Becca looked around. “Hey, maybe we could try to go through the kitchen,” she said. The group went back toward the basement door, passing it this time in order to make their way into the dingy kitchen. Right away, Becca bolted to the window over the sink to see if it was unlocked; it wasn’t. Neither was the back door beside the trash can.

Danny took his time filming all the details from the kitchen—the dirty tile floor, the antique chairs that surrounded a tiny table, the old magnets on the fridge, which Becca assumed was not running. The sink was filled with dishes that were smeared with old food. Becca thought she spotted a bit of mold in the corner of the sink and felt a little sick.

“Gross,” she said, turning again to the window to see if she was able to spot the other group. Strange, she could see the short length of dirt behind the house, but no sign of Matt, Kylie, or Miguel anywhere. “I wonder what the others are doing.”

“Probably something significantly less gross than this,” Frankie said, looking around the room in disgust. “What sort of cook lets their kitchen get this filthy?”

“Who even knows how long all this stuff has been here,” Danny pointed out, moving the camera to face Frankie. “It could be years.”

“We need to find a way outside if we want to find a silkworm,” Becca said, thinking as she surveyed the rest of the room.

“Whoa,” Frankie said suddenly from the other side of the room. “Did anyone else notice this stuff on the counter?”

Becca turned to look—there, on the counter in front of Frankie, were a few things that seemed desperately out of place with the rest of the kitchen. There was a clean, brightly colored plastic package of some kind along with a big clay flowerpot filled with soil. “This stuff looks like it was put here recently,” Frankie said as Danny filmed the spread. “Like, really recently.”

“Maybe even while we were in the basement?” Becca said nervously. “Someone could be in the house watching us right now.”

The group fell into an uncomfortable silence as everybody considered it. “I don’t see anybody,” Danny finally said. “But who knows how many places there are to hide here.”

“Look,” Frankie said, picking up the brightly colored plastic package. “We found our worms—and they’re of the gummy variety!”

“Nice!” Becca stepped forward to look at the package. “That’s kind of cool.”

“It is,” Frankie agreed, setting the candy down again. “I might be more inclined to try one if we weren’t in this kitchen.”

“Seriously,” Becca said. “So then what’s with the pot of dirt?” She went closer to inspect the pot, turning it around slowly. “Wait, there’s a note here!” Taped to the back of the clay flowerpot was a piece of paper with the GM symbol on the outside.