Robert, a code breaker, is pressed into naval service on a submarine. He escapes several times and lives for a spells at a time in foreign lands, even starts a few families. But the submarine always catches him. After each recapture he has to sit and listen to the captain make a speech about the importance of their mission, and watch him drink a glass full of half-rotten plankton. Part of the speech always covered how the eskimos would let their meat rot for a bit to season it. He called te plankton “aged.” Then the speech would move on to how key Robert was to their mission, to the future of the mother country, indeed to the future of humanity. Once they got the message they were waiting for, Robert was the only one who could decode it. But the message never came, and Robert began to wonder if their mother country existed anymore.
