The Martian

He clasped his hands behind his back. “And the American people may be sentimental, but their government is not. The US State Department won’t trade anything major for one man’s life.”

“So it’s hopeless?” asked Zhu Tao.

“Not hopeless,” Guo Ming corrected. “Just hard. If this becomes a negotiation by diplomats, it will never resolve. We need to keep this among scientists. Space agency to space agency. I’ll get a translator and call NASA’s Director. We’ll work out an agreement, then present it to our governments as a fait accompli.”

“But what can they do for us?” Zhu Tao asked. “We’d be giving up a booster and  effectively canceling Taiyang Shen.” 

Guo Ming smiled. “They’ll give us something we can’t get without them.”

“And that is?”

“They’ll put a Chinese astronaut on Mars.”

Zhu Tao stood. “Of course,” he smiled. “The Ares 5 crew hasn’t even been selected yet. We’ll insist on a crewman. One we get to pick and train. NASA and the US State Department would surely accept that. But will our State Council?”

Guo Ming smiled wryly. “Publicly rescue the Americans? Put a Chinese astronaut on Mars? Have the world see China as equal to the US in space? The State Council would sell their own mothers for that.” 

Teddy listened to the phone at his ear. The voice on the other end finished what it had to say, then fell silent as it awaited an answer.

He stared at nothing in particular as he processed what he’d just heard.

After a few seconds, he replied “Yes.”

Johanssen:

Your poster outsold the rest of ours combined. You’re a hot chick who went to Mars. You’re on dorm-room walls all over the world.

Looking like that, why are you such a nerd? And you are, you know. A serious nerd. I had to do some computer shit to get Pathfinder talking to the rover and oh my God. And I had NASA telling me what to do every step of the way.

You should try to be more cool. Wear dark glasses and a leather jacket. Carry a switchblade. Aspire to a level of coolness known only as… “Botanist Cool.”

Did you know Commander Lewis had a chat with us men? If anyone hit on you, we’d be off the mission. I guess after a lifetime of commanding sailors she’s got an unfairly jaded view.

Anyway. Try not to think about all those guys wanking to your poster.

“Ok, here we are again,” said Bruce to the assembled heads of JPL. “You’ve all heard about the Taiyang Shen, so you know our friends in China have given us one more chance. But this time, it’s going to be harder. 

“Taiyang Shen will be ready to launch in 28 days. If it launches on time, our payload will get to Mars on Sol 624, six weeks after Watney’s expected to run out of food. NASA’s already working on ways to stretch his supply. 

“We made history when we finished Iris in sixty three days. Now we have to do it in twenty eight.” 

He looked across the table to the incredulous faces.

“Folks,” he said, “This is going to be the most ghetto spacecraft ever built. There’s only one way to finish that fast: No landing system.”

“Sorry, what?” Jack Trevor stammered.

Bruce nodded. “You heard me. No landing system. We’ll need guidance for in-flight course adjustments. But once it gets to Mars, it’s going to crash.”

“That’s crazy!” Jack said. “It’ll be going an insane velocity when it hits!” 

“Yep,” Bruce said. “With ideal atmospheric drag, it’ll impact at 300 meters per second.”

“What good will a pulverized probe do Watney?” Jack asked.

“As long as the food doesn’t burn up on the way in, Watney can eat it.” Bruce commented.

Turning to the whiteboard, he began drawing a basic organizational chart. “I want two teams,” He began.  

“Team One will make the outer shell, guidance system, and thrusters. All we need is for it to get to Mars. I want the safest possible system. Aerosol propellant would be best. High-gain radio so we can talk to it, and standard satellite navigational software.

“Team Two will deal with the payload. They need to find a way to contain the food during impact. If protein bars hit sand at 300m/s, they’ll make protein-scented sand. We need them edible after impact.

“We can weigh 941kg. At least 300 of that needs to be food. Get crackin'.”

“Uh, Dr. Kapoor?” Rich said, peeking his head in to Venkat’s office. “Do you have a minute?”

Venkat gestured him in. “You are…?”

“Rich, Rich Purnell,” he said, shuffling in to the office, his arms wrapped around a sheaf disorganized papers. “From astrodynamics.”

“Nice to meet you,” Venkat said. “What can I do for you, Rich?”

“I came up with something a while ago. Spent a lot of time on it.” He dumped the papers on Venkat’s desk. “Lemme find the summary…”

Venkat stared forlornly at his once clean desk, now strewn with scores of printouts.

“Here we go!” Rich said triumphantly, grabbing a paper. Then, his expression saddened. “No, this isn’t it.”

“Rich,” Venkat said. “Maybe you should just tell me what this is about?”

Rich looked at the mess of papers and sighed. “But I had such a cool summary…”

“A summary for what?”

“How to save Watney.”