5 Minute Freewrite - Prompt: Itching

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The airlock hissed, then it hummed. He took off the layers of his protective suit and placed them in the hatch for processing. He stood naked as the lights built. On command he closed his eyes and waited for the flashes of radiation. He thought of his son waiting inside the dome. He thought of his wife; tried to remember her broad smile as she looked up from the scraggy plants in the Martian soil. Their thin, etiolated stalks were her own personal miracle. He tried to think of anything but the itching. He would not scratch.

There was life on Mars it turned out. Not the life they had brought with them, nor the plants that June had grown, but old life, dormant in the red dust. It had sat inert for eons waiting for organics to return. It took hold wherever there was water, eating away at its hosts like rust on iron. They had found no concrete method for diagnosis. They had found no cure.

Itching was the first sign. An absentminded scratch could get you reported. A spell under observation in the infirmary would most likely follow. None returned from there. The quarantine deck always needed new hands.

Had he been careless? He was sure he had closed that seal. Perhaps it had come undone, snagged on one of the instruments as he climbed into the rover. It was a trick of the mind, he told himself. A vicious circle. If you think about itching, your body starts to itch. And it goes on itching. Itching, itching, itching. Until you scratch.

Pain was the only override he knew. He curled his toes, pressing them into the edges in the metal floor. He dug his nails into the joint of his thumbs, seeking out the bones. He thought of June, of her face staring through the protective glass of the infirmary, the red patches of discolour. He thought of his son, alone in a dying colony. He would not scratch.

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My morning freewrite work-out. The goal simply being to write faster.

10 minutes for the first paragraph of 97 words. I'll call that my freewrite for today. An hour to finish the story! I was trying to make it into a tale of following / avoiding our overriding desires but couldn't quite get it to shape that way. Still, happy with it as it stands.

Today's prompt is here:
https://steemit.com/freewrite/@mariannewest/day-22-5-minute-freewrite-prompt-itching

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