The Starless Sea explores whether a story’s outcome, and its twists and turns, are fated by the story’s structure or determined by the free will of those in the story. Zachary’s preconceptions about the nature of fate are challenged both by his experiences and by Fate herself.

An Emerging Media student, Zachary acknowledges early on that gamers want the comfort of knowing that they exist within a greater narrative, but he does not accept that real-life humans want this same assurance in the external world. When he finds Sweet Sorrows and sees his own story, as the son of a fortune teller who bypassed a door to the Starless Sea, he wants to uncover the storyline laid out for him. He wants to have confidence in his actions because he knows his fate, and he wants someone else to blame should there be consequences. Mirabel—who, ironically, is the personification of fate—confronts this viewpoint directly: “You want to think that you did or that you were supposed to but you always had a choice […] You don’t do anything until someone or something else says you can” (346).

Zachary ultimately chooses to take the elevator into the Harbor because he, like all who enter the Starless Sea, is seeking.