Park returned to consciousness slowly, her mind skimming over the surface of full wakefulness like a dragonfly over water. She lay in bed and thought for a while about how she kept getting drawn backwards lately. Why did she keep thinking, seemingly at random, about these particular moments, these particular memories? Why was she dreaming in such clarity about Antarctica, or reliving so many moments with Glenn? There was an eerie quality to it all, too—as if she were an outside observer, looking in on herself with a cold and dispassionate interest. It was all very strange. And it wasn’t like her to dwell so much on the past.

But, she thought, at least it was better than nightmares. She still wondered what had dredged up these parts of herself, the memories like silt disturbed from the bottom of a deep lake. What internal mechanisms were propelling these thoughts? What anxiety or longing was manifesting as a trip to the past? The human subconscious really was a marvel. She would have analyzed herself if she had the time.

She stretched in her cot, feeling the cartilage pop in her back. She felt a sense of wellbeing she hadn’t had since she first boarded the ship at Baikonur. It was as if she’d been on a treadmill this entire time, walking ceaselessly, getting nowhere, trying to keep up with the moving ground beneath her. Now she’d stepped off the treadmill, found steady land again, and the world was no longer swaying. Wick had told her what was going on. She knew where she was headed.

She flipped over in her bunk and found Jimex’s chin resting on the bed’s edge, his lambent eyes watching her like a cat’s.

Park’s body locked up: she found that she could not scream, or even wrestle out a gasp. After a moment she said, only slightly shaky: “What are you doing?”

“I was wondering how to best wake you,” Jimex said. His voice was hushed, as if she were still sleeping; his whisper buzzed against her ears.

“How long have you been there?” Park asked, rubbing the grit out of her eyes.

“Approximately sixty seconds.”

She noticed suddenly that the room was empty except for the two of them—and that the gray artificial light that usually simulated dawn was absent. Was it still the middle of the night, then? Had she actually only slept for an hour, maybe two? Park felt a sharp sense of displacement, disorientation. She’d been in such a hard and hurtling sleep, the kind full of dense, close-fitting dreams. Now it was not the time she felt it was. Had she taken a wrong turn somewhere, forgotten something or confused her own sense of being and presence? . . .

“What time is it?” she asked, whispering too.

“Five hours until sunrise,” Jimex answered.