Chapter Text
“Communications are a go…”
“Thrusters are a go…”
“Navigation is live…”
Everyone held their breath as the explorers rattled off things that, with just minor miscalculation, could end up being fatal. The tension in the bridge was enough to give an old man a heart attack. People all around were making silent prayers to anyone that could hear them for the astronaut’s safe return, checking calculations again and setting up systems.
After what seemed like a million years, the bridge hears a message from the ship.
“Successful launch with maintained trajectory,” one of the pilots said.
Cheers could be heard throughout the bridge as the workers completed step one of getting the men and women of the Diadem back home safely. In another part of the facility, there was a viewing party of non essential workers who also were celebrating a successful lift off.
Towards the back, a pair of people held hands and watched the screen that peered into the bridge, anxiously excited about the journey of the astronauts. One of them was muttering to himself in a low voice,
“If Yong’s team made the calculations correct then the spacecraft should get here in about 2 hours, but hey, that's just speculation and especially with this because it’s the first time using flynnoleum as propellant and what if the craft doesn't take the input correctly and they just fucking explo…”
“Varian, you have to have faith in them that they know what they're doing," the girl next to him says, squeezing his hand. “They will make it back safely, we have to think positively.” She says her hand is slightly sweaty, indicating the nerves that she also presents.
“Right, just think positively. They will get home safe with the thorium nitrate. I just need to trust the experts.” Varian takes a breath and sips water next to him.
“Varian, you are the experts,” she held up air quotes, “Just have faith in Yong,” the princess says, glancing over at him.
The viewing room he and Rapunzel were in had enough chairs for each person, It looked like a small auditorium. There were many people crowding around the front and just as many sitting down looking like they would faint. Periodically, people would pass out water and snacks.
Just as he was getting empty on water, a worker walked up to them to hand him a new one. Varian looked at the nametag of the worker.
“Thank you… Stan,” Varian says sincerely and tightly.
“You're welcome, keep yourself up young man. It's supposed to be exciting!” Stan says, obviously reading the slight panic in Varian's eyes.
“O-ok, thanks.” Varian managed, smiling slightly for the man.
“Princess, would you like one as well?” He pulls an additional water from his portable cooler.
“Yes please, Stan. Thank you so much!” She smiled brightly at him. Varian was always jealous of how she could make people feel comforted by her smile at any time. Rapunzel was famous around Sundrop Industries . She was bright and bubbly and only needed a name once for her to remember a person.
Varian on the other hand, was so engrossed in his work sometimes that he would forget people exist.
People had started giving her the nickname “The princess” because of her upbeat personality and status in Sundrop Industries as her father was a higher up executive. She wanted to pave her own way though. She loved the art of nature and preferred designing spacecraft and decorating for comfort for the passengers as opposed to working on the passion of making it go far.
Varian refocused on the screen and was painfully transfixed with Rapunzel for the next hour and fifty minutes.
As the astronauts began to descend into Earth's atmosphere, the air in the room became strained again as people hoped for successful landing into the ocean.
The cameras switched from just being on the bridge to showing both the bridge and a place in the sky with a dot, presumably the Diadem.
Varian looked at it with brief nausea.
“Have faith," he repeated the words of the princess from earlier.
As he looked at the falling descent of the now visible craft, It started gaining speed as it hurled towards the ocean.
“How can the bridge be so calm right now?” Varian squeaked out.
“Believe me Varian, they are definitely as anxious as you, just look at Nuru.” She was right, the bridge was full of pale faces and Nuru, the navigator for the craft, looked like she was about to pass out. She was sitting next to Yong who was rubbing her back as he was looking at his computer.
Varian took another deep breath and as he looked back at the screen the Diadem was on. He watched in practically slow motion as the bridge counted down from 3 for the parachute on the craft to deploy.
All of the sudden, he blinked. The chute deployed and for a split second he couldn't breathe but then it caught wind and slowed the descent of the aircraft and everything came rushing back to him.
He stood up with a start, looking around the room as people were jumping for joy and celebrating. He let out a whoop and clapped as his eyes started filling with tears.
So much work and heartache for him and others went into this and they just returned giving everyone a sense of ecstasy. He looked at the bridge where his friends Yong and Nuru were hugging. He let a few tears slip by as he smiled for this momentous occasion. He looked over to Rapunzel who was cheering and clinging to the nearest person, not caring who they were.
Varian was overwhelmed with emotion and wanted to ride this high for the rest of his life. Although he knew that as the alchemist and chemist working on the thorium nitrate that the crew was bringing back, his job had essentially just begun but still, the loss of the substance or the loss of human life would have been devastating for Corona.
He wanted to run out of the room and scream to the world. He wanted to run a marathon. He wanted to do something illegal, he didn't care. The adrenaline made him crazy.
Raps grabbed his arm and crushed him in a giant hug as they jumped together. He let out all the emotion he had been keeping for the past months and even years before that in place of that having this excitement. He clutched onto Raps and looked back at the screen as the celebration calmed down in the bridge, communications with the crew captain, Cassandra taking place alongside the victory celebrations.
People started slowly trickling out of the viewing deck to go celebrate with their families or each other. Sundrop Industries had said that as soon as the crew had reached earth, the non essential workers could go and celebrate in their own manor but that there would be a party later in the evening.
Rapunzel pulled out her phone and texted someone, probably Eugene. She looked back at Varian as soon as she got a text back.
“Eugene and Lance are with Adira, Hector and Edmund. We should go celebrate with them.” Rapunzel puts her phone in her dress pocket as Varian nods excitedly.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
They both leave the crowded room and make their way outside the facility. About a mile away a group is sitting at a bar watching the successful return of the Diadem back into earth's atmosphere. The group celebrates and Eugene pulls out his phone to see a message from his girlfriend.
Sunshine: THEY DID IT, WHERE ARE YOU GUYS??
Eugene: I KNOWWW!! Lance and I met up with Varian's family and were at the bar on third and west.
Sunshine: Ok, we will head over there and will be there in 5 mins.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
5 minutes later a decorated car holding Varian and Rapunzel pulled up outside the Snuggly Duckling. They get out of the car and rush to the door. As soon as they step in they are surrounded by family and friends. Adira picks Varian up off of the ground and spins him around.
“Auntie please I’m already nauseous enough!” He giggles as she puts him back down.
Quirin comes up and traps Varian next as Rapunzel practically jumps onto Eugene to hug him.
The atmosphere is comfortable and calming as opposed to the chaos of the bridge right now.
The group herds them over to a table where they had left their drinks alone before. The bar was full but not packed and people glanced over at the crazy group of people making a commotion as they passed but Varian couldn't care less, still chasing the high of victory.
As they sat down the group launched into excited conversation about the Diadem.
“Varian, wait what was your role in the craft again? I forgot…” Lance asks, feeling bad for forgetting. Varian couldn't blame him though Lance was a bodyguard for large events so he didn't know much about the inner workings of rocket science.
Varian chuckled, “I worked on a team that monitored the effect of oxygen on the body and I also worked on how the thorium nitrate could be instrumental for the developments for new drugs and I am working on how to make them reproducible. Now that the substance they farmed is back, my work truly begins because I have to figure out how to make it reproducible and sustainable before we run out.” He rants, gesturing with his hands to get the point across.
Edmund chimes in “That's my nephew, one of the youngest Sundrop Industries scientists at 19 years old!” he says clasping Varian on the shoulder as he's sitting next to Varian, “Your father and I knew from the moment you were born you would become something amazing.”
At that Adira kicks Edmund under the table and he yelps slightly, “Hey what was that for?”
“Honestly you have no social skills Edmund.” Hector scolds. Hector looks over sympathetically at Varian.
Varian staring off into space, comes back to reality sensing eyes on him. He looks around the table and tries to focus more on the celebration for today. He tries not to focus on the thought of his dad in the hospital, tries not to think of the fact that it is all his fault, or that he may never wake up…
“I-it’s fine” Varian stutters slightly, sweating. He tries to think of how he can turn this conversation away from him. “Rapunzel the craft looked amazing, you really outdid yourself with the design.” He pivots. He senses the eyes of Adira still on him but luckily Rapunzel understands and starts talking about how she wants to bring art to any future aliens because art is a language of joy.
Varian personally thinks its music and dance but if this topic will keep eyes off him, he doesn't mind keeping up with the princess. Varian relaxes a little bit after a while with no further parental mention.
“Wait princess, don't you have that board of executives meeting your dad asked you to go to tomorrow?” Eugene inquires. Most everyone gets the next day off but unfortunately Rapunzel had to go into the executing board meeting in her fathers stead because he was in some far away country promoting Sundrop Industries success.
“Ughhh don’t remind me.” She says exasperated, stretching her arms out in front of her and reaching for her drink. “As much as I love my job, I wish my dad could take care of his job himself,” she pouts.
“It's ok princess, we appreciate your service,” Varian laughs as he salutes her. “And hey the good part is that you can spill all the juicy details to me afterwards” he grins mischievously.
“Varian then the only one benefitting from the meeting is you,” she laughs. “But don’t worry good sir, for I will fetch you the information you so desire.”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Rapunzel sighed as she opened the door to the executives meeting room. In the room there were about 10 total executives that she knew by name and 3 she had seen but never caught the name of. There were labels on the tables for each executive with their name and titles.
Rapunzel thought it was interesting that one of the executives she knew (named Dr. Donella) was not present at the meeting quite yet. She was usually the early one, Rapunzel wondered if she got held up in traffic.
“Welcome everyone to a debrief of the most successful project Sundrop Industries has had in years.” A cheer was heard behind Rapunzel as she clapped for the declaration.
“Here’s the good and the bad. On the good side, our crew and their ship made it home safely. In addition, all calculations made for the craft were accurate.” Another round of clapping from the listening members, “Now for the bad news, we had originally gathered the crew together and launched this whole operation because we found a chemical compound called thorium nitrate. This compound, which we will call TNI, is an active ingredient that, when chemically engineered, can create what we believe is a cure to cancerous cells.”
He pulls up a screen of a generic scientist using a pipet. “However this compound also has a downside. It can be used for the destruction of bones and skin cells. When the compound comes in contact with cancer without tempering, it quickly dissolves the bones from the inside out, leaving the human body without bones.” Small breaths escape the room as everyone is reminded of that horrifying image.
Rapunzel raises her hand, “So why are we even bothering with something so dangerous to begin with?” A few of the board members turn her way, giving her an odd look.
“Ma’am as most scientists know,” He snarks, “This compound is the cure to cancer, if we can get it right, it would be monumental for the development of modern medicine.”
Rapunzel ignored the looks from the rest of the board, “Then why are we going so far into detail about this?” She questions. Rapunzel had been aware of the objective of the mission but not the dangers behind using the compound.
“Well this morning, about 3 hours before the meeting, intelligence was breached and a large amount of TNI the crew collected was stolen from the storage units, leaving only small amounts left.” Gasps go around the room as the board panics. A wave of ‘what’s and ‘how could this happen?’ fill the room and Rapunzel tenses. She looks around the room with eyebrows knit.
The man, Andrew Hubert grins and points to the screen, "Don't worry though, we have a suspect in mind for who could have done such an act. A picture pops up on screen that makes Rapunzel’s heart stop.
A boy who is almost 20 with black hair and a stripe through the middle of his hair. He’s sitting in a lab working on an experiment in the image, unaware of the picture being taken.
“This is Varian, he's one of the chemists who has been working on the TNI project. The reason we suspect him is because of his… colorful past.” The princess once again raises her hand in slight fury as she glares at Andrew.
“Have you ever even talked to him? How would you even know it was him? Varian is one of the sweetest and kindest people I know and there's no way he could have done this.” The princess crosses her arms at her outburst standing her ground.
“Just like there's no way he could have confined his own father to the hospital?” Andrew fires back, winning the small argument.
“We have all done bad things, Varian was just a kid when that happened. He never meant to do it!” she says exasperatedly.
Andrew rolls his eyes at her and looks towards the screen again. “No one in their right minds would have even done the things he has done so ma’am, you can see my hesitation to trust him completely, especially since he is on the team that will be working on the TNI.” He looks back at the board. “We can’t just fire him based on no evidence though so we will be putting additional cameras on him and the rest of the team as well as launching a police investigation. The team still has enough TNI to get started but we will be watching.” With that, Andrew turns off the presentation and focuses on putting his hands in his pockets.
“Thank you for meeting today. I will stick around for questions if you have them and if you are worried about the details of the robbery just know that I am not giving any details unless I have police and or a lawyer present.” Andrew steps off the small platform as people start packing up. Rapunzel quickly gathers her things and waits until all members of the board accept Andrew have left to speak.
“You can’t just target someone like that, it's unfair.” Rapunzel looks him in the eye and frowns as he also packs up his stuff.
“I absolutely can. I know what that boy can do and I will not risk him ruining our chance at saving humanity because he has feelings. Plus, he looks slyly at her, if he wasn't the person who took TNI, it would still be a win for my publicity.
Rapunzel looks flabbergasted, “So that's what you want, publicity? Just admit it, you don't care at all. You just want money! Nothing you just said about the hope for humanity is true is it?”
“I mean every word I say princess” The man says having the audacity to enunciate the ‘princess’ and he walks out of the room leaving Rapunzel to herself.