The Neptune Project

In a future where global warming and famines have devastated civilization, a repressive government called the Western Collective controls the remaining population through curfews and locator chips. Nere Hanson, a teenage girl with chronically weak lungs and painfully light-sensitive eyes, lives in the coastal fishing village of Goleta with her mother, Gillian, a marine biologist who secretly possesses telepathy, a rare and illegal ability. Nere has inherited this telepathy, which she uses to communicate with a pod of trained dolphins led by Mariah, a dolphin who can communicate in English. Nere's father apparently drowned two years earlier, and her older brother, James, disappeared on his sailboat a year ago.

One night, Nere's best friend Cam, a 15-year-old fisher boy, wakes her to help rescue smugglers whose boat was sunk by the Marine Guard. Using the dolphins' echolocation, they locate two survivors trapped in the sunken vessel and deliver them to Scarn, the leader of a smuggling gang. When they return to the harbor, Hycault, the local government official, catches them breaking curfew, but Gillian intervenes, citing her research authority. Back home, Nere discovers that Gillian maintains a secret underground lab filled with illegal computers and equipment, deepening her unease about her mother's hidden life.

The next day, a government deputy minister announces that everyone in Goleta and the nearby farming town of Santero must relocate inland due to poor crop yields and smuggling activity. The Marine Guard burns the fishing fleet to prevent escape. The relocation would be a death sentence for Nere, whose lungs deteriorate in dry inland air. Gillian rushes home and hurries Nere and Robry, Cam's younger brother, down into the secret lab. There, she reveals that Nere's father is alive, living in the Broughton Archipelago and building an undersea colony called Safety Harbor. Gillian and other geneticists participated in the Neptune Project, a secret initiative to create humans genetically engineered before birth to survive underwater. Nere, Robry, and Lena McFadden, a former friend of Nere's who shares her weak lungs and sensitive eyes, have all been altered. Robry, who has independently deduced the truth by studying his own body and learning about the Eugenics Wars, a past conflict tied to human genetic engineering, calmly accepts the news. Gillian injects each of them with a virus that triggers their final transformation: Dormant gill filaments activate, sweat glands shut down, vision adapts for underwater environments, and telepathic abilities switch on.

After a painful, sedated transformation, Nere wakes unable to breathe air. Gillian forces her head underwater, and after a terrifying moment, Nere discovers she can breathe seawater. She helps Robry and Lena through the same transition. Gillian removes their government-implanted locator chips, equips them with seasuits, spearguns, dive knives, and supply packs, and leads them by night to Tyler's Cove for a final goodbye with Cam. Cam tells Nere he will always love her and kisses her. Moments later, Hycault and soldiers charge down the hillside. Cam fights to buy them time but is shot and clubbed unconscious. As Nere flees into the water, Gillian steps between her daughter and a soldier's aimed rifle and is killed by the blast.

Underwater, Robry takes charge and guides them past Marine Guard divers. The dolphins tow them at high speed into a kelp forest, where they hide in caves. The Marine Guard drops depth charges, forcing them to flee. When divers surround Robry, Nere and Lena attack with spearguns while the dolphins bite air hoses and ram the soldiers. Dai, another Neptune Project kid with a large dolphin named Ton, appears and deploys a magnetic mine against the pursuing cutter, allowing them to escape.

Dai leads them to a group of six Neptune kids led by Kyel, a scarred boy raised among guerrilla fighters. The group includes Thom, a big, good-natured fighter; Tobin, a compassionate red-haired medic; his little sister Bria; and Ree, a tough former gang member from Los Angeles. Kyel threatens to leave the slower Lena behind, but Nere stands up to him, and the dolphins' ability to tow Lena resolves the conflict. Nere assigns each person a dolphin partner and teaches the group basic dolphin commands and towing techniques.

Near Santa Cruz Island, they rescue three more Neptune kids from a shark attack. One of them, Sara, has a spear dart in her shoulder. Despite Tobin's efforts, she bleeds out after the dart is removed. Before dying, Sara makes Nere promise to bury her on land. The burial party goes ashore at night, and Tobin sings "Ode to Joy" at the graveside. Nere realizes her transformation is permanent: She feels unbalanced on land and her lungs burn in the air.

The group gathers at the Alicante, a sunken freighter designated as the Neptune Project rendezvous point. Kyel establishes training routines, but conflict erupts when he and Penn, one of the rescued kids, advocate attacking a nearby Marine Guard vessel. The group votes to keep Kyel as leader while rejecting the attack plan. Dai privately warns Nere that Penn may act on his own.

Nere's brother James reappears, living alone on the Channel Islands. He reveals that his own genetic transformation failed: His gill filaments never activated, though he gained enhanced underwater vision and powerful telepathy. His telepathy is mutated, making him a "controller" who can implant thoughts in others' minds, a condition that forces him into isolation. He warns that their father's colony is under attack. Before they can discuss more, Penn steals a mine and sinks the Marine Guard vessel, triggering a massive military response.

In the ensuing battle, Pani, Ree's dolphin partner, is killed. James appears briefly, shooting divers from behind. Kyel takes a spear dart in the chest while shielding Bria. Dai deploys the group's last three mines against the attacking vessels, and the explosions allow them to escape. Kyel dies in a sea cave, making Nere promise to accept leadership when the group elects her. The vote is unanimous.

As their new leader, Nere guides the group north along the coast over several weeks. A giant squid attacks beyond the continental shelf, grabbing Thom. Penn shoots out one of its eyes, and Dai kills it with an explosive dart. Near San Francisco, dwindling supplies force Nere to trade with scroungers. An old trader named Crab sells them spear darts but reveals a wanted poster: The Western Collective is offering 1,000 dollars per Neptune kid, dead or alive. Smuggler boats ambush them, but Mariah saves the group by summoning a wild school of dolphins whose chaotic movements confuse the boats' sonar.

Romantic tensions complicate the journey. On Nere's birthday, Dai kisses her but then recoils in self-loathing and retreats into isolation. Tobin gives her a pendant that belonged to his and Bria's late mother and kisses her gently, but Nere realizes she cannot stop thinking about Dai. Tobin reads the truth in her eyes and steps back, promising he will always be there for her.

Days from Safety Harbor, the group encounters Wasp, the leader of a gang of strangely mutated underwater kids. Wasp has venomous sea-wasp stingers on her fingertips, and her companions include a boy with six arms and another who can deliver electric shocks. Nere negotiates safe passage, but Wasp's gang ambushes them that night. The electric boy incapacitates Dai, and Wasp seizes Bria, holding her venomous hand to the girl's throat. Wasp demands that Dai "come home." Dai, radiating anguish, agrees and joins Wasp's group without looking back, Ton trailing behind.

Nere pushes the shaken group to travel through the night. Hours later, they encounter a patrol from Safety Harbor, and a friendly girl named Janni escorts them through a bubble-wall perimeter, a barrier of bubbles that deters sharks and scavenger fish, into a thriving undersea community. Nere surfaces to find her father, Dr. Mark Hanson, working on a boat. He embraces her and explains that Wasp's group was created by Ran Kuron, a renegade geneticist who left the Neptune Project to pursue his own vision for humans in the sea. As Janni leads Nere and her companions into their new home, Nere takes in the caves, corals, and welcoming faces around her, carrying the weight of everything she has lost and the unresolved questions about Dai, Kuron, and whatever threats still loom over the colony.