Above

The second installment in a series that began with Beneath, the novel opens with a newspaper article establishing the stakes: The FBI is conducting a nationwide manhunt for the Pod (People of the Deep), a domestic terrorist group led by Dr. Lawrence Oliver Dane, known as Lod. Decades earlier, Lod faked his death and led followers into an underground compound beneath Manhattan called the Deep. The Pod funded itself through a multimillion-dollar mushroom business, but now Lod and his senior followers, the Originals, have vanished, draining the organization's accounts.

Pat O'Toole, the narrator, waits inside Union Station in Portland, Oregon, for his older brother Coop and their companion Kate Dane, Lod's granddaughter. After escaping the Deep and providing the FBI with a dossier about the Pod, all three received cash and supplies from Alex Dane, Lod's estranged younger brother and a researcher at the New York Public Library. Alex instructed them to travel separately, change their appearances, and stay off the grid.

Kate arrives first and tells Pat she spotted two disguised Originals, Bill Ord and Bella, at a train station in Idaho, confirming the Pod is hunting them. As they eat at a restaurant inside the station, Kate spots Bella and Bill scanning the crowd. Pat devises a plan: Since the Originals have never seen his face, he will intercept Coop at the arriving train while Kate exits through the restaurant. Coop is nearly unrecognizable with dyed hair and contact lenses. A conductor he befriended leads them out a back exit. Meanwhile, an unidentified man intercepts Kate on the sidewalk outside.

When Pat and Coop reach the meeting point and Kate is missing, Alex appears and throws Pat's smartphone in the trash, explaining that Lod hacked Kate's text from Chicago. At the Multnomah County Library, Alex explains why he refuses to contact the FBI: He still partly shares Lod's political philosophy, Lod is his brother, and arresting low-level Originals would accomplish nothing because none of them know Lod's master plan.

A stranger delivers a handwritten note from Kate: She followed Bella and Bill to motor homes gathering at Nehalem Bay State Park on the Oregon coast. They buy a car and drive through the night. At the park, they find Kate's bicycle with a twisted front wheel.

Kate is struck by a car driven by LaNae Fay, a Pod operative, and wakes handcuffed inside Bella and Bill's motor home. Bella refuses LaNae's demand to execute Kate, insisting they need Lod's permission. Kate lies during interrogation, denying contact with Coop or Pat since New York. Lod orders the caravan to move via radio from his helicopter. Before the caravan departs, Kate leaves a note in the camp restroom listing the Pod's vehicles and their direction south on Highway 101.

Pat takes the wheel and heads south, tracking the caravan at gas stations. Alex buys a truck with a camper and boat trailer to change their vehicle profile. Kate's chapters reveal her relationship with Bella thawing; she pockets a notebook and pencil for leaving notes. At a roadside pulloff, Kate emerges from her motor home, recognizes Pat, and leaves a note confirming the caravan has 22 vehicles and that Lod directs operations from his helicopter.

The caravan enters the California redwoods. Lod takes Kate on a private walk and reveals he once planned to make her his successor but now considers her a traitor. He attaches an electronic ankle bracelet that will alarm if she moves more than 200 feet from Bella, warning that one violation means death. Kate learns the dreaded "mush room," a punishment chamber, never existed; it was a fabrication to enforce discipline.

Suspecting Alex is hiding something, Pat searches his backpack and finds a military-grade laptop, a satellite phone, a loaded revolver, and a small container holding what looks like a flash drive. He pockets the phone, bullets, and container. At the Humboldt State University library, Alex reveals that his daughter Rebecca married Lod's son Tom inside the Deep, making Alex Kate's biological grandfather. When Rebecca and Tom tried to leave with baby Kate, Lod murdered them during a lunar eclipse. Alex recovered, built a new identity, and spent years secretly leaving Kate books through a hidden entrance to the Deep.

After this confession, Alex disappears with the camper. In the abandoned boat trailer, Pat and Coop find LaNae Fay's body. Coop reveals he previously sent a postcard to FBI Agent Tia Ryan detailing their situation. Martin Holds, a retired Los Angeles police officer they met at Nehalem Bay, pulls over and offers to drive them to Humboldt Redwoods State Park.

Meanwhile, Lod has obtained a copy of the dossier that Pat, Coop, and Kate provided to the FBI. He confronts Kate at the campfire, exposes her lies, and has Bella restrain her inside the motor home.

At the park, Coop finds Alex wounded inside his camper. Carl, the Pod's giant Guard, emerges from Martin's vehicle with a shotgun, revealing that Martin has been working for Lod. Lod arrives, pays Martin, and shoots him dead.

Lod forces everyone into his motor home, where Kate is already handcuffed. Pat secretly activates the satellite phone and hits redial, hoping Agent Ryan will hear. The group speaks loudly about Deep Two Point Zero, broadcasting that the new compound is built inside a former mine. They arrive at a mine entrance filled with hibernating bats, pass through four sets of bombproof steel doors, and descend into a bright, multilevel facility. Pat, Coop, Kate, and Alex, whose shoulder has been treated, are locked in a transparent glass cube.

Lod addresses the compound, declaring they have surfaced to save the earth by dismantling modern infrastructure. Via live video, he boasts to Agent Ryan that the compound is impregnable, then demonstrates: He shuts down the US cellular network and satellite phones and announces the Internet and power grids will follow.

Inside the cube, Alex reveals the device Pat found is a "silver bullet," a custom malware system designed to destroy Lod's computers remotely. When the compound's technician cracks Alex's confiscated laptop, the device infiltrates the server through its Wi-Fi signal. The indicator light turns steady green, confirming the connection is live.

Lod enters the cube and announces he will execute all four prisoners. Alex holds up the glowing device and threatens to press it. Kate kicks Lod's pistol from his hand. Carl draws his own gun and turns it on Lod, refusing to follow orders. Alex presses the button, and the compound's servers die. Carl ties up Lod, and Alex uses Lod's master keycard to open the cube.

Kate leads them to Lod's private apartment and opens his safe using the same combination from the original Deep. Behind the safe, she finds a hidden escape shaft she recognized from one of Lod's secret planning notebooks—small books he kept filled with plans and drawings before burning them, fragments of which she had secretly retrieved over the years. Carl hoists the wounded Alex onto his shoulders, and they climb the ladder. Pat battles severe claustrophobia with every rung. At the top, Coop knocks free a manhole cap, and they emerge under a full moon during a lunar eclipse.

An epilogue three years later describes the aftermath. The FBI entered through the shaft and captured everyone. Lod and the Originals are in prison. Kate and Coop started a dog-training facility; Carl, granted immunity, lives above the kennel. Alex lives in Pat's attic. Pat attends Portland State University. On the evening of another lunar eclipse, Coop walks across a field carrying his and Kate's fourteen-month-old daughter, whom they have named Rebecca.