The ascent in the Nereus IV is a slow, agonizing crawl through the crushing dark.
The cabin smells of recycled oxygen, copper blood, and the sharp, chemical stench of the shatter-round propellant. The titanium hull groans and shrieks under the immense, shifting pressure of the Mariana Trench, a constant, deafening reminder of the millions of tons of water trying to crush us into a sphere of meat.
I sit on the floor of the command module, my back pressed against the cold bulkhead. My left side is soaked, the freezing ocean water from my suit breach seeping into my thermal underlayer. My teeth are chattering so violently I can barely keep my jaw clenched, and my vision is swimming in a sea of gray static. Hypothermia is setting in, a slow, creeping numbness that starts in my fingertips and
