As expected I did not make it among the selections in the On the Premises contest, but in the rejection email they were kind enough to tell me it placed among the top 10% so that's probably the closest I've ever gotten 
And it wasn't a fully polished entry, either, though also not as rough as I feared. I'm grateful the contest gave me the impetus to get a draft out and very glad I sent it in. #LjWrites #RejectionSlips
Discussion
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In a way I'm glad the story didn't win because the draft was such an early one (though it was developed for a while) and even after submission I was thinking up new stuff I could add, like a name for part of a geological feature on Mars that is so newly discovered it hasn't been named yet. Also, since the story is in conversation with science fiction tropes and modern culture, it may very well be a better fit for a more scifi-focused outlet.
There are also decisions to make on how the story might be developed, like right now it's fairly short at 3K and leaves a lot to the imagination while hinting at some pretty significant details. 3K is probably around the sweet spot for many outlets in the 1K – 5K range and suits the philosophical/reality-bending nature of the story, but some speculative fiction mags want longer and more developed stories, especially on the more classical and worldbuilding-heavy ends by my sense of things.
But then again I'm pretty sure fans of rational, harder SF would hate my story anyway no matter how hard I go in on world construction, so my best bet is probably to keep it largely at its current length and form and then shop it around the hybrid, slipstream places after a couple rounds of reading and edits. Any editors who are also philosophy/religion majors might actually love it, that's how weird this thing gets xD
Another thing that tickles me about this story is that there's an active, classically "heroic" protagonist with a goal, in keeping with general short story formula, but he's more of a Villain Protagonist and readers may find his reactive antagonists more sympathetic (and those who don't will likely hate the whole thing). And the potentially sympathetic antagonists, a community represented in the story by female, genderqueer, and disabled characters, aren't morally squeaky clean either. That's the sweet spot for me personally as an author, but readers who find the antagonists highly sympathetic may hate their methods and the story. So that tells you the extent of my marketing skills in possibly alienating EVERYONE lmao.
Vida Cruz's essay We Are the Mountain: A Look at the Inactive Protagonist https://psychopomp.com/fantasy/august-2021-issue-70/we-are-the-mountain-a-look-at-the-inactive-protagonist/ and @JessMahler 's Fiction and A Conflict Centered World View https://jessmahler.com/fiction-and-a-conflict-centered-world-view/ were not consciously on my mind when I planned and wrote the story but definitely helped shape it, dovetailing with my horror at the obsession with taking from the world and changing it that underlies the active protagonist and conflict-centered storytelling tradition so central to the Anglo science fiction I grew up with. I'm pleased that I've come to be able to envision stories and futures beyond that framework.