White Crystal Butterflies | Wattys 2021 Shortlist | ✔

Chapter Twenty-Five

I can't make myself go before Kwon as we return to the entryway. I want to. I need to. But I can't. I should be out there, battling through the snow to reach Liu and make sure she gets here safely. I should be suited up and in the thick of the action. Instead, I can't move.

I think Kwon sees it. She catches my shoulder and sits me down on the bench where I had another meltdown just days before. I touch one hand to my face and find my own skin cold and clammy as a corpse's. I am not okay.

This is supposed to be my job. I'm failing at it already and everything is falling apart, but I don't deserve to lead anything if I can't at least be there when one of my trainees returns from the field without her teammate.

It feels like an hour before Liu stumbles into view of the camera still functioning over the airlock door. Kwon is suited up and already waiting in the airlock. Despite everything she went through when she last ventured out of the Pod, she shoves it open and jumps outside.

Liu near-collapses into her arms.

Kwon brings her inside. Now I move on autopilot, helping Liu pull off her snow gear. She's exhausted, like she hiked ten kilometers on foot through Mahaha's hills, canyons, and snowdrifts to get back here. The moment her top half is free, Kwon hugs her. Liu sinks into it and starts to sob.

I focus on the task at hand. If this was Yahvi and I, I'd be the one doing the comforting. Yahvi never had the patience for it, unless the person on the receiving end was me. I catch Liu's oxygen tank before it hits the floor, and retrieve the handheld receiver shoved in her jacket pocket. It's set to the station's signal, but it's picking up another from kilometers out in the field. It's the transmitter of one of the dead mini-probes.

I set the receiver aside and crouch down to grab Liu's boots, instructing her to step out of them. It takes her an effort. I hope she's not frostbitten. Her hands at least look fine: white from the cold, but no worse damage. I do a scan for other injuries and find none. I give Kwon a nod. She walks Liu to the common room and sits with her on one of the couches, murmuring reassurances of safety.

Liu isn't coherent yet, so I find other things to do. I retrieve our first-aid kit from Kwon's room, just in case it's needed. I fetch a thermal blanket, then move to the kitchen, switching on our overworked kettle and digging in the snacks drawer for an energy bar. Liu has been out since three in the morning, and I doubt she's eaten since. I set the bar and a bag of dried fruit on the coffee table, then return a minute later with a mug of hot chocolate.

By now, Liu is starting to get her sobs under control. Kwon relinquishes the hug and wraps an arm around her shoulders instead, so they're sitting side by side. "Can you tell us what happened?" she says.

"It took Tobias."

Those three words hit me like a ton of earthquake-shaken mud. My hand finds the wall, vaguely aware that I'm still on my feet, and that my body would rather I wasn't. The blow-up armchair makes it into the tunnel of my vision. I sink down onto it.

"We went out to talk to it," says Liu, her breath hiccuping between tears. "It went calm as soon as we were outside, and then it disappeared... but there was a butterfly that moved like it wanted us to follow it. So we did."

Kwon frowns. "On foot?"

"It didn't like it when we went close to the garage. It acted like it was scared."

Mahaha doesn't like our technology. It wrecked our probes, and attacked when it saw Kwon—our engineer—driving Samson. It's painfully clear now.

"It kept running away, then waiting for us," continues Liu. "Well... flying away. The butterfly. I think it was scared of me, too. Tobias tried, and he could get closer, but it was still skittish, so we kept following it to see if we could approach it... he almost could. It was getting friendlier. It didn't like the receiver, so Tobias gave that to me and went out towards it alone... and then the ground under him"—she's sobbing again—"just dropped. I tried to run over, but a big pile of ice covered the hole. The snow acted like it was going to attack me like it attacked Dea, until I backed away."