance and friction on, through, and within the pile, the whole picked up a tiny, tiny fraction more heat.
The pile was still cold, but not cold enough.
The empty packet, while not an active fire risk in normal circumstances, would burn under the right conditions.
Fireball stepped as close to the mound as he could without stepping in it, leaned his sinuous body forwards, and carefully scooped the packet into the slimy dust. On the first pass the packet wouldn’t open enough to let any in. A second attempt achieved little better, as the clingy perchlorate gunk refused to admit the edge of the pack.
On the third attempt, the gunk around the packet began to bubble and pop. Fireball dropped the packet and took a step back, watching in confusion as the bubbling and popping built up.
A flame erupted from the mouth of the packet.
Something surprisingly fast and heavy tackled the dragon and knocked him away from the pile.
A second later, the perchlorate pile exploded.
TRANSCRIPT – WATER TELEGRAPH EXCHANGE, ESA BALTIMARE and ESA SHIP AMICITAS
AMICITAS: Amicitas calling Baltimare, over.
BALTIMARE: Baltimare calling Amicitas, where have you been? Over.
AMICITAS: CB – Accident. Alien, two crew injured. Tests postponed indefinitely. Will call. Over.
BALTIMARE: Please repeat, did not copy. Your hoof is too slow. Over.
AMICITAS: DF – Accident. Alien, one crew injured. Teqqq
BALTIMARE: Baltimare calling Amicitas, over.
AMICITAS: DF- Accident. Alien, one and only one crew injured. One other crew very hungry. No tests until next contact. Over.
BALTIMARE: QC – You are all ordered to not die until I get there. Over.
AMICITAS: When? Over.
BALTIMARE: TS – Working on that. Over.
AMICITAS: DF – Going back to bed. Will drill commander more on code. Out.
BALTIMARE: One or two crew injured? Over.
AMICITAS: CB – Two. Over.
AMICITAS: DF – One. Over.
BALTIMARE: Copy two crew injured. Awaiting your signal, out.
MISSION LOG – SOL 41
I’m lying in my bunk. Fireball brought me the laptop to write this on, and also to tell me “sorry, big sorry.” He must have learned the word from Starlight or Dragonfly, because I don’t think he knew it even in his own language.
Good news: I’m alive. I survived a pile of perchlorate decomposing and spraying fragments of itself around like napalm. I survived another breach of my spacesuit, followed by first and second degree burns on my upper right arm where the suit breached.
Bad news: I hurt. I hurt like a motherfucker. Did I mention second degree small blistery burns on my upper arm, requiring me to lie on my back or my left side? How about an even worse decompression headache than I had after waking up on Sol 6?
Here’s how it happened, as well as I can piece it together. It started two sols ago, with Fireball’s re-creation of the Cinnamon Challenge. Apparently he wanted some more, and rather than tell anybody what he was doing, he snuck an empty food pack into his EVA suit to get a stash for later.
I can’t blame him that much. By the time we were knocking off for lunch yesterday, I’d almost forgotten that we were shoveling a combination of two potentially dangerous oxidizers. It just hadn’t done anything. And, after all, he’d eaten some of it with no worse result than one flaming belch. Sure, he forgot the danger. But I had too, so I can’t blame him completely.
Of course, the drugs might have something to do with that. Spitfire gave me some of the really strong painkillers from their medicine kit. Wheeeeeeeee! I’m still feeling some pain, but at the same time I’m feeling so pleasant and well-adjusted towards the world that I almost don’t care. This stuff will be outlawed the minute we establish full diplomatic relations with the pony government, I’m sure. I’d be scared of the danger of addiction, but hey, the main alternative in my medical supplies is your choice of opiates, either pill form or injection. So who am I to judge?
Back to the explosion. I had just untied Spitfire when I noticed Fireball crouched over the mound. We’d really reduced it down and were on pace to get back to base early, but there was still a good bit there at lunchtime. At first I was curious; why was he farting around with that stuff? Had he decided to picnic on the grounds instead of going back to the rover with the rest of us?
I was already walking over to him (carefully, because all appearances to the contrary I hadn’t become a complete idiot) when he sprang back up like something had bit him. Then I saw the food pack. I shouted at him to get away, but of course he couldn’t hear me- their suits can’t hear my suit radio. And then I saw the first flame shoot out of the pack’s open mouth.
Yeah. Open flame around magnesium perchlorate and an organic fuel source.
Can you say, oh shit? Sure, I knew you could. And I’ll be waiting here until your mommies get done washing your mouths out with soap.
I ran three steps to the right to get a good angle and then turned, got a running start, and slammed into Fireball’s side to knock him out of the way. Even taking into account Martian gravity he was surprisingly light. He hit the crystals on the far wall of the cave, fortunately not hard enough to break or puncture his suit.
Unfortunately Sir Isaac Newton is a bastard, because by imparting all my momentum to the dragon I didn’t have much left for myself, and what I did have left me off-balance. So I had just about time to catch myself from falling and take one step forward before the perchlorate pile went up.
It wasn’t a Hollywood explosion. It was more like a mudpot letting off an air bubble, spattering its surroundings with stinky mud. That is, if the mud was on fire. A huge blob of it hit my right side, which was facing the pile, and the part that hit my upper arm was burning.
NASA spacesuits are designed to withstand high temperatures and be extremely fire-resistant, but the slimy perchlorates clung to the suit and ate happily away at my sleeve. I couldn’t drop and roll because there wasn’t enough space around me not covered in decomposing perchlorates, and it only took a couple of seconds for the crap on my arm to eat a hole in my suit.
Then things really got interesting. And painful.
I don’t know how long it was after that, but it can’t have been more than a few seconds, because I’m still alive. I must have passed out at some point, but I can’t remember exactly when. (Reminds me of a couple of parties I attended at the University of Chicago, though I think only one of those involved fire.) When I came to I was in the rover, wearing my grubby jumpsuit but not my spacesuit, my right sleeve half burned off, and an unconscious unicorn in full spacesuit beside me.
Apparently Starlight had the presence of mind to see what was happening, drain all the magic battery’s remaining charge into herself at one shot, rush over and teleport us into the rover, carefully leaving my compromised flight spacesuit and all the perchlorates behind. That quick bit of magic saved my life. It also knocked her flat on her magical little ass.
She’s still sleeping in the bunk next to mine. Cherry Berry says she hasn’t woken up yet. Even through the painkillers, I’m worried.
I don’t remember much of yesterday after that. I think I must have been in shock. (Which, come to think of it, explains why every blanket in the Hab was on me when I woke up this morning, except for the one Starlight was using.) From what I gather from the ponies, I was the only one that got splashed by burning perchlorate. Once Starlight and I were out of the cave, the others hauled ass the non-magical way.
I remember Dragonfly coming in by the rover airlock and coaxing me to the driver’s seat. She even went so far as to imitate the General Lee’s horn to make sure I got the message.
But I may have dreamed that, because I think I also remember Johannsen standing next to me, leaning over my shoulder. “Go, Mark,” she said. “You can do it.”
Come to think of it, it must have been a dream. It’s been over thirty sols since I last saw my crewmates, after all. But there she was, in coveralls as grungy as mine, right next to me. I think I said, “I love you.” (And if Beck ever reads this, he’s going to be pissed, but hey, buddy- if you don’t tell your crush how you feel, what I do with her in my dreams is nobody’s fault but your own.)
And she said something really profound: “Love makes us alive.” I’m going to have that carved on my tombstone, assuming I get one.
On second thought, no, that’s a stupid idea. I just had a mental image of a horde of zombies chanting, “Heeearts… heeeearts…”
Anyway, dreams or hallucinations aside, I got the rover back to the Hab somehow. I remember none of the driving, aside from what I just mentioned. The ponies got back first and brought me my good EVA spacesuit- at least, I remember them coaxing me into it. I definitely remember the pain that woke me up when the right sleeve brushed past the burn on my arm. And I remember the pain again when Fireball grabbed me by the same damn arm to help carry me from the rover airlock into the Hab airlock.
I also remember them carrying Starlight into the Hab. And then Dragonfly. I was a little surprised by that. I saw the bug up and around today, but she’s not looking well. When they first arrived her wings glittered. They’re not glittering anymore, and I think the holes in her wings and legs are a bit larger.
Why have I never got round to asking about how Dragonfly works? Now the only pony I could ask about it is out like a light.
Long story short; it could have been worse. I lost a suit, but it was a suit with a hole in it already, so I don’t miss it much. I’ll have to wear dressings on my arm for a couple of weeks while the burn heals. I might have some scars there that’ll look like chicken pox scars. And I’ll have to limit my activities, let the ponies do more things for me.
And Fireball. Especially Fireball. He owes me big, and I think he knows it, especially considering he’s bringing a steaming meal-pack over to me. I’m so glad I showed the ponies how the microwave works.
Going to eat and rest now, after cuing up something random from Lewis’s 70s TV Hall of Crap. Don’t feel like watching a show about a cyborg right now… the ponies won’t enjoy most of the non-musical sitcoms until they get more language…
“The Electric Company.” No description aside from “PBS 1971-1977.” Well, if it’s PBS, it’s probably good to doze off to.
MISSION LOG – SOL 41 (2)
The ponies have spent all day around my bunk watching this silly, didactic, juvenile, kickass show. This is SO going on the daily rota. Before Partridge Family. Maybe instead of Partridge Family.
And Starlight just woke up. She’s flopped onto her side so she can see the screen. Poor thing, she looks absolutely wiped, but she’s nagging at me in broken English to quit typing and play more.
I think things are going to be okay. But that could just be the drugs again.
Considering what he survives, Watney has the devil's own luck.
8693676
If he didn't have bad luck, he would have...
No luck at all.
When did Dragonfly learn those words in English?
Also, Watney is on some good stuff. Those sound like the best painkillers ever.
How has the Changling Space Program not killed anyone yet? Their safety standards are enough that if I had to make a choice I would pick a Soviet spacecraft over theirs. Hell Mark's hacked apart MAV from the book had higher safety standards.
8693716
She might be making him halucinate a thing he loves so she can feed and grab enough magic power to help with his wounds, the changeling pods do that in CSP, and she does say she's hungry.
Also, yay "Electric Company". Considering what the show is all about it's the perfect thing to help the Amicitas crew get up to scratch with the english language, and more Blue Beetle is always welcome.
8693733
The magic of Quicksaving might have something to do with it, methinks
Electric Company, woohoo! The crew will be talking like Morgan Freeman in no time. Out of sight!
This can only end well.
8693733
They have a few small things going for them. Changelings in general are pretty tough in this setting-they all survived a colossal impact with the desert floor after being hurled out of Canterlot at extreme velocity (granted, they probably bled most of the force off in the trip-if there had been a second shield wall around canterlot when they were thrown out, most of them would be decaying mush and chitiny bits.)
Two, this setting has magic, which has taken care of and simplified many problems real life astronaut's faced, at least to some extent. Even then there's been close calls, but it should be noted.
Three, the author hasn't wanted to. So far, Changeling Space Program hasn't been big on tragedy. Adventure, a bit of intrigue, yes, but not tragedy. Me, personally, I'm convinced that in an absolutely realistic world, at least one of the agencies would have had a lethal accident by now (dragons don't count-they survived theirs). The CSP in particular, despite fairly tough changelings, has had such idiocy occur around it that I'm convinced at least some changelings or their other workers should have died by now.
But, that doesn't bother me too much-it's not really a focus, and the writing is good. Plus, they treat death seriously enough, so, while I know the author isn't particularly a fan of death in the setting simply because no one's had a lethal accident yet when they very much should have, it's still tense and exciting for the most part.
8693733
Because changelings are changeling proof of course
Hoping to see Dragonfly get a little more focus after this. Mark needs to learn more about her (and Changelings in general), and there has been a notable lack of bughorse hugging so far.
8693864 Also, CSP is as much comedy as adventure, if not more so. I'm dialing down the comedy a lot for Maretian.
first Starlight with the Magic Bullet then Fireball nearly killed them with his namesake....
Not quite horse tranquilizers, but Mark's certainly on horse analgesics.
In any case, wow, Fireball. Wow. At least he acknowledged that he messed up.
As for Dragonfly, yeah, that probably ate up a lot of love. Highly admirable what she did, but it's going to be several sols of rest and recuperation for most of the crew.
And I do have to appreciate Cherry's status report. Mark's as much a part of the crew as anyone.
8693433
It shall be drawn with fire.
didactic: intended to teach, particularly in having moral instruction as an ulterior motive.
8693676
Kaz, I'm already in Tartarus
I'm assuming Dragonfly used some of her magic to coax our Martian to do things under the influence of extreme pain.
8693914
Understandable to dial down the comedy, it wouldn’t fit with the current narrative. I actually ended up deleting an entire section of two different stories because I felt they didn’t fit. Sure I lost over 3k words total(probably, it would have hurt to count) but that continuous tone is much more important.
...doesn’t make me feel much better though
He got Morcambed.
All the right calls, not necessarily in the right order.
Good news, the cave is probably useable now?
Bad news, The Hab is downwind of the deposits, and the next wind storm is going to be intresting?
8693883 Bughorse hugging... hugborse?
8693919 Not exactly. Cherry referred to him as "alien" in the report, as in "alien and two crew injured." The two crew injuries are Starlight and Dragonfly, and Dragonfly is protesting the status as vigorously as she can manage. It helps that Cherry is very rusty on her Mares Code while Dragonfly has a fast fist... er, hoof... on the key.
8693939 In this specific case, it refers to using a tone of voice or diction that basically screams at the kids, "It's time to be taught something, so I'm going to speak as slowly and clearly and condescendingly as possible."
8693966 More extreme shock than pain. Mark's mind was trying to check out, but a combination of changeling underhandedness (underhoofedness?) and Mark's fundamental unwillingness to give up got the rover home.
welp congratulations fireball you may have just put dragons out of space travel for life. i'm sure torch well be ready to congratulate you for this one.
as someone whos had second degree burns before i don't pity watney, providing they have access to anything resembling proper bandages and purified water, pain isn't the worst part of whats to come, thats going to itch and then the skins going to start peeling, which well itch some more.
I am worried about dragonfly there. What did she do exactly? It looks like she did something using some weird change on Powers.
option A: Chrysalis did get around to breaking out that royal jelly and maybe Dragonfly did some mind magic
Option B: Dragonfly got Mark to attempt to drive, studied what he did and then transformed into Mark
Option C: Dunno lol.
8694206
She turned into Johannsen to get Mark out of his shocked state long enough to drive them back to base and apparently used up enough love reserves that she's suffering from severe malnutrition.
8693821 Careful, he's going to break out in song next.
8694114 Sooo..... Does changeling spit help the healing process in this 'verse? "Um, Johannsen, why are you spitting on my arm?"
8693919 Just be glad he's not being cocooned....
8693914
Another great chapter. Love the seriousness with just the right about of comedy to it to keep it in tone with MLP:FiM.
Keep up the great work!
The sad part is the Changeling Space Program isn't alone in how they do things. Think about it, there program was a 'quick and dirty' program. Safety was almost secondary in comparison to the end goal. And if you look at Mercury and early Apollo programs this was exactly what they did. They cut corners, took risks. And they did the impossible and went to the moon.
"If we die we want people to accept it. We are in a risky business, and we hope that if anything happens to us, it will not delay the program. The conquest of space is worth the risk of life."
-Gus Grissom
Dragon Greed. I simply love how you take things I hadn't thought about and make them be damn relevant.
Oh Dragonfly, you're going to make earth's governments shit themselves in fear. Shape changers are every intelligence agency's greatest dream and fear in one neat, terrifying package.
"But he couldn’t object if Fireball kept it in the Amicitas galley, could he? The lights were back on over there, and some canned air, and even a little heat."
...
You... you did remember to tell Fireball why Mark was so worried about the perchlorates, right? Right?
"Yes. It’s yours, Fireball. Just take some."
...Ah! Well, alright then! Hopefully that's just draconic hoard instincts interfering! And not, you know, the awakened and baleful planetmind of Mars planting a thought in his head.
"Manehattan manufacturing firm, as used by both Changeling Space"
"Manehattan manufacturing firm as used by both Changeling Space"?
"Spitfire gave me some of the really strong painkillers from their medicine kit."
...So... did she confirm that a safe pony painkiller wasn't a deadly human neurotoxin or something, or just... assume? Could see the latter, given she's not actually had that much medical training, but they dodged another potential bullet there.
"Open flame around magnesium peroxide and an"
"Open flame around magnesium perchlorate and an"?
Or is this me not remembering some chemistry detail?
Hm. Wonder what Dragonfly used that much power for? Just the transformation, with the love gain from Mark seeing her being insufficient to cover the cost? If so, and she expected that, probably pretty desperate to get him driving, with lesser attempts not working.
"And Starlight just woke up."
Ah, yay! :D
So that's one less problem...
8693914
Oh I don't know about that, there's at least one big laugh in every chapter. If not silly comedy, than dry/dark comedy.
p.s. It's weird (almost creepy) how FOX has been playing The Martian on tv more than a few times lately.
8694562 Spitfire knows what to do with the pony painkillers. She knows absolutely NOTHING about what's in the Ares III stores- she can't even read the labels- so those are out of the question. It was pony painkillers or nothing.
Change that to the smarter you think you are. Because I know multitudes of idiots who think they're geniuses who wouldn't believe water being wet if you held their head under it.
8694572
It's creepy how Netflix Canada removed it from the list shortly before this started...
I want to hear Fireball’s take on this whole situation now.
8694748 "Sorry. Big sorry."
Also, he's bringing something to somebody else to give to them without being ordered. Think how difficult that normally is for dragons who aren't Spike.
I had a thought while I was in the car: does the Earth hate its inhabitants in a similar fashion as Mars hates its occupiers? Life seems to be a bit more eventful on Earth than on Equus. Tectonics and meteorology come to mind.
8694525
actually, NASA's pathological fear of fire stems DIRECTLY from Apollo 1; because North American Aviation used flammable wire insulation as well as carelessly left tools and other metal objects in the access panels; the design of the hatch prevented rescue (it opened inward, and the pressurized cabin pushed the hatch tighter against the hull making rescue impossible) and the 100% oxygen environment acted like an accelerant making the fire burn MUCH hotter.
8694582
Good point; that makes sense. And while "nothing" may have been the safer choice, it'd presumably also be very unpleasant for Mark and, following that, likely everyone else in the habitat.
8694907
Many species on Earth use tools in some fashion; otters breaking clams on rocks is one example.
Only humankind uses fire. Everything else flees from it.
We mostly hairless apes are the only ones crazy enough to make fire and fly into space on tin cans filled with fire.
8694907 Paraphrasing the book, where Watney bemoans the lack of flammables in the Hab: "If you asked the NASA engineers what their single greatest fear was for the hab, they would say, 'fire.' And if you asked them what the likely result of a fire in the hab would be, they would say, 'DEATH by fire.'"
8694793
I'm pretty sure he has an idea of how badly he f'ed up. Maybe some humility and kindness for others will do him good. I wouldn't expect a 180 on his draconic tendencies tho.
I strongly suspect that the biggest problem with fire on Mars would not be low temperature, but low pressure. I.e. you may get something interesting to happen deep inside that heap where pressure can build up, but not open flame at the surface.
I'd say start burying the stuff. Especially if you can't safely do a disposal burn.
They should have plotted out where to dump the percolates before the attempt to move them. Then if possible set them off from a safe distance.
8695265 I'm not going to defend this too strongly, but I will point out that the top of the pile when Fireball stuck the fuel into the oxidizer had been the middle of the pile four hours before. For whatever that's worth.
8695766
I kinda got curious today and bought potassium perchlorate (unfortunately store was out of magnesium perchlorate). I tried it on small pieces of polystyrene and soft rubber-like PVC. PVC required a few seconds of heating with small butane torch to ignite and after that burns in similar fashion to match heads (maybe a bit tamer) and leaves behind ashes and beads of molten perchlorate. Surprisingly PS refuses to burn funny outside of torch's flame.
I also tried small piece of chicken and it burned pretty funny with flashes and cracks inside torch's flame (but I couldn't get it self-sustaining). Conjecture: there is a good chance that hot KClO4 can burn humans and ponies alright (at least in Earth's atmosphere)
Now I wonder how to get rid of that smell
8695869 Magnesium perchlorate is a major component of flash powder. Potassium perchlorate is much more well-behaved by comparison.
But please don't conduct any similar experiments again without a vent hood. One of the frequent byproducts of perchlorate combustion is chlorine gas. You're bleaching your sinuses.
8695869
You should not worry that you need to get rid of the smell. You should worry that you smelled the smell.
I echo Kris's sentiment: Use a fume extractor if you intend to play with oxidizing anything. They're cheap and readily available online. They are a common tool to anyone who does soldering regularly.
It was due to this that I reprogrammed by cortex for maximum flexibility by splitting my consciousness into subunits which attained their own individuality and can offer alternative thoughts and viewpoints as though a committee! (Alondro gave himself multiple personalities on purpose...)
But that would mean that I am smart...
Or just stubborn as a mule.
Yes, probably the later
They may have changeling-proofed their spacecraft, but unfortunately they didn't think to dragon-proof them.