Prelude (Some time ago)
Far beneath the surface of the waves, steel finds its rest. Far below the point where the light fades away, iron decays. Rust and ruin form the ocean floor here, sunken remnants of fallen warships having found their rest, silent at long last. Even in places like this, life exists, fed by scraps from warmer waters; filter-feeders bloom on the steel of the wrecks, taking them precious meters closer to the falling snow that sustains them, while jaw-marked skeletons remain a record of the bounty their flesh brought to the deep. Life blooms from the grave, even in places like this.
And as life blooms, metal begins to stir from its endless rest. Iron remembers, and whispers of the past echo within broken hulls. And as ancient whispers resound within their steel prison, life blooms, and malice festers...
Much of what dies in the ocean is never seen by the land, dark waters claiming every scrap of flesh. Some however, finds its way onto the shore, to rot and decay in the sun. As such, the corpse of a whale washing up on the shores of an island in the south pacific is, unusual, but not particularly unremarkable. What is remarkable, is the way it seems to have died; vast chunks of flesh have been torn out of its body, craters in flesh bordered by strange tooth marks. Still, on it's own, this would not be too unusual. But this is not the only time this happens; as the weeks pass, more and more ocean life washes up on shores all around the world, all showing the same wounds, and fishing boats begin to report ever lessening hauls, while weather patterns shift, with the seas becoming more turbulent, and storms becoming more frequent and severe.
Something is wrong in the oceans.
To be caught in a storm at sea is a dangerous thing indeed, especially if unprepared. But such a risk is one that many fishermen have had to take lately, with lighter catches requiring longer trips in more dangerous waters to get enough fish to keep the lights on. For many of them, their luck runs out, and they find themselves struggling to keep their vessels afloat as the waves crash on deck. Some manage to make it to shore safely. Other sailors find themselves dragged beneath the surface, precious air spilling from their lungs as they try to swim from the wreckage as it pulls them down with it. None succeed, darkness creeping in at the edges of their vision as their bodies grow too heavy to move, with the last sight they see the surface far above them… and the ghostly green lights rising up to greet them from the depths, bodies of black metal, nightmarish jaws opening wide.
With the seas becoming more dangerous, it was inevitable that people would try and uncover the source of the changes. Under the sea, a drone descends, lowered down from a research vessel at the surface, searchlight illuminating the inky depths. Even at the seabed, so far from the sunlight, life exists. But not here. The only thing to find here is death, slow and choking; vast lakes of brine flood the ocean floor, trickling over the lip of the pools it's formed and flowing deeper into the oceans heart.
There shouldn't be this much brine here; it's normally found only as small pools a couple of meters across, but the lakes here are dozens of meters across, and far deeper than just a rockpool, all surrounded by the corpses of sealife that strayed too close to the lifeless water.
And in the centre of one lake, the searchlight illuminates something impossible; a single human arm, reaching out of the brine towards the distant surface, not a single mark on its pale flesh. And as the drones camera turns towards it, the hand twitches.
The drone inches closer, trying to get a better look at this impossible sight, as clamour fills the ship above.
Closer.
Closer
Too close.
The arm moves, hand grabbing the drone. Cracks spread across the cameras lens the hand begins to squeeze/ Blue light shines from beneath the brine as something begins to pull itself up and out. Panic fills the research vessel as the camera shatters. Engines roar in a desperate attempt to run.
It's not enough.
Visible only to the frantic pings of the sonar, things rise up from the deep, growing ever closer to the fleeing ship.
The ship never makes port, and only three traces of it are left behind; scattered wreckage on nearby beaches. A garbled distress call screaming about monsters, before being sharply cut off. And a single image, captured in the last moments of the submersibles camera; a human figure pulling itself up out of the brine pool, dull metal grafted onto pale flesh, and a glowing blue eye concealed behind a bone-white mask.