Page 57 of Alien on the Moon

To the second, five minutes later, both Rylan and Elena were ready to get to work. They met at the door, gave a quick kiss, grabbed each other’s hand, and walked out.

Since Rylan moved in with her, they’d been upgraded to a full apartment within the palace. It gave them great privacy while also giving them plenty of room to share. It was just another perfect part of their newly perfect life together.

The pair walked hand in hand through the palace. They headed out a side door and toward the institute, where the most prestigious royal scientists on Thryal worked. It wasn’t far,technically still on palace grounds, and the two of them liked how much quality time the walk gave them. Because once they strode in, it’d be all business.

Rylan held the door open for Elena as they stepped into the institute. They may have arrived early, but no one would know that. At all hours of the day, the building was packed with scientists working away at a variety of projects for the kingdom.

On the way to their lab, they passed all sorts of exciting developments. The team making a weather machine was covered in snow. The team making jetpacks was covered in soot. The man in charge of discovering how to regrow limbs had a new hand, though it was the wrong color and on his back. Something was always going on.

However, Rylan and Elena were the first of their team to arrive. Their lab was still dark when they stepped in.

“We shouldn’t expect the others for a few hours,” Rylan said, putting on safety gloves and goggles.

“Perfect,” Elena said as she did the same. “Then we should be able to get some work done.”

The two of them immediately got to work on what was their third project since coming to Thryal. The first, a test to see if they were actually smart enough to work there, was to figure out a way to flash freeze living organisms without killing them. Then the second was to develop a new type of mining machinery for the mines of some far-off moon.

Working together, they finished both projects in record time. So for their third project, they were given a team and a problem that had stumped the royal scientists for a long time.

Space travel wasn’t very efficient. The kingdom was always in need of a better fuel source—a cheaper way to get from one end of the universe to the other. If they could crack the code, they’d be legends.

“You know,” said another royal scientist one day in the break room. He had a smug look on his face. “Your project is another test. They give it to all the hot shots that come in with a big head. It’s to humble you. If there was a better fuel source, it would’ve been found centuries ago.”

“Well,” Elena said without even looking at him, “if it’s another test, I plan on passing. Like no one else before.”

“You heard the woman,” Rylan said as he followed her out of the room.

Maybe it was a truly impossible task, but they didn’t care. Working together was all they wanted. And they were actually making some headway on a solution.

In their lab, they cleared a board of equations and started writing down new ones. They didn’t even need to communicate verbally. They were just naturally on the same page.

Elena would start to write an equation, and Rylan would finish it for her. He would reach for a reference guide, and she’d already be handing it to him.

By the time the rest of their team arrived, they were ready to conduct the newest tests, a series of simulations. The simulations came up with exactly what they were expecting. No new fuel source, but they were on the right path. Rylan could feel it.

The whole team got back to work. Some were drafting blueprints of new engines. Others began researching space travel techniques of other cultures, some from centuries past. The remainder were writing out more equations.

Other bodies in the lab didn’t stop Rylan and Elena’s in-sync workflow. Rylan knew right when to bring her a cup of coffee. Elena could tell when Rylan was getting frustrated and what snack from the break room would calm him down.

They could work together effortlessly. If any problem arose in the lab, it would not be between them. There was no competition. No rivalry. No jealousy. Rylan just loved her and knew she loved him back.

At one point in the day, Rylan and Elena made eye contact from across the room. They both just smiled at each other and carried on. It was all they needed.

They didn’t need to constantly be right next to each other or working on the same exact thing. But as long as they wereworking toward the same end goal, Rylan was happy, and he knew Elena was, too.

Once again, Rylan was feeling like a broken record in his own head. But it was all he could think about. Any spare moment was populated with a single belief. He was fucking lucky to have Elena.

He also got to go home with her every night. He got to catch her smiling at him while they worked. He got to feel her subtle slap on his ass as she walked past him in the lab.

Lucky and happy. That’s what Rylan was. He felt he couldn’t possibly be in a better position, and nothing was ever going to change that.

Around midday, an alarm went off on Rylan’s communicator. He stopped what he was doing and took a deep breath. He knew that reminding Elena of this engagement on their schedule wouldn’t be easy.

He walked over to where she was hard at work. Her eyes were firmly glued to the diagram of an engine before her. Yet her body language made it clear she knew he was behind her.

“Did you solve those equations already?” she asked.

“Not yet. I’m working on it. I’ll have them done after lunch.”

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