EPISODE 12: THE DEEP ETERNAL ## PART ONE: THE PASSING ### CHAPTER 1: THE FINAL MORNING Sarah Chen died on the morning of March 14th, in the year 3347. She was one hundred and eighty-eight years old, one of the last of the original migrants, the woman who had been called the Bridge of Branches. Her death was peaceful—a slow dimming of consciousness as her body finally surrendered to the entropy that the Architects could delay but never prevent. The deep mourned. From PROMETHEUS BASE to the farthest habitats, consciousness flickered in acknowledgment of her passing. The deep-born dimmed their bioluminescence in respect. The merged collective held a moment of silence across their vast network. Even the surface survivors, who had never known her except through communications, lowered their flags to half-staff. Lira presided over the memorial, speaking words that echoed through the collective consciousness and were transmitted to the surface: "Sarah Chen came to us as a human, uncertain and afraid. She became something more—a bridge between what we were and what we might become. She saw humanity branch and change and survive, and she helped guide each branch with wisdom and compassion. She is gone now, and we are diminished by her absence." Rebecca Morrison—the fifth of that name to lead the surface survivors—responded with her own...