Ten

The lights clicked on as Areina and Bryce stepped inside and out of the cold. The walls of the command center groaned around them, the ice trembling deep under their feet. Another icequake?

But just as quickly as the feeling began, it ended, as if it had never been. And in its place, a crater in the middle of the floor, one they couldn’t see from the door. Chunks of ice glittered around the edges like broken diamonds, light in the facets of the ice, glowing with the same light Areina was familiar with—the same light she herself emitted.

“Areina?”

Areina spun at the voice, one she had longed to hear over the past days, one that may hold all the secrets to her existence. “Terrance?”

Terrance stood from the shadows on the far side of the room where he had been huddled with the other members of the scavenging team. But he did not approach, his movements stiff and restrained.

“You shouldn’t be here.” Instead of the joy she had hoped for—had expected—from him upon their reunion, his voice was tight, strained.

Terrified.

“What?” She swallowed as tears pricked her eyes, voice cracking. “I came to find you. To rescue you.”

Terrance shook his head slowly. “No, it’s too dangerous. We thought... we thought by now the radiation would have subsided. This is bad.” He turned away from her, running his hands through his hair.

“Radiation?”

But even as he said it, she could feel it, like a warmth in her chest.

The tug.

Bryce suddenly yelped and jumped back, his eyes fixed on the crater. The lights died, and the glow from the crater intensified, soft at first but growing with each passing second until the crater in the ice looked like it was a lantern.

She met Terrance’s eyes across the pit, hers full of confusion, his full of fear. “What’s going on?”

And then the light flashed, nearly blinding her, replacing her vision of the dark room, of the terrified scientists, with something else.

The wide expanse of space. The glimmer of distant stars.

There was something there, a presence in those stars that felt... alive. Familiar. If she focused on the stars, she could almost see humanoid shapes, close to the size and shape of the adults she’d always known, but different. Their bodies were smooth, their skin glistening like fine glitter. Pulsing patterns of light covered their skin like fine lace, and their mouths were open, as if in song. It was the most beautiful thing she had ever seen.

A song that something within her knew. Something she’d always yearned for.

The room came back into her vision, but her confusion only grew. What was that all about? Was it somehow connected to her glow? Her strange ability to command the icecar?

If only she hadn’t lost the field notebook!

The crater pulsed with the song from whatever it was she’d seen just now, filling her mind with its odd, chime-like melody. It comforted her even as it called to her, telling her without words that she belonged somewhere else. Somewhere far from here.

Daughter, came a voice, seemingly directly in Areina’s head. You are here!

“What?” Areina couldn’t take her eyes off the crater, but unlike Bryce and the scavenging team, she felt no fear. Only that odd connection, that feeling that she knew these voices.

We thought you dead, it continued. We thought when you stopped singing, it was over.

Areina’s eyes flicked up, and she sought out Terrance’s eyes again. Could he hear its words?

“Terrance?” Areina said. “Can you hear this?”

He nodded, his face morphing from fear to thrilled surprise. His eyes filled with wonder, glittering with the light from the crater as he listened to the words, the song, that Areina heard. All this time he’d been searching for life on other planets. And he’d finally found it. “I can,” he breathed, his voice full of wonder.

“What is it? What happened here?”

Areina’s heart pounded as she finally asked the question. Would he tell her what had happened? What she had missed?

Terrance swallowed, his Adam’s apple bobbing. “We... we weren’t really sure. Not at first.” He began to step toward Areina, carefully giving the crater a wide berth. “When we got here, everyone was dead. And all we could think was that it was because... because of you.”

Areina blinked, and time almost seemed to stop. It was what she’d suspected, but now... She glanced at Bryce. His face had grown carefully expressionless, as if he were hiding whatever it was he was feeling. Would this be the end of their careful truce?

“Station Beta had just completed establishment, sealing the last of the dome, but something broke through, something from space.” His eyes flicked to the crater between them, and he stepped over a broken chunk of ice. “They thought it was just a meteorite, like the small ones that crash down on Earth. So they sealed up the hole in the dome before the exposure to the air did too much damage, then repaired the roof to this building.”

Areina looked up, as if she needed to confirm his words. Sure enough, a hasty patch covered the remains of a burnt hole in the metal of the ceiling.

She returned her wide eyes to Terrance, skin gleaming, eyes sparkling. “Then what happened?”

“If the logs are to be believed, everything was fine at first. But then we lost contact with the station. And the Beta logs state that people started falling ill. No one was spared in the station. Except... except you. A baby they... they rescued from the crater.”

Areina held her breath. Was he finally going to tell her about her past?

“You were... you were intelligent.” Terrance smiled, the expression warm through his exhaustion. “And you looked human. Except you weren’t. Every now and then after we took you back to Station Alpha, you would glow. We never figured out why. Your DNA is something else, but in every other sense, you’ve always looked and behaved like a human child.”

Areina glanced at Bryce again, but where she had expected anger, fear, even hatred... she only saw grief.

Terrance continued forward. He had almost reached her.

“By the time we arrived, everyone was dead. As far as we could tell, it was something in the crater. Some kind of radiation we couldn’t detect, one we’d never encountered before. We left as quickly as we could, hoped we’d never have to return.” He looked back at the crater. “We thought it might be gone by now. Or at least more tolerable. But we were wrong.”

“What do you mean?” she said, her dread growing again.

But even as she said it, the tug drew her attention again. It felt raw, powerful, like an open flame ready to devour anything it could.

But it also felt... familiar.

As soon as she had the thought, she knew it was true. Whatever this glow was, whatever was in the crater... somehow it had come from her. She had brought it here, somehow, when she’d arrived. When she’d fallen.

And through it, the voices sang, calling for her, telling her it was time. But time for what?

He half shrugged, that sad smile back. “We still don’t know why everyone died. But the radiation... if we can’t get out of here...” He didn’t finish the thought. He didn’t need to.

And now Bryce was trapped here with them, condemned to the same fate. Areina’s heart pounded, and she looked between the crater and the others who she’d thought were like her. At Bryce, who still only looked sad—not vengeful, not furious.

What was she supposed to do with all of this? Just an hour ago, she was merely weird. Now, she’d brought some kind of plague?

And if this radiation stayed here, Bryce, Terrance, and the others would die.

But perhaps they didn’t have to. Perhaps... perhaps she could make up at least a little for what she had done, the pain she had caused, the death, by whatever horrible accident of fate had brought this to Europa.

“How?” Areina said, spinning to face the crater. If there was a chance to fix this, to atone for the past she hadn’t known, she had to take it. A tear, glowing so brightly even she could see its reflections on her face, slid down her cheek. “How do I save them? What do I do?” She hesitated before saying her last thought. “What... what am I?”

The chorus hummed for several long moments before answering. The answers are here, where you fell first.

Where she fell? What on Europa did that mean?

The glow in the crater pulsed with the songs, calling to her, and she stepped toward it. The closer she came, the warmer she felt. The singing sank into her, lodging itself in her soul.

And with the song came the knowledge. What she was. How she was here. What she needed to do.

Areina was a star. A real, true star. And the power that was here... it had come from her.

So she could take it back, take it away from the humans. And, somehow, break it down. Release it back into space, safely.

And with it, she would be able to leave Europa. Rejoin the stars. Find who she was always meant to be.

She would have to, if she was to have any hope of saving them.

She looked back at Terrance, and he squinted, holding up an arm to protect his eyes. How brightly did she glow now?

Her heart wrenched. How could she leave them? How could she leave everything she’d ever known? How could she leave this reality to become something that—up until a moment ago—she would have said was impossible?

Understanding flashed across Terrance’s face. Tears glistened in his eyes, his own version of the stars. “You have to go, don’t you?” he whispered.

Areina bit back a sob, wishing with all her heart it wasn’t true. She hadn’t planned on leaving, but now that she knew what she was, where she belonged, how could she stay?

But maybe, even if she had to leave now, she could still return one day. After she figured out who she was. After she protected those she loved.

Leaving wasn’t the end. It was a beginning.

The chorus sang louder, as if feeling her decision. And in the sounds, without the words, she could hear the truth. Yes, she would leave. But she would be free. She would learn, from others like her, how to exist, how to sing, how to, one day, return... when it was safe again.

“Yes,” she managed to choke. “I have to go. And you have to get those generators back.”

Terrance closed the distance between them, wrapping his arms around her. She held him, too, crying into his shoulder. She grew warmer again, and Terrance leapt back, scratching at his arm as the once-dead controls flickered back to life in his suit. She felt stronger, more radiant. She had drawn the radiation from him, added it back to herself.

There was no doubt left. Areina could save them all.

It didn’t take long for the scientists to reopen the way to space. Areina’s path home.

***

AREINA DROPPED HER helmet to the ground and unbuckled her belt. It had taken almost an hour to say her goodbyes, to draw the radiation from the other humans. But there was no time left. She didn’t know how long they could stay here without worse effects from the radiation she now held in her body, the radiation she didn’t know how to control. Not yet.

She didn’t know how long she could resist the pull of the songs, of the stars above her calling her... home.

“You’re sure about this?” Terrance said, placing his hands on her shoulders. His breath fogged the glass on his helmet’s visor. Now that the hole was open again, letting the air escape from the dome, all the scientists had suited up again. “You don’t have to do this if you don’t want to.”

Areina’s non-human heart fluttered in her chest. It was a terrifying prospect, of course. To leave everything she’d ever known. To go into a harsh environment she’d always believed would kill her.

Space.

But she was ready, if she was being truthful. How much had she yearned to be free? To explore? To learn who she really was? To shed the confines of this human form and become something new?

No, not new. Become who she always was, now that she knew.

This was it. It was her chance, and she was ready. Terrance had made sure of that, with the way he’d cared for her all this time.

She unzipped her suit, revealing the fur of Terrance’s wife’s sweater. “I’m sure. But it won’t be forever.” She looked up at him, tears pricking her eyes again. Even for something good, goodbye was hard. “I’ll miss you.”

Terrance nodded, tears in his own eyes. “I’ll miss you too, Glowworm.” She almost smiled, the name suddenly making sense. “But I know I’ll see you again. One day.”

Areina nodded. She pulled the sweater over her head, leaving only the cold suit beneath. She folded the sweater carefully, handing it back to the man who had for her whole life been her father. He nodded, pressing his lips together. Sadness wrinkled his eyes, but there was more there.

Excitement. Hope. Love.

“And if this is goodbye...” he began.

Areina shook her head. “You don’t have to say it. You took care of me when I needed you. But now I have to leave. Go back to where I belong. Learn who I really am.”

Terrance leaned forward, wrapping his arms around her. She leaned into his embrace, perhaps for the last time.

“I guess this is it,” Bryce said, stepping up behind her. “Finally getting rid of you.”

Areina turned to face him, ready with a retort, but the sheepish look on his face stopped her. “I guess so,” she said instead.

He clasped his hands in front of himself. “Listen, I... I’m sorry. I mean, I was right, but... I could have been nicer to you. And you did just save us.”

She nodded. “Thanks, Bryce. Don’t cause any more trouble.”

“And Areina?”

She hesitated, watching him squirm for a moment. Waiting for him to tell her how he’d never forgive her. How any hope of a friendship, even a long-distance, short-lived friendship, was impossible.

“No hard feelings,” he said instead, flashing a smile at her.

She smiled back, brilliant in the dim light.

He stepped away, clearing a path for her to the crater, to where the hole had been reopened for her. It was time to go.

She stepped into the middle of the field of radiation, surrounded by ice sparkling in the glow. Her glow. The chorus grew in volume, and she closed her eyes. Her body morphed, and she could feel the flesh dissolving around her, leaving only energy.

Areina glanced over her shoulder at Terrance one more time. He nodded at her, smiling sadly. She smiled back, her expression uncertain, but the feeling coursing through her, shifting her body... this was her. This was right.

Her body finished its shift, becoming the same almost featureless form as she had seen of the others. The ones like her. She shed the artificial skin of the suit, stepping out of it and into a new life. A new reality.

Areina looked up through the hole in the ceiling, the stars calling her from far above. The chorus beckoned for her, and she followed, a smile on her face.

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