Chapter Text
Orion was not quiet.
The natural flow of rest did not occur in microgravity. Nothing about being in space was natural. Recycled air, scheduled sleep hours, and walls lined with various life support systems were all symbolic that nobody is supposed to be here. The silence of sleeping on Earth was something they all missed deeply, but the constant hum of various technology engineered to sustain their lives was certainly a comfort, if also a mild annoyance.
The capsule was not quiet. But it was filled with a version of silence in which one could hardly tell there were four people packed into such a small space. 1 more day, they reminded themselves.
That is, until the tone of an alarm filled the cabin. Immediately, Reid’s eyes flickered open. The momentary disorientation of waking up floating was overridden as he pulled himself towards the displays.
“Runbox,” he says aloud. Within moments, Jeremy is at his side, ready to execute their emergency procedures.
“No fast hands,” Reid warns as they watch the alarm blink on and off for a few moments. Atypical for this particular emergency. Various commands and discussions ring through the capsule until he makes the final call.
“We’re leaking fuel—”
“Integrity, it appears you are leaking fuel. Proceed with your commands,” suddenly comes through the comms speakers. Victor swiftly takes to communications whilst the other three conduct each individual safety procedure.
“Integrity, we’re just having a look here at the capsule,” the crew paused everything they were doing. “Your re-entry thrusters seem to have been hit by some sort of debris. Your procedures were all executed perfectly, but it’s still leaking. We’re checking with our ground team.”
Victor, checking the monitors, noted the gradual bleed-off rather than a significant drop. A leak was one thing, but damage to the spacecraft meant unprecedented circumstances. There were simulations of standardized fuel leaks, but it was impossible to prepare for every situation.
“Integrity, the size and place of the damage is allowing fuel to leak under your heat shield, it could ignite upon re-entry.”
Each of them looked around at each other. They took a moment to breathe, warding away the initial thought of what could happen to them. Grace, honor, fear. All three briefly went through their heads before they went back to work.
For a while, there was no communication back and forth on either end. Once the crew completed their necessary emergency procedures, they all sat back for a few moments.
“Is it guaranteed to ignite?,” Jeremy asked aloud.
“No,” Christina responded. “But there’s no reason it shouldn’t.”
“The longer we discuss, the more fuel we’re losing,” Victor interrupts. Everybody nods along. Their training taught them the delicate balance of letting time tick forward during malfunctions. Reid always valued taking time to discuss before deciding, but time was no longer on their side.
“He’s right. By the time we hit re-entry, the amount of hydrazine under the shield could almost definitely kill us. The metal of the capsule will be a huge catalyst.”
They went back to sitting in silence.
“What’s our move, commander?” Victor looked at Reid. Nobody expected him to know precisely what to do. The question was moreso a symbol of respect to his role.
Reid did not answer the question. Instead, it was Christina who looked back at him.
“We could undock early,” she replies. “It’ll stop any more of our fuel from getting stuck, but the propellant thrusters won’t be operational.”
“We can’t orient the capsule for re-entry if we don’t have thrusters,” Victor says. Christina goes quiet. The heat shield would be nearly useless if they entered the atmosphere uncontrolled. “That, or we completely miss our landing spot. The capsule isn’t designed to take ground impact.”
They were stuck between the possibility of combustion, or shattering against Earth. Neither seemed particularly enticing.
“Call the ground team,” Jeremy speaks up. They all look at him. Not once during the mission had they made him feel like being the rookie made him any less valuable to the team. In fact, the other three were shocked at how natural he seemed in microgravity, but a small part of Jeremy said something about this situation should have him shrinking away from speaking up.
The other part of him said ‘we need to fix this, and we need to fix it now’.
“Maybe we could alter our trajectory first? Angle ourselves first, undock, and free fall. We know the angle we have to enter at, can we not… recalculate relative to our current position?”
Yet again, they all take a moment to pause and think. And then, Reid’s putting on his headphones and turning on comms.
“Houston, Integrity, this is Commander Wiseman. We are requesting the possibility of undocking from our main mission module in order to prevent further leakage, as well as a request for a trajectory edit.”
A few seconds go by.
“Integrity, we are processing your request.”
Nobody lets out a breath yet. Until there is approval, there is very little to do except watch the fuel volume numbers tick down on the display. It feels like days, but it most certainly has only been an hour before they get a response.
—
…
—
“Integrity, your request has been approved. Our ground flight team is adjusting your parabolic flight course. This may take a few moments.”
A sigh of relief echoes throughout the cabin, even with the knowledge that they are still no where close to safe and sound. Victor sends up a quick, quiet prayer.
“This is like throwing a frisbee into a hurricane,” he tells the crew. It provides very little… anything, really.
Their displays edit themselves, courtesy of the Houston control team, and once they’re all up to speed on the change, the crew springs into action, beginning to secure all of the various floating items.
Once the cabin is safe, they take their seats. They do not need to buckle in yet, but they seat themselves in front of their displays to prep for an early undocking. Soon enough, the steady thump of their remaining thrusters are reorienting the entire module.
In their simulations back on Earth, Victor thought the sound was rhythmic and calm. An expected, practiced procedure. Now sitting in their respective seats, the noise felt off. Not the sound itself, but the circumstances in which they were firing. This was not part of his carefully scheduled mission regimen.
In short: these thumps should not happen this early.
But they are. Because something has gone wrong. Not just a malfunctioning Microsoft Outlook, but wrong-wrong. He whispered an apology to his family.
—
…
—
“We’re almost there,” Reid called out, strapping himself into his seat as the rest of the crew did the same. The air of the capsule felt increasingly suffocating, as if their oxygen tank was leaking. He swiftly tucked that thought away.
“We’re still set to land in water, just no where close to San Diego,” Victor says, staring at the screen in front of him.
“Where are we landing?”
Victor speaks up, “Yukon.”
“That far? Jeez,” Jeremy replies.
“We might get to meet some of your old friends, Jer,” Reid calls out, trying his hardest to bring spirits up. Just then, Houston cuts in.
“Integrity, you appear to be landing way further North than anticipated. We’re contacting the Royal Canadian Navy. We are entering our blackout period.”
The crew responded accordingly. It was out of their hands, so they merely buckled in and held on. Victor said yet another prayer, words messy and oddly specific. Perhaps if God heard him praying for their ship not to combust in the atmosphere, He’d take pity on the crew. The four of His children who had explored the furthest they could of His creation.
Re-entry is typically intense even when things go to plan. This time, the G forces felt heavier than usual. As Victor called out their rising G-loads, Christina could not help but disagree with each number. He had to be wrong, they had to be higher because what else could be causing this crushing weight on her chest.
“2.39… 2.73…. 3.02..”
He counted up steadily as they breached Earth’s atmosphere. She could feel her body weight pressing down against her bones, as well as the weight of what they just pulled off. It sat heavy in her stomach, much less gravity forces, and far more longing.
Christina thought about Bob for a split second. Something she had not truly allowed herself to think of for the past day and a half. If she did, it would give her fear.
Her crew and her family did not need fear, they needed perseverance, and bravery, and quick thinking, and—
Damn it, she wanted her husband. She wanted to crawl into bed next to him and she wanted Sadie curled up at her feet again.
Christina is pulled from her thoughts as the capsule is quite literally jerked around by the first parachutes deploying. The blackout period should be over by now, but their comms remained silent.
For a few moments, they begin falling again before the main chutes deploy. Reid tried communicating first, this time. Absolutely nothing. He tried again immediately after splashdown. Silence.
The four of them took a moment to breathe after splashdown. They were alive, they were together, and they were likely floating around the middle of the biggest ocean on the planet with malfunctioning communication.
Still, they celebrated their survival with a few brief whoops. The situation could be worse. They, so conveniently, were in a capsule designed to sustain their lives with extra supplies to last weeks.
Jeremy and Victor began organizing technology and supplies. Food was hardly scarce, and their technology was abundant.
Reid and Christina set to work on their comms. Figure out what’s wrong and try to call Houston. Simple.
—
…
—
Communication was not established. It had been hours of trying to fix their signal, but nothing happened. Through the capsule’s small windows, they could see Earth’s blue sky—home—slowly fading to oranges and reds before going dark.
They each slept in their seats. It was hardly comfortable, but they were alive.