Challenger Deep

Caden speculates that if he’d been born in another century, he would have been viewed as a shaman, or a prophet. His prognosis is better, given current technology, but he thinks he would prefer to be a prophet than a mentally ill kid. 

Raoul is a new kid in the therapy group. He hallucinates famous dead people, and Shakespeare in particular. Caden sits by him and asks him whether he feels like he is in one of Shakespeare’s tragedies or comedies when Shakespeare talks to him. He can tell that Raoul really thinks about the question, and he feels good for lightening Raoul’s dark thoughts. 

Caden grows tired of hearing Alexa repeat the details of her suicide attempt in therapy group. Today, when she tries, he interrupts and says that he has seen this movie before. He doesn’t think she should forget it, only that she needs to move on and figure out how to stop being a victim. Raoul agrees with him. Afterward, Carlyle tells Caden he was very insightful. Carlyle asks Caden whether he knows about his diagnosis. Caden has overheard Poirot use the words schizophrenic and psychotic when talking to his parents. 

Callie asks Caden to go for a walk with her, and she leaves the window. She worries that they will not be able to leave the hospital together. She makes him promise that they “free each other” when the time comes (216). 

Caden’s stomach hurts on the ship. The Navigator tells him it is a sign that the Abyssal Serpent is stalking them. 

Caden’s mother brought him eggplant parmesan that he ate after hiding it from the orderlies for a day. He believes that it’s what made him sick. Hal asks whether his parents might have tried to poison him intentionally. Caden has already had the same thought, but he knows that it might be paranoia. 

Caden is in the White Plastic Kitchen. Three people in masks are there, watching something claw its way out of Caden’s stomach. 

The Captain tells Caden that people who seem to be his friends are not and that Caden can’t trust anyone. 

Caden begins to see that some of his thoughts are irrational and delusional, but that sometimes he also has no choice but to believe them. He is concerned that Callie is getting better and will leave him. He prays for her to stay broken as long as he is. 

Caden’s parents bring Mackenzie to visit for the first time, and they try to build a house of cards together. Mackenzie asks Caden if the remembers the cardboard forts they built at Christmas. He does, and he asks if it’s Christmas time now. His father says that it’s almost summer. 

On the ship, Carlyle tells Caden that he was also institutionalized once, when he was 15. He was diagnosed as schizoaffective, which is a cross between bipolar disorder and schizophrenia. As long as he is on his medication, he has no problems working at the hospital. In his spare time, he designs computer games for a software company. 

The storm finally hits the ship. As the ship flounders, the Parrot tells Caden that it is time to kill the Captain. A wave washes a creature onto the deck. It has the upper body of a horse but no hindquarters. Its eyes are red, and its tail is coiled around a mast.

The Captain says that they are in Crestmare Alley and kills the creature with his blade. More Crestmares swarm the deck and begin biting the sailors. Three of them fight with the Captain. Caden grabs the Captain’s dagger and manages to kill the creatures that are attacking him. Then Caden hits the Captain with a board, knocking the peach pit out of his eye socket. He takes the key and runs to the forecastle.

After unlocking the padlock, he goes in and sees Calliope’s legs. He takes a wrench from Carlyle and undoes the bolts holding her. She escapes, and the Captain promotes Caden to Master of the Helm for saving them all. 

Callie is leaving. Carlyle gives Caden a flower, which Caden gives to Callie and writes his email address down for her. She says that she will miss him but that she is no longer looking out the window. 

Caden tells Dr. Poirot that he wants to leave the hospital, and Poirot suggests adjusting his medications instead. He agrees to leave Caden’s dosage as is for one more week before reevaluating. 

Caden goes to the crow’s nest with the Navigator, who says that he is a god in the process of becoming a constellation. He also says that he no longer plans on taking his cocktails. 

Without Calliope on the ship, Caden feels lost. The Navigator gives the Captain a map covered in zigzag lines, which pleases the Captain. He says Caden should follow the Navigator’s example and stop visiting the crow’s nest. 

The Captain gives Caden a pistol. He says that once he kills the Parrot, they will both be free. 

Caden recalls the stories of Hamlet, King Lear, and all of the psychosis present in each work. He wonders if Shakespeare wrote from experience. 

Caden sees two beasts fighting in the sea. The Parrot alerts them. The Navigator begins climbing the main mast and Caden knows he plans to jump. The beasts attack the ship. The Navigator jumps and disappears before he hits the sea. The beasts are calm. Caden shoots the Parrot because the Parrot did not stop the Navigator from jumping. Before the Parrot dies, he says that the Captain is not what Caden thinks he is. 

Caden tells his parents that Hal slit his wrists with the blade of Caden’s pencil sharpener. In his therapy group, Carlyle refuses to say whether Hal died or not.

Caden ponders the ethics of suicide. He thinks he would have killed himself if it weren’t for Mackenzie. He did not want her to have to live with his absence.

Poirot tells Caden that the hospital staff failed Hal. He will not tell Caden whether Hal is alive.

Caden’s parents ask if he wants to go to another facility, but he says no. He realizes that they are as helpless as he is to change what happened with Hal. 

The Captain tells Caden that one day he will be a captain, and that Caden alone will make the voyage to Challenger Deep. 

There is a new bartender in the crow’s nest, and Carlyle says he will no longer lead the group. Caden is upset that the administration might blame Carlyle for Hal’s self-harm, but Carlyle reassures him that there is more to the situation. 

Gladys is the new group facilitator. The patients tease her because they blame her for Carlyle’s disappearance.

Caden begins pretending to take his medication, hiding it in his cheek instead of swallowing it. 

Caden gives a breakdown of the effects and half-lives of antianxiety and antipsychotic medications. He knows that he will feel normal for a few days after stopping the medication “before you plunge headlong into the bottomless pit” (276).

The rest of the crew is gone; only Caden and the Captain remain. They reach a scarecrow in the sea. Beneath it is the deepest spot in the ocean: the Marianas Trench and Challenger Deep. 

The Captain tells Caden that he is jealous of him and prepares him for the descent. 

Caden rows to the scarecrow in a dinghy. The scarecrow is dressed in the clothes of Caden’s family. The Abyssal Serpent swims around them. Its whirlpool destroys the boat and Caden clings to the scarecrow. Then, Caden lets go and plunges into the vortex. 

Caden mourns the things he will never experience. He refers to the books he will never read, the movies that he will never finish, and the birthdays he will never have as “the overwhelming never” (286).

Caden reaches the bottom of the ocean and walks among piles of treasure. He sees the ghost of the Parrot. He finds a gold coin, and then realizes it is chocolate. All of the treasures are made of candy. 

Caden remembers visiting a Hershey’s store in New York. That day, he saw a homeless man with a Captain Crunch box on his head. One of his eyes was swollen shut. He asked Caden if it was true that birds don’t have heartbeats. Caden gave him a handful of chocolate gold coins from the store. His family joked about the man, but Caden felt unsettled throughout the day and never forgot him. 

Caden faces the Serpent: “It speaks in me in feelings, and it projects into me hopelessness of such immense weight, it could crush the very spirit of God” (296). The Serpent says that it will trap Caden with it for eternity, and keep his alive, unable to die. He remembers that once the Parrot told him the answer was in his pocket. Caden takes out the blue puzzle piece from Skye, drops the gold coin, and shoots toward the surface. 

Caden describes his belief that the labels given to diseases are like the labels given to the definitions provided by religion.

Caden wakes to find Poirot looking at him in his room. He admits he that he had stopped taking medications. 

Skye is discharged before Caden can return the puzzle piece, but then he realizes it is lost. He never learns whether Hal died. He never hears from Callie. Caden is released, picked up by his parents at 10:03 in the morning. They go to get ice cream together. At home, Mackenzie has tied a Mylar balloon shaped like a brain to the mailbox.

Caden was hospitalized for nine weeks. He meets his new doctor, Dr. Fischel, who prescribes his medications from then on. 

Caden dreams that he is on a boardwalk. He loses his family and sees a yacht in the water. He sees a well-groomed version of the Captain inviting him onto the ship. Caden declines. Caden knows that the Captain could catch him one day, and he could eventually lose his battle with the Abyssal Serpent. But it will not happen today.