Miranda works as an administrative assistant at Neptune Logistics in Toronto, outside her boss Leon Prevant’s mostly closed office. With little to do beyond managing itineraries forwarded by Thea, she spends long stretches sketching her long-running graphic-novel project, Station Eleven, while feeling out of place next to Thea’s corporate polish and increasingly aware that she prefers the office’s calm to her cramped apartment with her boyfriend, Pablo.

She outlines the world of her project: Dr. Eleven and other rebels live on Station Eleven, a moon-sized station damaged so it is perpetually twilight, with most land reduced to islands. A faction called the Undersea longs to return to Earth and threatens sabotage; Miranda draws a scene with Dr. Eleven and his mentor, Captain Lonagan, and imagines a full-page spread of a mechanical seahorse carrying an Undersea rider beneath alien constellations.

During the afternoon, Pablo calls Miranda at work and berates her about her hours and “the corporate machine,” then reveals his real aim by calling the office line to confirm she is there. Miranda, angered and bored by his accusations despite paying their rent, ends the call by setting the receiver down and ignores his follow-up email and texts.

Arthur Leander calls Miranda’s cell phone and asks to see her again; Miranda proposes dinner, and Arthur rearranges his plans to accept. Miranda does not warn Pablo, finishes a small task for Leon, and keeps drawing her Undersea scenes, thinking about how the Undersea spends life waiting for life to begin.

At dinner, Arthur listens with genuine interest as Miranda explains how childhood comics led her to the form and to the creation of Station Eleven’s “beautiful wreckage.” Outside afterward, Miranda tells Arthur she is breaking up with Pablo, and Miranda and Arthur go to Arthur’s hotel together. After a night together and escalating texts from Pablo, Miranda replies that she is staying with a friend, then feels giddy freedom when Pablo tells her not to come home. At dawn Miranda returns to the apartment, packs two suitcases, leaves quickly, and prepares at Neptune’s gym, while she and Arthur quietly begin making plans and Arthur asks if Pablo might react dangerously.