10:45 Hours. The San Nicolas Basin.
The MC hovered at 1,200 meters. The ROV buzzed a hundred meters above, its floodlights cutting through the bathypelagic dark. He didn't look at it with a "hello." He looked at it the way a shark looks at a diver—tracking the movement, calculating the threat.
His red markings weren't "signaling"; they were flaring because his internal temperature was spiking as he adjusted to the massive pressure of the deep. To the ROV, he just looked like a bioluminescent nightmare.
10:47 Hours. NOAA Regional Lab.
"He's not moving," Dr. Elena Thorne whispered, her eyes glued to the monitors. "He's just... drifting. Aris, look at those pectoral fins. They aren't flippers. Those are jointed limbs. If those claws are functional, this thing can grab onto the seafloor."
The high-definition feed showed the MC's golden eye. It was huge, cold, and fixed on the ROV's light. There was no "handshake." The creature simply tilted its massive head, its white chin spikes catching the glare.
"He's massive," Aris breathed. "The Square-Cube law should be crushing him, but he's holding perfect buoyancy. Look at the water around his skin—it's shimmering. Like a heat haze, but underwater."
10:50 Hours. The Trench.
The MC felt the ROV's presence as a series of high-frequency electrical hums. It was annoying. He didn't nudge it; he simply swiped a massive, winged fin through the water. The sheer displacement sent a surge of turbulence that knocked the ROV off balance, tumbling it through the dark.
He wasn't trying to be friendly. He was clearing his space.
He turned away from the mechanical buzzing and dove deeper. He reached the basalt floor at 1,800 meters. There was no "plan" with the old Navy junk scattered in the silt; to him, the abandoned array was just more debris in a graveyard of human waste.
He headed straight for the hydrothermal vent. The superheated, mineral-thick water billowed out in black clouds. As a biologist, he knew this environment should kill almost anything. But as he settled his 30-meter bulk near the vent, he didn't feel pain. He felt a deep, heavy pull in his gut—a biological need for the minerals and the heat.
He settled into the silt, his square claws digging into the basalt to anchor himself against the currents. He closed his eyes, his red markings pulsing a deep, angry crimson as he began to "feed" on the thermal energy, acting exactly like the apex deep-sea organism he had become.