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There is a ship on the horizon. I can see it from the kitchen window, even through the storm. It has arrived one day too late to save a great many of the species in that vault. But it may have come in time to save a man’s life. It will be full of naval officers. I can tell them where he is and they can retrieve him, and I won’t have to go back down there. I am shaking with the relief of it.

I need to take the quad back for Dom and Orly, but first I unpack my load of containers. Our freezer is just about full. Both Raff and Fen are there, making space for this last lot. The only way we’ve been able to pack them in tightly enough is to follow Fen’s idea of removing them from their containers and storing the little plastic bags of seeds. They help me open my last containers and take the precious bags out, placing them gently on the piles. I look at these seeds, pausing to note that the bag I have just placed on top contains something rather extraordinary looking, and not what I was expecting. The wrinkly seed seems to sit within a hood, a great draping hood that curves around like a papery moth wing, and then at its base is a long needlelike point. The shape of the whole thing is that of a sickle, and this hood is so fine—parchment thin—that light travels through it, illuminating the delicate filaments and giving the illusion of movement. I stare at it, taken aback by its loveliness, and then I look at the label. Pterocymbium tinctorium (Malvaceae)—or the melembu, from Indonesia. I don’t know what this name means; it could be any kind of plant.

I look at another packet, also strange. A walnut-shaped seed is covered in long, thick, blond hairs that stand on end, a child’s drawing of a golden sun. The Aulax pallasia (Proteaceae)—or the needle-leaf featherbush from South Africa. Again, no idea what this is; I have read Hank’s list a few dozen times, scanning my eyes over the seemingly endless and incomprehensible Latin names in search of containers to collect and move, and neither of these is remotely familiar. Doesn’t mean much really, there were too many names for me to memorize of course, but a thought starts tugging at the back of my mind.

I look at more of the seeds, now exposed.

There are the Wollemi pine seeds, and the common dandelion seeds. I know those two and I’m not surprised by them, but the next looks like a weapon. It is covered in sharp tusks or antlers, and it’s called a Cullenia ceylanica from Sri Lanka. There is a seed that looks like a jellyfish, with a hood and several long tentacles. There is one with two chambers, both an impossibly vibrant and deep inky-blue color. One that is long and curling and snakelike. One that looks like a pineapple. Another like a wiry bird’s nest. They are strange and otherworldly and I was not expecting their beauty. They don’t look anything like seeds as I know them. When I reach a packet containing the Banksia grandis , from Australia, I know what this is—it is a giant banksia—and I know what he’s done.

“What’s wrong?” Raff asks me, because I am standing in the freezer, staring at the sea of seeds around me.

“Nothing,” I say.

As I approach the beach, I can see my hope was in vain—that ship is too far out. It will take time for them to prepare and load their Zodiacs, to reach us, to understand. The weather might even be too rough to disembark at all. The air shaft will be starting to fill.

Dom is loading the Frog with tools. I kill the bike’s engine and jump off. Shout through the rain. “What are you doing?”

“I’m going back,” he yells, with a shake of his head like he can’t believe he’s doing it.

“Where’s Orly?”

Dominic straightens. He frowns, and meets my eyes, and in the space of a moment I see a universe pass through him. “He was with you,” he says. “He told me he was going on your boat.”

He sees the answer in my face. Orly told me the same thing.