The Infinite Sea

Cassie is a protagonist in the novel. Although she is less prominent in The Infinite Sea, she is the primary protagonist throughout the entire series. She is a 16-year-old girl. She lost her mother during the first Waves of the invasion, then escaped with her younger brother, Sam, after their father was killed at Camp Ashpit.

Throughout the novel, Cassie is largely defined by her relationship with Evan, as all her actions center around finding and saving him. At the start of the novel, she refuses to leave the hotel despite the obvious danger, insistent that Evan is going to return to them. Then, when Grace attacks, she refuses to accept Evan’s plan to stay behind and kill her by destroying the hotel. In this way, Cassie is contrasted with the often cold, calculating nature of the other characters in the novel. Because Ben, Sam, Ringer, and the others were trained by the military, they often lack the emotional attachment that Cassie demonstrates when she stops Ben from killing Megan and repeatedly emphasizes the importance of their humanity.

Cassie’s internal conflict over her relationship with Evan is a microcosm of the larger conflict between humanity and the Others. Because she and Evan both believe that Evan is an Other inside a human body, they each grapple with their romantic feelings for someone on the opposite side of the war. In this way, their relationship exemplifies the theme of Love as Both Strength and Vulnerability: While their love motivates them, it also hinders them. This idea reflects the larger issues at stake for humanity. Because of the psychological manipulation of the Others, the human survivors struggle to trust each other and to understand whom they should be loyal to and why—just as Cassie constantly oscillates between love and distrust for Evan.

Ben is a 17-year-old boy and the former leader of Squad 53 before they escaped and destroyed Camp Haven. Before the arrival of the Others, he was a popular student at Cassie’s high school and a football star. He is described by several characters as being attractive with a striking smile, and Cassie had a crush on him when they were in school. At Camp Haven, Ben meets Sam and takes him under his wing, serving as his mentor and protector. As a result, he has a bond with Sam throughout The Infinite Sea that Cassie struggles to understand. Sam, Dumbo, and Poundcake unquestioningly follow all of Ben’s orders, allowing him to command them even after Squad 53 has dissolved. His charisma and bravery, defined by his willingness to risk his life to save his squadmates, make him a strong leader, though he often turns to Cassie and Ringer for advice and relies on their intelligence. Throughout much of the novel, Ben is hindered by the gunshot wound that he asked Ringer to give him so that he could infiltrate Camp Haven, a fact that makes him a relatively minor character. However, he is still valuable to the survivors, as he uses his quick thinking and his skills as leader to help them survive Grace’s assault and escape the hotel.

Evan is a point-of-view character in The Infinite Sea. At the age of 13, he believed that his Other consciousness woke up inside his human body. When Cassie meets him, he is a Silencer, an Other assassin who kills remaining human survivors. When he shoots Cassie, however, he helps her heal and ultimately falls in love with her. As a result, he struggles with a conflict between his love for Cassie and his identity as an Other. Although it is revealed that this is a lie and that Evan is really an augmented human, he has not learned this fact yet by the novel’s end. Instead, he continues to grapple with his feelings for Cassie, choosing to stop Grace and remain loyal to Cassie and the rest of humanity instead.

In many ways, Evan serves largely as a plot device throughout The Infinite Sea. He is the reason the characters remain in the hotel, even though they are unsure if he has survived or will return. When Megan arrives, Evan regains consciousness just in time to tell them about the incinerator implanted in her throat. He knows about Grace’s safe house and the plan to send an escape pod to her, giving Cassie and her friends an end goal. In this way, he serves largely as a source of information for Cassie and the Others, while—despite his point-of-view chapter—he remains a largely flat character. While he is driven by his love for Cassie, he does little physically in the way of helping her in The Infinite Sea because of his injuries; instead, he gives Cassie and Ben the tools and information to help themselves. At the novel’s end, he unexpectedly survives the explosion at the hotel just as he did at Camp Haven, returning to Cassie and Ben.