"If there's one thing I've learned in life, it's that nothing ever goes as planned."
-Eleanor Crowley

TEMPEST

Out of all the people who should be outraged by the fact that Yuri and I could explode and any moment, and that Yuri could go nuclear on top of it, you'd think that Emperor Oshiro would be the most upset. But no. Instead, he is calm and collected at the table, while everyone else is flipping out. I always imagined that professionals would be... you know, professional? But not here. Not on the Mayflower. I'm continually impressed in the most sarcastic way possible by the immaturity and stupidity of the adults who have planned this mission. I'm passed the point of anger, where most of the adults in the room are stuck for this meeting. Yuri and I sit, our fingers intertwined under the table, in utter disappointment and annoyed acceptance.

The scientist who spoke at the dinner and promised to have an FTL drive in working order as soon as possible stands up, waving his hands and repeating, "Alright," until everyone shuts up.

"Now, look," he starts. His voice is deep and raspy, but his tone is soft. I can already picture whatever he's about to say getting steam rolled. "I can speed up the process if we forgo the trials. It can be dangerous, but not as dangerous perhaps as having live, literally live, explosives on board."

"Ha," I say under my breath.

Mom looks at me. She would have definitely glared at me before all of this came out, but now she mostly just looks concerned. Now everyone walks on eggshells around us, because they don't want to see us explode. Makes sense.

"I say it's worth a shot," Mom says. "We need to get to land. What are our options? Can we get back to Earth? I heard that the World Alliance has the technology to suppress the explosives."

"Well, so, here's the thing," the scientist replies. "There is a clear landing pad on Earth, because that's where we took off, right? So, if we go back to Earth, sure, yes, we can get there safely. But the goal is to get to Janus. The only thing is that Janus doesn't have a clear landing spot. If we use the FTL drive to get there, we're not sure where on the planet we will end up or if we will be able to track ourselves. And considering the lack of information we have on the planet from Robert's crew, there's literally no way to predict it."

"Do we have people who we can use for the trial runs?" the emperor asks.

My dad scoffs, and Yuri comes out of his silence long enough to say, "Jesus, Dad. We're talking about people, not dummies."

The scientist answers all the same. "We have people who could go. We could go as soon as tomorrow if that's the case. And they'd be fine as long as they could survive on Janus in case we can't find them to get them back right away. They'd need to be able to survive until we get there if we can't find them, and worst case scenario, that could be another thirteen more years."

"That's insane," Dad says.

"Start the preparations," Oshiro commands.

"Hold on, we should vote or something, shouldn't we?" another guy asks.

"I am the emperor," Oshiro reponds, and his cheeks fill with red anger as the words come out of his mouth. "You do what I say." He turns to look at the scientist, and stands at his seat. "Start the preparations."

Without any discussion, the emperor leaves the room, and closes the door to a silent room. Everyone is too dumbfounded to talk, and the most dumbfounded of all seems to be the boy at my side, who, like his father, stands and walks out, untangling our fingers without a word to me.

I stand to follow him, looking back at my parents long enough to see them nod at me. The rest of what I can only imagine will be an argument amongst the supposed grown-ups won't be any use to me. All I can do is help Yuri and keep him calm.

I'm prepared to follow him back to his room, calling after him like we're in some sort of lover's quarrel, but he cuts the dramatics and walks straight to my room to decompress. Some of the workers are in the hall, and even though I'm focused on Yuri, I'm pretty sure Neo is in the mix. A worrisome ache burns in the pit of my stomach: What if Neo is one of the expendable people the emperor is willing to send to Janus without a trial?

Despite chasing after Yuri, even the notion that I maybe saw Neo makes my heart flip. I have the sudden urge to talk about all of this with him, but my body betrays my brain and I walk into my room to talk to Yuri. I shut the door, and with it, anyone else who might be in the hall.

"Yuri, hey Yuri. Are you ok?"

He stops, his back to me, and then spins around so I can see the tears in his eyes.

"You're not ok," I say. He shakes his head. "It's ok not to be ok. I'm not ok."

"Stop saying 'ok.'"

"Ok."

Yuri smirks. "Thanks."

"For not saying 'ok'? Because I did."

"No," he says with a small grin. "For always making me smile. You are exactly what I needed."

"Needed?" I ask. "Or need? Present."

"Need, needed. No difference."

I hear what he's saying. I know the look in his eyes and the tone in his voice. He's desperate, he's upset, and he's ready to do something stupid.

"I think you should stay here tonight."

"No, that's ok, I wouldn't want to burden you," he says.

"You wouldn't be a burden. I want you here. I like you, Yuri."

He stares at me for a few moments that keep me in limbo between continuing to talk to fill the silence or laughing awkwardly to pretend away the sentiment. But then, he steps forward and places his hand behind my neck. He pulls me close, and I think we are going to dive into a kiss until he stops just before my lips. He gently gives the tip of my nose a peck.

"I like you too." He rests his forehead on mine. "That's why I have to go."

"To your room?" I ask.

"Yeah."

He starts to pull away, so I grab his forearm. "Just to your room?"

"What do you mean?"

"You're not going to...." I trail off. I'm not sure how to put it, so I just come out with it, no matter how harsh it sounds. "You're not going to hurt yourself?"

When he doesn't immediately dismiss my question, I have my answer.

"Let me stay with you tonight," I say.

"I won't hurt myself, but I am dangerous. I don't want you to get dragged into it."

"Isolating yourself and allowing yourself to be this upset is exactly what will make you dangerous. Stay."

He shakes his head, and as tears pool in his eyes, I can see his cheeks redden with heat. I want to stop him from overreacting and I want to stop him from looking so sad. So this time, I kiss him, fully and as passionately as I can. I pull him into me by his arm and wrap my own arm behind his neck. He welcomes my embrace and returns it as our bodies press together.

When I stop for air, I whisper, "Stay. I want you to live."

He sighs. "Ok."

***

I wake up from a dream about explosions I can't stop, and I see that Yuri is no longer in my bed. I get dressed and set off to look for him. There's no time for thought, I barely have time to panic about where he might be and what he might be doing. My fear has made me focused: I have to find him.

I step into the dimly lit hall and quickly tip-toe my way toward Yuri's hallway. Once I'm through, I see that there's a different door left open. My curiosity pulls me close to the room left open, especially at this time of night, but my feelings for Yuri stop me. I need to make sure he is safe first. So I knock on his door. Softy at first, but when I get no response, not even to my whispered call, I knock harder.

"Yuri," I call again. "Are you in there?"

I turn the handle to see if it will open, and it does. That makes my stomach sink even further than it already is. If Yuri was in here, he would have locked the door. And my assumption is confirmed when I am greeted with a neatly made bed and zero signs of Yuri.

Now I can satisfy my curiosity's hunger and check the opened room, but when I race from Yuri's room to the other, I am met with another empty room. I check for signs of who's room it might be, because, while it might be a stretch, I doubt this absence in the middle of the night is unrelated to Yuri's. Whoever this room belongs to knows where Yuri is.

The room is not nearly as neat as Yuri's. I check the bathroom first since it's the first door on the right, and the sink is lined with soap residue and facial hair shavings. In the bedroom, the bed is a mess, and there are papers strewn on the dresser. When I flip through the papers, I see equations and blue-prints and... It's the scientist! There's a plan for the updated FTL drive and calculations to attempt to predict where it will drop off its passengers.

I have to get to the laboratory.

"What are you doing here?" A voice asks from the doorway, but I'd recognize that voice anywhere. It's the voice of confusion and uncertainty. It's Neo.

"Where's the lab?" I ask. I don't have time to do anything else, but enlist Neo's help in finding Yuri.

It's somehow like he understands the unspoken meaning behind my question, because his expression changes to something more serious and he asks, "Where's Yuri?"

I'm not crying, but there's a tremble in my voice that seems to foreshadow future tears when I answer, "I don't know."

Neo changes his stance and commands me to follow him, and then we're off, racing through hallways I'm not paying attention to in order to reach the lab. Would I know if Yuri killed himself? Would he have exploded? Would I have felt the disconnection between us? And what part does the scientist play in all of this?

Neo stops in front of a door with a keypad on its handle. He moves to type in the code, but the door pushes open at his touch. Neo slams his palm against the metal door to push it all the way open, and a bright yellow light pours out of the room. Neo runs in without a moment's notice, but the light scares me. It's unknown and if I've learned anything from the history of life since the world ended, it's that science can sometimes be more powerful than we as humans can handle. I follow Neo, but at my own pace.

When I enter the room, Neo is pulling the scientist out of a crouched position on the floor by his shoulders and yelling at him about where Yuri is. I don't pay much attention to their interaction, because the glow of the yellow light is hypnotizing and calling me toward it. It spins in circles, spinning around into a tiny point and my eyes focus in on the yellow light swirling into a deep black pit. I don't hear anything that Neo or the scientist says, so I have no idea if I'm interrupting when I say, "Yuri is in there." I nod my head at the swirling light.

"That's what I just said," the scientist says in a panicked tone. Whatever happened, the scientist was definitely not a willing accomplice. "The emperor is going to kill me. Literally. I'm dead."

"Shut up," Neo says, forcing the scientist against the wall of the lab by the collar of his pajama shirt. "Tell us how to get Yuri back."

"I have no idea. I don't even know if he made it to Janus. This is all new to me and completely untested."

I can't help my body from walking toward the swirling light. It feels right. It feels like what I should be doing to save Yuri, but Neo protests.

"Tempest, stop."

"I... I don't think I can. Or want to, for that matter," I reply.

"Knock it off, Tempest."

"Nope."

"Tempest. Stop."

I haven't stopped the entire time, and now I'm so close to the swirling light that I can see where the yellow mixes into the void at its center. It shimmers like glitter until it wears away to nothing.

"Stop!" Neo yells, but now my arm is extending. I'm reaching into the void.

"Stop!" he repeats as my finger tips dip into the swirl.

A jumble of screams and orders follow me into the light, but I feel my body pushed in further by another body tackling me, pushing me over the line, intentionally or not. It's Neo, and when I snap out of my daze, Neo and I are on the ground of a place that looks eerily like Earth, but lusher, greener, and more vibrant. It's a world that humans have either not touched at all, or barely touched, depending on which conspiracy theory about Robert's crew you subscribe to.

"Where are we?" Neo asks, groaning a bit from the impact of our fall from the swirling light.

I smile and look around. A butterfly-like creature with wings the size of my head and in every color of the rainbow flaps between tissue paper-looking petals of huge flowers.

"We are on Janus. We made it."