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Brushfire on Europa

sci-fiEveryone
5 contributors · 3 paragraphs deep

Priya grabbed her radio and called the green shack. "Theo. Are you seeing the blue light too?" A pause, then his voice came back, shaky. "Yeah. My whole screen's lit up. Stop drilling, Priya. I think we hit something alive."

They both shut their drills down and met outside on the ice. Through the clear crust, the glow spread wide beneath their boots, soft and blue. "We can't tell the company," Theo said. "They'll send a mining fleet and crush whatever this is."

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They agreed to keep the secret and study it quietly, just the two of them. But back inside, Priya's company tablet pinged. A message from headquarters: "Odd readings detected at your site. Survey ship arriving in six hours." Their secret already had a clock on it.

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Sasha Volkov
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