The descent down the upright wall of the Kermadec Deep gap felt like rappelling into a bottomless chimney of black glass.
High-pressure nervous syndrome was an insidious enemy. At twenty-three thousand meters beneath the surface, the human central nervous system began to experience subtle synaptic delays. Tremors developed in the distal hands and feet. The optic nerves produced phantom flashes of white light as high-pressure cerebrospinal fluid pressed against the back of the eyes. Arthur Vance was only immune to the affliction because of the constant, sub-skin bio-spark filter humming through the neural electrodes of his Zeiss-Vanguard monocle, fed by Echo’s cryo-treated mucus.
Titus led the descent. His spade-like claws were locked into the upright dark rock face, using his earth-shaking mass to slow their fall. Attached to his rear harness was a braided cable woven from high-pulling stygian spider silk, supporting Arthur and the mobile outer edge cage.
Around them, the water column was filled with ghost fauna.
At these depths, the creatures of the deep had evolved beyond normal living symmetry. Semi-clear ribbon-fish with rows of needle-like teeth drifted past like strips of lit up parchment. Jelly-like deep-sea jellies, stretching fifty meters into the gloom, pulsed with faint orange bioluminescence, their stinging nets dangling uselessly against Titus’s impervious dark rock back shell.
