((i actually made the aesthetic pic above! it's basically just mark + white + space bc why not))

Recommended Song(s) For This Imagine:
Cry Baby - The Neighborhood

Sol 27

The snow storm lasted all night.

As the wind howled and the white snow tinted orange from the dust whipped against the HAB, Fischbach inspected your ankle.

"You'll live. It'll be a bit swollen, so I'm gonna recommend staying off your feet as much as possible for a couple days." He said, then saw the 'oh really?' look on your face. "Which I know you're not going to do."

"We've gotta try to make contact with the Hermes." You stood up, wincing at your ankle, but continuing on to the communications panel.

"Commander, they said they would make contact with us, we should wait."

You sighed, sitting down on your bed and propping up your foot with a pillow.

Sol 28

They never made contact, and you fell asleep waiting for a message from your other crew mates. In the morning, it wasn't your alarm that woke you up, it was the involuntary shivering your body was going through.

"What the hell?" You curled up against the cold. "Mark!"

He woke up too. "Jeez, why is it so cold in here?"

"I have no clue." Standing up, you limped over to the temperature control panel. "The storm must have knocked the temperature controller out. We. Are. Fucked."

"No, I can go out and fix it." Mark determined, looking outside the HAB. "It's stopped snowing."

"Mission control wanted us to leave the surface, I don't think you should go out." You thought for a moment. "Then again, frozen carbon dioxide is just dry ice, which you can handle with gloves. We should be safe in our suits."

"We?"

"Yes, I'm going out as well."

"Very well, Commander."

Outside, the ground was blanketed in a few inches of peach-colored snow. Picking up a little bit, you formed it into a ball. "Fischbach," you caught his attention, and as soon as he turned around, you threw it at him, and it splattered onto his chest.

"Oh, you're gonna get it!" He picked some of his own snow and it hit you smack in the face shield.

As you wiped it off, he kept pelting more snowballs at you, and you laughed, throwing more back at him. When your snowball fight had concluded, you continued to walk to the outer power sources and such.

You hummed as you inspected it, and sighed at the damaged wiring. "I should be able to fix it, but I'm not sure if its going to be able to keep it at the optimum 24°. It'll probably fluctuate."

"As long as we don't die of hypothermia, I think we can manage."

You fiddled with the wirings, repairing them sufficiently, knowing that the fluctuations in temperature would vary from blizzard conditions to a beach day on the Equator.

Sol 32

You woke up shivering, the temperature adjustor decided to be in cold mood today. Desperately searching for a jacket, you didn't find any of yours. With a groan of annoyance, you grabbed an apple from the kitchen then paced in front of the communications panel for who knows how long.

"Commander?" Mark poked his head in, and you stopped pacing momentarily to speak to him.

"Why haven't they called yet?" You tried to hold your panic in, anxiously gnawing on your apple core.

"Honestly, I don't know. Maybe our communication system got knocked out?"

You shook your head, walking over to the garbage can to throw the core away. "No, I checked that out on Sol 29."

Mark frustratedly ran a hand through his hair, and you could feel goosebumps along your bare arms. You rubbed them, your pacing from earlier had warmed you up, but the cold was settling in again. Fischbach frowned, noticing your attempt to stay warm. "Where are your jackets?"

"Apparently on the NAV, and Pinzon's spares are all too small for me."

"Here," in one fluid movement, he had pulled off his jacket and tossed it to you. "I have another one."

"You sure?"

"Worst comes to worst I can take Wade's."

"Thank you, Mark." You said, slipping into the still-warm hoodie embroidered with the NASA logo, the Ares V patch, and FISCHBACH across the front. You weren't exactly sure what it smelled like, but it was an inviting scent, and that plus the warmth and softness made you want to take a nap. But there was work to do.

"You're welcome, Commander." He ducked out the door back towards the bunks.

"You can call me Y/N, you know!" You called after him, getting a noise of 'eh' back.

Sitting down at the computer panel, you quickly did what you had been doing the past few days, recording an update video. There wasn't much to update other than it was a cold day in the HAB and you hadn't had contact with the Hermes yet.

You rolled your chair back and forth between the communications panel and the local panel, which controlled and gave you info on all the technology on Mars' surface. Hearing footsteps behind you, you began giving your crew mate some instructions.

"Rover 2 needs recharging, and some weird smell is coming from the lab." You informed him, and he immediately called charging the rover. "I don't think I wanna know what Muyskens did in there..."

"Well I guess you're gonna find out, Commander."

"Guess I will, Fischbach." You were shaking your head as you stood up and stepped over towards the lab.

The strange, slightly repulsive odor got stronger the closer you got, and soon you had to plug your nose with one hand, coughing into your comm.

"Smell good, Y/N?" Mark's smug voice sounded in your ear.

"Like a scented candle from Bath and Body Works."

"You know, I'm really enjoying myself out here. So wonderful in the fresh Martian air."

"Maybe you should take off your helmet to breathe in that fresh Martian air." You continued your smelly trek down the hall, getting to the laboratory door. "Okay, I'm going in."

"Don't die!"

"Good advice." You were still plugging your nose, and looked around warily at the open chemicals. "Anything could be causing the smell, it looks like he was in the middle of an experiment when we did the evacuation."

"Yeah, I think he said he was working on turning resources on Mars into renewable energy. I don't know how far he got."

"Well I'm going to close everything just to be sure- wait nevermind."

"What'd you find?"

"Some spoiled food of sorts under the desk." You tenderly threw it in the trash, gagging a bit.

"Oh jeez, Bob."