Sarah leaned closer to her monitor, squinting at the latest batch of images from the Mars drone survey. "Uh Mike. Can I get your take on this?"
Mike rolled his chair over, coffee mug in hand. "What've you got?"
"I'm not sure, but...doesn't that look a lot like a helicopter?"
Sarah couldn’t see his eyes, but she was hopeful they widened as much as hers as he took in the image for the first time. There, amidst the ruddy Martian landscape, sat an unmistakable aircraft. Its sleek design beautiful, large and unlike anything in NASA's arsenal.
"That's impossible," Mike muttered. "We don't have any aircraft on Mars besides Ingenuity and that's certainly not it."
Sarah zoomed in, revealing more details. "It's not Russian, Chinese, or maybe even of this planet? I don't recognize these markings at all."
They exchanged a glance before Sarah spoke. "We should let someone know."
“I’m not sure it’ll matter much.” Mike was already moving back towards his monitor.
“How can you say that? Of course it will! This is huge. Literally." But Mike didn't laugh. He simply placated her need to go talk to their superior.
Twenty minutes later, printed images in hand, they entered Dr. Jameson’s office - the current Deputy Administrator in charge of the Mars Mission. His face remained impassive as they explained their discovery, showing him the perplexing images.
After a long pause, Dr. Jameson leaned back in his chair. "I appreciate you bringing this to my attention," he said, his voice unnaturally calm. "I'm going to need you both to forget what you saw today."
"But sir," Sarah protested, "this could be the most significant discovery in human history!" Why wasn’t Mike backing her up? Why wasn’t he saying anything?
Dr. Jameson's expression hardened. "What you saw was a glitch in the imaging software, nothing more. I’ll go ahead and shred these copies so they don’t end up in the wrong hands and you will delete the images and continue your regular duties. Is that understood?"
Sarah and Mike glanced at each other, a mixture of confusion and unease passing between them. Or maybe it was resignation on Mike’s part as though he'd been expecting this very reaction.
"Is that understood?" Dr. Jameson repeated, more forcefully.
"Yes, sir," they agreed in unison.
“You may go.” He didn’t look up as he swiveled his chair around and dropped the photos into the shredder.
Once they were a safe distance from his office, Sarah whispered to Mike, "What do we do now?"
"Other than do what he asked? I’ll go make the deletion."
“Just like that? No questions. No concerns.”
“It’s our job Sarah.”
“To deceive the American people? The world?”
“It’s in the contract.”
She stopped walking.
“And just how many things have you been asked to ‘forget’ Mike?”
Sure she’d only been on this project for three months but couldn’t imagine this would be the norm. She needed him to tell her it was not. But Mike didn’t respond and instead kept moving until he disappeared around the corner.
By the time she returned to her workstation, the weight of the discovery - and the order to ignore it - hung heavily over her. Mike was back in his position drinking coffee and logging data as if nothing had happened. But for her, the red planet, it seemed, held more secrets than she could have imagined. And secrets they would stay.
Unless…she returned to the printer quietly and noticed what she’d hoped she’d find. What compelled her to print the images a second time she may never understand.