The Road to Duna - The Probes are Dispatched

[MarkWatney]

Val's Fiery Descent

Valentina stirred herself from her sleep and floated over to the computer display to check for any incoming messages from Kerbinside. Glancing at her watch she realised that it was the day when she would finally leave the station and return to Kerbin.

"Thank Squad! I'm finally leaving this old tin can!" she sighed.

After a few days of occupation the station already smelled worse than before and it was almost becoming intolerable for Valentina so she was extremely glad she would be departing in a few hours. Looking at her messages she noticed a few from Bill and Jeb. Most of Bill's messages composed of requests to check the station's systems. Like she would ever do that! While Jeb's messages mostly were selfies of him and Mismera on various dates. Val gave a sigh of longing she would love to try and do the civilian thing but she thought to herself that it woukd be extremely boring and not full of enough action. Anyhow she comforted herself she was perfectly happy being a kerbonaut.

A few hours passed and Valentina once again became very bored. 

In an attempt to relieve her frustration Val decided to go on a quick EVA and take a lot of pictures to show to everyone back at Admanatium Tech.

Val sealed her helmet and prepared to depressurise the airlock taking care to switch off her radio so that Bill wouldn't be squawking in her ears the whole time. She took a deep breath in and stepped into the inky darkness. 

She felt neither hot nor cold, although that was mainly thanks to the suit, and the world stretched out before her. It was absolutely magnificent.

She took some pictures then hurried to the capsule's airlock and quickly got inside. After pressurising the ship she prepared to disconnect the capsule from the station. She felt a small pang of regret that she would be leaving it behind after all it had been her home for the past few days. Her oasis in a desert of black and stars.

She blew the connection locks and gently thrusted back from the station.

 After backing up a reasonable distance away from the station she gunned the thrusters and fired the engines in a retrograde manner aiming to place her ship' s landing trajectory in the landing zone in the grasslands. The engines completed their task and shutdown and Valentina drifted into the atmosphere.

There was loud thump. Then a loud clang. Then a huge rumble sounded. On the thermometer in her suit it registered an unexpected high temperature. Outside the ship was being engulfed in flames.

Val muttered a few curses and gritted her teeth all throughout this and kept a watchful eye on the heat displays praying to Squad that the heat shield wouldn't fracture under these extreme temperatures. But after a while the noise and heat all went away and was replaced with a loud whistling sound. 

Val couldn't figure out what the sound was until she realised it was a sign that she was going too fast.

"Oh karps and krakens!" she yelled, "Give me a break!"

Improvising quickly she restarted the engines in order to slow her speed down as much as possible

She also manually triggered the parachutes hoping to land as softly as possible. She glanced back at her speed altimeter.

"Karp still too fast!" she cursed.

There was a splutter indicating that the engines had run out of fuel and Valentina cursed again and braced for impact.

A few moments later......

Valentina woke up with an aching head and realised that once again she had survived. She gave a sigh of relief and triggered the emergency beacon for the recovery team to come and pick her up.

Until Next Time

 

[MarkWatney]

Hey guys sorry there hasn't been much updates to this in a while. I've had a lot of work to do but I will try to post another chapter relatively soon....

-MarkWatney

[MarkWatney]

A Brand New Frontier

Jeb began his day as normal. He had his usual morning cup of coffee, talked with Mismera about their upcoming wedding and then headed down to his office to try get some paperwork done.

For a few precious moments there was a sense of tranquility in his office...

Which was quickly ruined by Bill bursting through the door of his office once again...

"Jeb I had a brilliant idea!" exclaimed Bill

"For Squad's Sake Bill just come through the door like any normal kerbal without sending my door off its hinges!" yelled Jeb.

Bill slightly miffed by this carried straight on with his supposedly brilliant idea.

"Jeb I think we can get the BDB 2 to the Mun."

Jeb sat up his interest piqued replied, "I thought that was purely theoretical that we could even get the BDB 2 into Munar Orbit or to the Munar surface? I only mentioned that in the Board meeting to distract them from the fact that we crashed a highly expensive reusable first stage into the fracking ocean!"

"A ha my dear friend!" answered Bill, "It's no longer theory we're in the process of beginning production of several unmanned tanks of fuel that we'll leave in LKO and Low Munar Orbit for the sole use of the BDB. The BDB itself will only require a few modifications such as a new tracking and landing computer, navigation systems, an improved antenna..."

"Wait hold on a minute." interrupted Jeb, "You're telling me that this whole time we've been flying capsules without navigation equipment!!!"

Bill shrugged and said, "I thought you pilots liked doing things manually."

Jeb sighed and motioned for Bill to carry on.

Bill launched into his talk once more: "We'll also need to improve life support systems and re-position the engines." Bill pondered for a few moments to think if there was anything else to mention then decided that there was nothing else.

Jeb got up and asked Bill, " Well this seems like an ok idea way better than the time you tried to control a rocket with a neural implant but how much will it cost to set this all up?"

Bill quoted a number and Jeb winced. The cost was manageable but it was erring on the expensive side meaning he would need to cut out more than a few of the science programs probably resulting in Bob trying to strangle him.

Jeb concluded the meeting and decided how to tell the board he needed to use up another 150,000 funds for this new program....

 

[MarkWatney]

Hey guys sorry for the wait but new chapters are on the way.

 

[MarkWatney]

The Probes are Dispatched

Bill's master plan was beginning to take shape. Over the following weeks the probes were carefully assembled in the VAB and were being prepped for launch.

According to Bill's 'Master Plan" (this name was coined by him and whenever he said those words Val would usually whack him in the face) several of these probes would be launched and placed in strategic orbits in the Kerbin-Mun System waiting for the crewed spacecraft to arrive. The spacecraft would be piloted by none other than Valentina Kerman something she took great pleasure in teasing Jeb over.

After a final few days of testing the probes were one by one hauled out to the launchpad and launched over a series of days.

All of the launches proceeded without a single glitch or accident much to the relief of Mortimer who did not dare to think of the financial costs and insurance claims if an accident had occurred. 

Upon achieving orbit the probes then proceeded to burn towards their appointed destinations in the Kerbin-Mun System.

In a few days time the first Kerbal would be setting foot on the surface of the Mun....

Until Next Time....