She peered around the boxes of preserved fruits, squinting at the floor for signs of disturbance. She wished there were dust in space: handprints or scuffs in dirt would really help her case right about now. But the ship’s filtration and purging systems took care of all that. And if it didn’t, then Jimex did, cleaning the ship with laser focus every day.

“Damn it,” Park muttered, straightening. She closed her eyes and tried to think of what the man had looked like. It couldn’t have been any of the other male members of the crew: none of them were blond, except Fulbreech. Or could someone have been wearing a wig? How ludicrous—but no more ludicrous than the idea that some stranger had snuck aboard the ship.

As she stood there in the chamber that served as their pantry, thinking, her inlays gave the briefest flash: a warning that went by so quickly Park didn’t have time to interpret it. Then there was a sputtering, some faraway churning and gasping deep in the ship’s walls. Before she could move, every light on the Deucalion went out.

Park heard distant exclamations and screams, somewhere above her. She fumbled for a moment with her inlays: METIS told her that it was experiencing an unknown electrical failure. Oh, shit, Park thought, biting her lip. Had Hunter tampered with the controls? Or was this something else? At least the life support and gravity systems were still working—so far. She stood still for a while, listening in the dark. The communication system between inlays was down, too. And she didn’t have a flashlight.

Suddenly her gut knotted. What if this was all the work of the stranger?

What if he was trying to cut Park off from the others—and leave her blind?

Park suddenly felt as if someone were watching her, even though she knew the pantry had been empty just a few moments before. She began to fumble her way towards the entrance, reluctant to reach out and feel around for her surroundings—afraid of touching something she didn’t recognize. Something warm or alive. Her breath sounded too-loud and raspy, like a machine on the verge of breakdown. Her eyes could not adjust to the lack of light.

Finally she bumped into what she thought was the pantry door and slapped her palm against its lock. The door sprang open—at least that was still working, too—but now Park was left standing uncertainly at the mouth of an immense black corridor. She hesitated, feeling with her toes as if she were standing on the edge of a precipice. Where to go from here? She thought she’d committed most of the ship to memory, muscle memory—but everything was so different in the dark.