Finn and Lena stood side by side, having watched a wall of gray stone turn blue from the waking of luminous bugs. It must have been hundreds of them, fixed against the caves' inner surface, and there they sat in tranquillity, scattered like stars.

"They look like fireflies," said Finn, his soothing voice traveling through the chambers and tunnels. "But fireflies aren't blue."

"I have never seen anything so beautiful."

Finn thought the same about beauty but was not looking at the wall. He looked at her profile; her face was more than half in the dark, only the tip of her nose and her forehead were bright and blue from the light.

"We can make them fly," said Finn, knowing she had never seen an animal in her life. None that were alive at least.

"They fly?" Her eyes got excited.

"Go, touch one."

After hesitation, Lena stepped forward and moved closer to the wall, now less than one foot apart from the light. Her eyes were fixed on one particular bug, and as her finger slowly raised to touch the insect, she felt the heat on her face.

"I think," she whispered and turned to him in composure, "we don't need a fire. These little friends give off heat. It will be enough to sleep beneath their light, with them guarding upon us."

Finn did no more than smile and decided to stay where they stood and rest until the sun would walk the skies once more. 

They lay on the solid ground, but it was surprisingly warm, and despite his longing for a bed, Finn did not mind. He had taken off his sweatshirt and shaped it into a pillow.

Both lay flat on their backs, their eyes roaming the false constellations formed by the insects above them.

"I can't sleep," said Lena after some time had passed.

"Me neither."

"I'm starving."

"Tomorrow we'll eat."

"Stop lying."

Finn's body rose, but she did not return his looks. "Let's make a promise. I will never lie to you, but you have to promise something too."

"I don't believe that. You can't not lie. No one can do that; everyone always lies."

"If I promise you to be always honest, then I will do just that. A promise is not to be broken."

"Speak the truth now, have you ever broken a promise?"

"I have not."

Lena looked at Finn to catch his eyes avoiding hers.

"But—" continued Finn after noticing Lena's skepticism, "I made a promise once, which I am not sure I can keep."

"What is the promise?"

"I—" he blinked away the tears, "I promised—"

His tongue refused to speak for him. He had promised Nitha he would see her again, but now she was declared dead and Finn knew that his promise could only be kept if a million miracles happened at once. 

He feared that if he were to say it out loud, he would hear it in his own voice, that his desire to find Nitha was nothing but the absurd dream of a naive child. He would come to realize how little of it was founded on logic, and how much his mission's success depended on a chain of flukes. 

If he were to say it out loud, he would give up finding love and happiness before finishing his own sentence.

"You don't have to tell me," said Lena after moments of silence. "Just tell me this. Are you trying to keep your promise?"

"Every day I am risking my life to keep my promise."

"Does it have to do with that spaceship and the hard drive?"

"Yes, it does. I'm chasing more than just the truth. It's much more than just that."

Lena heard his voice breaking and acknowledged his honesty. "And what is it you would want me to promise?"

"I'd want you to be more optimistic. You love so many things in the universe, yet you seem to despise your own life. I wonder—when did you lose hope."

"I do love many things in the universe, you're right. What others take for granted, I see as important, even when it's not unique to some. Air to breath, water to drink, shelter at night. Three things you never appreciated before suddenly determine your survival. Day after day, year after year I dreamed of only four things. With you, I found three of the four, and I have yet to find the fourth, but I realize that even if I had them all, nothing would change the fact that the universe is a very complex place. Even after everything we've seen, we've scarcely caught a glimpse of what it all truly means. Humans try to complete this cosmic puzzle, but our minds can't work it into a clear image. And my existence doesn't influence that one bit. So—I suppose, I lost hope when I came to understand that I am not a puzzle piece."

"What if you are?"

"Impossible."

"What if everyone had a place in the Universe?—A purpose."

Lena replied nothing, until at least half an hour later she had come to other thoughts.

"Tell me, Finn, what exactly does a neconox look like? I've only ever heard stories."

"No one who's ever seen one lived to tell. Its features are unknown."

"Is that why humans never settled here?"

"No," Finn laughed, but not with joy, "trust me, if they wanted to kill it, they would. That's in their nature."

"Then why? Why is Demeter uncolonized? It seems far more pleasant than Pluviam. Why would the people not just live here?"

"For one, it's too small. It's a dwarf planet and—"

"But Tempestas is tiny in comparison to this jungle. Pluviam may be large, but the area it offers to live in is crowded and horrifying."

"Yes, but Pluviam also serves as a prison for people who have done wrong on other planets. And the whole point of sending criminals to Pluviam is to have them suffer for their sins."

"I wasn't born a thief, why did I have to live there? If I hadn't been raised by criminals, then maybe I wouldn't have become a bad person."

"Hey, you're not a bad person. You risked your life to help me. A bad person would never do that."

"You risked your life for me, too. You could have left me, but you didn't. I never understood why you didn't just go."

"I stayed, because—Well—"

"You promised not to lie," Lena reminded him.

"I stayed because I was scared, and I was hopeless, and sad. And leaving you—Well, I won't lie, I considered it, but I knew that if I left, nothing would change for the better. I would have still been scared and hopeless. I would have been angry at myself, and at everyone else."

Finn remembered what he was told before launch. 

"My father taught me that we can't always control what happens to us, but we can always control our own actions. No matter how unfair the world seems, we can choose how to react to it. I knew that leaving you wouldn't fix anything. I needed to stay."

"Your father sounds like a wise man."

Finn smiled. "He is. He's great."

The cave was silent when they did not talk. Finn had his eyes closed and loosened his mind and body. It seemed to be a quiet night; untroubled and peaceful.

"Finn?" muttered Lena to see if he was still awake.

"Hm?" his eyes remained shut.

"Do you truly believe we'll be fine?"

"Mhm," replied Finn as a substitute for yes.

"You promised not to lie."

"I'm not. I truly believe we'll be fine."

And with his words ended another day on Demeter. Pluviam's capital, however, was still in the presence of daylight. The storm had lasted two days before traveling south. It left the city half in ruins, and the search for Finn continued ceaselessly.

"Sir, we have almost searched every building in the city," said a soldier to Nathan. "A tip from a woman tells us the location of the girl's hideout. We think the boy might be hiding there with her. We have moved our search there."

"Thank you, I will forward the message immediately."

"Sir? There is something you should know—"

After a distressing conversation, Nathan walked into the next room to talk to Christopher, whom he had never seen more worried.

"Chris," began Nathan. With his head lowered, he sat down next to Christopher on a shabby sofa. "The troops have a lead on Finn's location. There is a building at the border of the city where he might have hidden for the past days."

For a moment, it was clear to see that hope was returning to Christopher by the way his eyes looked up from the cold concrete floor. Then that moment ended.

"Chris——" both of Nathan's hands were placed on his legs, and as he continued, his fingernails pierced his knees. "The building collapsed from the storm. The troops are searching the ruins now. If Finn stayed there when it collapsed—"

"Don't say it."

"Chris—Finn might be—"

"Stop right there."

"I just want you to be aware that there is a chance that—"

"Finn is not dead! Don't you dare tell me he is dead, or so help me—"

"Alright, alright."

Nathan, unable to cheer up his friend, took the warning into account and stood up to return to his room.

On the other side of town, one of the men climbed the pile of shattered glass and broken bricks as he was ordered to. Only the skeleton of the building was left after wind and rain had torn it down. 

The man spotted something unusual laying upon the remains of the book Lena had read on their last night on Pluviam. Down on one knee, the soldier picked up a black braided bracelet. It was ripped and no longer bound to a circle. 

After taking a good look at it, he decided to deliver it to Dr. Clarkson, who confirmed that it was Finn's.

"I know this," murmured Christopher, as he held the muddy bracelet in his shaking hands. "Finn wore it every day. He would have never taken it off. Never!" 

His eyes burned, his throat ached, and everything from his feet to his neck was numb.

The crew stood behind him, in silence, clueless what to say to comfort him. Even Day, who was always counted on for a good laugh, was mute now and did not look at Christopher.

"Chris," said Andy when she was the first to approach the wreck of a man that stood before them. "I'm so, so sorry." She looked at the others. "We all are."

She tried to comfort him with words, but Christopher was deaf from the paralyzing shock that dominated his body.

It remained unspoken, yet, having taken the bracelet as evidence, everyone in the room implicitly agreed with the certainty that Finn's bones were crushed and buried by tons of rubble. Everyone, but one.

"He is not dead," said Christopher, his mind made up. "And if I have to find him myself, so be it!" He stormed out of the room.

The crew left him to grieve and later came together in the KSP building, without Christopher. 

Andy's eyes were puffy and red from crying for hours. She had a daughter herself, she was fourteen, and nothing in the world was more important to Andy than her. Her deepest empathy for Christopher caused her to feel as if her own child were gone.

"What was Finn doing on the computer?" asked Hajo while his finger wiped the dust off a metal cabinet.

"He was searching for something," answered Nathan, his arms crossed and his feet apart.

"And what was it?"

"I already checked the computer. Whatever it was, he made sure we wouldn't find out."

"Did he find whatever it is he was searching?" Hajo looked at Nathan, still pondering.

"We don't know."

"I don't understand what Finn was doing here, at all," said Hajo. "He had no business here. He was a reasonable and mature kid, I never thought he would do such nonsense."

"He also shouldn't have run when the alarm went off," said Nathan.

"Especially not with some strange girl."

"I feel so bad for Chris," cried Andy. "His son passed away, and you idiots are listing all the mistakes Finn has made! How can you even think about that right now, when Chris is out there looking for his kid? We all know what he'll find. We have to do something about him! We can't let him dig out his son's body. No one needs to go through that! We need to talk to him, he must accept the reality!"

The room went silent. Everyone's words had vanished after they had been yelled at by sweet Andy, for the first time.

"Can I talk to you outside?" Nathan asked Andy, then led her out the door.

They were alone now, standing behind the building with no one around. With their shoes covered in sand, they looked over the desert that lay before them.

"I'm sorry that I flipped out, it's just—I can't imagine the heartache he must suffer from. I feel so helpless."

"I didn't ask you here to lecture you," Nathan tried to calm Andy. "We all feel bad for Chris, there is no question in that."

"Why is no one doing something then? All he will find is a body!"

"Andy—you need to know about something. Christopher—Chris had two sons."

"What?"

"Ten years ago, his son Levi passed away."

Andy held her hand in front of her mouth in shock and with her back against the wall, she slid down until her fingers touched the sand.

"I had just started at KSP and met Chris a few days before it happened. We didn't talk much back then, and I didn't think much when he stopped showing up for work. One night, he called me during one of his breakdowns. He slurred half his words. His voice was breaking with every breath he tried to take. Out of all his colleagues at KSP, I was the first to find out what happened, and so I rushed to his apartment. I don't know why he called me, we barely knew each other, but he did. When I arrived at his apartment I saw the boxes of empty beer bottles on the floor. He was a mess. Nothing but a drunken stupor. I checked after Finn first. He was in bed, only seven years old at the time. Frankly, I don't know what the hell I was doing, but Chris felt better by the time I left that night. Ever since, I've helped him to heal from his loss. That's how we became best friends."

"How—" she sobbed, "How did Levi die?"

"He died in his sleep. Chris was the one who found him." Nathan turned away from Andy to hide that even he could tear up. "If Chris wants to find Finn, then that's what he needs to do. I think we should let him. And no matter what happens next, I'll be there to help him get through it."