Will the new planet be scary? Hans asked, as they watched the shadows of something unknown move over the viewscreens. The shadows seemed to merge, to bend and bleed into the lush vegetation. Everything was too green, and shimmered in the dim light of this planet’s suns. He thought he saw teeth. He rubbed his eyes.
Yes, it will be scary, said Gzifa. It will be covered in forests, and strange new animals will wait in dark corners to devour us.
Hans blanched.
But, said Gzifa, we will find our way. To a place where we can make our new world. She lifted her braids, tucked them into her space suit. She pulled her helmet over her head. That’s the story, Hans.
Okay, said Hans. He reached for her hand. And they opened the hatch, their silver-clad bodies pressed together as they stepped through.
This new world moved like a cat: slow, languid, mysterious. There was rain from time to time. Gzifa took out an acid detector, but the rain seemed clean and pure. They moved slowly, too, quiet as they could in their big heavy boots and helmets. It felt humid and hot here. There was a strange sense of waiting; the planet seemed alive to their footfall.
I think they know we’re coming, said Hans.
Yes, said Gzifa. That’s part of the story, too.
They walked a little way through foliage so dense they couldn’t get a good look at the planet’s suns. The light seemed to be waning. In this part of the story, said Gzifa, the children stumble upon a secret. She pointed to a bone, then another—Human? Animal? No way to tell—strewn along so regularly it might be a path. A bone path.
Why should there be bones? asked Hans. They had seen no life at all, other than the trees.
It’s the evil witch, said Gzifa. She eats children, and throws out the bones. But we’re too smart for her.
Why, said Hans, what happens next?
We drop our bread crumbs, said Gzifa. She didn’t want to admit that under her helmet, her sweat was cold. Hans reached into his belt, powered up a little gray sensor, and let it fall. As they walked farther from the ship, he dropped another, then another. They walked away from the bones, or tried to—but the macabre little path seemed always to be just ahead. Frustrated, Gzifa consulted an instrument on her wrist. I know we’re not walking in a circle, she said. At least, I don’t think we are. Behind them, something hissed in the trees.
It will take a long time for the seeds to grow, said Hans.
We have food on the ship, said Gzifa.
I’m hungry, said Hans. He was a muscular boy, and in the way of all twelve-year-olds, he was always hungry.
You know the story, she told him. The children live on the ship until they build a home. It’s long years to make a home, Hans. She thought about her father, his strong brown hands cradling the tiny sprouts, the little green shoots longing for the sun. I’m not the story anymore, her father had told her. Everything in space is starting anew.
They walked for a while in silence, Hans dropping sensors, bones dotting the unchanging landscape. Gzifa thought she saw a skull, but when she blinked, it resolved into smooth strange rocks, alien as any life-form here in this wild place. They heard hissing, almost like cicadas; it grew stronger, until the children came upon a sight so strange that they froze.
A house. A cottage, really, built of brick and wood, ordinary and terrifying. Gzifa had never seen such a house, or lived in such a house; she and her father had traveled the world, nomadic, living mainly in settlements or on bases. Hans, though, was raised in the countryside, and knew these little houses. This one looked like a storybook home: sturdy squat brick with two painted white shutters, a red door, and a crooked little chimney with a plume of smoke that blew sideways in the light breeze. It smelled like something delicious, sweet and salty at once. Both children shuddered at the wrongness of the place.
Do the children go inside the house? Hans asked. In the story? He blinked at her, and she could see his pupils, narrow and scared.
No, she told him. They turn right back around, and they follow the bread crumbs until they reach their ship.
The light was growing dim, was almost gone above the thick tangle of branches and leaves overhead. The hissing was so loud, Gzifa had to turn up her intercom to be heard. She flipped open her sensor app and stared. Nothing. No beeping. No bright blue signals. She stared at the ground. Where was the path home?
Hans, she whispered. Did you power them up?
I did, yes, he said, his skin milk-pale.
Gzifa went to pick up the nearest sensor, just a few feet away. She reached her gloved hand out and, impossibly, the ground came up to meet it. There was a sucking sound. Hans, she said, standing perfectly still.
What?
It’s gone. The ground. It—it ate the sensor. Just—just swallowed it. Gzifa blinked. She couldn’t believe it. This planet was alive, somehow. There was nothing in the story about this.
Hans wasn’t listening; he had begun walking, slowly, toward the house. Hans, she shouted, there is no house in the story! It can’t be real, she shouted, stop, Hans, but he was moving faster toward that red front door, and it seemed to be grinning, seemed to be tooth-filled, seemed to be dripping, not with paint but blood or something like it, opening, opening. The trees were leaning, branches snapping as they made a tunnel over the boy. Hans, screamed Gzifa, but he was already gone, he was inside,
