The Nereus does not explode.
There is no fire, no shattering of metal, no violent displacement of water. One second, the sleek, black hull of the UN submersible is bobbing in the swells a mile offshore. The next second, it is simply gone.
Where the submarine had been, the ocean surface is perfectly, terrifyingly flat. It is not a hole in the water; it is a hole in reality. A perfect, hexagonal patch of absolute nothingness, roughly fifty yards across, hovering just above the waves. The water does not rush in to fill the void. The wind does not blow across it. It is a blind spot in the universe, a geometric erasure that consumes light, sound, and existence itself.
I stare at it, my breath trapped in my throat. The psychic scream of the earth is so loud it feels like a physical blade driv
