Part 7, Chapters 50-53 Summary

In chapter fifty, Floyd sends a message to Caroline, informing her that he is getting ready to enter hibernation, and that he hopes whatever happens on his return is best for Chris. He also tells her that Jupiter is more or less destroyed from the monolith's self-replication. Chandra is already designing HAL 10,000. He is in the middle of explaining to Floyd that he had disconnected his blackout device on Hal months ago when Sasha suddenly cries out in alarm.

In chapter fifty-one, it is revealed that an alien race has been attempting to breed intelligence all over the galaxy for a very long time now, and that they are the ones responsible for the monoliths. They were also responsible for human intelligence, and have long since transformed themselves into beings of pure energy.

In chapter fifty-two, Dave Bowman returns...