At benthic depths, a woman hides, working pelagic intrigues from the bottom upward and then back down, twisting memory and thought in on itself until there is nothing. Her world spans centuries, a lake at midnight, the littoral zone a chalk outline of a murder mystery. So tired, annihilated, empty-handed, she cannot go on. There is only one conclusion to draw, she says, there is no truth out there.

"What if, during their memory experiments, Aquarius stumbled onto a mind-control substance?"