He spent the next three days obsessed, watching her. She didn't look like an actor. She ate protein paste, repaired solar panels, and stared at a sky that held two moons. He tried to trace the signal, but it was impossible—it was a "folded" signal, tucked into the back-end of a legitimate telecommunications stream.

"A film set," Elias muttered, leaning in. "Or a high-end screensaver."

But then, a figure walked into the frame. It was a woman in a heavy flight suit, her helmet tucked under her arm. She looked exhausted. She walked to a small metallic pod, sat down, and began to speak. Elias checked the stream data. The source IP was garbled, bouncing through a defunct satellite relay over the Pacific.