Take the bread and take the salt,

Know that this is not your fault;

Take the things you need, for you will not be coming back.

Pause before you shut the door,

Look back once, and never more.

Take a breath and take a step, committed to this track.

The broken doors are kept in places ancient and unknown.

My darling ones, be careful now, and don’t go out alone.

—FROM DON’T GO OUT ALONE, BY SIMONE KIMBERLEY, PUBLISHED 2006 BY LIGHTHOUSE PRESS. CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT.

We’ve been testing the worms that Mom isolated from the water supply, trying to figure out exactly how they got in there. They all share a strong genetic resemblance to one subject from her files: an implant she calls “Persephone,” as if that will somehow keep me from realizing that she’s talking about Sal. Someone put Sal—or put something tailored and cultured from her genetic material—in at least one of the local reservoirs, if not more than one. We know it wasn’t anyone here, which leaves two possible candidates: Dr. Banks or Sherman.

Mom wants to think Banks did this. She hates him so much that it clouds her judgment sometimes. She’s never been good at feeling things intensely, and the degree of the hate she feels for him doesn’t leave room for her to feel anything else. Banks is a bad person, but he’s not a fool. Putting tapeworms in the water supply hurts everyone, including him. He wanted Sal to use her as a weapon for the humans, not against them.

This is Sherman. It has to be. She knows that too.

I just need her to admit it, and act.

—FROM THE NOTES OF DR. NATHAN KIM, DECEMBER 2027