The Abyss

Enoch's Grasp

Jason trudged along the metal walkways of the observation deck, the lowest floor in the city. To conserve power, he kept the lights running along the walkway dimmed, just enough to clean the machines by. The scent of the cleaning chemicals caused Jason to cough, and he buried his mouth in his sleeve to relieve his lungs. His hands were raw from scrubbing, and his stomach grumbled as he passed between the buoyancy pumps. His food, along with everyone else's, was being rationed due to the diminishing crops of their gardening capsules. Jason heard similar stories from the visitors of other settlements.

All Jason had ever known was life beneath the surface. Tales had been passed down through generations of the beauty and radiance of the sun, the gentle blue of the endless sky, the smell of rain upon the earth. But Jason's life was only cold metal catwalks, pale artificial light, and the ever present darkness that lay beyond the city. He couldn't help but daydream as he went about his tasks.

At the bottom of the North American Ocean, Enoch's Grasp was one of the last bastions of humanity remaining beneath the wave swept surface. Seven generations after the cataclysm that tore apart the continents, Jason's people still remained, though each day was more difficult than the last. The ever increasing toxicity of the ocean around them made it difficult to survive; a result of the ash and sulfur spewed forth at the breaking of the world.

Jason sighed as the motor he was cleaning dripped brown sludge on his pants. He had no shortage of stains on his clothes, many of them from exploring the hidden areas on Enoch's Grasp. At only sixteen years, he was still small enough to fit through some of the air ducts and maintenance hatches. Jason grabbed a clean rag and dipped the corner into his bucket of soapy water; best to attack the stain now before it seeped through to his leg. Jason knew from experience that the sludge from these motors burned when in prolonged contact with skin.

Ever since he was little, Jason had to work hard to help out the city. The machines needed cleaning and upkeep, the gardens needed tending, and the prophets needed assistance. Jason never liked helping the prophets. The descendants of the founders of Enoch's Grasp, the prophets were the only ones with the knowledge and ability to maintain the city. Jason found many of them to be pompous and arrogant, except for Cain.

Cain, second in command to the high prophet, was kind to the children of the city. He oversaw the maintaining and teaching of the population. Every child on Enoch's Grasp knew Cain by the time they were three. Jason enjoyed his time assisting Cain. He would help to teach the younger generations, aiding the prophet in his lessons. The most important teachings were impressed upon all at an early age; protect and preserve the city, never take more than you need, and obey the prophets. Jason found the last of those rules to be the hardest to follow.

Breaking any of the three rules brought about punishment, but disobeying one of the prophets incurred the heaviest toll. The survival of the city was so delicately balanced that even a single act of defiance could sentence the whole of Enoch's Grasp to oblivion. Jason himself had felt the lash of punishment once before. He still winced as he remembered that day.

Jason had always been fond of exploring the city, especially the restricted sections. When he was ten, he and some of his classmates found a way into the city's bottom level ocean-lung, one of four in the city. They would climb through the ventilation shafts into the chamber that held the lung. Jason loved to sit and listen to the rhythmic pulsing of the ocean-lung as it filtered out clean water for the inhabitants of Enoch's Grasp to use. Eventually, one of the classmates got cold feet and told the prophets. As the leader of the group, Jason was the one that incurred the punishment, a lesson he would not soon forget.

With his pant leg soaked, Jason decided to take a break from cleaning. He walked over to the far end of the observation deck and leaned against the railing. When he wasn't assisting Cain, he often came down here to gaze out through the transparent shell at the muted gray world beyond. The exterior roving lights on the Grasp temporarily illuminated Jason's view, revealing a pair of bulbous eyes staring back from a crevice in the ground. One didn't have to wait long before spotting a creature from the observation deck.