They thought it over. They could jettison the Arkheia and leave the ocean to whatever had crawled forth. Or they could try to repair and quarantine—at enormous cost and with uncertain success. The canister’s telemetry came through: sealed, inert, and venting nothing. It would not come back to life.
Outside the hull, the ocean kept its secrets. Inside, life kept its own counsel. And somewhere, in an incubator converted to a terrarium, a juvenile curled under a heat lamp and dreamed of the ship that had not killed it—of a hand that had not struck, of a world that might, with care, still be saved.
The predator lunged. It was quick enough to erase thought. Metal screamed as Mara dove aside and the creature barreled into the reactor housing, tearing through wiring like ribbons. Sparks blossomed. She pulled her pistol and aimed for the throat—not to kill. Argent-blood sealed injuries fast; killing risked scattering biological agents. She squeezed; the impact stunned it, not dead, but rolling. She scrambled out and wedged herself into the service ladder.
They set to work. Days blurred into rotations, a litany of welds, sterilizations, and measured euthanasia where containment failed. The juveniles retreated into the quiet places and the larger predators, once a threat, became specimens under glass. Argent samples were locked into triple containment. The crew logged everything in precise, terraced files—each observation both a victory and an indictment.