"PHEW! I thought he wouldn't make it out…"
Tenka exhaled, brushing a bead of sweat from her brow, but when she turned, the rest of the room wasn't sighing with her.
They were staring.
"C-c-commander…" Shogo muttered, blinking like the screen was lying to him. "How the hell did he break out of that?"
"For once, I'm with the clown," Yumi added, eyes wide, the usual snark stripped from her voice. "That wasn't human. That was…something else."
Tenka didn't answer right away. She just smiled, like a quiet truth had finally been confirmed.
"I told you. Kentaro's always been the one I trusted, even when the rest of the world wouldn't."
The crew stared at her. At the screen.
At the boy they all assumed would be frozen in place forever, standing again like the ice had never touched him.
A boy talking to a disaster. Standing between two storms.
"…No one else could do that," Haruka murmured.
"He's not supposed to be able to."
"But he is."
