[Round Two] Survival of the Fittest
The entire world was an immersive, pacifying blue.
Schools of fish swam by in clusters of tangerine orange, coral pink, and sun yellow, their brilliant scales tinged with the all-engulfing hue; seaweed swayed and shuddered in the ebb and flow, their willowy forms darkened by it; the bleak gray sands were livened with the touch of it, the colored light washing over their shapeless expanse in elaborate patterns.
This was the panorama of the ocean floor.
Hayden gazed skyward through the clear dome’s vaulted ceiling, looking as far as the sprite’s eyes could see without even spotting the slightest hint of where the surface could be. No matter how much she strained, she only saw a blurry plane of swishing water that told her that sweet air and land were far beyond her visual limits—not to mention much further than she could ever physically strain herself to go. This underwater shelter was an alien world to her; such a vast and deep body of water anywhere at all was alien to her. It was as if someone took the tallest peaks of the mountains back home, hollowed them out, and inverted them, so that rather than reaching into the wispy bellies of heavenly clouds, they burrowed deep down into the furthest reaches of the planet’s core. To think of such a space filled entirely with saltwater was mind-boggling; she and this shelter were just blips in this underwater world, insignificant and unnoticed in the grand scheme of it all.
But even so, at the moment, the shelter and her own well-being were her greatest concerns. This dome was the only thing standing between her and the tons and tons of water bearing down on the structure at that very second, exerting a pressure great enough to crush her many times over. And this structure was failing—when she had awakened that morning, one of the marine biologists that had asked her to come along to help build this research center was at her bedside, screaming to her in a language she only partly understood about how the pressure was becoming too much for the structure to handle, and how they would have to evacuate that day. Most, if not all, of the scientists had already left, having been given first priority because of the research and knowledge they had to convey with them, both in their minds and on paper. Hayden and the others that helped with the construction were requested to stay until all the researchers could get away, locked out of the evacuation bay until further notice. There was supposed to be a signal given automatically immediately after the last of the humans went, but hours had passed before the dome’s program reacted and the siren rang out. Its power systems were already failing.
Soon, escape would just be a distant, drowning dream.
Staring up, unable to even glimpse the surface, drove that reality home even more. Hayden was unsure of just how many people were left in the shelter, but the low-resolution read-out screens that were still functioning reported that only one of the egg-shaped, single-person escape pods remained in the evacuation bay. The whole of the bay was blocked off from access by anyone whose eye-scan didn’t identify them as a scientist; even though all of the researchers had left long ago and the “civilians”, as they were being called, should have been allowed to go. The sprite could have bent the metallic door without so much as a second thought and gone inside, but she knew even the tiniest bit of pressure applied to the building might jeopardize the delicate structural integrity of the entire failing structure, bringing the shelter crashing down all around her and extinguishing the spark of life in her body quicker than she could blink. Someone needed to obtain the bypass codes that were kept in the auxiliary computer lab in the case of the eye-scan’s malfunction if they ever wanted to leave—and doubtful that she was the only one left to escape, that was easier said than done. No one would give up their only shot at survival willingly.
So, who was left for her to compete against then? It was a terrible thought to have, but a necessary one. One of them still stuck here would escape and any others would die—and that was best case scenario. At any moment, the dome could just be crushed and they would all be wiped out. Nothing was guaranteed.
Survival of the fittest is an ugly way to decide things.