Chapter
Chapter V — The Returning
25r – 30v
“I had thought I would mark each ascent. By the time the second contract closed, I had stopped counting.”
The chapter that ends a contract. Boneward in the winter, a tender's day on the surface, the drowned coasts and the one structure built above them — memorials we did not know we were building memorials when we built them.
The Surfaceborne are here — the only polity made entirely of returners — and the species that survey the margins of return: a translucent pelagic specimen one identifies on the monitor without annotation, and a deep-water gulper hanging in the still water above the Vault. The volume closes here. Volume II would be the next contract, if there is one.
- 25vJournalBoneward, in winter2187-03-14 · 145 m
- 26vPlaceThe Boneward120 m – 180 m · contested
- 27rPlaceLethewards Drift90 m – 140 m · contested
- 27vPlaceThe Reliquary at Pell80 m – 110 m · contested
- 28rSpeciesGlass-shawl medusaVellumina pelagica
- 28vJournalTender north, surface day2188-01-05 · 0 m
- 29vPlaceThe Lipless Reach30 m – 90 m · contested
- 30rPolityThe Surfacebornehuman enclave
- 30vSpeciesPlumed gulperfauna