“I know that. Obviously.”

“You actually want to be far away from tall objects.”

“Sure, but we’re stuck here anyway. Can I say a comforting thing?”

“Not if it puts us in danger.”

“I’ll take a survey. Hello, teammates. Did any of you change your behavior because of what I said?”

Ashley held in a giggle and Mara felt a flush of pride. She and Kyle weren’t fighting, not now at least. This was how they passed the time.

“Fish tomorrow, right?” he said.

Mara nodded. She had suggested leaving the trap for a while before checking it, to ensure the best odds, because even their shadows on the surface could startle fish away from the edges. The longer they waited, the better their chances of triumph from the start.

“Well,” said Kyle. “Then I’ll tell you what. I’ll get us dinner today.” And suddenly, in a terrible accent that was perhaps meant to be French, “I hope zat you brought your appetites.”

Sometimes Mara wanted to roll her eyes at Kyle, but Bullfrog did it instead, and it felt like he was doing it for both of them. But even Bullfrog fought a smile, his white mustache twitching. It seemed final proof that the world was different now, better, even in the pissing rain.

Another thunderclap sounded. This time it was farther away.

“So what are you going to feed us?” said Mara.

“You’ll see.” Kyle added another stick to the fire. A lens poked through the doorway, and they all fell quiet. The lens turned from side to side before withdrawing.

For a while they waited, still crouching, until the sky started to brighten. Kyle slipped out the doorway into the gentle rain. Ashley crawled to Mara’s quadrant and sat beside her. Bullfrog sighed and lay down, plucking bits of straw from his damp legs. When Mara went out to fill the pot, the air outside felt heavy, like she was pushing through velvet curtains, and she felt the moisture in her lungs. The trunks blackened, the grass and leaves sparkling and dark. Two crows called in unison from the direction of the bog. Everything was warm and still.

An hour later, Kyle returned to the shelter, dripping, with a basket half-full of writhing worms.

Maybe the others were too surprised to object. Or maybe, like Mara, they wanted to see what would happen next. She scooted to the back wall of the shelter, arranging some logs into a backrest, and Ashley followed and rested her head on Mara’s clammy neck. Bullfrog stretched his legs and sipped from a cup of nettle tea, which had grown thick and cool. They were a captive audience, but they expected a good show.

Kyle seemed pleased but nervous. For all his talk, it was rare that he kept his teammates’ attention. “I need to use the pot,” he said. Tentative. Expecting disagreement.

That was gross, but nobody stopped him.

He lifted the worms one by one and dropped them into cooled, boiled water. Almost immediately, they began to stretch and contract. The worms sank to the bottom, wriggled upward, and sank back down. Dark spots moved the course of their bodies, and waste emerged in brown strands. A constant throbbing process, at once measured and immediate. The worms, when they rested finally at the bottom of the pot, tangled amid grains of waste, were the color of a bruise.