The Vats (Brine Lake)

An unusual hypersaline lake that formed close to the coastline, Brine Lake brought the first and founding colonial industry to the area. The city of Brinelake is named after it, though for more than a hundred years, the lake has been locally known as "The Vats", so named because of intense pollution caused by industrial runoff to the North. It was connected to the city's canal system until 1956, when the canals were officially closed and converted.

Many superstitions persist about Brine Lake and its surrounding neighborhoods. Many revolve around the lake and its relationship with the nearby traditionally low-income Shoreborough, known to locals as "Crime Park". Variously, the lake has been the subject of speculation regarding unsolved murders, mutation-causing chemicals, and ritual significance to old gods.

Biologists have long studied the lake for its unique flora and fauna, adapted to harshly polluted conditions. Recent study has centred around the lake's slow recovery after the intervention of the EPA in 1976.

Featured in: S1E2 House of the...