One small step for man

Yesterday, I took my first historic step onto Martian soil ... sort of.

The good news is, I'm still alive as are the rest of the crew. It was pretty sketchy this last week as we drew near our destination and the huge red planet filled the viewing screens. Everyone was in high stress mode. Conversations were tense. Everyone seemed to be preparing for the worst.

We'd been watching the engineers rush back and forth from the navigation room all ashen-faced and muttering curses under their breath. Thankfully, we established communications with Virgle Base 1 and they helped guide us in to a rough but non-explosive landing. The ship got beat up pretty bad and one of the engineers got a concussion. Other than that it was just bumps and bruises and everyone cheered for what seemed like ten minutes.

They had us put on our Virgle spacesuits as we prepared to disembark. I stuck a raised Nike swoosh sticker on the sole of my boot and put my digital camera in it's protective casing. I had envisioned my unique footprint on red soil fetching a high price from news outlets or perhaps a low level Nike endorsement. My dreams came to a crashing halt when the exit doors opened, revealing a silver, accordion-like tunnel connecting the spaceship to the base. There wasn't even a window in that giant aluminum-foil looking dream smasher. So much for my triumphant entrance.

They rushed us right through the tunnel to a whole slew of radiation tests and debriefing meetings. I don't remember much, I was too busy scarfing down food from the buffet style tables they set up. The food wasn't the stuff of dreams, mostly potatoes, rice, onions, tomatoes and spinach but I must admit they had done some impressive things with soy beans. Besides, after surviving weeks of strict rationing everything tasted like it was straight from heaven's kitchen.

At the end of it all, they led me to a small, dorm-style room and I crashed out for about 12 hours. When I woke up this morning, there was a message on my viewing screen:

"Welcome to Mars. The Virgle Corporation would like to congratulate you on a successful mission. You have joined the ranks of early Virgle Pioneers and are to be commended for your bravery and adventurous spirit.

Please enjoy a continental breakfast at your leisure in the Phobos Cafe.

Once again, congratulations on your arrival!

-The Virgle Corporation"

Below this was a small notation that read:

"Please notify your assigned counselor before leaving the room:

Traveler #1002: Clark Leighter
Assigned Counselor: Dr. Ben Ibonek

-End Message"

I wasn't that eager to talk to another counselor, much less one assigned to me, after all the debriefing yesterday so I stayed in my room all morning.

If only I'd brought my xbox.