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She'd thought that ten days of isolation would be fine. She wasn't extroverted like Watney or Martinez. (She was sure they'd probably gone crazy during isolation. Well, Watney was pretty much already crazy.) Having spent so much of her life in front of a computer screen or with a textbook she felt like she knew herself and her brain well enough to maintain her composure for ten days. She'd once spent 48 straight hours in the library awake on a toxic (read: life-giving) cocktail of coffee and adderall. That had been fine. Surely this would be as well.
It's not that she didn't like human interaction or even that it necessarily made her anxious. She just liked being by herself. She felt a sense of stimulation, focus, and purpose when she was coding that she didn't find in other way. She'd never questioned it.
The desire to become an astronaut, however, had gotten in the way of her psuedo isolation. They were constantly together, the six members of the Ares III crew. It was part of the team building that was required to get six strangers to trust each other implicitly. They'd be responsible for each others lives for more than a year.
But by the fifth day of isolation, she was ready for it to be over. Known introvert Beth Johanssen missed people.
(Or was it person.)
"Give me the skinny on the crew."
"Like my personal thoughts?"
Though it was quite the change from her previous life, she'd come to find that she didn't mind the constant companionship. In fact, she'd grown to like all of her crew mates. The past year had given them time to get to know each other quite thoroughly. They complemented each other well. (Those NASA psychoanalysts they always made fun of had actually assembled a pretty harmonious crew.)
So, it wasn't exactly a difficult question. Describe how you feel about your crew mates. Easy enough.
For the most part.
Easiest first.
"Watney is everybody's favorite."
Everyone loved Watney, the smartass. Even if he did like to tease them (the Commander too--but only sometimes). Always quick with the one-liners, Mark was ready to make you laugh. She wasn't used to having a guy like him around. Her friends weren't quite so--exuberant.
"Martinez really thinks he's funny."
Sometimes he was and sometimes he wasn't but they all humored him regardless. Him and Watney were always making jokes. They especially seemed to tease Beck. About what she didn't know but more often than not she'd find Beck laughing and rolling his eyes about something one of them had said or trying to hush them as they walked into a meeting.
"Lewis is pretty badass."
Lewis had the kind of exterior confidence she wished she had. Not that she wasn't confident. You weren't selected for an Ares mission without supreme confidence in your abilities. But it wasn't really in her knowledge or abilities that she didn't have complete confidence.
"Vogel is direct, to the point. More formal than the rest of them."
It was true. Maybe it was the fact that English wasn't his first language (not that he had any trouble speaking English) but somehow his words always seemed more formal. Still, she liked working with him. Sometimes when she wanted a challenge he'd explain some of his navigational equations to him. He reminded her of some of her friends back home. (But more formal.)
"Beck--"
And therein lay the problem.
--is nice, her brain finished lamely.
No, no. That sounded deliberately vague. Like a non sequitur which might make it sound like she didn't like him.
He was nice. Very nice. But that wasn't really the point.
The first time they'd met she had been very nervous. Not because of him though. She'd never been to space before (she wasn't the only one in the crew), but the other person to show up at the same time as her had been Beck.
He'd been to space before. He was going not only as their flight surgeon, but also as their EVA specialist. He should have been intimidating.
Instead he was warm and open. Not talking too much, but enough that she felt less on edge. His eyes were bright, reflecting only passion for what he was doing and the happiness at meeting someone who would be joining him on such a mission. He'd made her a cup of coffee (Was it the bags under her eyes that had tipped him off?) as they waited for everyone else to join them for their first briefing. She'd accepted it gratefully, and joined him in wondering where everyone else was.
--is quiet. It wasn't entirely true but it wasn't entirely false either. He was quiet. Well, compared to Watney and Martinez anyone was quiet. He got along well with everyone and always had a smile on his face. His sense of humor was dry and he'd laugh embarrassedly sometimes after he'd make a joke almost as though it had been a mistake. But then he was quiet at times and working in silence with him was one of her favorite things. It wasn't a cold silence. It was warm, full of energy.
--confuses me. That was true. Maybe too true. No NASA psychologist needed to know how much Beck confused her. Not in an obvious way. Just in small ways here and there. Like when he'd walked out of a particularly brutal round of high g force training and she'd touched his elbow on impulse. (To make sure he was all right? She didn't know and she didn't ask herself. At least, she hadn't asked herself before isolation).
--wasn't there.
She'd felt this acutely.
The first couple days she hadn't been able to figure out what was missing. She'd been coding since she was twelve. She wasn't a stranger to passing hours upon hours alone. It never felt like that when working. Time flew by as her fingers flew over the keyboard. Somehow it was different now. Five days in and it was becoming strange not having anyone there.
But it wasn't just anyone. It was him.
He wasn't there. In the past year she hadn't gone more than a day or two without seeing him, if that. And now it was five days. It felt wrong. Not an immediate, screaming sort of wrong. But the kind of wrong you feel when you walk into a room and you can tell someone else has been there.
And then the thought just won't leave your mind.
"Beck, well Beck is always friendly, ready to help."
It was a cop out and she knew it. But that's all she wanted to tell his NASA guy anyway. Hell, it was more than she wanted to tell herself.
What she'd meant to say is that he was constant.
Maybe that sounded too strange. She couldn't completely put it into words. But honestly, that was the best way to describe him. Or at least it was the best way to describe him for her.
Even after their most brutal day of underwater training, when she'd climb out of the water and lay there exhausted beyond belief, he'd be there (just as exhausted), but ready to offer a smile or even a hand.
It sounded stupid and she didn't like it. She didn't even know why she was thinking about it so much. (That wasn't true. What else is there do to in isolation but to think? And with Beck on her mind there was too much to think about.)
She sighed and adjusted the hood on her sweatshirt as the psychologist wrote something down on his notepad.
She wondered if the psychologist had asked Beck the same question.
She wondered what he'd answered.
No. Enough wondering. Back to the mission at hand.
"All right, next question."