Page 178 of Commander’s Mate
“What if we find it and going back is the wrong answer?”
My chest tightened.
Zoe arrived at exactly the wrong moment, as usual.
“Cool. Existential crisis?”
“Apparently.”
She looked at the destination board.
“Oh.”
Nora said, “Wanting home and wanting your old life are not necessarily the same thing.”
Scarlet folded her arms.
“My old life had Billy.”
That ended the easy philosophy.
Zoe looked down.
“My mom.”
“My parents,” I said.
“My sister,” Nora added.
Scarlet’s jaw worked.
“So we go.”
“If Earth is found,” I said.
“And then?”
No one answered.
That was new.
For weeks, Earth had been a binary.
Found or lost.
Home or trapped.
Now Halor had added another possibility.
Found and complicated.
I hated Halor for that.
Also thanked it.
Maybe that was what freedom did.
It replaced one terrible certainty with a lot of difficult choices.
