After four seconds, the shaking died down and the ship returned to weightlessness.
“Reactor room still pressurized,” Martinez reported.
“Bridge seal holding,” Johanssen said. “Obviously.”
“Damage?” Martinez said.
“Not sure yet,” Johanssen said. “I have External Camera 4 pointed along the nose. I don’t see any problems with the hull near the VAL.”
“Worry about that later,” Lewis said. “What’s our relative velocity and distance to MAV?”
Johanssen typed quickly. “We’ll get within twenty-two meters and we’re at twelve meters per second. We actually got better than expected thrust.”
“Watney,” Lewis said, “it worked. Beck’s on his way.”
“Score!” Watney responded.
“Beck,” Lewis said, “you’re up. Twelve meters per second.”
“Close enough!” Beck replied.
“I’M GOING to jump out,” Beck said. “Should get me another two or three meters per second.”
“Understood,” Vogel said, loosely gripping Beck’s tether. “Good luck, Dr. Beck.”
Placing his feet on the back wall, Beck coiled and leaped out of the airlock.
Once free, he got his bearings. A quick look to his right showed him what he could not see from inside the airlock.
“I have visual!” Beck said. “I can see the MAV!”
The MAV barely resembled a spacecraft as Beck had come to know them. The once sleek lines were now a jagged mess of missing hull segments and empty anchor points where noncritical components used to be.
“Jesus, Mark, what did you do to that thing?”
“You should see what I did to the rover,” Watney radioed back.
Beck thrust on an intercept course. He had practiced this many times. The presumption in those practice sessions was that he’d be rescuing a crewmate whose tether had broken, but the principle was the same.
“Johanssen,” he said, “you got me on radar?”
“Affirmative,” she replied.
“Call out my relative velocity to Mark every two seconds or so.”
“Copy. Five point two meters per second.”
“Hey Beck,” Watney said, “the front’s wide open. I’ll get up there and be ready to grab at you.”
“Negative,” interrupted Lewis. “No untethered movement. Stay strapped to your chair until you’re latched to Beck.”
“Copy,” Watney said.
“Three point one meters per second,” Johanssen reported.
“Going to coast for a bit,” Beck said. “Gotta catch up before I slow it down.” He rotated himself in preparation for the next burn.
“Eleven meters to target,” Johanssen said.
“Copy.”
“Six meters,” Johanssen said.
“Aaaaand counter-thrusting,” Beck said, firing the MMU thrusters again. The MAV loomed before him. “Velocity?” he asked.
“One point one meters per second,” Johanssen said.
“Good enough,” he said, reaching for the ship. “I’m drifting toward it. I think I can get my hand on some of the torn canvas….”
The tattered canvas beckoned as the only handhold on the otherwise smooth ship. Beck reached, extending as best he could, and managed to grab hold.
“Contact,” Beck said. Strengthening his grip, he pulled his body forward and lashed out with his other hand to grab more canvas. “Firm contact!”
“Dr. Beck,” Vogel said, “we have passed closest approach point and you are now getting further away. You have one hundred and sixty-nine meters of tether left. Enough for fourteen seconds.”
“Copy,” Beck said.
Pulling his head to the opening, he looked inside the compartment to see Watney strapped to his chair.
“Visual on Watney!” he reported.
“Visual on Beck!” Watney reported.
“How ya doin’, man?” Beck said, pulling himself into the ship.
“I… I just…” Watney said. “Give me a minute. You’re the first person I’ve seen in eighteen months.”
“We don’t have a minute,” Beck said, kicking off the wall. “We’ve got eleven seconds before we run out of tether.”
Beck’s course took him to the chair, where he clumsily collided with Watney. The two gripped each other’s arms to keep Beck from bouncing away. “Contact with Watney!” Beck said.
“Eight seconds, Dr. Beck,” Vogel radioed.
“Copy,” Beck said as he hastily latched the front of his suit to the front of Watney’s with tether clips. “Connected,” he said.
Watney released the straps on his chair. “Restraints off.”
“We’re outa here,” Beck said, kicking off the chair toward the opening.
The two men floated across the MAV cabin to the opening. Beck reached out his arm and pushed off the edge as they passed through.
“We’re out,” Beck reported.
“Five seconds,” Vogel said.
“Relative velocity to Hermes: twelve meters per second,” Johanssen said.
“Thrusting,” Beck said, activating his MMU.
The two accelerated toward Hermes for a few seconds. Then the MMU controls on Beck’s heads-up display turned red.
“That’s it for the fuel,” Beck said. “Velocity?”
“Five meters per second,” Johanssen replied.
“Stand by,” Vogel said. Throughout the process, he had been feeding tether out of the airlock. Now he gripped the ever-shrinking remainder of the rope with both hands. He didn’t clamp down on it; that would pull him out of the airlock. He simply closed his hands over the tether to create friction.
Hermes was now pulling Beck and Watney along, with Vogel’s use of the tether acting as a shock absorber. If Vogel used too much force, the shock of it would pull the tether free from Beck’s suit clips. If he used too little, the tether would run out before they matched speeds, then jerk to a hard stop at the end, which would also rip it out of Beck’s suit clips.
Vogel managed to find the balance. After a few seconds of tense, gut-feel physics, he felt the force on the tether abate.
“Velocity zero!” Johanssen reported excitedly.
“Reel ’em in, Vogel,” Lewis said.
“Copy,” Vogel said. Hand over hand, he slowly pulled his crewmates toward the airlock. After a few seconds, he stopped actively pulling and simply took in the line as they coasted toward him.
They floated into the airlock, and Vogel grabbed them. Beck and Watney both reached for handholds on the wall as Vogel worked his way around them and closed the outer door.
“Aboard!” Beck said.
“Airlock 2 outer door closed,” Vogel said.
“Yes!” Martinez yelled.
“Copy,” Lewis said.
LEWIS’S VOICE echoed across the world: “Houston, this is Hermes Actual. Six crew safely aboard.”
The control room exploded with applause. Leaping from their seats, controllers cheered, hugged, and cried. The same scene played out all over the world, in parks, bars, civic centers, living rooms, classrooms, and offices.
The couple in Chicago clutched each other in sheer relief, then pulled the NASA representative in for a group hug.
Mitch slowly pulled off his headset and turned to face the VIP room. Through the glass, he saw various well-suited men and women cheering wildly. He looked at Venkat and let out a heavy sigh of relief.
Venkat put his head in his hands and whispered, “Thank the gods.”
Teddy pulled a blue folder from his briefcase and stood. “Annie will be wanting me in the press room.”
“Guess you don’t need the red folder today,” Venkat said.