The doctor closed the door behind Peya. “Have a seat, please.”

 

She’d been called to the community building, taken away from working in her family’s garden, and Peya had no idea why. A messenger had come and gotten her, waiting while she washed her hands and told her parents she’d be back. Her mother had been curious, seated in her chair with a blanket over her lap in the early spring chill, but a look between them had stalled any questions she might have asked.

 

The doctor sat across his desk from her, folding his hands, a small smile on his face. “Peya, we just got your test results.”

 

Her stomach jumped into her throat. Everyone else she knew had received a message with their results. Bria and Cal had already gotten their’s a few days ago; It was a 20-year-old’s rite of passage in Crescent to be tested and to get the letter that they’d tested positive.

 

“Your test came back negative,” the doctor said. The smile on his face now nearly stretched ear-to-ear. “We’ll do another just to be sure, but I believe this is a day for celebration.”

 

He waited for her to respond, but Peya didn’t. She couldn’t. A negative test? This couldn’t be right. There had to be some kind of mistake.

 

“It’s a lot to take in, I know,” the doctor said. “Come with me; we have a lot to do,” he said, and she followed him out of the room on autopilot, legs moving with no direction from her.

 

Down the hall, past closed and open doors, the doctor led her into another room, this one with more doctors. “We’re going to run a few more tests,” he said. “Just to be sure.”

 

They poked needles into her arm as soon as she was seated, drawing a couple vials of blood. After kindly offering her tari juice–green and pulpy–a technician made sure she wasn’t dizzy and whisked her out of the room, depositing Peya with a woman he introduced as Bex.

 

“Congratulations!” she said.

 

The room spun until Peya forced her lungs to slowly take in more air.

 

“I’ve been waiting for this moment my whole life,” Bex said, though she was hardly older than Peya. Bex’s younger brother was Peya’s age—she didn’t know, though, if he’d gotten his results back yet.

 

“It’s my job to show you how all this equipment works.” Artifacts covered shelves and tables: malleable armor, handheld energy weapons with accompanying holsters, different-sized packs, and a whole host of what looked like scientific equipment. Peya had learned about what had been salvaged from the shuttle but had never seen any of it. Growing up there’d been no school trips to this secure section of Town Hall.

 

“How much can you carry?” Bex asked.

 

“What?”

 

“Have you backpacked before?”

 

“No.”

 

“Camped?”

 

“Not outside Crescent.”

 

Bex rolled her eyes. “Not even once? Every kid’s done it on a dare.”

 

Peya considered lying, but shit–maybe they’d change their minds if they knew how unqualified she actually was. “Not me,” she finally admitted.

 

Frowning, Bex circled Peya, sizing her up. “Hm. Decent musculature. Good posture but weak upper body. Endurance?”

 

Peya shrugged, having no idea what she was asking.

 

“We’ll have to start you light; they don’t want to wait, so no time to build on what you’ve already got, unfortunately. I really wish they’d be more strict about training everyone in the basics. Hell, we’ve been waiting so long, who can really blame them for not wasting resources on something that might never happen.” Bex laughed, her gaze lingering on Peya. “But hey! I guess it has!”

 

She walked her along the table, showing her scanners, key cards, various tools, and a rope made of some material Peya wasn’t familiar with. She fought to focus, tried to force her mind to remember every word the woman was saying. She knew she might need it later, that her life might depend on it, but she couldn’t concentrate over the ringing in her ears.

 

“Alright, then. That should be it. Any questions?”

 

Peya’s stomach churned. She had so many, but she only had one. “Am I leaving today?”

 

Bex smiled, wiping her hands on her faded blue coveralls. “That’s for you and Director Russ to talk about. But it’s already afternoon. My guess is tomorrow morning.” Peya’s face must have given her away. “But don’t worry–if it doesn’t work tomorrow, you can always try again.”

 

Was that true though? Would she get more than one shot at this? What if all their tests were wrong?

 

As if on cue, two people walked through the doorway. Peya had never met them, but she knew who they were.

 

“Well, here she is,” Director Russ said. “The person of the hour.” Before Peya could react, he took her hand in a firm shake, his palm hot and calloused. “The results were just verified,” he said, and Bex squeaked behind her.

 

“Congratulations,” Assistant Director Jilli said. “All our lives are about to change thanks to you.”

 

~ * ~

 

“That should be everything you need, other than a good night’s sleep,” the Assistant Director said.

 

Jilli had accompanied Peya back to her cabin after an evening of reviewing plants to avoid, the basics of operating the shuttle’s electrical system, and what items she had to be sure to grab while she was there. They’d just finished going over the map together three times, though the nearby landscape had been drilled into every Crescent kids’ head since birth.

 

“That’ll be the second miracle of the day,” Peya said, and Jilli smiled.

 

“Take this.” Jilli handed Peya a small vial. “It’ll help you fall asleep. But don’t wait too long–you’ll be out for at least seven hours, and we leave at oh-seven-hundred tomorrow.”

 

She picked at the skin around her thumbnail. Despite a day’s worth of preparation—had it only been a day?—she wasn’t ready. Besides, this was prime planting season, and her parents needed her. They didn’t get around as well as they used to, and Peya hoped a generous bumper crop would allow for more trading this winter when other stores were running low.

 

“Don’t worry, Peya. You’ll do great.”

 

“Why tomorrow? Can’t it wait until I’ve had more training?”

 

Jilli gathered the map originals, leaving the duplicates for Peya. “It could,” they said. “But honestly, there’s not much more training that you’ll need. Simply get in, find the transponder and the needed information, and get out.”

 

They made it sound so simple, but it wouldn’t be them walking through a valley of death.

 

“On this first trip, it’s most important to get the transponder. We’ve shown you what to look for and what to bring back. You can worry about the rest of it on subsequent trips.”

 

“But you don’t even know if I’ll survive,” Peya said quietly.

 

“Peya, getting back is too important to risk leaving anything to chance. We’ve run plenty of tests; we’re as sure as we can be.”

 

“What does that even mean?”

 

Jilli smiled, taking a breath. Everyone in Crescent knew the process. Everyone in Crescent knew what they were trying to do.

 

“It means we’ve tested you. We’ve exposed you.” They paused, and Peya wasn’t sure if it was for effect or for her to chime in like some elementary student with a sing-song answer. “And there was no reaction,” Jilli said, finishing the mantra.

 

~ * ~

 

At 0700 the following day, Jilli and Director Russ led Peya out of the clearing, past the wood and thatch-roof cabins, and in-between two trees, luscious and blooming. A few heads turned their way, but word hadn’t gotten out yet that Peya had tested negative. While she suspected they were keeping it under wraps to quell a communal panic, the news would get out soon enough. Crescent didn’t keep secrets well.

 

The air was thick and humid in the underbrush as they weaved along a “path”. Peya couldn’t tell any difference between where they were walking and any other place in the forest, but Jilli and Russ seemed to know exactly where they were heading. They had walked for less time than Peya expected, just under an hour, when Jilli stopped and Peya almost stumbled into Russ’ back.

 

“Here it is,” they said. “The perimeter.”

 

Nothing looked different here; she couldn’t see anything that indicated they were about to leave the safety of Crescent.

 

“Are you ready?” Jilli asked, and Peya coughed a laugh. Shouldn’t they have asked her that before now?

 

“Peya, this is a great day,” Russ said, not waiting for her answer. “One that we’ve waited nearly six hundred years for. You’re going to be the salvation of our people.”

 

Jilli went over the details with her one more time: follow the map through the perimeter, through the rolling hills of the forest, then down the slope into the valley. If she started to feel sick, she should turn back immediately. If she felt light-headed or had trouble breathing, she should turn back immediately. Itching? Turn back. Peya swatted at a fyrro buzzing around her head and wondered if the resulting bump from a bite would be sufficient itching to end the day’s expedition.

 

Last reminders given, Jilli and Russ looked her over. “You have everything you need,” Jilli said. “We’ll meet you back here at sixteen hundred. Should be plenty of time to get there, get what we’re looking for, and get back to Crescent before dark.”

 

Russ patted her on the shoulder strap of her pack. “Good luck,” he said.

 

Luck. That’s what had gotten her into this situation in the first place. The random splitting of chromosomes in meiosis and the random coupling of sex cells during fertilization. A baby born with the right genetic makeup. A mature adult with the perfect allele combination to provide immunity. They’d gambled on the genetics of a small group of people, looking for just the right sequence. Looking for her.

 

Tightening her pack, Peya headed further away from Crescent through the dark, waxy leaves hanging heavy with humidity.

 

She followed the copy of the map they’d given her, stopping every so often to do a quick self-assessment. The map was color-coded, different shades radiating out from an X at the top signifying different contamination zones between the shuttle and Crescent. Each time she crossed into a new shading, Peya’s stomach would drop. Breathing? Fast, but easy. Dizziness? Negative. Itching? Not yet.

 

The striations on the map were approximations, of course. There hadn’t been time to make a detailed version in the panic; a few brave souls had tried to go back, but they’d rarely lived long enough to gather much data.

 

Space Shuttle Due had made an emergency landing on this planet 604 years ago. Very few injuries, all minor, had been sustained in the event. The 188 of them had collected themselves, done preliminary scans of the area, gathered a few supplies, and headed off to make camp while an engineering team would stay behind to fix the shuttle.

 

Most of them didn’t make it.

 

Thirty-three. Wheezing and gasping for air, hives on nearly every centimeter of exposed skin, thirty-three made it to a stream, rinsing the pollen from their hair, their clothes, their nostrils. And then they kept going. Running until their lungs were clearer. Moving until they could build a settlement out of reach of whatever plant had killed their comrades.

 

Those survivors had built Crescent, mourning the dead and telling their children and their children’s children about a place called Earth, their homeworld. They’d never intended to be colonists. They weren’t prepared for it. They had to find a way back to where they were from. A way back home. But first, that meant finding someone who could get back to the shuttle.

 

A bird flew off, bright pink against noon’s navy sky, as Peya crested the final incline: hot, out of breath, and developing a blister on one ankle. She almost missed it at first; the unnatural valley created by the shuttle’s landing had mostly healed over. But once Peya looked closer, there it was–a giant metal beast, covered in moss and vines.

 

Her heart pounded in her chest. No one else in Crescent had seen this. No one for over 600 years had seen it. But here she was–breathing clearly and able to walk in like she did this every day.

 

It took Peya a few minutes to reach the shuttle, descending down the hill. Jilli and Bex had prepped her for so many different scenarios. The manual opening mechanism being jammed. The door being too damaged to open at all. The emergency hatches being inaccessible for some reason.

 

As suspected, the door in the hull of the ship was dead, but the manual access turned with an ease that surprised her. From what she’d been taught, she’d expected the area to be a disaster damaged nearly beyond recognition: a war zone that had made them all refugees. Instead, everything looked peaceful.

 

Pulling the hatch open, she stepped inside.

 

It was a time capsule from both the past and the future. Everything was so new to Peya: the solar-powered emergency lights that still glowed, the electronic consoles with their blank gray screens, the alien smell of synthetic material everywhere. What was all of this? What had it been used for?

 

Peya shook those questions from her head and, opening the metal box hanging on the wall to her left, grabbed what Bex had called a flashlight. She shook it for a minute, and it came to life, shining pale yellow.

 

Following the light down the corridor, past the kitchen and a few closed doors, Peya made her way to navigation. This was the room where they’d flown the shuttle, her childhood teacher had said. This was where they sailed the ship among the stars. Now, 600 years later, no one in Crescent knew how that worked. No one from Crescent could use any of this–except one thing.

 

There it was, just as it’d been described to her, where the centuries-old, hand-drawn diagram said it would be. Those records, at least, had been accurately preserved.

 

Peya’s hands shook as she picked it up, easily popping loose the clamps that held it in place. The transponder. The beacon that would send a message to Earth. A message home. This was what all the fuss was about, what she’d been selected for.

 

Something caught Peya’s eye, a square piece of paper tucked into a console. Setting the transponder down, she picked up an image of a person holding a child, a bright red ball clutched in their fingers. They were both laughing: the adult smiling down at the child in their arms and the child fixated on its toy. These people must have been on the Due when it went down, or maybe whoever worked this console had known them, had loved them. Whoever they were, had they survived the crash? Had they been ones with a slower histamine response, making it to what was now Crescent before the forest sucked the air from their lungs?

 

Peya shook her head, spotting more of the crew’s mementos as she looked around the shuttle. More pictures, a tiny spaceship model, a mug from some place called New Orleans. It was all so foreign to her, so unfamiliar. She didn’t know these people, these places, these things. What would it be like once they connected the transponder to a new energy source? Once it pinged a message out to the nearest ship traveling from Earth, letting them know that they’d survived, that the Due’s crew had lived?

 

But the crew hadn’t. The people of Crescent were generations removed from that. Where would they go from here?

 

All Peya knew was Crescent. And Crescent was more than an accidental colony that was obsessed with getting back to Earth. They lived here; they thrived here. Gardens bloomed every year, providing more than enough sustenance for their community. They made music, they danced, they sang. Crescent was alive, and this shuttle…it wasn’t. It was a crypt.

 

And Peya: she was more than a body that didn’t produce the reaction. She was more than a happy accident of chromosome combinations. She hadn’t just been made for this moment. She had a life here. She had her parents as well as Bria and Cal. She had her garden, her art, her cabin.

 

She existed for much more than this, and it wasn’t fair to her–or to any child born in Crescent–to be treated that way.

 

Peya buttoned up her pack and stepped outside to check the light. It was time to head back.

 

Up and down the same hills, Peya made her way back to the meeting site. Her muscles were sore from her trek that morning, but she made good time, conscious of the bundle secured to her back.

 

She slowed as she neared the perimeter, somehow knowing Jilli and Russ would be waiting for her despite being earlier than planned. Swatting a bug from her face, she took a deep breath and walked a few more paces, emerging where she’d been just hours before.

 

“Peya!” Jilli said, getting to their feet when they saw her. “Back so soon!”

 

Peya stayed where she was, trying not to read into Russ’ surprised expression. Had he expected her not to make it? Had they sent others out, thinking them immune, only to have them never come back? Well she was here. She’d gone to the shuttle and back. She’d done what they’d asked.

 

“Did you make it there?” Russ said. “Did you see it?”

 

Peya nodded.

 

“And you went inside?”

 

She nodded again.

 

Jilli took a step toward her. “What was it like?” they asked.

 

Russ cut Peya off before she could answer. “Did you find the transponder? And the codes?”

 

“Yes.”

 

Both Jilli and Russ cried out with joy, approaching her with sweaty, grinning faces.

 

“Wait,” Peya said, backing up into the brush, breath coming quickly. “Wait.”

 

“What?” Russ asked, brows furrowing.

 

She’d thought the whole long walk back here, pack slung on her back. She’d gone over and over this moment, but now it was here, Peya wasn’t sure she’d be able to stand her ground.

 

“What will I get from all this?” she blurted before she could change her mind.

 

Seconds of silence passed as the director and assistant stood there, uncomprehending. “Now, Peya…” Russ finally said. He took another step toward her, and Peya matched it, stepping back into the undergrowth. She doubted he’d come much closer; it was ingrained in every Crescent child to not cross the perimeter. Even without a breeze from the north, it was dangerous to be this close to the line. Dangerous for them, at least.

 

“What will you give me for it?” Peya asked again.

 

“We’ve been over this,” Jilli said, holding back a sigh. “The well-being of your people. The knowledge and satisfaction that you saved us.”

 

“Saved us?” she said, tears pricking at the corner of her eyes. “Saved from what?”

 

“Peya, we can finally go home,” Russ said, rough palms up in supplication. “We can contact Earth and a ship will come get us.”

 

“Earth isn’t our home,” she said. “Crescent is.”

 

“Now listen,” Russ said, patience waning, but she cut him off.

 

“No. You listen.” Peya was shaking now. “I could’ve died out there. And for what? So that everyone in Crescent could be carried away to some new place? So that our home and our lives could be torn apart?”

 

“This is for the good of all of us,” Jilli said.

 

“Is it?” Peya said, breathing hard. “I don’t want to leave here. What good will it do to upend all of us, send us all away?”

 

“The Due crashed; we were never meant to be here,” they said.

 

“We’re not from Earth! We’re from here!”

 

“Then stay!” Russ said, sweat dripping from his dark hairline. “When Earth sends a shuttle to pick us up, you can stay along with whoever else wants to. Is that what you want?”

 

Peya looked from Russ to Jilli and back again. She’d been told for so long what she wanted—what everyone wanted—that she honestly wasn’t sure. But none of what they’d described was it. “Even if only some of us leave, everything about Crescent is going to change. Why do you get to make that decision for all of us?”

 

Russ’ face reddened, and he started to speak, but Jilli beat him to it. “And why do you get to be the one to decide that we all stay?”

 

Peya froze, looking at the Director and the Assistant Director each in turn. Could she do it? Could she really be the one to strand everyone here? Leave everyone to a fate of her choosing?

 

No. Even then, Crescent would be different, everyone knowing what she’d done—or hadn’t done. Everyone knowing they were so close to what they’d been told they wanted their whole lives. That she’d taken that from them. Even if there were others who felt like she did, it’d never be the same.

 

“Alright,” she said. “Fine.”

 

Some of the tension left Jilli’s shoulders, and they reached out a hand toward Peya. She took another half step back.

 

“If everything’s going to change, I want some sort of payment.”

 

“Money?” Russ said, disdain in his voice. “What good will that do you?”

 

While he didn’t know how much had changed outside of Crescent and if humanity relied on capital again not, that’s not what Peya had meant.

 

“If I’d died, it would’ve been back to the drawing board. If I’d died, you’d all still be stuck here until you get another negative or found another way to get a message out or…” She stared at them in silence, hoping her point was sinking in. “Promise me my family and I will be taken care of.”

 

A pause, all ambient forest noise seeming to inhale, and Russ and Jilli lunged at the Peya. She reacted, tried to run, but she wasn’t quick enough. Jilli grabbed her arms with a granite grip, and Russ turned her around, grasping her pack.

 

“Don’t be so selfish,” Russ said, his spit spraying the back of Peya’s neck. “We need to get off this planet. We need to go home.”

 

Peya straightened as much as she could, eyes locked with Jilli’s as they held her still. Russ ripped open Peya’s pack.

 

He froze, and Jilli’s eyes flashed in recognition.

 

“Where is it?” he said, yanking her shoulder so she turned to look at him. “What did you do with it, Peya?”

 

“It’s back on the shuttle,” Peya said, and she felt Jilli’s nails press deeper into her skin. “And like I said, I’m the only one who can get it. Either that or you can take your chances waiting for another genetic anomaly like me.” Her knees shook, but her voice was stone cold. “You want to use me to leave Crescent? To destroy our home? Then swear no matter what is out there, we’ll be provided for.”

 

They let her go, and she straightened up, tugging her shirt back into place.

 

“So,” Peya said. “Do we have a deal?”