LOG ENTRY: SOL 97 (Feb. 13, 2036) It worked! Holy fucking shit it worked! I just checked the Lander. The high gain antenna is angled directly at Earth! Pathfinder has no way of knowing where it is, so it has no way of knowing where Earth is. The only way for it to find out is getting a signal. They know I’m alive! Happy dance, happy dance, I’m doin’ the happy dance! All right. Enough happy dance. Time to make…

PATHFINDER LOG: SOL 0 (Sol 96, Feb. 12, 2036) BOOT SEQUENCE INITIATED TIME 00:00:00 LOSS OF POWER DETECTED, TIME/DATE UNRELIABLE LOADING OS… VXWARE OPERATING SYSTEM (C) WIND RIVER SYSTEMS PERFORMING HARDWARE CHECK: INT. TEMPERATURE: -34C EXT. TEMPERATURE: NONFUNCTIONAL BATTERY: FULL HIGAIN: OK LOGAIN: OK WIND SENSOR: NONFUNCTIONAL METEOROLOGY: NONFUNCTIONAL ASI: NONFUNCTIONAL IMAGER: OK ROVER RAMP: NONFUNCTIONAL SOLAR A: NONFUNCTIONAL SOLAR B: NONFUNCTIONAL SOLAR C: NONFUNCTIONAL HARDWARE CHECK COMPLETE BROADCASTING STATUS LISTENING FOR TELEMETRY SIGNAL… LISTENING FOR TELEMETRY SIGNAL… LISTENING FOR…

LOG ENTRY: SOL 96 (Feb. 12, 2036) I was really hoping I’d wake up to a functional Lander, but no such luck. Its high-gain antenna is right where I last saw it. Why does that matter? Well, I’ll tell ya… If the Lander comes back to life (and that’s a big if) it’ll try to establish contact with Earth. Problem is, nobody’s listening. It’s not like the Pathfinder team is hanging around JPL just in case their long dead probe…

LOG ENTRY: SOL 95 (Feb. 11, 2036) Today was all about repairs! The Pathfinder mission ended because the Lander had an unknown critical failure. Once they lost contact with the Lander, they had no idea what became of Sojourner. It might be in better shape. Maybe it just needs power. Power it couldn’t get with the solar panels hopelessly caked with dust. Setting it on my workbench, I pried open a panel to peek inside. The battery was a lithium…

LOG ENTRY: SOL 94 (Feb. 10, 2036) Home sweet home! Today I write from my gigantic, cavernous Hab! The first thing I did when I got in was wave my arms wildly while running in circles. Felt great! I was in that damn rover for 22 sols, and couldn’t even walk without suiting up. I’ll need to endure twice that to get to Ares 4, but that’s a problem for later. After a few celebratory laps around the Hab, it…

LOG ENTRY: SOL 93 (Feb. 9, 2036) I found the Hab signal today. I have a solid bearing and direction to go. No more chance to get lost. According to the computer, I’m 24718 meters away. I’ll be home tomorrow. Even if the rover has a catastrophic failure, I’ll be fine. I can walk to the Hab from here. I don’t know if I’ve mentioned this before, but I am really fucking sick of being in this rover. I’ve spent…

LOG ENTRY: SOL 92 (Feb. 8, 2036) I got 2 seconds of signal from the Hab beacon today, then lost it. But it’s a good sign. I’ve been traveling vaguely north-northwest for two days. I must be a good 100km from the Hab; it’s a miracle I got any signal at all. Must have been a moment of perfect weather conditions. During the boring-ass days, I’m working my way through “The Six Million Dollar Man” from Commander Lewis’s inexhaustible collection…

LOG ENTRY: SOL 90 (Feb. 6, 2036) Seven days since Pathfinder, and seven days closer to home. As I’d hoped, my inbound tracks gave me a path back to Lewis Valley. Then it was four sols of easy driving. The hills to my left made it impossible to get lost, and the terrain was smooth. But all good things come to an end. I’m back in Acidalia Planitia now. My outgoing tracks are long gone. It’s been 16 days since…

LOG ENTRY: SOL 83 (Jan. 30, 2036) Oh god I’m sore. But it’s the only way I could think of to get the Lander safely on to the roof. I built a ramp out of rocks and sand. Just like the ancient Egyptians did. And if there’s one thing Ares Vallis has, it’s rocks! First, I experimented to find out how steep the grade could be. Piling up some rocks near the Lander, I dragged it up the pile, then…

LOG ENTRY: SOL 82 (Jan. 29, 2036) Victory! I found it! I knew I was in the right area when I spotted Twin Peaks in the distance. The two small hills are under a kilometer from the landing site. Even better, they were on the far side of the site. All I had to do was aim for them until I found the Lander. And there it was! Right where it was supposed to be! Pathfinder’s final stage of descent…