This is a Test

Ch. 1 - Part III - This Is a Test

Monitors adorned barren walls, and the only furniture was a bed, a desk and chair, and a small dresser where he deposited his clothes. On the desk was a tablet, which he would need for his projects. The only other amenities were two coffin-sized gaps in the wall that could serve as either shelves or sleeping spaces for extra colonists. Cashe tightened the corners on the made bed and left the room, tablet in hand. A few moments of playing with the security pad outside taught him how to lock his door, though there was nothing to steal. As he departed, the rest of the group arrived, trudging along with their bags. The Dante guy seemed surprised to find him there.

"Hey, buddy. There you are," he said, flashing another smile. "We missed you."

"How could you have missed me?" Cashe wondered aloud. "You don't even know me."

Dante laughed a short, insincere laugh. "I just thought that we'd all stay together."

"Oh." Cashe couldn't control what the guy thought. "The rooms are all pretty much the same. I took that one on the end."

"Trying to stay away from the rest of us?"

"Trying to stay away from any snoring. I'm a light sleeper." Cashe said, which was one consideration, though staying away from the rest of them was the biggest point. "The two there are larger than the others."

And this was the first of what Cashe assumed would be many tests; seeing how they would choose their living quarters. Each person peeked inside a large room and a small one to note the comparative sizes. Roger raised his hand immediately after his inspection.

"I call dibs," he said, walking just inside the doorway.

Dante's smile had a touch of a wince in it. "Perhaps we should consider some of the ladies first."

"There's another one right there," Roger said, pointing to the door opposite his. He stood for a moment, looking at everyone else. No one claimed they had the right to one room over another, so he nodded and went inside.

Cashe passed the group as he headed back towards the lounge when Dante called out, "Hey, where are you going?"

Cashe held up his tablet. "I'm heading to the machine shop in order to start."

"Well, we all thought we'd get together and get acquainted first before diving right into work."

" 'We?' " Cashe repeated. "This was discussed already."

"Well, no. I... I was thinking that we take a few moments to decompress from all the excitement and meet one another."

Cashe understood that appearances would be part of this job. He didn't wish to appear antisocial on his first day, let alone in his first few moments. Avoiding the others might cost him points if they tallied his bonus based on teamwork. He could start loading projects into the tablet, so he pointed to the lounge. "Fine, I'll be waiting out there."

Over the next fifteen minutes, he saved files in his device as people filtered in to take seats around the table. Dante and the Indian lady passed through towards the hydroponics lab. He couldn't recall what any of the women were called. He usually remembered people based upon how much he hated them and none of them ladies had irritated him yet. He didn't expect he'd know their names until day's end.

He looked up from his tablet every so often to examine his fellow colonists. Bad Hair's expressions fluctuated between discomfort and irritation. The Asian woman seemed confused as to why she was there, and Cashe wondered if the Chinese government had forced her to participate without telling her what she was involved in. Having plonked his load down, Roger sat back with fingers interlaced over his belly and a self-satisfied look on his horrid face.

Waiting gave Cashe the chance to examine the geologist's shirt stain better, a dark oval mark haloed by another lighter one. Cashe induced it was an oil ghost left behind after some condiment or sauce had landed on the cloth, the lighter stain being where the food was licked away. How the guy could have eaten and spilled something on his outfit already defied Cashe's comprehension.

His tablet contained the details of their mission, including a roster of the other colonists and pictures, so he left that screen accessible for this meeting. Dante returned with a platter of mugs while Miranda, her name was Miranda, followed with a coffee pot. "I wanted to propose a toast, but they didn't load us up with any champagne, so this will have to do."

Miranda poured and Dante distributed. Miranda worked with a smile, not an excited smile, but a smile that came from someone being naturally happy. In other words, the smile of a loon. Cashe examined Dante's face. At times, the chemist seemed handsome and then other times not. All of the man's features were attractive, the blue eyes, the dimples, the full lips, but it was almost like where someone took pictures of different beautiful people, cut out the nose of one and the chin of another and slapped them all on a new face. When the man stopped moving and Cashe stared directly at him, Dante's face was just weird. Cashe could not have been the first to notice this and Dante must have known for the chemist never stopped moving.

Once everyone had a full cup and Miranda took a seat, Dante raised his mug and said, "It is an incredible honor to be among such elite professionals in their field. We were chosen for a unique mission out of tens of thousands of applicants. I want to say this. I have a gift. I can see the good and the great in people. We are the best that Anoptica could find, the best of the best, and were we truly granted the blessing of being send to another world, I cannot see the mission being anything but a success. If we are to be the chosen ones, I have no doubt in my mind, none whatsoever, that Mars would be proud."

Everyone clapped, and Cashe joined in as he surveyed the room. Cashe had a gift, too: detecting horseshit. In this moment, he also realized something. If what Dante had said was true, that they were truly the best that Anoptica could find, a team consisting of the Pollyanna and the showboat, the angry chick and the oaf, the wallflower and even himself, then there was no doubt in Cashe's mind, none whatsoever, that Mars was fucked.