When the screen showed a cold, grey light outside, I got up and made some tea.
I tried talking to the computer again but it wasn’t having any of it. I tried hard not to remember that this time yesterday I was having breakfast at St Mary’s.
My training said it was important to establish a routine, so I began to map out my day. Tidy the pod and myself and put away the sleeping gear. Have brunch around mid-morning. Spend some time on the roof looking for signs of human habitation – although if I found any, whether I would run to or from was a good question. Walk or run for one hour. The ground was so flat I should be able to run for some time without losing sight of the pod. I’m not good with direction. Sit in the sun and read until it became chilly. Go inside and tidy up. Eat again. Read again. Write up the daily log. Go to bed. Don’t lie awake panicking.
That’s how it went for two days. It wasn’t unpleasant. On the third day I was sitting outside, using a valuable page in the scribble pad to sketch the mountains when something clicked in my head. This was not a bad life. I had everything I needed; good weather, a safe environment, something to read, enough to eat.
Yes, I did, didn’t I? I had everything I needed to survive comfortably for a fortnight at least.
Another click. How lucky that this pod was loaded ready for a quick turn over, even though there were other pods available for use.
And then I started to laugh. As if Chief Farrell would ever send out an unreliable pod with a trainee. This was why they sent you alone. It wasn’t spending an afternoon in Shrewsbury that was the test. This was the real test. To survive, alone, lost, with no hope of rescue or backup. This was why he programmed the co-ordinates himself. This was why it was all on automatic.
I bet if I just sat quietly and waited; the pod would re-activate itself in twelve days’ time and get me back to St Mary’s as if nothing had happened. Well, I was going to tough it out. Of course, if I was wrong then I was going to look pretty silly in twelve days’ time. On the other hand, who would know?
The days slipped slowly by; each one the same as the last in this unchanging landscape. I sat in the sun, thumb in bum, brain in neutral, and let my mind drift. I thought about the chain of events leading to this moment. I thought about my childhood, but not for long. I wondered if I wanted to be alone all my life. I wondered if I didn’t want to be alone all my life.
I wrote my log, spending five or six pages on the subject of technical incompetence and embellishing the text with small sketches. I had long chats with myself. I tried new ways of wearing my hair. And really doing my best not to think about what would happen on Day 14. Which came, of course, shortly after Day 13, as is the scheme of things. I didn’t leave the pod all day, waiting for the console to light up again.
It didn’t.
Noon came and went.
I sat unmoving.
The sun started to go down. Shadows lengthened. Total silence.
Nothing happened.
It began to get dark. Still nothing happened.
I clenched my hands tightly in my lap. I sat in the dark.
Nothing happened. Nothing bloody happened!
The one thought clanking around my head was that this was self-inflicted. Obviously, obviously, I should have declared an emergency and returned home at once, when I could, when the bloody system was still working. How could I have pushed my luck like this?
I must have dropped off because I awoke, cold and stiff, early on the morning of Day 15 with some hard thinking to do. Reviewing my resources, I had about three days’ food left and a little less water. It was definitely time to go home.
On the other hand … on the other hand … on the other hand … maybe this was the test. How traumatic is it to be marooned somewhere safe and quiet with plenty of food? Maybe the test was survival after all expectation of rescue was past and supplies had run out.
How did it go? Three minutes without oxygen. Three days without water. Three weeks without food. So, should I leave the pod to find water and miss the chance of possible extraction? Or should I stay put and gamble on being rescued before death by dehydration, which, I’d heard, was not a pleasant way to die? But short of expiring of exhaustion underneath a chocolate-covered Leon Farrell, what is a pleasant way to die? And should I start rationing myself? Which meant I could last for maybe an extra two or three days? Or just eat and drink the lot and die anyway?