Mark was silent.
Not in a dismissive way. Not in the way people hesitated when they wanted to avoid a difficult question. No, he was thinking. Calculating.
He met my gaze, and for the first time since I'd seen him, there was no authority in his stance. No ironclad certainty.
Just quiet understanding.
Finally, he exhaled.
"Yes," he admitted. "There's a chance you'll die."
No fanfare. No sugarcoating. Just the truth, laid bare.
I felt the words settle into my bones. I had already known, of course. The risk of space travel was obvious. No one stepped onto a rocket without understanding that they might not step off again. But knowing and hearing it aloud were two very different things.
Mark must have seen something shift in my expression, because his voice softened. "This mission is unlike any that has come before it. Mars is not the Moon. There is no emergency return option, no rescue within hours. Every mistake, every miscalculation, is magnified a hundredfold."