"If it was all just a lie, then where is the spaceship?" Lena asked.

"Who cares about the ship? The passengers were brought here, and it is true beyond doubt that it was not done voluntarily. Most of the people were critically ill. They were all supposed to travel to the islands in the east, where they could be cured, not to the north pole, where they were surely bound to die. And now some cruel person took them all away to die somewhere else."

"I don't think so," said Lena and received Finn's dubious looks. "Whoever brought them here had to first enter the ship."

"You might be onto something. What if it was an inside job? Perhaps a crew member!"

"No," Lena said, behaving much calmer than Finn, "that's not what I'm trying to say. Listen, if the goal was to murder one hundred people, why hide them inside a mountain on Boreas? With all the power clearly given, the kidnapper could have killed them all in space. But he or she went through the trouble to hide the passengers, to feed them, and to provide some sort of entertainment for the children. Just look at this drawing for example."

Lena picked up the doodle of a child. It showed a blue planet with large, green and brown landmasses. It was not the sole drawing. Next to the paint and pencils, more papers with the same planet drawn upon them were covering the cold, dull floor. Still, Finn shook his head and crumbled the drawing to throw it into the corner with the others.

"If anything, it proves that these kids really missed Kepler. And they sought to escape this hellhole. I feel really bad for them. They were too young to die."

Remaining hopeful, Lena said, "If the goal was to kill them all, they would be dead already."

"What tells you they aren't?"

"Everything you see down here is evidence that they were taken care of. Whoever brought them to this secret bunker wants to keep them alive."

Finn shook his head. 

"No. He wants to watch them die slowly. He wants to have control over their lives and determine when to end them. I know you want to believe the best in a person, but history has the tragic habit of repeating itself and I've come to understand that some souls are lost in the infinite darkness. Our world breeds bestial monsters whose sick minds host desires of inhumane needs and far worse. Those demons that walk amongst us are brutal savages without a sense of mercy. They take away your every wish of life and with the fading of hope's last spark you have nothing left but to pray for your own death."

"Trust me, I've met those lost souls. I know they exist, but this right here was not an individual. This was KSP."

"I thought that too. But I can no longer believe it was them."

"Why?" said Lena, curious.

"I don't want to believe it as true. After Fortem came to Boreas, we entered an empty bunker. I bet, if the crew hadn't come in time, this place wouldn't be abandoned. All the evidence points at KSP, yes, but if KSP moved these people, then my father didn't come for me. He came because of me. To hide the truth that we are so desperate to find. It's a thought I don't want to bear. But nothing is more haunting than the inescapable fact that my father knew all along that Nitha was here. Alive. He called me delusional for believing in her survival. If——if I believe—that this is KSP's work, then I am bound to believe that I matter nothing to my father."

"You do." Lena walked up to Finn, removed the photograph from his cold hand, and took his fingers between her palms. "You matter. Your father cares so much about you, more than you can imagine."

"You know nothing about caring parents," said Finn pejoratively. "You don't even have a father."

"But you do!" Lena's head dropped forward. She bit her bottom lip and swallowed painfully. "I feel a little attacked. It's not my fault that my father left. But nevertheless, you prove my point. That is exactly why I know that your father cares about you. Because if he didn't, then you wouldn't have a father either."

"I'm sorry," said Finn. He retracted his hand, feeling unworthy of her comfort. "I shouldn't have said that."

"But you're right. My father did not care about me."

"I do. I care about you."

Lena's head lifted slightly and her eyes looked up at his.

"You have been nothing but supportive," continued Finn, "and I haven't thanked you once. I keep pushing you away, and yet you're always there when I need you."

"That's what friends are for."

"But it is much more than that." Finn made a step forward, the flashlight aimed at their touching boots. "I was in a state of utter incomprehension. I thought that my mission was mine alone. That's where I was wrong. There would be no mission without you. I would be lost without you, presumably gone mad. My soul has grown accustomed to you."

She raised her chin to look up at Finn. In her mind, his words repeated like the music of a skipping vinyl record. It was irrefutable that he enjoyed her company. She had doubted it often, but now she blushed just at the thought of it and modestly omitted to answer him.

"And although I say it far too rarely, I am exceedingly thankful to have you with me."

While he opened his heart in speech, Lena's mind was gone too far to hear his words of kindness. The depth of his eyes had robbed her every sensation and feeling of verisimilitude. 

"How does he smell so good?" thought the curious voice in the back of her head. Lena glanced at his hair and quickly returned to his eyes. She felt the sudden impulse to drive her fingers through the unruly mess, but she recognized the peculiarity of her thoughts and controlled her fingers to stay affixed with her thighs. 

Her own thoughts about Finn's outright agreeable cheeks drowned out the sounds of his voice until he paused and patiently awaited a response.

"Wouldn't you agree?" he said, seeing that she was startled by his question.

"Y—yes," she answered, oblivious to what she was agreeing to.

"Maybe I made every wrong choice given. It all escalated when I disobeyed Nathan and snuck out that first night on Pluviam. By doing that, however, a chain of very unfortunate events has driven us closer. Closer together I mean. And I would be lying if I confessed to regretting that."

There his voice faded away again. Lena's body stood before him, but her mind was anything but trapped inside it. Too busy from sorting her chaotic ideas, she failed to pay his meaning and purpose a grain of attention and missed the second part of his appreciative articulation. 

His features were highlighted by the soft bits of weak light that reflected from the floor and low ceiling, and she longed to see his face now clear and bright. Her right hand made subtle movements toward his hand holding the flashlight vertically. 

Only a few inches lay between her and the icy surface of the black material, and when her two fingers touched the flashlight, she wanted to grab it, turn it, and view the ample colors of his eyes, but with scant composure, she decided against it. Her hand was brought back to affix.

"—worries, the burden, everything else dragging me down; they all went away, offering a place for a rebirth of self that I profoundly needed. As for the present and future, I will treat you right. I hope you'll allow me to make that a promise."

He was finished. She felt the duty of participating in the overly one-sided conversation, and whilst hoping to say something fitting, Lena remarked, "An apology isn't necessary."

"I would go so far as to call it an avowal. Sounds a bit more—uplifting. But even so, an apology, as well as a thank you, are much in order. I value and admire you in so many ways, Lena. You deserve to know that." 

When Lena looked at him without a vocalized response, he bade her to say what she was thinking.

Her head felt hot. "Finn?"

"Yes, Lena?"

Words simmered on her tongue, willing to be spoken, but a strange sound interrupted their moment. It came from up above, and when Finn remembered that Arrakis was unsupervised, he jumped at the ladder and climbed it in a heartbeat.

"Arrakis is gone," said Finn in shock and pulled himself up.

"That can't be!" Lena followed him into the moonlight.

"I'm here," croaked Arrakis, whose waving hand was the only visible demonstration of his attendance. It shot into the air while the rest of his body was concealed by the snow. "Please, get me down now."

Lena rushed over to him and freed his leg from Chione's saddle. It plunged down and reposed still.

"Why would you help him?" asked Finn, coming up to the two.

"Because I told him I would. And I am not a liar."

"Phineas," Arrakis lifted his head and chest to some degree. "You can never tell anyone about this place. You'd kill every one of those innocent people. We need the scientists to work out a plan, and that must remain a secret."

Finn looked at Lena, and she looked at Arrakis who was looking at Finn. A very tangled net of looks and thoughts. 

Arrakis spoke of his desperate request, but neither Finn nor Lena understood the origin of his bitter prayer.