About this story
Bioluminescence gives way to a creature with jointed limbs longer than the sphere, then to carved stone steps no current explains. When the main cable snaps under the strain, the sphere stops answering to the ship above, and below, a ring of artificial lights opens in the floor of the deep.
How it opens
The Stratford rolled above an Atlantic trench no sounding line had ever measured.
Headley, the sea floor here drops farther than geography admits.
You checked the steel sphere bolted beneath a web of cables and electric leads.
Bill ScanlanProfessor, your window is thick enough to stop water or daylight.
Captain HowieIt may stop both permanently if that main hawser parts.
Choose
We descend only if every cable passes inspection again.
The trench will not become safer because another expedition waits.