Breathing... Heavily... Every day I ask myself... Is today the day I die? My body was shaking. It was the last day that I would ever see my family. It's January 1st, 2026. Our six-month trip would begin. The point of no return in which my whole entire life would change. What if we died? What if the ship had problems? What if Mars is uninhabitable? All I could focus on was saying goodbye. That was my main goal.
The first day was surprisingly easy. I spent so much time preparing and saying goodbye that saying my last ones were quick. Andrew, my husband, drove me to the shuttle.
"I'll miss you," he said.
"I'll miss you too, Andrew," I said.
I was welcomed at the shuttle with warm hugs and breakfast, as it was early in the morning. I saw the three people that I would spend the next two and a half years with, all by ourselves. A man came up to me and introduced himself.
"Hi, I'm Matt," he said.
"I'm Emma", I said, blushing.
I felt a connection between us right away. I knew that we would be best friends. Eager to tell Andrew, I turned around. When I did, I noticed he was gone. My new life was about to begin without the man I love.
Before I knew it, we were in space. Take off was rough, but I expected that. Earth looked different than I expected. We've always seen pictures of Earth and I envied those who were able to see it with their own eyes. Earth looks beautiful from above.
By the third day, panic began to erupt in the shuttle. Jill Matthews was looking pale one day. We hadn't spoken to each other yet, with the exception or a few words here and there.
"Shut up!" Jill said when I asked if she was okay.
"What's your problem?" I said.
She hit me. As I fell to the ground, I felt searing pain go through my face. I got back on my feet and as I was about to hit her back, I realized that there is no point in fighting. I asked her why she hit me and immediately, Jill burst into tears. She said that she was missing home and that she wanted to see Earth again.
That was the last time she ever spoke in an almost normal way. Every hour felt like a day to us. I could see it in their eyes, including mine, that we were suffering. Matt was the first of us to stand up and get everyone to admit that they were missing home and that they needed to talk about it.
"I miss my family," Jasper, a French man who was the fourth and final member on our ship said.
"Very good," Matt said.
That's what I liked most about him, Matt could calm people down. I knew that we would be best friends for a very long time.
After that, we were calm, cool, and collected for a very long time. Two months had passed and I was able to see in Jill's eyes that she wants doing well. She would throw up at least once a day, and wasn't doing too well. She seemed to be close to Jasper, I went up to him and asked what was going on with Jill.
"Her husband didn't really want her to go. Jill applied only to see if it was possible to get selected. When she found out that she was, Jill couldn't turn the opportunity down. She really misses him and just needs time to get over her past," Jasper said.
I was happy that I knew something about her, and I wanted to learn more. I kept putting it aside, and didn't get to it for a very, very long time. Seconds, minutes, hours, days, and months went by again, as it tends to do, and let us forget about our problems for short amounts of time. As our arrival on Mars neared to only a few days away, all four of us, Matt, Jill, Jasper, and myself all got nervous. We began to wonder what life would actually be like, considering it would be a reality soon enough. Time began feeling exciting, rather that depressing. Our lives were truly about to begin.
I can still remember when we first saw Mars from the shuttle. Leaving Earth was very difficult because it was our home. I felt a connection to Mars, and not because I'm an Aries. The "Red Planet" didn't feel like just a red planet. It felt like my home. I kept thinking about this as we left the transit habitat, where we spent the last six months, and moved into the landing module with only the things we brought with us.
Matt, Jill, Jasper, and I all held hands when our ship began to descent. We all said the pledge of Mars that we thought of in training. When we told our coaches, they said we should say it during our descent and every time a new crew landed. He said it would be the "song of our land".
All of us said with pride and joy, "We, the initial Martians, have devoted our lives to find our people a new home. We are the selected 24 from 100 possible candidates from over 200,000 applicants. We are the chosen Martians. We are creating an environment on a place not originally meant to sustain life. We are using our privilege of being from Earth and having its resources to create life on other planets. We the chosen Martians will prosper in creating a colony outside of our homeland."
