49 pages • 1 hour read
Kat FallsDark Life
Fiction | Novel | Middle Grade | Published in 2010A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Chapters 1-6Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 1 Summary
Ty explores the undersea in Coldsleep Canyon, what used to be Hudson Canyon before large portions of the coastline broke off and collapsed into the ocean. Ty knows he shouldn’t explore this area but does so anyways.
Ty sees lights and realizes green lantern sharks have seen his headlamp and will pursue him. While trying to escape he finds a submarine and hides inside until the sharks give up the chase.
Inside the sub, he finds a gruesome scene–blood all over the first room and empty weapon racks. He hears footsteps and prepares his weapon. He is confronted by a young girl, Gemma. Gemma’s freckles, lightened hair, and tan allow Ty to identify her as a Topsider, someone who still lives on land. Gemma thinks Ty is a ghost at first because of his glowing skin, but Ty informs her the shine comes from eating bioluminescent fish. Ty is a pioneer, one of the first children born under the ocean. Topsiders call them “Dark Life,” a name that pioneers dislike. Gemma admits that she has been trying to find her brother’s submarine using a rented vehicle and suit.
The teens’ meeting is interrupted by outlaws hooking chains to the submarine. Ty teaches Gemma how to use Liquigen, which prevents their lungs from collapsing in sea pressure, and he connects their suits with a tether before escaping just in time. With the outlaw trapped in the submarine and the other outlaws preoccupied with hoisting the submarine, the teens find each of their vehicles and escape. Ty offers to return her to the Trade Station; he must go there himself to report the submarine and outlaw activity.Gemma realizes that Ty’s ability to find her vehicle in the ocean dark is not “normal.” Ty tries to distract her, claiming any pioneer could have done it, but Gemma replies, “‘It’s true, isn’t it? […] What they say about pioneer kids down here.’ […] ‘Admit it,’ she said. ‘You have a Dark Gift’” (11).
Chapter 2 Summary
On the ride to the Trade Station, Ty denies Gemma’s claims about Dark Gifts. Gemma tells him about the child studied for his ability to speak to dolphins, and how the physician studying him claimed that growing up under the ocean caused his brain to develop differently than Topsider children.
Ty knows that rumors like these only increase the tension between Topsiders and pioneers, creating problems for his home called the Benthic Territory. Topsiders believe that such Dark Gifts are dangerous mutations. He tries to put Gemma off by saying that her parents wouldn’t think a Dark Gift was cool, even if Gemma does. Gemma tells Ty that her parents are dead; she is a ward of the Commonwealth.
Chapter 3 Summary
As the teens break the ocean’s surface, Ty experiences a headache from the brightness of the sunlight and colors. Brushing off Gemma’s concern, Ty dives for his mantaboard vehicle to alleviate his headache. The two race to the Trade Station.
Ty runs into his neighbor, Jibby Groot. Jibby wants a wife, so Ty unsuccessfully tries to keep Gemma away. Jibby tries to ingratiate himself, but Ty sends him off with a warning about being out and about at dark. Ty is surprised at how he wants to keep a girl to himself.
Gemma has been showing an old picture of her brother to anyone she runs into, but Ty claims that pioneers would be more likely to have seen him than fishers, so he offers to take Gemma down to a meeting where pioneers have gathered that day.
Ty spots Topsider “tourists” at the Trade Station and tries to steer Gemma away quickly. The tourists spot them.
Chapter 4 Summary
The two Topsider women approach Ty, asking questions about his skin and demanding to touch it, to see if the glow can be wiped off. Gemma helps Ty escape.
The teens move through the Topsider portion of the Trade Station to get to the elevator; Ty becomes increasingly uncomfortable as everyone stares at him. Gemma helps by grabbing his hand and leading him through the crowd. As soon as the elevator reaches the sub-sea levels, Ty relaxes.
As they approach the meeting, they hear raised voices. Sneaking in the back, they hear the pioneers sharing their complaints over taxation. The Commonwealth requires taxes be paid by food, something the Commonwealth sees as a kindness. Pioneers see the taxation as harmful since they could get far better prices for that food at market. The pioneers are also running low on Liquigen, having to use the Trade Station’s emergency supplies because the Commonwealth isn’t providing enough.
Benton Tupper, their representative, ends the grievances portion of the meeting to address the reason he had called the meeting: the Seablite Gang. The Commonwealth is coercing the pioneers to help capture the gang, dead or alive. With the Seablite Gang attacking supply ships, the Commonwealth won’t send any more supply ships including Liquigen. They are also taking away the only doctor the pioneers have, Doc Kuntze, and will cease subsidizing new homesteads. The Commonwealth will reconsider these actions if the pioneers demonstrate that they can maintain peace in their settlement by capturing the gang.
Ty is angry, particularly at the refusal to subsidize homesteads. He had his heart set on his own once he turns 18. His future as a pioneer under the ocean depends on being able to have his own land. When Ty cries out, his father, Pa, removes him from the meeting. Ty decides to wait to tell Pa about the submarine he had encountered. He claims Gemma wanted to see the homestead and asks if they can use the cruiser. Pa gives his permission, welcoming Gemma and commenting that it would be good for Ty to be able to spend time with another teenager for once.
Chapter 5 Summary
Ty and Gemma arrive at Ty’s home. Gemma observes their home with shock and awe. Gemma is accustomed to cramped apartments, so she is amazed by how much light they have in their home on the ocean floor. She cannot conceive how one family can use so much space.
Ty explains the crops they grow and the animals they keep, including land animals for milk and eggs. He also explains the family’s system for storing gear and keeping water from flooding their home.
The teens are frightened by the sudden appearance of a large snake-like ocean creature, but it seemingly dies. and Ty’s younger sister, Zoe, calls for him to help her bring the creature inside. Zoe wants to keep the creature, but Ty, thinking it is dead, tells her it will rot and stink up their home. Gemma notes that it doesn’t smell rotten, and both realize that it must not be dead just before it rises.
Chapter 6 Summary
Zoe tries to keep Ty from shocking or harming the snake-like creature while Gemma flees. It escapes from the room, upsetting Zoe.
The sight of Gemma’s knife brings Zoe back to the moment. She tells Gemma that Ty has many items like it and offers to show Gemma Ty’s room. Gemma is fascinated by nearly everything in the house. Zoe opens Ty’s door to reveal a room full of historical items that Ty restores and sends to museums. Ty finds them in the remains of land that slid into the sea. Given Gemma’s history and lack of possessions, Ty wonders if his collection is greedy.
Gemma tries on one of the crowns, noting that it makes one look special. Ty wonders to himself why anyone would want to look special, as he sees it as a euphemism for different and weird given his own experiences.
Gemma tells Zoe that she lives in a boarding house. She explains that she is looking for her brother so he can sign her emancipation papers, allowing her to leave.
A dark shape approaches quickly and runs into the home. Ty knows it is Hewitt, their neighbor; Ty does not know why Hewitt would run into the home, but he suspects something is amiss.
Chapters 1-6 Analysis
The first six chapters of Dark Life structure the narrative’s world to bring the reader into this post-apocalyptic setting, where what we know as the east coast of America is now part of a government called the Commonwealth. The opening chapters familiarize the reader with the pioneers’ way of life and their methods and tools for survival underwater, such as Liquigen, biosuits, and the farming and building techniques that Ty explains to Gemma. The setting’s tone is established through the worldbuilding; the ocean is often represented in fiction as something dark or frightening, but from Ty’s perspective the ocean is something to appreciate, full of light and beauty. In Dark Life, where land-living has become cramped and in some ways more dangerous, Ty views the ocean as safer and full of promise for the future. Gemma is the vehicle through which the reader learns about this world. As a Topsider, she knows little about pioneer life and how it works, so Ty must explain it all for her.
Conflict in these early chapters is established through the theme of Morality Versus Government Abuses: The government places the responsibility and costs of governance on regular people by removing all support for Benthic Territory and requiring them to capture the Seablite Gang in order to regain basic necessities. The pioneers’ argument with Representative Tupper and disagreement about the taxation system reveals several cracks in the relationship between pioneers and the Commonwealth. The Commonwealth uses Benthic Territory for its resources, but it maintains it as a colony rather than a state, limiting pioneers’ rights and carefully manipulating them for the mainland’s benefit. These issues parallel the conditions of the American Revolution, which also occurred largely on the east coast. The Commonwealth’s willingness to use their own citizens as fodder foreshadows the revelation of their experiments in later chapters.
Dark Life’s opening chapters set the stage for Ty’s journey toward Self-Acceptance in the Face of Prejudice. Ty reveals his discomfort with attention due to his distrust of others’ intentions. His distrust prevents him from realizing his own attractiveness, and he hides integral parts of himself—his Dark Gift—to avoid the prejudices of others. Ty hides his Dark Gift from Gemma from a sense of shame and a desire to preserve the reputation of pioneers.
The action of these opening chapters builds tension for the characters. The Seablite Gang and the Commonwealth are established as antagonists opposed to the desires of the pioneers. Ty and Gemma have a close call with the Seablite Gang when they flee the submarine where they meet, and the submarine’s bloody scene establishes a darker tone for the conflicts of the novel. The sudden appearance of Hewitt Peavey at the end of Chapter 6 builds fear and suspense as the reader is left without resolution within the chapter.
