Mars, Venus and Jupiter ?

Chapter 1: Mars, Venus and Jupiter?

"Men are from Mars, Women from Venus, and who came from Jupiter?" -- Raul

Stars were still visible, bright and shining.
A little different sight than from back home. Rahul thought. "They look wonderful don't they, these formations ?" He asked nobody in particular. He was talking about some unusual clusters of stars, constellations he hasn't seen or hadn't heard of, he thought. But he was happy to be able to see them, they were in great shape.

Peter nodded. "That is odd. I hope our cameras are taking proper pictures, I want to show this to my kids." he said.

Sarah laughed at Peter, and Nobody knows why.

Peter : "What is wrong ? Am I funny ? Is there a horn out here through my nose ?"

Sarah : Continuing the smile. "I was wondering, if you were doubting about just the camera or the whole mission?"

A brief silence.

Sarah continued. "I mean if you are not sure if a camera is working properly or not, how could we be so sure of landing on the surface of Jupiter."

Anu replied after bearing some silence. "Don't speculate on things...".

Sarah corrected "I.. I don't intend to speculate, not at all. In fact I was just amused at how Peter thought the camera might not have been working properly. Just at those thoughts..." she said. she laughed again and said "Don't worry Peter, not just your kids the whole world would see them."

Peter gave a satisfactory nod, while Anu was relieved of a major distraction. During the last 2 weeks Peter and Sarah had been fighting over everything and anything, and she had to be the one who would settle their disputes. Rahul meanwhile, as usual, wouldn't care about them and continue to gaze the night sky, looking deep into the stars and was almost lost in them.

Today, they were going to touchdown. Landing on Jupiter, their second pit stop ever since they started from earth. Their goal was to reach Saturn and collect data and perform experiments on Saturn's atmosphere and so on. Rahul wasn't in a mood of anything, he was just enjoying his view through the windows.

Anu looked at the clock, 1 hr and 12 minutes, before scheduled landing at Jupiter. Suddenly there were some sounds, as if something hit their craft. Everybody except Rahul was puzzled. Then again there were more noises. Craft suddenly fell a few metres down in its flight path, or so they felt, but it was steady again now.

Peter screamed "We are sighting high turbulence ahead, and I would request everybody to get back to your stations please. Now!"
Rahul wasn't listening. He was happy at the sight he was watching. It was beautiful but he could also see a little disturbing images ahead which he ignored.

Anu came over and pulled him "Are you crazy, come over here." and she pulled him to his station and was buckling him up when another craft movement was observed as the craft slid in vacuum somehow, and she fell on him.

He smiled and said "Get to your station. I'l help myself."

They were trained to not panic in situations like these. But real life was so different from training, Anu thought.

Everybody except Rahul panicked for few moments; There were more thugs and thunders, small items were being thrown here and there.

Rahul and Anu looked into each others eyes. They were at peace, almost as if they knew this was their last chance and they shouldn't ruin the opportunity.

Meanwhile, more disturbance due to turbulence; they both looked deeper into each others eyes.

Rahul: "I love you sweetheart." He said throwing a kiss through air.

Anu: "I know ..." came reply while she returned him his gesture of love.

Both smiled at each other, and at their fate. They didn't want to close their eyes, but they were slowly closing amidst screaming noises. He was hardly able to see or sense anything now, everything was very bright and there were sounds, more sounds out aloud.

Chapter 2 here