They spent a while debriefing each other, talking rapid-fire in that chilly space. Wick refused to say anything more about the Fold, and Park didn’t press much: now that she knew what the problem was, she found that she didn’t care much about the specifics, the scientific details of the thing. She only had to know that the ISF considered it important enough to hide it from some of its own crew. She found herself wondering exactly who knew what: Had Keller known all along, or had she only been told the day they landed? Did Chanur know? Did Jimex? But she was afraid to ask. Rather than relief, she felt a little afraid of being told that she was the last to know. Even if Wick claimed it wasn’t personal, she felt ISF’s mistrust of her. Felt singled out. Now she knew how the other crewmembers had felt, knowing she was there solely to report back on them.

“So if I’m taking a shower,” she said, “Sagara could be listening to me at any time?”

She hoped, almost viciously, that he was listening now; that he would be embarrassed by the implication, just as Wick was.

“You make it sound perverse,” he said. His skin was ruddy under the tan—he was blushing. “As I said, ARGUS doesn’t differentiate between crewmembers. It only processes their voices and movements blindly, like they’re—nameless entities, or ghosts. And it’s quite finicky as it is, anyway: the proton storm must have affected it. We’d need Reimi to know for sure.” He shook his head. “And like I said, Sagara—or I, for that matter—can’t just tune in and spy at any moment. The computer only detects commonalities between different figures, or keywords they use, and pinpoints them for us after the fact. You understand?”

ISF’s hackneyed attempt at maintaining privacy, Park supposed. It could avoid the sticky issue of identity misuse, having the program collect data on everybody on the ship but rendering that data inaccessible unless the computer aggregated it under specific criteria. Most likely so the people who found out later couldn’t raise a legal fuss. She said, “Is no one exempt? Could Boone or Sagara listen to this conversation later on, if the computer flagged it?”

“Yes,” Wick said. “Though I already told them that I was going to tell you.” His mouth twisted, wry. “We all found out about your little investigation earlier. They were none too happy about it, but I understood. I would have done the same thing, in your shoes. That’s when I decided to let you in on things.”