The world of Gate Six

Calder

Calder is a city of nine million that should have drowned a century ago. A sea wall keeps it dry. The rich live up in the Lift, offices and CivicGuard fill the Shelf, and everyone else lives in the Sump, where the water comes in through the floors.

Places, powers and one pebble

A flooded street of timber shacks, iron stairs and washing lines, with a noodle bar glowing in the rain and the sea wall rising behind.
Sea level

The Sump

Flooded streets, walkways, noodle bars, iron stairs. Rain that never stops.

A tram with lit windows passes under a concrete viaduct between grey office blocks in heavy rain, a fortress-like gate at the end of the street.
The middle

The Shelf

Offices, trams and CivicGuard.

A lone figure in a dark coat on a rain-soaked concrete terrace between two towers, with the sea wall and a flooded city far below.
High ground

The Lift

Towers, Morrow-Kade, money. Dry shoes.

A colossal sea wall in the rain above a flooded district of stilted shacks, a sluice gate marked 6 in its base.
Nine million kept dry

The Wall

Nine million kept dry. Its gates are numbered.

A tall oval window hanging in a rain-wet alley, showing a pale, dry street, with a lone figure in a long coat standing before it.
Between worlds

The Shear

The space between parallel Calders.

A bare corporate lobby high in a tower, a lone figure watching the rain-lashed city far below.
The franchise

Morrow-Kade

The franchise that owns the rain.

A pebble-sized device glowing amber in an open palm.
The navigator

Fair Weather Friend

A pebble-sized navigator with terrible news about your odds.

These pages come from the world of Gate Six. The first two chapters of Low Water, a Rook story, are free to read.

The sea always collects.

Read a Rook story, free