Helena has exhausted her anger and grief after the loss of her companions, but the octopus interrogations bring no rescue, reparations, or answers. Portia tries to support Helena by helping communicate through posture and translated signals, yet Helena feels the absence of human comfort more sharply than ever. The other octopus prisoner is briefly present, then gone, leaving Helena emotionally drained and uncertain.

An exit opens into contained water, held back by an invisible field, and the octopuses shape an air pocket as if instructing Helena and Portia to enter. Although Helena and Portia fear drowning, experimentation, or execution, Helena decides they have no leverage and must obey. Portia seals her suit and clings to Helena as the two pass into the water.

The air bubble moves ahead of Helena, but Helena soon loses control in the low-gravity water and tumbles helplessly. A current carries Helena and Portia through a pipe and deposits them into a small transparent quarantine capsule suspended in a vast spherical chamber. Around them, hundreds of octopuses cling to structures or drift in the water, while an enormous window reveals a sprawling, intricate orbital habitat.

Helena tries to interpret the octopuses’ displays and realizes their society’s communication is even harder to parse than she imagined. Portia helps identify shifting factions whose members change constantly while their arguments persist, making Helena think of ideas or memes fighting through different bodies. Most factions seem angry, fearful, and hostile toward Helena and Portia, while quieter subgroups appear to hide their true signals beneath feigned public outrage.

The chamber rotates until the planet below comes into view, and the octopuses’ emotional displays become more unified in fear and revulsion. Screens magnify the surface, showing oceans fouled with dark organic slicks, animated foam, enormous shifting masses, and a colossal half-formed human-like face collapsing back into slime. Helena understands that the world has been overtaken by the same pandemic from Nod, and that this horror is what the octopus wardens feared when they destroyed her companions.