The First

Thanks.

Where are you at?

- Huh? - The manuscript.

30,000 or so.

That's progress.

The last 5,000 are just words.

I'm going round in circles.

- Maybe give it a rest for tonight.

No, I'm gonna plow on.

- I don't like it when you sleep in here.

- You also don't like it when I wake you up.

- Well, that's something I'll have to get used to, I guess.

We both will.

If we have a baby.

Yeah, right.

Give me the towel.

Going to fall.

No, leave them.

Y... You've ruined it.

You'll live.

Alarm off.

Time.

How'd I do?

There's room for improvement.

- Is it the DNA sequencing? - It's a few things.

- Chain-termination I'm good with,

but the shotgun sequencing,

I can't... - We'll get there.

- You did this in your sleep, huh, at minus 40.

- More like minus 20. It was summer.

I thought Alaska was no joke,

but Antarctica must've been so gnarly.

- You were saving lives. I was just drilling into ice.

Let's go over your results. - Okay.

- It's eating into Aiko's training time.

- There's no point in training if you don't have

a way to get home.

The MAV is our top priority. - I understand that.

I'm just letting you know we're gonna get jammed up.

- I'm less concerned about Aiko than Fletcher.

I've not been impressed with his performance.

Well, it's a lot to learn.

Sadie's doing a great job with him.

- Did we make a mistake? - No.

- Now's the time to reverse it before we get too entrenched.

- I'd let you know if we had a problem.

Kayla?

We're good.

- When we realized the EHA issue was fault masking,

we hoped that the respin would clear the faults.

Um, I'm working with Eitan's team

to determine why it caused the deadly embrace.

If we can isolate the mo... - How far along are you?

Here.

- If you finish and still nothing?

We repeat the process.

- The problem is that we can't get the on board computers

to talk back to us. It's sort of like trying to heal

a patient that won't show up at the hospital.

- I can't say that to the President.

It takes time.

It's slow.

Every line of code needs to be evaluated.

Is it a question of resources?

Do you need more people on the software team?

- No, no. Throwing more personnel at it won't work.

- We need to show them a path forward,

otherwise this mission gets scrubbed.

- What path other than what we're doing?

If you have a solution, I'm all ears.

- Listen, the, um... the analysis is almost done.

That's scheduled to be another week.

We can talk about ways to accelerate.

Let us get back to work?

She is who she is.

She is. Since day one.

It doesn't make it any easier.

Sometimes I feel like I should've just stayed at NASA.

- Mnh-mnh. You pulled me into this program.

You don't get to shit-talk it.

Okay.

So how do we accelerate the analysis?

I have no freakin' idea.

- I have a NASA administrator who has no answers.

I have a Congress that feels like fools

for reallocating your budget.

The opposition is up my ass for wasteful spending.

- We're moving as fast as we can to find a solution.

The MAV respin protocol

is a time-consuming and complicated process.

If the... - I want a plan,

and I want it by next week.

If not, I'm having the Speaker introduce a bill

to freeze your funding again.

- Well, another freeze, and we'll miss our prep target.

There won't be a mission.

- I should've killed it in the first place.

Is there anyone you want me

to talk to in Congress before I fly back...

- We are so far past the point where glad-handing

is gonna do any good.

Your time is best spent with your team.

Ma'am?

The economic council.

- Are there any other fuck-ups I should be aware of?

No, ma'am.

Finish your tea before you go.

They went to the trouble of bringing it.

That's not fucking tea.

- I ran the DNA sequencing three times just to be sure.

It's solid data.

We're already finding complex microbes in the core samples

20 meters above the lake.

The whole team is flipping out.

If there's evidence in the ice, there must be life in the water.

That means it's possible anywhere...

Europa, Enceladus, maybe even Mars in the subsurface.

It's just... so exciting, Ollie.

I can't sleep.

All this work, and it's happening.

We have proof. I feel...

I feel drunk or, I don't know, exhausted.

Both, maybe.

Maybe it's just the light.

You can sing now.

I got my period.

Well, maybe next month.

Yeah.

- Do you see chloromethane in this data?

- Uh, yeah, at 15 parts per billion.

Good. This DNA sequence...

Is the signal here strong or weak?

- Strong. - And this one?

Strong?

- I know it looks that way, but see here?

There's too much baseline noise for it to be reliable.

Right, right. Shit.

- You're being too hard on yourself.

- Mm. I got a perfectionist bent.

My sister says it's a "Virgo thing."

Written in the stars?

- Nah, written in her frou-frou astrology books

next to this massive pile of quartz she has.

What about this one?

- I know that this is harder for you than it is for me.

I just wanted to say it, at least once.

I'm amazed...

by everything that you know that I'll never be able to grasp.

And I'm even more amazed about how well you're handling this.

It's big of you, and it makes me want to work even harder.

Let's keep going.

- Hey, I wasn't trying to make you uncom...

I know.

What about this one?

11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17,

18, 19, 20.

Oxygen. - Copy.

Colonel?

Ms. Ingram would like to see you.

- I'm in the middle of a sim. - Whenever you're free.

- Well, let me finish up here and change, okay?

- Yep? - Uh, Colonel Price.

- Laz. - Hi, Kayla.

Please, uh, sit down. - Oh, thank you.

How's it going with Matteo?

- Oh, we're working out the CPR protocol.

We're in good shape. Uh-huh.

- Excellent. Look, I won't keep you long.

I wanted your opinion on Fletcher's performance...

whether we'd made the right decision.

We all discussed this.

- Yes, but we've a major problem with the MAV,

and I don't want to compound that with a crew problem.

So... if we made a mistake,

now is the time to correct it while we still have time.

- Well, don't you think Tom should be here?

- You've worked with the crew for longer.

I wanted an honest conversation... just you and me.

- You're bypassing the chain of command.

- Yes, so you can speak freely, in confidence.

I gave my opinion months ago.

Tom decided to go a different route.

Our job is to make that work.

What if Tom was wrong?

That's not for me to say.

It's a choice you make. I should get back to training.

I would value your input.

I hope you don't see bringing Tom back

as any kind of lack of faith in you.

- We don't need to revisit this. - It wasn't just my choice.

NASA approved. You and Tom spoke.

Was I going to say no?

I was the last person to the table.

- If you resent the decision to...

What I resent...

is being forced to discuss this.

- But if there's a deeper issue, we should address it.

All things being equal...

You didn't think I should be the face of this program.

- Are you suggesting... - Yeah, I'm black.