15.

Park seized Fulbreech’s arm. “There’s a stranger,” she hissed.

He looked at her, startled. “What?”

“A stranger,” Park repeated, her voice low and urgent. “Aboard the ship. Someone I’ve never seen before.”

His brow furrowed; he put his hand on her elbow, even though Park knew she wasn’t shaking. “Where?”

“Over by the door. He’s gone now. But I saw him.”

“Are you sure it wasn’t just a trick of the light?” Fulbreech asked. He tried to smile. “Maybe your eyes deceived you for a second—mine do all of the time—hell, sometimes I don’t even recognize myself when I look in the mirror. Could you have imagined it?”

He was looking at her with that face again, that expression of open and genuine concern for her wellbeing, like a puppy not quite knowing what was wrong with its master, and despite herself Park felt a surge of irritation towards him, even hatred. No need for that look, Fulbreech, she thought. I hardly know ye. But more than that—no need to imply that she’d simply been foolish. She’d examined every person on this ship on a daily basis, for God’s sake, something even Chanur didn’t do. She couldn’t have just imagined a stranger.

But of course she knew she was being unfair. If he said something like this to her, she would have a similar reaction, or at least ask him to do a perfunctory psych eval. Because it was impossible, that someone had managed to stow away on the ship. Impossible for him to have lived on the Deucalion for the last several months. What would he have done for food, for bathing? What would have happened during the radiation storms, so bad that they penetrated even the titanium shell of the ship, and the crew had to take shelter in the storm bunker at the Deucalion’s core? A stowaway would have died, surely, or at least contracted severe radiation sickness. And yet the man had looked well-fed, clean. It was impossible, Park knew it was, and yet—she’d seen it.

“I have to go,” she said, her voice strangely distant and muffled, as if she were underwater. She stood, letting go of Fulbreech’s arm. From the corner of her eye she saw Sagara stalking across the room with that trademark look on his face—an expression that made his eyes snap dark lightning. He strode up to Natalya and Hunter and pulled them apart as easily as if he were separating two children, speaking to them in low, vicious tones. Although he never raised his voice, everyone in his field of concentration instinctively mimicked him, went quiet and grim. The room crackled with silent intensity, as if preluding the outbreak of a storm.

Park turned away from the scene, which was still arresting the others in the mess hall. It felt incredibly insignificant now, almost unreal, images flickering on a media stream—even though she knew that this fell under her domain. An incident like a physical brawl was sure to impact the psychological conditions of the crew—or what was left of it. But following the stranger was more important. There was either some renegade loose on the ship without anyone knowing . . . or Park was seeing things. She didn’t know which one was worse.

Fulbreech was looking at her with concern. “Where are you going?”

Behind him, someone called out his name. Said they needed his help. Neither Park nor Fulbreech looked at the speaker.

“I need to lie down,” Park said, feeling as if her facial muscles were frozen, locked into place. “I’m—tired.”

“I’ll go with you.” He looked as if he didn’t believe her; no, as if he were afraid she would do something rash.

Park shook her arm slightly, and Fulbreech’s hand fell away from it like a dead thing. “No,” she said. She felt as if she were sleepwalking. “I’ll be fine. The others need you. I’m just going to sleep.”

Then she left. She couldn’t remember if he said anything else: only that he didn’t follow her out of the canteen.

There were three decks to the Deucalion in all, with over a hundred different partitioned rooms spread throughout each of them. Park eliminated the idea of searching the crewmembers’ cabins entirely: it was impossible for anyone not to notice a stranger living in their twelve-foot-long cubicle, and anyway the only ones with the authority to unlock the crewmates’ quarters were Wick, Sagara, and Boone, along with any androids who were acting as their delegates. She thought briefly to go find Jimex and requisition him for her search—but when she stopped by the medical bay, he was nowhere to be found. Neither were Ellenex or the security android Dylanex. So Park decided to comb the obscurest parts of the ship alone.

She had to be sure, she thought as she hunted around tall crates and lumpy shapes in the murky gray light. She could not have a repeat of the utility rooms, not in front of Fulbreech—which was why she hadn’t let him come. She had to be sure. She could not scrabble madly, desperately for answers again, with him looking on with pity and bewilderment. She would rather have a hidden assailant jump out at her and force her to use her measly, one-day self-defense training than have to face that.

And she could not have her sanity being called into question. Not with everything else going on, everyone else acting irrationally. Holt, Ma, Keller, Hunter—fighting, violence in the mess hall—the androids failing the simplest commands, behaving strangely. How long would it be before this mental wildfire claimed the rest of the ship?

And who’s to say it hasn’t already? a little voice clicked and chattered in the back of her brain. The insane did not know they were insane.

She felt sick, queasy with lack of sleep and sour paranoia. She was looking in the ship’s least-used corners, starting with Deck B: the cargo bays, the storage facilities, the supply closets. If there was a stranger—and there was, she told herself adamantly—then he would be here. Here in the uninhabited spaces of the ship.

But the more she searched, the more her inner panic rose. She began to question herself. Surely a stowaway would have blankets, stolen food. The man couldn’t have lasted so long without leaving a trace. And yet there was nothing. Crates and shelves loomed over her like shadowy cairns, as if she had stepped onto some strange, ancient trail, edged by indecipherable markers—or a burial ground. Was her mind playing tricks on her? Had she merely glimpsed someone unremarkable, and imposed an imagined unfamiliarity onto them? It couldn’t be—could it?

She peered around the boxes of preserved fruits, squinting at the floor for signs of disturbance. She wished there were dust in space: handprints or scuffs in dirt would really help her case right about now. But the ship’s filtration and purging systems took care of all that. And if it didn’t, then Jimex did, cleaning the ship with laser focus every day.

“Damn it,” Park muttered, straightening. She closed her eyes and tried to think of what the man had looked like. It couldn’t have been any of the other male members of the crew: none of them were blond, except Fulbreech. Or could someone have been wearing a wig? How ludicrous—but no more ludicrous than the idea that some stranger had snuck aboard the ship.

As she stood there in the chamber that served as their pantry, thinking, her inlays gave the briefest flash: a warning that went by so quickly Park didn’t have time to interpret it. Then there was a sputtering, some faraway churning and gasping deep in the ship’s walls. Before she could move, every light on the Deucalion went out.

Park heard distant exclamations and screams, somewhere above her. She fumbled for a moment with her inlays: METIS told her that it was experiencing an unknown electrical failure. Oh, shit, Park thought, biting her lip. Had Hunter tampered with the controls? Or was this something else? At least the life support and gravity systems were still working—so far. She stood still for a while, listening in the dark. The communication system between inlays was down, too. And she didn’t have a flashlight.

Suddenly her gut knotted. What if this was all the work of the stranger?

What if he was trying to cut Park off from the others—and leave her blind?

Park suddenly felt as if someone were watching her, even though she knew the pantry had been empty just a few moments before. She began to fumble her way towards the entrance, reluctant to reach out and feel around for her surroundings—afraid of touching something she didn’t recognize. Something warm or alive. Her breath sounded too-loud and raspy, like a machine on the verge of breakdown. Her eyes could not adjust to the lack of light.

Finally she bumped into what she thought was the pantry door and slapped her palm against its lock. The door sprang open—at least that was still working, too—but now Park was left standing uncertainly at the mouth of an immense black corridor. She hesitated, feeling with her toes as if she were standing on the edge of a precipice. Where to go from here? She thought she’d committed most of the ship to memory, muscle memory—but everything was so different in the dark.

She stood there for a while, breathing loudly. She could feel her heartbeat throbbing in her fingertips. Why hadn’t she brought a weapon? And why wasn’t METIS responding to her requests for guidance, some kind of map?

“Shit,” she said again, and it sounded as if her voice came from someone else: she did not recognize it.

After a moment she began to shuffle forward, balling her fists. She would run into someone eventually, she thought. They had to be looking for her.

But no, Park thought then. I told Fulbreech that I went to bed.

There was a shuffling noise in front of her. Someone moving around. Park stopped, closed her mouth, and strained to listen.

Suddenly a shape resolved itself before her in the darkness. A human shape, tall and still, assessing her. Park had to choke down a scream. She came to a dead stop, waiting, unsure if it was an android or a crewmember—or something else.

Then: “Park.” A familiar voice, to Park’s short-lived relief. Sagara’s voice.

“Captain Sagara?” She hated that she used his official title. It was a fear reflex, she told herself. She wanted an authority figure.

He clicked on a small utility light. Park closed her eyes against the sudden glare, but before she did she caught a glimpse of his dark hair, his fine-boned face looking damply unimpressed. “What are you doing here?” he demanded.

“I—” She cleared her throat. “I got turned around. Lost. My inlays seem to be malfunctioning.”

“So are everybody’s.” He frowned at her. “Are you alone?”

“Yes.” She hoped he wouldn’t ask her why. “Are you? Why did you come down here?”

“Fulbreech said you went off somewhere.” Sagara sounded annoyed. “Everyone else is accounted for. You weren’t in your bunk, so I went looking for you. Why did you leave the medical bay?”

“I was hungry,” she told him, biting back a defensive tone. The exchange calmed her, somewhat; it was familiar, almost comforting. It made her forget to be afraid. “Is that a crime? To need food?”

“You should have told me. You left Hunter unguarded.”

“I left three androids with her.”

“They weren’t there when I checked.”

“I assumed as much. I don’t know where they’ve gone. Hunter—?”

“Sedated, for now,” he said darkly, switching his light to his other hand. “I’ve left her in Chanur’s care.”

She made an exclamation, shielding her eyes against the beam. “She’s as good as frozen, then!”

“Maybe,” he snapped. “But it’s not as if I had a choice. Who else was going to go looking for you?”

“Oh,” Park said. She cleared her throat and tried to bank the sudden ember of shame in her stomach. “I see. That is . . . unfortunate.”

Sagara was silent for a moment, gazing at her. Finally he turned his back on her, and for a horrible moment Park thought he was going to leave her there. “Hold onto my belt,” he said, his voice now stiff and toneless.

She didn’t want to touch him. But he had the light, and seemed to know his way back to the others; what other choice did she have? So she reached out and slipped her fingers under his belt, following him as he walked back into the dark. There was surprising heat trapped there, rather than the chill she had been expecting. So he was human, after all.

“Thank you,” she said as they walked along. She tried to calm her heart’s clamoring—afraid that he might pick up on it, like some kind of night-hunting predator.

Sagara didn’t turn his head. “For?”

“Coming to get me. And . . . supporting me, last night. I know we haven’t—seen eye to eye.” This had to seem ultra-suspicious to him, Park thought. This and the bridge, and the utility rooms. And everything he’d overheard with ARGUS. She cringed internally as she recalled all the jabs she’d thrown at him, knowing he would eventually hear it; all the furtive talk she’d had with Jimex and Fulbreech and Wick. And yet he’d chosen to put all that aside and lead her back.

The security officer didn’t answer her for a moment. Finally he said, “You don’t need to thank me, Park. Whatever you may think, my loyalty lies with the ISF. That extends to every member of its crew.”

So he was rebuffing her olive branch. She couldn’t help but challenge him on that. “So personal feelings never enter into the equation, for you?” She tried to gauge his body language. “What if you had to protect someone you hated?”

His posture didn’t change. “I don’t hate anybody.”

“And love?”

A pause. “Nor that.”

“The perfect soldier.”

“I have been called that.”

She could see it: years of dutifully serving the ISF, of never questioning orders, carrying out his tasks with a cool and efficient gravity. In some ways he reminded her of herself—and that frightened her a little. Was Sagara simply a mirror-image of Park, had she been space-born? What if she had been selected because ISF thought she seemed like the perfect spy, as he was the perfect soldier? A matching set.

But that was before I learned about all of the ISF’s secrets, Park thought. Its inequities. The divide between the conscripted and the non-conscripted. And the mad, eldritch gauntlet they’d sent their people into—knowingly or not.

Her fingers felt cramped around his belt; he was towing her along like a boat dragging someone on a lifesaver in its wake. To break up the silence Park said, “Do we know what caused the blackout?”

Sagara didn’t answer. For a moment she thought that he meant to ignore her entirely until they made it back to the upper deck. But finally he said: “I thought you might know.”

Indignation sparked in her gut. “How would I know anything? I’ve been down here for the past hour.”

“Exactly. For what purpose?”

“I was—looking for something.”

Sagara didn’t prompt her: Park recognized the tactic. He thought that silence would pressure her into volunteering information, if she felt guilty. So she said, out of spite, “I’m wondering if ARGUS overtaxed the system. Maybe that’s what caused the blackout.”

She felt Sagara stiffen slightly. “Maybe,” he answered, his voice carefully disinterested. “Or maybe someone sabotaged it themselves.”

“You mean me, of course.”

“I mean anyone. Nothing would surprise me after what happened in the bridge.”

“You can prove someone tampered with it?”

His head rotated hawkishly to glare at her. “You were in the room with the proof.”

Park clenched her jaw against his glare. He meant, of course, Hunter—and Natalya’s accusations against her. Did Sagara believe the surveyor, then? Did he really buy that Hunter had tampered with the ship’s controls? And was it even worth bringing up again that the androids had said that she didn’t? He’d made it clear that he didn’t value their input on things. But would Park’s failure to speak doom Hunter to the freezer—or even criminal prosecution, if Sagara went far enough?

She thought of something suddenly. “Are you conscripted, Sagara?” It seemed obvious, given his behavior, but she was beginning to realize that nothing was quite so simple on this ship. She could trust none of her previous assumptions.

He made the low hissing sound that she’d noticed citizens of the outer planets making to express contempt. “That’s none of your business.”

“Isn’t it, though?” It was becoming the defining thing. Was someone working for ISF because they wanted to, or because they were under the Frontier’s tyrannical thumb—immune to the usual pangs of remorse and personal loyalty, because they had loved ones being held hostage? In other words—could she trust him?

Sagara’s answer surprised her. “If you must know,” he said waspishly, “I used to be. But I’m not anymore.”

She gawked at him, even though he couldn’t see her. “I’ve never heard of such a thing.”

“Just because you haven’t heard it, you don’t believe it’s true?”

“But—how?” She wanted to let go of him, force him to turn around, but the hall was still cold and oppressive; she was afraid to release him. Afraid that he might vanish like smoke. “You—worked off your debt to them? They let you go?”

“Essentially,” Sagara answered, sounding somewhat irritated—or bored. “It was after my service in the Outer System Wars. They honored me. Gave me medals. And cleared my debts as repayment.”

She had never, ever, ever heard of such a thing, not in all the years the ISF had been in control. But Sagara’s body language said it all: he was telling the truth. The truth as he knew it, anyway. “Then—why are you here? Why are you still working for them, if they’ve released you from service?”

Sagara laughed, and the sound of it startled Park; her stomach leaped uncomfortably. It was the first time she’d ever heard him laugh. “What else was I going to do? Who else can you work for, if you’re not on Earth?”

“The private sector—”

“It’s still all controlled by ISF. Indirectly, but why bother with the middleman at all?”

“But if your debts are cleared, do you even need to work?”

He paused, cocking his head as if it had never occurred to him. “I am not a man suited to leisure,” he said after a moment, in concluding tones.

They were silent for a little, shuffling along together. Finally Park said: “So you know about the Fold, then? You’ve seen it? Or—” Or have they kept it from you, too, now that they don’t have any assurance they can trust you? No insurance policy against you?

Sagara’s reply was full of scorn. “Of course I know about the Fold.”

“Even without being conscripted?”

“Yes. I am the ship’s security officer. I needed to know that information to do my job. You didn’t.”

“That’s debatable.”

He ignored her. “ISF knows it can trust me. I served in their wars. I’m the head of security on Corvus. I’ve proven my loyalty.”

She sensed his pride, despite the usual matter-of-factness in his tone; she felt the unnatural desire to puncture it. “So you have seen it, then. And seen the data they’re keeping down in the utility rooms?”

Another pause. “Yes,” Sagara said finally—almost petulantly, she thought. “Not that it matters much. I don’t need to examine it closely. My role is to protect it, not understand it.”

She nearly laughed. “And here I thought you were supposed to protect us.”

“That, too,” he said, “so long as none of you conspire to work against me.”

Park rolled her eyes. Back to this again. His paranoia was dogged. She said, “You’re so quick to assume the worst of everyone else. But why don’t you extend that same suspicion to the ISF itself?”

Now he did turn his head to look at her. “Why would I?”

“Look at how they operate,” Park said, indignant. “Secrets, half-truths, outright lies—they sent me here without telling me it was a planet with a fucking gravity well!”

She stopped then, shocked by the heat of her own anger, her fear. Sagara didn’t say anything for a moment, and she felt as if his belt were melting out of her own grasp. Finally he said flatly: “The ISF represents order in the universe. The only order. Its way of doing things might not be perfect, but at this point in time, it’s the only thing standing between the human race and total chaos. Of course I support that—of course I trust it. I have no choice. Neither does anyone else. And of course I’ll continue to serve it, and accept the flaws such a system comes with. There is no alternative. To do anything else is to contribute to the collapse of our civilization.”

“Sometimes collapse is necessary,” Park argued, “to incite change.”

“By collapse you mean destruction,” Sagara fired back. “Mass death, loss. Change on that scale is always violent. Look at the Comeback. Look at the Privacy Wars.”

“Some might say those who started the Privacy Wars were in the right. They wanted a revolution, a change in how things are done, and in a way, they got it. That’s why there are no cameras on this ship.”

“I am not one of the ones who would say that,” Sagara answered, very cold now. “My wife was killed in the rebels’ second bombing of Halla.”

Park felt as if he had struck her. All the wind was sucked out of her lungs; she nearly let go of his belt.

They walked for just a moment in silence. Then Park managed to say, very faintly: “I’m sorry. I didn’t know that.”

“It’s not in my file,” Sagara said, his voice still cold—but detached, as if he were making a report on someone else. “I made sure of that.” When she said nothing, he continued: “She was a transcriber; a data collector. She and thirty-two of her colleagues were killed when the terrorists destroyed ISF’s archives. They were writers, researchers, academics. The best in the galaxy. All of that knowledge and light—snuffed out in less than a minute.” He paused for a moment, still faceless, still unreadable. It felt as if the corridor had chilled by several degrees. “ISF thinks we lost one hundred years of secret histories and future innovations in that bombing. They’re still trying to tally the amount of data that was lost. They won’t say it, but they don’t know how long it will take the tech sector to recover.” Another pause. Then: “No one recovers from something like that.”

She wanted to say something, to proffer comfort, sympathy—a more heartfelt apology. Or commiseration; she had lost a loved one of her own. But Park found herself rendered mute by the coldness, the rawness of Sagara’s anger, so fully buried that she could only sense the edges of it. She had not known a person could feel this deeply and still speak with perfect composure. No wonder she had never been able to read him. He could have been an android—except androids never concocted stories about war. Or death, or love.

“I’m sorry,” she said again, finally, but Sagara did not seem to hear her.

“You see then why I hunt ISF’s enemies so earnestly,” he said. His pace quickened. “Why I’m dedicated to rooting out its saboteurs, its malefactors. I’ve seen what happens when one doesn’t. It’s more than missions failing, worries over not getting paid. People die. And progress is halted—ISF being the only way progress is made in this universe.” He shook his head. “People think me obsessed, dogmatic—a loyal soldier to the end. But I have my reasons for it, just as anyone does.” At this he trailed off, his words loaded with some sort of hidden meaning.

She did not know what to say in the face of his absolute certainty; his bone-deep resolve. She was not sure she had ever felt such a thing in her life. Her causes, if she had ever had any, were never that grand. She was trying to find a way to articulate this when Sagara stopped suddenly. Park, still holding onto his belt, said, “What’s wrong?”

There was a long silence. Finally Sagara said, his voice carefully even: “I don’t recognize this place.”

She let go of him and took a step so that she was standing with him side by side, squinting to make out what his watery light illuminated. They were in what looked like any other tunnel on the ship to her, but when Park looked at Sagara, she saw that he was glaring at the walls as if they had personally slighted him.

“I don’t understand,” Park said.

Sagara didn’t move from his spot. “There should be a right turn here,” he told her.

Park shook her head. “The lights are out,” she said, stating the obvious. “Which can disorient and skew your sense of direction.”

“Not possible,” Sagara said, his voice a hard rap. “The turn is one hundred and eighty-two yards from the pantry. I counted.”

They stood there for a moment, each of them evaluating their surroundings—and each other. Finally Park said, uneasily, “Let’s just continue down the tunnel. I’m sure we’ll encounter the turn eventually.”

Reluctantly, the security officer nodded and began to follow her, shining his light so that Park could see where to place her feet. The tunnel seemed to stretch endlessly, but Park told herself that it was because they were expecting the turn: their apprehension distorted their perception of things. And yet her throat felt clogged with sudden fear. Slowly, an ache started up between her shoulder blades—it was the same prickling feeling that she was being watched by someone behind them.

Without either of them speaking, their strides lengthened. When Park dared to look at Sagara, his face was tense and troubled. She nearly asked him if he had a weapon; would have found a little comfort if he had, even if there was the possibility that he could use it on her. But she stayed silent. She had the strange notion that giving voice to her fears would allow them to manifest. If she held them within, she told herself, everything would be all right.

The tunnel stretched and stretched. After a while Park became convinced that Sagara was right; something had gone wrong. The passageway was so straight—and she knew there was no such construction on their rabbit’s warren of a ship.

“We’re going the wrong way,” Sagara said finally, with impatience. He seemed irritated that he didn’t understand what was going on. Being puzzled seemed to be a foreign feeling for him.

Park kept her eyes forward, on the lit, straight path at their feet. “How are your inlays?”

“They’ve gone dark. I can’t reach the others or access the ship’s computer.”

That was when Park heard it. A sound like knocking, or more accurately, pounding: a set of fists thumping urgently against the walls. And voices far off, arguing. Alarmed, she looked at Sagara. But when he looked back, she saw that he simply looked displeased.

“Did you hear that?” Park asked him.

The security officer scowled. “Hear what?”

Park faltered. “A—a sound like knocking. People shouting.”

Sagara looked at her as if she had sprouted two heads.

The knocking sound loudened. Now it sounded like more fists had joined the first pair; Park felt as if someone had gotten trapped inside the walls, and was urgently signaling for help. She had to dig her fingernails into her palm, trying to block out her feeling of disquiet. Her dread. The dark corridor suddenly felt too hot and airless. She felt as if she wanted to claw her way to the surface, gasping for air.

“Sagara,” she said quietly, sweating. “Listen. Something like this has happened to me before—”

He looked at her, his dark gaze intent. “What do you mean? A blackout?”

“No,” she said, shaking her head. She felt the urge to grab onto him, but resisted, swaying. “Before, when I was going down to the utility rooms—” When had that been? she wondered suddenly. The day before? Or was it the day before that? When was the last time she remembered sleeping? She felt tired, feverish, swollen—as if her limbs had been deboned and filled with saltwater. “I was going down to the utility rooms,” Park repeated, struggling to follow her train of thought. “And I felt—like this. Strange. Like I didn’t know where I was.”

Sagara was staring at her with his brows furrowed. But he stayed silent.

Park put a hand to her temple and said, “And I saw a stranger. Earlier. A man, watching the fight in the mess hall. I think he has something to do with this—”

“Hey,” Sagara said sharply, when Park half-sagged into him.

“I’m sorry,” she murmured. Her eyes were fluttering; suddenly the darkness felt too oppressive, as if she couldn’t look at it any longer. “I’m sorry . . .”

“What’s wrong with you?”

“I’m just tired,” Park said, fighting back a yawn. “I just need to sleep.”

He was lowering her to the ground. “Something’s wrong. I’m taking you to Chanur.”

“No,” she said. “Not Chanur. We just need to get out of here. And sleep.”

Her grasp on full consciousness was weakening rapidly—and Sagara was warm and solid. She nearly said to him, “Carry me,” the way she’d made Glenn carry her when she was too tired as a girl, but then her knees were buckling and he was saying in her ear, “Park. Stay awake. Park!”

“The man,” she said groggily. She had to struggle to say it without slurring. “He was tall, blond. A stranger. He had a flight suit on . . .”

All at once Sagara’s hands were seizing her, lifting her up. “What did you just say?” he asked harshly. “Park, what did you say?”

There were voices at the end of the hall. “What’s going on?” someone was saying. Sagara didn’t answer. In the wavering utility light Park could see a shadowy figure approaching them. She couldn’t recognize it—her mind was receding—and there was a weird disconnected pain in her palm, where she’d dug her nails in, a throbbing that radioed feverish waves of hurt throughout her body and sent the signal to some conscience far away.

“What’s going on?” someone asked again.

You tell me, Park thought. I’m tired of always trying to find out. Then her head touched the floor, and she was gone.