"Debbie's taking it apart now," Lubin says. "It wasn't booby-trapped, at least. She says we can probably get into its memory if there isn't any serious crypto."

Hopkinson looks a bit more cheerful. "Seriously? We can just give it amnesia and send it on its way?"

It sounds too good to be true. Lubin's look confirms it.

"What?" Hopkinson says. "We fake the data stream, it goes back home and tells its mom there's nothing down here but mud and starfishies. What's the problem?"

"How often do we go out there?" Lubin asks her.

"What, to the Lake? Maybe once or twice a week, not counting all the times we went out to set the place up."

"That's a very sparse schedule."

"It's all we need, until the seismic data's in."

The dread in Clarke's stomach—belayed a few moments ago, when the conversation turned to the hope of false memory—comes back like a tide, twice as cold as before. "Shit," she whispers. "You're talking about the odds."

Lubin nods. "There's virtually no chance we'd just happen to be in the area the very first time that thing came calling."

"So this isn't the first time. It's been down there before," Clarke says.

"Several times at least, I'd guess. It may have been to Impossible Lake more often than we have." Lubin looks around at the others. "Someone's already on to us. If we send this thing back with no record of the site, we'll simply be telling them that we know that."

"Fuck," Nolan says in a shaky voice. "We're sockeye. Five years. We're complete sockeye."

For once, Clarke's inclined to agree with her.

"Not necessarily," Lubin says. "I don't think they've found us yet."

"Gullshit. You said yourself, months ago, years even—"

"They haven't found us." Lubin speaks with that level, overly-controlled voice that speaks of thinning patience. Nolan immediately shuts up.

"What they have found," Lubin continues after a moment, "is a grid of lights, seismic recorders, and survey sticks. For all they know it's the remains of some aborted mining operation." Chen opens her mouth: Lubin raises a palm, pre-empting her. "Personally I don't believe that. If they've got reason to look for us in this vicinity, they'll most likely assume that we're behind anything they discover.

"But at most, the Lake only tells them that they're somewhere in the ballpark." Lubin smiles faintly. "That they are; we're only twenty kilometers away. Twenty pitch-black kilometers through the most extreme topography on the planet. If that's all they have to go on, they'll never find us."

"Until they send something down to just sit quiet and wait for us," Hopkinson says, unconvinced. "Then follow us back."

"Maybe they already have," Clarke suggests.

"No alarms," Chen reminds her.