Middle of Nowhere

The spaceship finally settled on the rocky and dusty surface of Mars. Named the Sakura, Japan wanted to be the first to land a spaceship on Mars, beating anyone else to the chase. The government had sent Miya and Kanai to be the first people to set foot on the red planet. Sitting in the cockpit, Miya looked over to her console to check the surface temperature and noticed how freezing it was. “-60 outside Kanai, turn on your suit heater,” she said to him, sitting across from her in the spaceship. “I hate freezing weather. Why can’t we just go back home?” It had been months since they had stood on a planet, leaving Earth in early March. Spring was just around the corner, and they were sent out to explore right before it. Kanai wasn’t too keen on being sent out on the mission, saying that he would rather sit on the ground and keep doing his experiments. Miya had been waiting for this day ever since she was a little girl, drawing and scribbling Mars inside all of her books and notes. As she got up to open the bay doors, Kanai got up and put his suit on, ready to explore. Opening the bay doors let in all the red dust into the spaceship, with the freezing breeze hitting their helmets, but they kept themselves well insulated. “It’s nothing like the simulations, it’s beautiful,” Miya muttered under her breath. Kanai stepped out to see the uneven surface below, the rocks forming diamonds in the distance near the horizon. It seemed like the set of a sci-fi movie, with the wind blowing the dust across their feet below. As Miya took a step, she felt herself float higher and higher, the gravity not pulling her feet back down to the surface. Kanai followed right behind her, and they both started walking further and further away from the spaceship. Miya turned around to face Kanai and saw that the spaceship had its engines on, and was drifting away. “Kanai, did you turn off the engines in the Sakura?” she asked urgently. “Yeah, why? What’s wrong?” Kanai turned himself around and couldn’t believe his eyes. The Sakura was flying higher and higher, but the cockpit wasn’t empty. There was someone in there.