The Citizen explains the First Pulse, which raised sea levels by ten feet over ten years after carbon burning used to fuel transport ships caused the ice at the poles to melt. Then, when CO2 levels continued to rise due to global warming, the sea level continued to rise because the warmed ocean water expanded. Currents sent the warm water to the Antarctic pole. The years of the greatest rise of the First Pulse were 2052-2061. The Second Pulse continued the problem, doubled sea level rise every ten years until the total rise in sea level plateaued at 50 feet.

The richest one percent of the world was able to afford property, but everyone else was left to scavenge along the drowned coastlines.

Mutt and Jeff have been on the bottom of the river for twenty-nine days. Jeff believes that anyone who investigates the glitch that resulted from his hack will find them in the ship: The people who put them there must have left some record. Now that Jeff has tapped into what Mutt calls the “dark pool” (148), someone will always be hunting them. Jeff finds a GPS chip implanted in him that is sending out a signal.