Mission Zero

--Day 1--

Amber

I was enjoying my time on the ship so far. Though the liftoff was rockier than I thought it would be, everything ended up fine. After we were safely out of the atmosphere and a couple miles away from the Earth’s gravitational field, we got to unbuckle and carry on by ourselves. Aaron was very friendly and charming in a way. He was suited for a leader, and I was wondering why I hadn’t been paired with any of his prior missions before.

That aside, Aaron also gave us each a journal. It was very nice, with an old-fashioned leather cover and small set of materials that had their own holders on the back: two pens, a mechanical pencil, and an eraser.

“If any of you feel like writing down about your experiences or even just to use it to take notes, you’re free to. I won’t be asking to see anything you write, nor will our officials unless something drastic happens-” Aaron sort of cut himself off from deepening the subject.

He seemed to do that a lot, drawing on too long about some subjects before entirely disengaging with it. It wasn’t a red flag, in my professional opinion- maybe just some anxiety. I made a mental note to possibly address it later.

I made my way back to the med center, finding Josh and Envy there. Envy had a black eye and Josh’s nose was bleeding.

“Damn, what’d you two get yourselves into?” I laughed. I wasn’t one to hide my amusement, and I often found it funny when someone got hurt.

“Chad knocked the daylights out of me earlier.” Envy snickered, covering his black eye as he looked me up and down shamelessly.

“Mh. I see why. “ I retorted, giving him a slightly disgusted look before turning to Josh. “And you?”

“Tripped and smashed my beautiful face into a wall.” Josh whined, tipping his head back to stop the dripping.

“Oh no, no, no- don’t tip your head back, you could swallow the blood and enough of that will make you sick-” I rushed over to Josh with a paper towel, getting him to tip his head forward to let the blood drip into the towel.

“What about me?” Envy complained, sounding jealous.

“You’re grown. Get yourself a damn ice pack from the freezer, wrap it, and get out.” I spoke sweetly, sarcasm seeping through my words.

Envy grumbled a bit, but did as told and got out after locating an ice pack. I huffed, turning my attention back to Josh. He was cute at least, so I didn’t mind his behavior- he was more polite.

“If it keeps dripping in ten minutes, I’m gonna have to shove one of those nose-tampons up in there, okay?” I chuckled as Josh whined like a child.

“I hope it stops soon then.. And have you gotten a talk from Aaron? Or am I the only one? ‘Cause he came to me after we were allowed to unbuckle and said to refrain from working until I was reassigned a job. Apparently I didn’t do well in the engineering room.” He looked dejected and had a childish pout.

I didn’t really know how to respond to that, but I sympathized with him.

“No.. You can’t be the only one though. Maybe go ask around? Come back in a little while. It doesn’t look like your nose is broken or fractured, so you should be fine.” I reassured, seeing him lighten up a bit.

“Thanks Amber, see you in a while then..” He got up and left without a problem.

With that dealt with, I found myself shuffling around through all the cabinets. I had done this before we launched and even organized everything, but I didn’t really know what to do with myself.

What sucked the most about these space missions was that we couldn’t bring our phones- it was because of something about data breaches and confidential information. If we wanted to contact anyone, it was through the communication’s center on the ship. Even with how far technology has advanced, it was sort of laughable how badly everything still operated.

In my midst of contemplating and fumbling around, Jamie came in.

“Hey uh.. Amber, how are ya?” She looked down at the floor as if it were interesting, hiding her face in her long hair.

“Awe, what- don’t tell me you’re shy.” I snickered a bit. It was almost an automatic response. I almost felt bad for teasing her, seeing her tense up. For a moment I thought she’d leave the room- but she stayed there, just messing with her hair. “Pfft- sorry, let me start over with that; I’m good so far- just bored out of my mind I guess. How about you?” I tried, and Jamie seemed to lighten up a notch.

“Same… I uh- uh.. I came in just to say thanks though.” She left it at that, looking at me with some sort of hope in her eyes. I didn’t know what she was referencing, if that’s what she was hoping I’d understand.

“What.” I stated rather than questioning, and she gave a nervous laugh.

“For earlier- you came and talked to me..” Jamie trailed off and then it clicked in my head.

“Oh! That, yeah! No problem. I know some people are more easily excited than others and some aren’t as thrilled. Care to chat some more? You’re welcome to hang out with me.” I offered, giving a playful wink afterwards.

Jamie almost seemed to panic, fidgeting where she stood.

“Suuurre-” she started, looking anywhere around the room but at me.

“Pfft- don’t look so conflicted! Here, I gotcha.” I smiled. There went my boredom at least. I came over to her and lightly placed a hand on the small of her back to usher her further into the room so we could at least sit and talk to one another.

------

We were already past Mars by the time it hit 10PM- according to the mapping center’s time that was provided from the OEA’s headquarters.

Aaron called a meeting on the main deck.

The area had recently been home-ized: with couches, pillows, chairs, carpets, tables, and other household furniture being strewn all over the room. Even some paintings and tapestries had been put up. The movies and TV hadn’t been brought out yet though- and streaming media aside from communication wasn’t permitted, unfortunately. But, the new stuff made everything feel less clinical, and much more comfortable. Everyone seemed to have claimed spots already, and Aaron rose from a spot on a couch to speak to everyone.

“Alrighty campers!” He joked, giving a wide gesture to everyone. “I hope everyone is getting comfortable and figuring out the layout of the ship without issue. Now, We’re here to address the sleeping situation.. In a week, we will be put to rest for the long haul, but until then.. We still need to tend to our bodily needs. I would like to not have to assign quarters, so you can all figure out your partners. Now, I’m not going to separate genders or anything of that sort because I feel that it’s unfair- Just know that if I hear anything, I will be forced to do something about it.” He gave a pause, letting everyone think and mumble to whoever was close to them.

“With that said, there are twelve rooms- I am well aware that that’s more than enough for everyone at the moment, but we are limiting ourselves to seven. This is so that those who are asleep will have the same opportunity when they are awoken, and so that we can get used to being around each other. Figure out your roommates before going to bed tonight.”

It was a gentle order. Aaron was lenient, he just wanted things done in a relatively timely manner. It was just for a week anyways- they could switch rooms at any point if they really felt like it. Aaron figured it’d just give everyone more incentive to get along.