Far from Home

The interplanetary locum tenens recruiter had really talked up Mars as a plum position for a working psychiatrist. “Lots of lonely people out there, Dr. Monk. Depression rates are high, not to mention a steady stream of trauma victims from the asteroid mining operations.”

Dr. Monk was seriously considering the offer.  Nothing had panned out for him on earth: a failed marriage, estranged from his kids, that indiscretion...  And Mars had the most infrastructure of all the hitherto inhabited planets from the outward expansion.

He was not really a nature guy anyhow, preferring the cold clean lines of metal and glass, plastic being about the most supple thing he could tolerate (there was plenty of that on Mars).  He was sure to be paid handsomely to self-exile from a crowded mother Earth.

The trip was made in suspended animation, dream-free, and therefore instantaneous.  Being a bit on the socially-averse side he was not one to venture out much and so the transition was a smooth one, from one hermetically sealed structure to another 50 million kilometers away.

Scrubbed air circulated pleasantly through the endless corridors smelling like absolutely nothing.  A deep hum permeated everything and made for a kind of calming white noise, but now that he was here something deep inside him sensed that he was far from home.