Deep Blue - The Descent

25: Not Alone

"Damn it!", the doctor shouted in frustration.

After a moment, he pounded the control console with a closed fist.

His head shook back and forth, "It doesn't make sense. No sense at all."

"What?", Jordan asked alarmed. "The fact that we just lost any and all contact with the ship and Nick?"

"No.", the doctor replied, more calmly than before. "The thickness of the walls in the cavern combined with a multitude of possible materials, known or unknown, that surround that cavern is going to wreck havoc with communications. That part is easy.", the doctor said waving his hand like he was swatting a fly from his face.

"It's The lights. The glowing lights; They're all the same."

He slowed down his speech and said in a very matter-of-fact manner, "They didn't grow. They were made; built."

The doctor removed his glasses and set them carefully aside on the glass console, "They were made and placed in that tunnel."

"The lights?", Jordan said with disbelief.

"The lights?!", she repeated with frustration bubbling up inside her. "We just lost contact with Nick and the M.A.N.T.A. with no way to retrieve them and you're wondering about the lights?!"

Commander Kennedy's normally cool and collected facade was slowly giving way to the anger building inside her.

"I would think you would be less concerned about the lighting and a little more concerned with the missing person."

"You're missing my point Commander.", Doctor Marshall replied calmly. "The lights. The crystals. Even the rise in water temperature. All of it. It all points to one thing..."

"I don't care.", Jordan interrupted.

"It was all created by someone!", the doctor shot back. "My concern is with Sheppard. The last we heard, he and the M.A.N.T.A. were fine. Communication was most likely disrupted by the cavern walls. There was no impending danger. And you had just ordered him to turn the ship around, which he is most likely in the process of doing right now."

The doctor then turned to the console and began typing rapidly before interrupting his own train of thought, "Syndi, keep monitoring the point where we lost contact with the M.A.N.T.A.. Keep your eyes and ears on that spot."

"Yes Doctor.", the A.I. responded.

"He's a smart guy...", the doctor continued before taking an instant of pause. "...ok, he's a good pilot. He'll notice we've lost contact and turn the ship around and head back the way he came. I'm not immediately concerned with the Lieutenant Commander's safety. My primary concern right now, is who is down there with him."

"Deep Blue, this is Nick. Please respond.", Nick radioed once again and once again there was no reply.

"Syndi. Are you there?", ironically, he figured if he could count on anyone to be there it would be the A.I. But still, there was only silence on the comms.

"Well, this is great.", Nick said sarcastically as he continued to pilot the ship deeper into the cavern. There was no end in sight to the end of the cavern, only an endless line of lights that continued to zoom past on both sides like the lamps on a highway.

As curious as Nick was about the cavern, he also knew keeping in touch with Deep Blue was a higher priority. Being alone at the bottom of the ocean was not a feeling he was enjoying.

"Deep Blue, if you can hear me I'm turning her back around and heading...", but his statement was cut short by the blip of a new contact ahead on sonar; followed momentarily by another, and then a third.