The Unseen
A sci-fi horror short story
Mike’s voice crackled to life over the radio, “Who would’ve thought that living on Mars would be so boring?”
An involuntary laugh burst from Elena’s lips. Easy for you to say, she thought. Six months, and Mike had yet to set foot on the planet’s surface. Gazing through her helmet’s visor at the expanse of red cliffs, dunes, and craters that stretched as far as the eye could see, she couldn’t fathom why. If they were going to spend the rest of their lives here, they might as well enjoy it. Sealing themselves away in the cramped, sterile base would be a terrible waste.
“You need to get out here sometime,” she replied. “It’ll do you good.”
Mike grumbled something indistinguishable, and she pictured him pushing his glasses up the bridge of his nose in disapproval.
“I didn’t catch that,” Elena said, though she was almost certain that was his intention. “Come on, Mike. Don’t tell me the space program hired an agoraphobic astronaut.”
“I’m perfectly fine where I am,” came Mike’s gruff retort.
Elena decided not to dignify that with a reply. There was no point in arguing with Mike when he was in this sort of mood. Besides, if her locator was to be believed, she wasn’t far from where the rover broke down. She rationalised that it probably fell off an embankment or got stuck in a crater, but the lack of activity was concerning. If it was badly damaged, it could take weeks to fix, and that would be weeks of data-gathering wasted. Inevitably, the rest of the cadets back on Earth would find a way to blame her and Mike once the news reached them. She could picture it clearly; all of them hollering that this setback was why they should’ve been chosen for the mission instead.
An ear-splitting shriek derailed Elena’s train of thought. For a moment, panic rattled in her chest, before she realised that it was emanating from her locating device. The red light at the top gleamed brightly enough to sting her eyes, and the word ‘ERROR’ was displayed in bold, flashing letters on the monitor. Apparently, the rover’s signal was offline. Elena smacked the locator with her free hand, hoping that it was just a momentary glitch, but to no avail. She gritted her teeth, pulse thundering in her ears.
“We have a problem,” she muttered, straining to keep her voice even. “The rover is offline. I’m guessing the transmitter just died, or something like that. Any bright ideas?”
A sigh echoed through the radio. “I think we should call off the recovery. You could get lost or injured if you keep looking. It’s not worth it.”
“But I’m in the right area,” she protested, gesturing to her surroundings as though Mike could see what she meant. “I was almost there. Just give me another half hour, okay? If I don’t find the rover by then, I’ll come back. Is that fair?”
“Ever the optimist,” Mike snorted. “Go ahead. But no more than half an hour. Don’t make me come out there and drag you all the way back to base.”
Elena scoffed at the idea. “You wouldn’t dare.”
It wasn’t long before she reached the rover’s last confirmed location, the edge of the Jezero Crater. Elena’s breath caught in her throat, and her eyes widened. Seeing images of it captured by rovers and drones was one thing; experiencing it in person was something else. Photographs didn’t do it justice. Dust from the previous night’s storm glistened across the ochre surface, interrupted at random intervals by the twinkling greens of olivine and pyroxene. She wondered what it might have looked like billions of years ago, back when the basin was flooded with water. Could it have supported life? Even after decades of research, no one back home was sure. She remembered reading an article about a potential biosignature in the crater while she was in college, but follow-up studies failed to reveal anything more definitive than that. It was a topic of frequent debate among the recruits; on more than one occasion, such debates devolved into shouting matches. Elena preferred not to get involved with situations like that.
Knowing that the rover had to be nearby, she clambered carefully down the crater’s ledge. The rugged terrain was far from accommodating, and she nearly lost her footing more than once during her descent. As she paused to catch her breath, she caught a glimpse of something metallic out of her peripheral vision. She turned to get a better look at it, and it slowly dawned on her what it was – the rover’s camera. A cobweb of cracks covered the screen. Surveying the rest of the area, nothing else caught Elena’s eye. As far as she could tell, the broken camera was all that was left of the rover.
“I’ve found the camera,” she announced, turning it over in her hands. Aside from the damage to the screen, the rest of it appeared to be intact. “It looks like it took a beating during the storm, but the footage should be recoverable, right?”
“You haven’t found anything else?” Mike asked, and Elena imagined his brow creasing with a frown.
“There’s nothing else around here,” she explained. “The wind was awful last night. It kept me up for hours, howling like that. The rest of the rover must’ve been swept away by it. That’s all I can think of. If you give me a bit more time…”
He cut her off, “No. We talked about this.”
She suppressed the desire to roll her eyes. “Fine.”
Climbing back to the top of the crater was more difficult than she anticipated. By the time she reached the precipice, her muscles ached, and her lungs felt as though they had been shoved through a meat grinder. Her spacesuit – heavy and cumbersome from the outset – never felt more claustrophobic than it did in that moment. Get it together, she reprimanded herself. Stomach lurching, she doubled over and squeezed her eyes shut. All she needed to do was take a minute to reorient herself.
“Did you see that?” Mike’s voice shattered her concentration. Something was off about his tone; his sardonic self-assurance was gone, replaced by a quivering uncertainty.
The only thing Elena could muster in response was, “What?”
“I thought I saw…” he trailed off. “I don’t know. Forget about it. Are you okay?”
“I’ve been better,” she replied, wiping some of the dust off her knees. “What about you?”
Mike huffed. “Seeing things that aren’t there, apparently. I’m probably just sleep-deprived. I’ll check the internal air pressure, just to be safe.”
“I’ll see you when I get back,” she said, grabbing the camera and steeling herself for the trek ahead of her.
Ever since she first saw photographs of it back at the space program headquarters, Elena thought the Mars base was an unsightly structure. The bulbous white domes and sprawling tunnels were devoid of character, marring the natural landscape like a bruise. Granted, she was no expert on architecture, but did it have to be so dull? Compared to the quaint Tudor cottage where she grew up, the Mars base was unspeakably ugly. It was one of the things she remembered least looking forward to when she and Mike set off for the red planet. The inevitability that she would one day die and be interred in that place wasn’t something she liked to dwell on.
As she drew closer, the base’s observatory towered over her. It was one of the most imposing parts of the structure, looming at twenty metres tall, its dome encrusted with hexagonal windows. Mike spent a lot of his free time there, gazing at Earth through the telescope. When Elena asked him about it, he joked that maybe he was homesick. She didn’t know much about his life before the expedition; like her, he was unmarried and had no children, but he was reluctant to divulge any details beyond that. To tell the truth, she couldn’t understand his reticence. The two of them were going to be on Mars together – alone – for the rest of their lives. It wasn’t like she was going to share gossip about him with anyone. Prying would get her nowhere, though. The last thing she wanted was to foster resentment.
“You made it back quickly,” Mike remarked, catching her off-guard.
Elena’s brow furrowed. “What are you talking about?”
“Don’t play dumb, I can hear you stomping around over by the airlock,” he chuckled. “I’m checking the ventilation now. I’ll be back at the observation deck in a minute. Then we can look at the camera together, yeah?”
She froze, her mind racing with possibilities. “Mike, I’m outside. I’m by the observatory. What the hell is going on?”
Several seconds passed in silence before Mike responded, “That’s not funny.”
“I’m not messing with you, I swear,” she insisted, quickening her pace as icy tendrils of dread slithered in her gut. “Are you sure you’re alright? You’re starting to worry me.”
“I think there’s something in here with me,” he stammered, his voice hushed.
Elena couldn’t believe what she was hearing. Was there a gas leak in the base? This wasn’t like him at all. She needed to get back as soon as possible.
“Stay put,” she said, trying her best to maintain her composure.
Mike continued as though he didn’t hear her, “I’m sure there’s something in here. I can hear it scuttling around like a spider. It’s getting closer. What am I going to do if it finds me? Elena, tell me what to do.”
Her jaw clenched. “Sit tight. I’m almost there.”
Elena flung the airlock open as soon as she reached it, slamming it behind her with enough force to rattle the steel walls. Her breaths came shallow and ragged, but she couldn’t take her helmet off until she checked the oxygen levels. To her astonishment, the monitor by the airlock didn’t record any abnormalities. Struggling to make sense of the situation, she tore her helmet off and set it aside. As she tried to calm her breathing, an unsettling realisation dawned on her – the base was silent. She expected to hear Mike’s footsteps running up to meet her, but there was nothing.
“Mike?” she yelled, her voice echoing more than she would like. “It’s me! You can come out now, it’s okay. Whatever it is you’re dealing with, I want to help.”
No answer.
She stumbled through the door into the observation deck, only to find it deserted. The only sign of Mike was a half-empty cup of coffee left behind on one of the desks; it was cold to the touch. Why wasn’t he answering her? Part of her speculated – or hoped – that this was a cruel prank, and that he would burst out of the shadows at any moment to startle her. The more rational part of her knew that was wishful thinking. There was no way he was a good enough actor to fake the fear she heard in his voice.
A sharp clack rang out through the room, jolting her from her reverie. For a few mystified seconds, she couldn’t figure out where it came from. The slithering dread from earlier coiled tightly around her insides as it hit her – the sound came from the ceiling vents. Although every instinct she had was screaming at her not to look up, she couldn’t help it. A thick, oily trail of mucus dripped from the slats in the vent, and she heard the unmistakable tap-tap-tap of something skittering out of sight. Whatever that thing was, it was watching her.
Was that what Mike saw outside? Did it do something to him? How did it get in? What did it want?
Her head throbbed with a million questions. Against her better judgement, she stood on the tips of her toes and craned her neck to peer into the vent, but there was nothing there. Perhaps the creature decided to leave her alone.
Elena’s last sliver of optimism shrivelled away when she heard a clatter, followed by something thudding to the floor behind her. Every muscle in her body tightened, and she found herself unable to move.
The foul odour of sulphur and rotten fruit permeated the air, causing bile to crawl up her throat. She felt the thing’s eyes on her as it made a noise akin to an insect grinding its mandibles, but she couldn’t force herself to turn around. The terrified child in her desperately wanted to believe that so long as she didn’t move, she would be safe. As pathetic and naïve as it was, it was all she had left. She clung to that hope right up until the creature’s hot breath grazed the back of her neck, and her world turned black.