I would have liked to say our hovercraft touched down smoothly and successfully as planned. That it sank into soft snow, quietly descending from blue, undisturbed skies like we hoped.

From takeoff, everything was fine. We were rebels in a world that didn’t want us, but we were escaping, and that was enough.

Our crew set out to land on Vandon, an isolated and icy peninsula off the coast of Della, a kingdom blanketed in snow and sleet.

We hastily boarded the plane, which was expertly concealed behind one of many skyscrapers in the area.

We didn’t think twice; we couldn’t.

Without bothering to do a head count, those of us who had made it on the aircraft thought we were safe. The mission was years in the making.