Andrew's voice reached his two teammates over the radio.
Bruno and Joy's breath caught slightly, and a flicker of fear flashed through both their eyes.
"Andrew? What's going on?!"
Bruno's voice trembled.
Andrew slowly stood up and shook his head bitterly.
"A Martian rock damaged the air circulation system."
"Just from what I can see, there's a gash more than ten centimeters long..."
"We probably missed it when we deployed the Mars Module, or NASA made a mistake in the design."
Silence fell over the radio channel.
Beside him, Bruno trembled slightly, then abruptly raised his head to look at Andrew.
Through the glass visor, Andrew could clearly see Bruno's pale face and his bloodless, trembling lips.
The next moment, Bruno reached out and grabbed Andrew's arm, growling in terror.
"Didn't NASA give us two sets of spare parts for the air circulation system?!"
"Why don't we replace the damaged..."
Andrew shook his head and cut Bruno off.
"As much as I'd like to say we can replace it, the fact is... that gash is in a core component of the air circulation system. Unless we remove and replace the whole thing, we can't fix it."
"NASA probably didn't anticipate this problem. They supplied some important removable components, but we don't have replacements for the fixed core components."
As he spoke, bitterness crept across Andrew's face.
Carefully returning each part to its original position, he sighed. "Get ready to contact NASA."
"Everyone, our trip to Mars might end here."
Earth.
3:15 a.m., United States time.
Houston Ground Control Center.
"Pathfinder calling Houston. Pathfinder calling Houston."
A voice laced with heavy static suddenly broke the silence of the control center.
"We've... run into some trouble."
"..."
Hearing the message over the radio, the drowsy Professor Chris jolted awake.
His lips