«I just wanted to… to do something with you» she explained «Something extraordinary and… unforgettable. With you. Well, okay, it’s not as simple as that, I…» she swallowed and slightly shook her head, lacking of words.
Jordan was totally captured and paralyzed. He noticed a slight blush on her cheeks.
«I don’t think I’m someone worth risking your life for» he admitted in a murmur.
Anna lowered her gaze before shaking her head like forcing herself to return to reality.
«Jordan, listen, we must go or it’ll be too late» she turned away from the window and met his gaze, changing topic.
The worry in her eyes dragged him back to the reality of the situation. He felt his heart pounding and his stomach twisting. He nodded once and swallowed.
«Ready to jump?» he asked trying to keep his voice steady.
Their gazes were glued to each other.
«We’re here, we can’t back out anymore. Even if I weren’t, who would really care?» she slightly shrugged.
The boy stopped to consider her words, but the answer escaped his lips before he could decide to speak.
«I would.»
She looked taken off guard by those words as much as him, but she seemed to recover quickly and that time Jordan couldn’t read her gaze, full of something new. She slowly raised a hand to stroke his cheek.
«Jordan…» she pronounced slowly, her voice soaked in tenderness, fear, trepidation.
Then everything happened fast. They found themselves closer than ever before and, while time stopped, the Earth under them ceased to rotate, the stars shone brighter and the Northern lights became more intense, they kissed. Their helmets floated forsaken behind them and not even the lumbering suits stopped them. In that moment, in a distant part of his still conscious mind, Jordan thought that in life he wouldn’t need anything else. That if the end was to come, it may also come and he would have no regret. In that surreal dimension without space or time, Jordan finally felt in peace with himself. He felt as if all his questions had found an answer, as if every doubt had vanished, together with every fear. But everything that begins will end at a certain point and that happened. They both blushed and found themselves unable to look at each other in the eyes while an air of embarrassment seemed to float in microgravity around them. Jordan swallowed and grabbed his helmet in a flash, Anna did the same.
«Let’s get moving» the girl ordered shyly and floated towards the descent module.
Jordan couldn’t hold back a smile as he followed her.
He did it, after all.
They took the central and left seats. They put on their helmets and sealed them. They looked at each other in the eyes and Jordan nodded once, so Anna returned to focus on the control panel in front of her.
«I proceed to stop the rotation» her voice articulated, spreading in Jordan’s helmet.
Her expert hands moved on the screen in front of her.
«Three, two, one» she counted.
A sudden lateral force pressed Jordan against the wall of the capsule. He tried to hold himself onto the seat with his hands, but the bulky suit impeded his movements and the belts already did the work.
«We’re almost there…» Anna commented between her teeth.
Shortly after the force stopped and Jordan could take a breath.
«I modify the orbital trajectory» Anna declared and in that moment Jordan felt a force pressing him back against the seat, but it was less strong this time. «T minus fifty minutes to the contact with the atmosphere.»
Some minutes of silence passed.
«What will you do once on Earth?» Jordan asked at a certain point.
«I think I’ll go to Russia first of all, I’ll look for my relatives. Then I’ll visit. As I already said, I’d like to see the sea. What about you?»
«I’ll find my mother. Then I’ll explore. After all, that’s what I’m best at.»
Before Anna could answer, a sudden notification alarm resounded in the capsule, capturing the attention of the two guys on the communication computer.
«Yan hasn’t chosen a good moment» Jordan commented.
«Open it!» Anna ordered.
The boy did as he was told, and...
«This isn’t Yan!» Jordan exclaimed before furrowing his eyebrows and taking a better look. «It’s... Earth?! There’s a series of... codes and values.»
«Boost… Boost-Glide Manoeuvre!» Anna read with increasing euphoria, «Jordan! It’s a NASA document, it’s the instructions!»
«They saved our lives?»
The girl returned serious.
«No, they’ve given us a possibility» she focused on the computer. «Separation from the orbital module: in three, two, one.»
The structure trembled. Anna was following the instructions with meticulousness as she brought the descent module, separated from the rest of the ship, on the right trajectory and tilting it with the right angle of attack. They were at about two hundred and fifty kilometers from the Earth’s surface and the capsule was beginning to feel the atmosphere’s friction. Jordan was paralyzed.
«T minus ten seconds to atmospheric entry, two hundred and thirty kilometres from the surface, entry speed: thirteen kilometres per second» Anna’s voice declared.
Jordan prepared himself.
«Atmospheric entry at one hundred and twenty kilometres from the surface, T minus five, four, three, two, one.»
The entire capsule vibrated, more and more intensely and, almost all of a sudden, a flare of light penetrated both the capsule’s portholes. Jordan couldn’t do anything but move his gaze towards his porthole, petrified. Real blazing flames were enraging out there and surrounded the entire capsule. They were a fireball in free fall. And everything was becoming more and more heavy. Jordan felt his head heavy, his arms heavy, his legs heavy. He realized he couldn’t move. The pressure on him was increasing constantly, unrelenting, merciless. He felt he was suffocating. His lungs begged for air but he couldn’t breathe enough. He felt a weight on his chest, as if all of his organs were compressing. He struggled to move his gaze on the screen on the right in front of them and, just like during the launch of some months before, he noticed the speed with which the gravity increased, weighing on them.
«Five hundred nautical miles» Anna’s breathless voice murmured, «Sixty-one kilometres from the surface.»
Jordan didn’t know how long he was going to be able to still resist. He returned to look at the flames wrapping the capsule.
«Velocity» he heard Anna’s far voice, «Nine point seven kilometres per second. Seven hundred nautical miles, fifty-three kilometres from the surface... Pull up!»
All the force seemed to suddenly squeeze Jordan in another direction and the boy perceived an uncontrollable motion sickness. He clenched his teeth. The sensation continued harshly for some seconds, but suddenly everything seemed to cease.
«T plus one minute and fifty-six seconds. One hundred and eighty-two kilometres from the surface, velocity: eight point eight kilometres per second. We’re out of the atmosphere, we proceed to the ballistic coast. Final atmospheric reentry at T plus four minutes and forty-four seconds.»
For the rest of the time there was nothing but silence. Jordan could only think of the fact that he wasn’t sure if he could resist that sensation one more time. In a distant part of his consciousness though he was rejoicing: they hadn’t exploded in the atmosphere. Or at least, not yet.
Time passed quickly, Anna announced the atmospheric reentry and the vibrations returned, together with the increasing gravitational pull. The clock kept ticking, the pressure increasing.
«First parachute opening» Anna’s weak voice warned, followed by a powerful blow that left both of them definitely breathless.
He wondered if that was really going to be the end. He saw Anna’s shaking hands moving one last time, performing the same steps she had done shortly before. This time she didn’t say anything though, he simply felt the second blow as the second parachute o
pened. His sight got blurry. With a last, desperate attempt to get some air, he struggled to turn his head slightly towards Anna and it seemed she tried to do the same, as if she had realized.
His eyes called, hers answered.
Then everything went black.
SIXTEEN
~ The day after ~
Jordan didn’t know what was happening. He had already tried a couple of times to wake up from that heavy and kind of empty sleep. But every time he returned to his senses, he perceived an odd pain in different parts of his body and if he tried to open his eyes, it seemed he couldn’t see anything. He was certain that the descent capsule had crashed on the ground. All the lights seemed to be turned off, maybe there was not an ounce of current anymore. He didn’t know where the girl was, he only hoped she had survived. And then he felt literally blocked, as if the safety belt had multiplied and kept him tight, bound to the seat. Sometimes he thought he heard voices, but considering his status they might also be hallucinations. Then he gave up and let himself slip down into sleep, hoping the next time would be better. As long as there was going to be a next time.
That time he felt like sinking into a longer sleep, almost more relaxing. When he woke up for the umpteenth time, he thought he was in the donut of the Odysseus, but as soon as he tried to move and he felt blocked again, the truth hit him like a meteorite and he began to panic. But if he thought about it, some of the heaviness seemed to have disappeared. Or rather, he felt like he had grown used to that sensation. Moreover, he wasn’t going to resist one more second tied up there. With great fortitude, completely returning in himself, he opened his eyes. He was suddenly taken by a sense of confusion and his head began to spin. He wasn’t in the descent module either. He realized he was laying on a bed, similar to the one in his room in the Red Stone, but the sheets were white, it was narrower and more raised from the floor. For a moment he wondered how could it be possible that he was again on Mars, he wondered for how long had he slept, but then he moved his gaze around himself, realizing there was no such place at the Aresland.
He was in a dark, small and cubic room, the walls were swarthy and spoiled, the bed was in the center, on his right there was a small wooden nightstand and a big closed door, while on his left there was a square window, but it was sealed as well. Slowly he became aware of a repetitive and constant sound spreading throughout the room, but at first he didn’t understand what was it. He lowered his gaze on himself and, surprisingly, he found out there was no belt binding him to the bed, even though he kept feeling its pull. He wasn’t wearing anything but a pair of light shorts in white fiber. He noticed he had some sort of stickers glued to his skin just above his heart, connected to some wires that ended up behind his bed where he couldn’t see, but then he understood that the repetitive sound he heard was his electrocardiogram graphically reproducing the electric activity of his heart. He had seen such a device at the Aresland too. Moreover he noticed he had a needle whose tip disappeared under a bandage on his left inner forearm. It was linked to a kind of little tube coming out of a bag containing a transparent liquid, carried by a metallic structure next to his bed. He tried not to think about it.
The first clear question that sprang to his mind was where was Anna, was she safe, was she still alive? He couldn’t just lay there linked to the wires any longer, he had to go look for her, he had to understand where they were, what had happened. He tried to pull himself up to sit and never would he think that such a simple movement could require so much struggle and fatigue. When he found himself sitting he felt his heart pounding quicker in his chest while the electrocardiogram accelerated accordingly. He tried to breathe deeply a couple of times, but suddenly the dark door opened, letting a ray of light in, but it closed shortly after, leaving him again in the darkness, with the difference that now there was another person. It was a young woman with a kind gaze, a round face and raven hair gathered up. She wore a long white coat and a weird thingy around her neck. She glanced briefly at him and pushed a button on the wall. A dim light was turned on, intensifying slowly so that Jordan could gradually get used to it after spending so much time in the shadow.
«Hello, Jordan. You’ve recovered, finally» she greeted him with a smile, walking to his bed. «How are you feeling?»
She addressed him as if they’d been knowing each other for years and yet, no matter how much he focused on her face and tried to recognize her, Jordan was sure he had never met her in his life.
«Who are you?» he asked instinctively, his voice hoarse. «And how long have I slept?»
The woman smiled at him with kindness, as if she was expecting that reaction.
«I’m doctor Aurora Wolter. I’m a physician» she replied. «And you’ve slept for nearly one day and two nights, it’s just morning.»
«Aurora… Like the northern lights?» Jordan asked raising an extremely heavy arm to rub the numbness away from his eyes.
Doctor Wolter smiled more widely.
«Yes, that’s right» she said before taking that instrument Jordan had never seen off of her neck and putting a couple of a kind of headphones in her ears. «Please, turn around.»
Jordan hesitated briefly, but then he decided he had no reason not to trust her, therefore he followed her gestures and slowly turned his back to her. He suddenly felt something metallic and ice-cold placing on his flesh and a chill crossed him. He struggled not to wince every time she placed that thing on a new point of his back.
«Breathe deeply through your nose» the woman requested and Jordan obeyed without questions.
Later she asked him to breathe through his mouth only and cough a couple of times in the end.
«Where am I?» Jordan asked finally, almost fearfully, while the woman slipped a weird tool into his right ear and looked into it, then repeating it with the left one.
«At the Capanna Margherita refuge on the Rose Mount, four thousand five hundred and fifty-four meters of altitude, it’s the highest refuge in Europe.»
«And this place is… on Earth, isn’t it?»
Doctor Wolter chuckled, softly amused, and answered affirmatively.
She lifted the front part of the bed so that Jordan could lean his back against it.
«Why right here?» Jordan questioned, looking around himself.
«Because the atmospheric pressure is of zero point fifty-seven atmospheres only. It isn’t certainly as low as on Mars, but it’s enough to let you acclimate gradually. Moreover the air is cleaner, for now we keep you away from the big cities’ pollution.»
Jordan nodded.
«By the way, I’m feeling… heavy. And fatigued.»
«That’s normal» the doctor reassured him, «You’re carrying forty kilograms more than when you were on Mars.»
«Yeah, I know, gravity here is almost three times that of Mars. It’s just that feeling it for real on yourself is completely different.»
«You’ll get used to it eventually» she said and Jordan nodded again.
Then, suddenly, he remembered. And he turned to the woman with a concerned look.
«Where’s Anna? Is she fine?» he asked.
Doctor Wolter sat on the edge of his bed and looked at him.
«Yes, she’s fine» Jordan took a sigh of relief, «But she hasn’t woken up yet.»
«Why?»
«She needs more time to recover, but we’re supervising her and we’re trying to help her as much as we can.»
«Can I… see her?» he dared.
«You shouldn’t move too much not to tire your heart» she seemed to speak to herself, «But we can do this, just once. But then I want you to stay in bed for some more days. Your organism needs to acclimate to the new conditions.»
«Thank you so much!» Jordan smiled. «But speaking of… days: what day is tosol – I mean – today on Earth? You know, we’ve been using the Martian system till the landing.»
«Today is September 18th, 2060. Autumn is approaching and the temperature is growing colder» the woman answered smiling as well. «An
d, tell me, what sol is it on Mars?»
«Dhanus 15th, 240. Full spring and the new year has begun since more than a month.»
«What a weird name, Dhanus» the woman commented.
«Yeah, I was thinking the same about September.»
Doctor Wolter let out a brief chuckle and headed back to the door.
«I go get you some clothes, don’t move from here.»
Jordan nodded his consensus and was alone again. He breathed deeply while letting everything sink in. He was on Earth. He had just spoken with a terrestrial.
He could barely stand on his feet. Detached from every wire and wearing new clothes, he was sitting in a wheelchair. He would have preferred walking and for a moment he complained, but after moving few trembling steps around the room, he decided that staying sitting on that chair and being pushed forward was going to be generally more comfortable and less tiring. Doctor Wolter pushed him out of his room and he found himself in a long corridor riddled with doors on both sides that he assumed being other rooms. He realized that place was completely built in wood thus granting a warm and cozy atmosphere he had never felt before. He noticed there was another big window at the bottom of the corridor and it was sealed as well.
«Why are you keeping all the windows closed?» he asked then.
«Due to the solar light’s intensity. We’re much closer to the sun here, remember? We’re trying to prevent any kind of damage.»
Jordan wondered silently how could he have not realized it by himself before, but that thought slipped away like the wind as soon as a door opened in front of him and he entered a room that was identical to his. He was pushed to the side of a bed and there he stood up, holding onto the edge. Anna was laying on her back just like him, her head was tilted to one side, her red waves were sprawled on the pillow. She was only wearing a brassiere and white shorts and, like him before, some wires were attached to her. The electrocardiogram hanging on the wall behind her resounded rhythmically according to her heartbeat, indicating she was still alive. Her chest raised and lowered slightly at every breath. Jordan stood staring at her, captured. Unable to control himself, he moved a hand and took hers. Her fingers were cold. He focused as if he could mentally speak with her and, with all of himself, he asked her to wake up, to come back to him. He told her it was over, they did it, they were on Earth. But as he expected, nothing happened and Anna remained absorbed in her deep sleep. Jordan sat back in his wheelchair as he began to feel his legs weak already.
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