Work Text:
Photo credit here.
Audio Log Entry: Sol 6
We lost Monty today.
It’s not my fault, I know that, but I…
…
Let me start from the beginning. Today was our sixth day on the martian surface, collecting the soil samples for our mission. As the third manned mission to Mars, our analysis is indispensable for the success of future missions, with the goal of long term Martian habitation.
Our mission had gone well up until today. This afternoon, however, we got news of a dust storm moving in from the West, faster and stronger than anticipated. We went into the Hab to see if we could wait it out, but with incredible and unprecedented wind-speeds, our MAV was in danger of becoming unusable. We were forced to evacuate the planet.
I led the team out into the storm. The dust was… incredible. We could hardly see two feet in front of us. Could hardly hear each other over the comms. The MAV was tilting, angling toward tipping, slow but steady. Our equipment was becoming untethered. Nothing we brought was meant to withstand the forces of such an intense storm. And Monty…
All I remember of the incident is seeing the shape of one of our satellite dishes, coming free from its tether. It struck Monty, knocking him out of line and into the depths of the storm. Our lights couldn’t reach him. He was out of range of the radar. We were searching blind.
Soon after that, Sim informed me that the MAV was going to tip. I sent the rest of the team off to safety, and I searched for him for as long as I could, but I… there was no time. The MAV… there was no time. We got a warning of a suit decompression and…
There are now four of us on the Hermes. Four of us going home. Four of us who will forever feel the loss of a great… great man. A friend.
Transcript note: There is silence on the log for three minutes and twenty-two seconds. Newton seems to have turned his mic off. He does not turn it back on.
Audio Log Entry: Sol 12
I can’t stop thinking about him. About his song. I know Monty hadn’t found his soulmate yet, but he had a song. He had a song. He died without knowing who he shared it with. And… it’s selfish, but I… I always hoped that I might be the one who shared it. I know he sang his song to all his one night stands, or at least the ones who were a good ‘lay’, as he would say, but he never… never sang it to me. It seems like an oversight, to have never heard his song in nearly thirty years of friendship, but I really have never heard his song.
And now I never will.
I’ll never… know.
Transcript note: After a short pause, Newton begins singing a song in soulscript. This continues for several minutes. I have not transcribed the words nor the exact time as per Newton ’s request.
Audio Log Entry: Sol 18
I can’t do this. I can’t lead my team. Not without Monty. I just… I can’t. Johanna is going to have to take over.
I can’t.
I can’t.
I can’t.
I can’t.
Audio Log Entry: Sol 18 (2)
After some food and a bit of sleep, I’m feeling a little better.
Perhaps ‘better’ isn’t the right word here. I’ve gritted my teeth. I can and I will bring the rest of my team home alive. Monty… Monty will always be my dearest friend, but I have to move on without him. I can’t dwell on his death. He was a vibrant person with a big personality, and he would never allow me to wallow in my grief. In his name, in his honor… I will keep going.
Audio Log Entry: Sol 37
You forget, when you live there for months or years at a time, how beautiful space is.
I’ve been talking a lot with Felicity lately. She’s mourning her brother just as I am. It was always our goal to go to space together. Me, Felicity, Johanna, and Monty. Ever since we were little kids. It was our dream.
Sometimes I think I’ll wake up from this. That it’ll turn out to be one long, strange nightmare. I think ‘he’ll be just beside me when I wake’. But no matter how hard I try I can’t wake up. I lie awake in my bunk at night and hum my song and I still can’t wake up and it’s… so much. So big. Too big to grasp. The fact that I’ll never see him again is—
But it’s fine. I’m okay, mostly. I’ll get through this. Me and Felicity and Sim and Johanna together, as a team, we’ll get through this. We will.
We will.
Audio Log Entry: Sol 98
We got some news, and—
Oh, god.
Transcript note: he pauses here for one minute and thirty-nine seconds.
Okay. Okay. I’m okay.
We got some news just now. Some news that I… I’m having some trouble processing.
Somehow, against all odds, Monty survived the decompression of his suit. He made it into the Hab and lasted out the storm. He’s growing potatoes and dug up Pathfinder to get in contact with NASA and is preparing to get to the Ares IV site, so in short… he’s alive.
And we left him behind.
I. I left him behind.
Audio Log Entry: Sol 100
Apparently Monty nearly blew himself up trying to make water. Smartest person on the whole planet and he still fucked up. God, he’s an idiot. God, I love him.
Audio Log Entry: Sol 107
NASA is letting us talk to Monty. Just short text communications, no audio or video available, but even that is a miracle. He’s done a good job with Pathfinder but there’s only so much you can do with a Martian probe from 1996.
It took me a long time to figure out what to say to him. It seemed like too much to say what was actually on my mind. The guilt of leaving him is not his burden to bear. It’s mine. He stresses every time the subject comes up that it’s not our fault, not my fault, but I… I stopped looking for him. I left him.
Still. It was nice to talk to him. He’s doing alright—he was even joking around. Technically once you grow crops somewhere you’ve colonized it, so guess what he’s done. That’s right, he’s become the first person to colonize mars. He says it’s his right as the dictator of his colony to tell me that my taste in music sucks.
…I miss him so much.
Audio Log Entry: Sol 116
Had a dream last night. My song was playing. You know how they say that the melody will lead you to your soulmate, who has a melody that twines perfectly with yours? I think… I think my dream was like that. I don't know what that means yet, but I think… when the time comes, I'll know.
In the meantime, I’ve been talking a lot to our flight director and the head of the Ares missions. They think they can get a supply shuttle to Mars by sol 898, which will help Monty survive until the Ares IV mission arrives to pick him up. It’s risky, and they’re cutting it close, but his crops are hearty and the Hab is self-sustained. As long as nothing goes wrong, he’ll be okay.
Fingers crossed. Knock on wood.
Audio Log Entry: Sol 122
So good news. Monty is a botanist. He’s grown enough potatoes to last him a couple hundred sols.
Bad news? None of our equipment was built to last that long. The Hab blew an airlock while Monty was in it.
Good news again—he’s okay.
And bad news—he can’t grow any more potatoes. He’s going to starve to death long before a rescue mission can reach him.
Unless…
…
Unless.
Audio Log Entry: Sol 136
NASA has informed us in no uncertain terms that we are to complete our return home. We are NOT to attempt a gravity assist maneuver around the earth, pick up supplies, head back to Mars, pick up Monty, and then return home. We are, in short, to leave him there to die.
I think… perhaps… this is what my dream meant. It's hard to know, but that's why it's called fate, isn't it? It's something other, something higher, than mere human understanding.
Still. It’s a serious thing, disobeying a direct order from NASA. Sim and I could be court-martialed for this. Even if we aren’t, none of us will ever be allowed on another mission again. This is a very serious thing I am considering. Felicity, Johanna, Sim… this is their decision to make. This is not something I can command them to do. I cannot command them to mutiny. I will only do the maneuver if the decision from the rest of my team is unanimous.
Audio Log Entry: Sol 136 (2)
The decision was unanimous.
Audio Log Entry: Sol 144
Monty asked me today to get a message to Adrian if he doesn’t make it. He wanted me to tell the kid that Monty died for something big… and beautiful… and greater than himself. He wanted me to tell the kid to follow his song, follow his dreams. And he wanted me to tell Felicity that she’s got more drive than any other surgeon, on the face of the planet or off. That she’ll survive and thrive no matter what.
And he said… he said he left a message for me. With Felicity. If he dies, I’m to go to her and ask her for his final words. ‘If I die and not a moment sooner,’ he said.
…He’s not going to die. I’ll tell you that right now.
Audio Log Entry: Sol 227
We’ve completed the resupply pickup. It took Johanna’s brains to hack the remote override in order to adjust our flight to complete the maneuver, but we did it. NASA is very much not happy with us but you know what? Fuck them. I am a mutineer and a defector and I wouldn’t change that for the universe.
Monty is alive.
He is alive.
Sorry, NASA, but we’re going to bring our boy home.
Audio Log Entry: Sol 296
Alright, so some more bad news. Monty short-circuited Pathfinder. He can no longer communicate with NASA, and therefore we can no longer communicate with him.
But. We have a plan, a viable plan. And as long as he can stretch his rations and finish the work on the rover to drive himself to the Ares IV MAV then we can pick him up and it’ll be okay.
He’ll be okay.
I know he’s living on borrowed time, but every time something else goes wrong I get more determined to get him back. He’s survived everything so far, against all odds. He’s survived, he’s a survivor, and I will be able to sing my song to him one day. I will be able to listen as he sings his to me. I’ll know, once and for all, if we were destined to be. Maybe our songs will harmonize or maybe not, but even if they don’t, even if fate says that we’re not meant to be, I don’t care. I love him with everything in me—my heart and lungs and my goddamn spleen, just… everything. Henry “Monty” Montague is the love of my life. That is the long and short of it. That is all you need to know.
Audio Log Entry: Sol 553
It’s been nineteen months since we left Monty behind. We’re close enough to Mars that I can see the red without a telescope. We’re approaching fast.
Now, the Hermes wasn’t made to hover in orbit, so a flyby will have to do—Monty will use the MAV that was dropped for the Ares IV mission to escape the atmosphere and we’ll pick him up from there.
The problem with this is that we have a very small margin for error—too far away when he launches and we’ll miss him. Go too fast and we’ll miss him. Overshoot and we’ll miss him. Miscalculate at all…
…and Monty has the worst day of a short and miserable life.
…
But hey. We’ve survived one hundred percent of our bad days so far.
I like our odds.
Audio Log Entry: Sol 561
This is my last log before we succeed or we fail.
I don’t have much to say. Just that I’m excited to get Monty on board and begin our trip home. Court-martial or no court-martial, I’m glad I made this choice.
Today is the day that we get our boy.
MAV Launch Transcript, Sol 561
JH: Fuel pressure, green. Engine alignment, perfect. Communications five by five. We are ready for the pre-flight checklist, Commander.
PN: Mission Control, this is Hermes actual. We will proceed on schedule. We are T-minus two minutes, ten seconds to launch, by the mark.
PN: About two minutes, Monty. How you doing down there?
HM: I’m good. I’m anxious to get up to you. Thanks for coming back for me.
PN: Well, we’re on it. Remember, you’ll be pulling some serious G’s, so it’s okay to pass out. You’re in Sim’s hands now.
HM: Good, because I couldn’t fly a straight line if I tried.
PN: Is that a bi joke?
HM: Indeed it is, Commander. Tell her no barrel rolls, though.
PN: Copy that, MAV.
PN: CAPCOM.
FM: Go.
PN: Remote command.
FM: Go.
PN: Recovery.
PN: Go.
PN: Pilot.
HM: Go.
PN: Mission Control, we are go for launch.
JH: T-minus ten…
Transcript note: Henry Montague begins humming here.
JH: Nine…
SA: Main engine start.
JH: Eight…
JH: Seven…
JH: Mooring clamps released.
JH: Six…
Transcript note: Percy Newton begins humming along with HM here.
JH: Five…
JH: Four…
JH: Three…
JH: Two…
JH: One.
Hermes Communications Feed Transcript, Sol 561
HM: Contact!
HM: Percy, I’ve waited so long to tell you this face to face, but good god you have terrible taste in music.
Translator ’s note: Laughter.
PN: You were humming during launch.
HM: You were humming with me.
PN: Yes.
HM: You know my song.
PN: I do.
HM: But… how? I’ve never—you never seemed like you cared about songs, so I never sang mine around you.
PN: Of course I cared. I just… didn’t know how to ask you to share that with me.
HM: So how did you—how—?
PN: …I know it because it’s my song, too.
Audio Log Entry: Sol 561
He’s safe. He’s with us. I can hardly believe that he’s safe and sound and he’s here in my arms. He’s so thin, and he broke a few ribs while the MAV broke the atmosphere, but god… he’s here. He’s here. He’s here. My soulmate, my Monty.
I am never letting him go again.