On the second day of Ursis, the waves reached our front steps at High Tide. By Low Tide the water was so far gone that we could see distant shipwrecks from the observatory. The orderlies worked day and night to move our equipment upstairs, before fleeing the Peninsula for higher ground.
The next morning, the waters drowned the first floor and cut off those who remained. There were only five of us, the senior scientists, the most renowned researchers on the planet. We were the world's greatest hope, trapped in a water-bound fortress.
We continued our work amidst the rising waters. We monitored the hurricanes developing over the Ocean, long chains of storms that fed on each other before battering the Shore. When the earthquakes started, we tracked their magnitude as they progressed along the Chasm. We sent our predictions to the Council, and in return we received maps of the planned evacuations. We slept in shifts, and each time we woke another city was gone.
At least, for once, it was easy to chart the Tides. The three of us who were Oceanographers had abandoned our posts completely. The observatory was closed to the howling winds, and the astronomical equipment sat unused. It would only tell us the one thing we knew anyway: the Alignment was upon us.
On the eighth day of Ursis, the water burst through the second story windows. Amnion went down to salvage some equipment and was swept away by the receding current. He was gone before we could say a word. We quietly moved our remaining tools up another floor, abandoning what we couldn't carry or use. Amnion was our only seismologist, so we left his machinery behind.
We lost communication with the Council on the tenth day of Ursis. The battering winds had finally snapped the only external feature of the fortress, the communicator to the outside world. Our work had saved millions, but now they were flying blind. The Council would employ their second-rate meteorologists, kept safe in the heart of the Continent, but their knowledge and equipment were no match to ours. To truly understand the Ocean, we had to be a part of it.
There was nothing left for us to do, but we did something anyway. Each day we faithfully charted the Tides and the storms, using whatever equipment we could still operate without power. We documented our findings in great thick binders that we locked away in waterproof safes. We knew that even if we did not survive, the fortress would. Our best measurements told us that it had already withstood three Alignments. If any shred of civilization survived, they would come here to rebuild.
On the fourteenth day of Ursis, the Alignment happened. Larios, Eurios, and Arkios unified in our sky, blocking all light from Helios. Even within the fortress, the world went dark. The earth shook, the water roared, and the wind howled around us. During the ten minutes of the Alignment, we measured nothing and simply prayed.
We knew from our predictions that the eye of a storm would sweep overhead just as the Alignment was ending. Against all of our advice, Samara climbed up to the observatory and pulled the lever to open the dome. It split to reveal the darkened sky and swirling clouds. From the stairwell, we caught a fleeting glimpse of the moons separating and the sun shining through. Then a gust of wind carried Samara away without a sound. Her last act was to grasp the lever, and the dome closed up behind her, blocking out the sunlight once more.
The three of us that remained turned back to our charts and measurements. The waters receded and returned to their chaotic Tides. The earth groaned and shifted, settling into its new topology. And on the first day of Sendis, we opened the dome again and returned to charting the skies. Eurios and Arkos traveled west together, but Larios arced away into southern skies.
Two years later, the orderlies found us. By then only Erthus and I were left, and we had used up almost half the supplies. The orderlies set about restoring the power, and they told us how the Continent had fared. Less than half the population had survived, but most of the Council and almost two-thirds of the apprentices were alive and well. They arrived on a ship several days later.
I stayed at the fortress, the only one to do so, to teach the apprentices and restore the supplies. The next Alignment would not be for thousands of years, but it would take that long to prepare. Generations would come and go, and each would do their duty to weather the next storm.
The first time that my apprentice charted a year of Tides correctly, I knew that my work was done. She would become the next Head Oceanographer, and she would train future generations of scientists. They would have forgotten the experience of this Alignment, but they would have learned how to survive the next one.
It is not a comforting thought, as I look past the dome and out to the endless waters. Society is still recovering almost four decades later, and we have lost so many things forever. Every night, that brief glimpse of the sun haunts my dreams. I see now why Samara opened the dome, and why Amnion went down to the second floor. It's time for me to join the others and return to the Ocean. The world must take its first steps toward forgetting.