Speaker 1: M follows the production of my R Radio. This episode
Speaker 1: contains depictions of drug use and mild violence. The second
Speaker 1: oil age, Jack's was dead. I stripped her of her
Speaker 1: skin suit. The blood from her shattered nose dribbled through
Speaker 1: the lines in her face. It pulled in the sutured
Speaker 1: wound down her cheek. Bruising and fingertip contusions on her
Speaker 1: throat told the story of her death. As I pulled
Speaker 1: one of her arms out of this suit, I glimpsed
Speaker 1: to name and date tattooed on her shoulder. I tried
Speaker 1: to block it out, to banish it to the uncertainty
Speaker 1: of peripheral vision, but the math was too easy, ramifications
Speaker 1: too tragic, even with someone like her. My hands trembled
Speaker 1: as I pulled the last leg free. I longed for
Speaker 1: a shot of basilisk to wash it all away. The
Speaker 1: fit wasn't perfect, but the suit would work. I grabbed
Speaker 1: her communit and left the spent squid gun where it lay.
Speaker 1: One of the twin plexiglass pods had already been emptied
Speaker 1: by Hoffman, I imagined. I checked the other pod and
Speaker 1: expected to find a Utex pressure suit inside, or something
Speaker 1: like Thetis's get up. But this was even more alien,
Speaker 1: more alive. It looked like a cross between a suit
Speaker 1: of SA m R I armor and a mollusk open
Speaker 1: wide to receive a humanoid form. The material looked neither
Speaker 1: solid nor liquid, The outer surface dark and covered with
Speaker 1: shell like bumps and walls. The pink, spongy interior left
Speaker 1: little doubt of its organic nature. I knew what it was.
Speaker 1: Marsh had mentioned Fukeland's disappearance in a portion of the proteus.
Speaker 1: This was the Triton biotechnic repurposed as a pressure suit.
Speaker 1: It made sense. No human technology would enable a seafloor
Speaker 1: walk this deep down, not for landsfolk anyway. Numerous fears
Speaker 1: tumbled through my mind. How was it activated? Would it
Speaker 1: fit me? Was it safe? But I didn't have time.
Speaker 1: It was this or nothing, the embrace of a living
Speaker 1: pressure suit, or certain death in the tunnels beneath that us.
Speaker 1: I slid open the plexiglass and watched tiny tube feet
Speaker 1: and polyps rise up from the inner meat of the suit,
Speaker 1: as if reaching for my body. I took a deep breath,
Speaker 1: turned and backed into its embrace. The appendages crawled over me,
Speaker 1: pulling the suit into position. The proteus grew around my body,
Speaker 1: enclosing me like an iron maiden of amorphous flesh. I
Speaker 1: realized the Tritons must have used something similar to bring
Speaker 1: me down. It felt familiar. It hurt, but for only
Speaker 1: a moment, the suit seemed to shift and adjust to
Speaker 1: my size and shape, even my injuries. It hardened around me.
Speaker 1: I felt soft pressure against my nose and mouth. Then
Speaker 1: I was breathing again. Everything went dark for a moment,
Speaker 1: then swelled back into existence. I don't know if I
Speaker 1: stared through transparent tissue or if the proteus connected with
Speaker 1: my mind somehow, but I looked down at my hands,
Speaker 1: now seamless gauntlets of crustacean armor. I stepped out of
Speaker 1: the pod. I grabbed the wheel of the airlock and
Speaker 1: gave it a turn, then another. I glanced one last
Speaker 1: time down the tunnel for sign of Thetis or Triton pursuers,
Speaker 1: but there was only Jacks's crumpled corpse, her daughter's name
Speaker 1: gleaming back at me in the harsh light. I threw
Speaker 1: open the hatch and jumped down the well of depressurized water.
Speaker 1: The hatch closed after me, and the chamber flooded. It
Speaker 1: pressurized in less than a minute. The suit didn't so
Speaker 1: much as groan but SALTI. We can't live in a
Speaker 1: san cat though. We're not even gonna do when attack
Speaker 1: comes in. It's o Kape Valley. I built another than
Speaker 1: cattle ands at the proof Forlorman about Sauti, it's not
Speaker 1: how living on her surface works. The seawater keeps wating
Speaker 1: because of climate cheek nursery. That's a fearmongering by anti
Speaker 1: energy obstruction is who you? You don't want to live
Speaker 1: in the castle. I ne cheve in it where it's dry,
Speaker 1: but her pass for you. You have salt water, dude,
Speaker 1: and we can still be playing them make My name
Speaker 1: is Tabitha Vail, and I'm leaving this recording on a
Speaker 1: dead man switch for release at the eating of the Mess.
Speaker 1: I want there to be evidence of where I went
Speaker 1: and why I did it. I've arranged passage to Atlas station,
Speaker 1: the DX Degrade station. There's a high probability I'll wind
Speaker 1: up in custody, and I'm uncertain what steps they might
Speaker 1: take to silence the press. But there's a story there
Speaker 1: that needs to be told. They're listening to this, they're
Speaker 1: aware of my journalistic focus what it means to be recombined,
Speaker 1: or to be landsfolk, or on whichever side of all
Speaker 1: of the other lines in the sand we used to
Speaker 1: turn human against human, on what continues to divide us
Speaker 1: in a time when connection might just be enough to
Speaker 1: save us, and on the rare corners of society we
Speaker 1: actually foster connection. Atlas, It's one of those places. I've
Speaker 1: obtained passage aboard a cargo sub and I have limited
Speaker 1: arrangements on Alice. I'm depowering my community for the journey.
Speaker 1: Hopefully this message will prove unnecessary. Thank you for believing
Speaker 1: in me and in a better world. I emerged in
Speaker 1: new absolute darkness, the very darkness. I realized that covers
Speaker 1: most of the Earth. Eternal midnight is the true norm
Speaker 1: on our planet, interrupted by occasional sunlit shallows and the
Speaker 1: rise of continents. The surface is but a fraction. I
Speaker 1: took a step into the unknown and felt rock and
Speaker 1: mud slide beneath my feet. Panic shattered through me, and
Speaker 1: then a lamp bloomed to life somewhere above my head,
Speaker 1: casting a meager sphere of bio illumination in the thick,
Speaker 1: gloomy waters. The glow was enough to reveal the airlock
Speaker 1: hatch set in the jagged outcropping above my head, as
Speaker 1: well as the small cliff upon which I stood. Utter
Speaker 1: emptiness yawned beyond the trench, plummeting hatal depths. I backed
Speaker 1: away from the brink, my limbs moving as if in jelly.
Speaker 1: I turned toward the adjacent cliff side and noticed first
Speaker 1: one reflector topped steak, then another marking the path of ascension,
Speaker 1: a narrow, snaking trail up the side of the great trench.
Speaker 1: I turned and followed. Visibility was limited. The bioluminescence revealed
Speaker 1: no more than three stakes at a time. I had
Speaker 1: no way of telling how far ahead Hoffmann had gotten,
Speaker 1: or how far up I had to climb to reach
Speaker 1: the plateau. So I plodded along the suit, seeming to
Speaker 1: augment my steps just enough to prevent outright exhaustion. At
Speaker 1: times I caught movement out beyond the orb light and
Speaker 1: panicked till I realized that pursuers would not be so shy.
Speaker 1: If they knew where I was, then they'd simply take me.
Speaker 1: More likely, it was some animal of the deep, intrigued
Speaker 1: by the light. I don't know how long I climbed.
Speaker 1: Occasionally my feet slipped on the rocks and mud, but
Speaker 1: each time I avoided the spill. Finally I saw the
Speaker 1: faint aura of the cliffs above me. It couldn't be
Speaker 1: more than a ten minute climb. I paused and stared
Speaker 1: off once more into the vastness of the trench, one
Speaker 1: of the many deep sea gouges that the Tritons called home.
Speaker 1: The darkness seemed to move, and at first I suspected hallucination.
Speaker 1: I had never gone this long without the drug. But
Speaker 1: then I glimpsed the faint tinkle of bioluminescence. A writhing
Speaker 1: wall of viscous aglutinations moved within my light, a tapestry
Speaker 1: of coiling tentacles that continually formed and dissolved as it
Speaker 1: moved through the void. It was the Proteus, or at
Speaker 1: least some massive portion of it, en route to or
Speaker 1: returning from its toil. I couldn't guess that it's eyes.
Speaker 1: I quickly turned to redouble my efforts lest it somehow
Speaker 1: alert its masters to my whereabouts. I climbed until the
Speaker 1: plateau opened up before me. There squatted the vibrant blur
Speaker 1: of Atlas Station and its surrounding spill of infrastructure. The
Speaker 1: squalid desolation of Ludex I marked the gleam of departing subs,
Speaker 1: mostly larger crew transports evacuation protocol. The reflector stakes marked
Speaker 1: a path to the nearest airlock. So I slogged on
Speaker 1: through the mud and gravel toward the abattoir that awaited
Speaker 1: me in those haunted halls. Yeah. The second oil Age
Speaker 1: was produced by Robert Lamb, Alex Williams, Lauren vogel Bond,
Speaker 1: and Josh Than. This episode featured Angel Masters as sinov Pond,
Speaker 1: Lauren vogel Bond as Tabitha Vale, and Jonathan Strickland as
Speaker 1: Salty Squid, supporting voice work by Gina Rikiki intro outro,
Speaker 1: and supporting music created by the Weirding Module. Learn more
Speaker 1: at Module dot band camp dot com. For more podcasts
Speaker 1: from I heart Radio, visit the i heart Radio app,
Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.