The Glimmer Below

Silas dropped backwards off the old rust-bucket, the shock of the cold Atlantic biting through the neoprene. Dark water swallowed him whole, a heavy blanket pulling him down, down. He hit the release on his ballast, watched the bubbles stream away, silver motes vanishing into the inky black. This was his life, the dark, the quiet, the crushing weight. Better than land, most days. Better than the noise.

He kicked, slow and steady, following the faint glow of the ROV's lights a hundred feet below. Eighty clicks out from the last charted wreck, they were chasing a flicker on the sonar, a signature too sharp, too regular to be natural rock. Dr. Aris, back on the surface, had been practically vibrating with academic glee. Silas just felt the ache in his knees from the last dive. Another anomaly, another lost cause, probably. He adjusted his mask, tasted the salt on his lips even through the regulator.

Then it appeared. Not all at once, not a sudden revelation. More like a slow, terrifying birth from the gloom. First, a spire, impossibly delicate, catching the distant gleam of the submersible's lamps, refracting it into a thousand shattered stars. Then another. And another. Columns, arches, entire structures, all of it built from what looked like pure, dark glass. Or crystal. The light played tricks, bending, distorting, making the sea floor shimmer like a vast, sunken jewel box. Silas stopped kicking, just drifted.

His comms crackled. "Silas? You there, boy? We're seeing it on the ROV feed. What in god's name is that?" It was old Manolo, his voice a strained whisper, stripped of its usual gruffness.

"It's… a city," Silas breathed, the words barely a rasp through the mouthpiece. "Made of glass." He moved closer, drawn by an invisible current, or maybe just pure, morbid curiosity. The pressure felt different here, heavy, yes, but also… fragile. Like the slightest wrong move, the smallest tremor, could shatter everything. Buildings rose from the abyssal plain, their walls impossibly sheer, reflecting the darkness back on itself. Some were intact, perfect geometric forms, while others lay in ruins, huge shards scattered across the seabed like frozen tears.

He glided into what looked like a main thoroughfare, a wide canyon of obsidian-like glass. No silt accumulation, no seaweed. Nothing. It was eerily clean, as if it had fallen just yesterday. Small, skeletal shapes of what might have been trees, crafted from a lighter, almost translucent material, lined the avenues, now just ghostly outlines against the deeper black. No fish, either. Nothing swam here. Not even the bottom feeders. The silence, always heavy at this depth, felt absolute, consuming.

Silas found a doorway, a gaping maw in a towering edifice. He pushed through, his powerful dive lights cutting through the inner gloom. The interior was vast, cathedral-like. More glass, polished smooth, cool to the touch even through his thick gloves. On one wall, he saw something. Etchings. Not hieroglyphs, not symbols he recognized. They were lines, intricate, flowing, like calligraphy, but with an alien grace. They coiled and twisted, telling a story he couldn't read, but felt in his gut. A story of things that lived, that built, that fell.

He ran his gloved finger over the cold, slick surface, tracing a particularly complex swirl. It felt… personal. Not just art, but a record. A life. He imagined hands, long gone, shaping this place, living within these walls, watching the light filter through glass that was not yet sunken. What did they see? What did they fear? He felt a prickle on the back of his neck, a chill that had nothing to do with the water temperature. This wasn't a wreck, a lost treasure. This was a tomb.

A sudden, sharp clang echoed through his comms. Manolo again. "Silas, readings are spiking. Something… big. Coming up behind you. Get out. Now."

Silas spun, his heart hammering against his ribs. Nothing. Just the vast, empty hall, reflecting his own frantic light back at him. "What are you talking about, Manolo? I don't see anything."

"Magnetic anomaly, massive, moving fast. Northeast quadrant, fifty meters. Get clear!" Manolo's voice was edged with real panic now.

Silas felt it then. Not saw it. A pressure change, subtle at first, then a growing hum in the water, vibrating through his very bones. The glass walls around him began to distort the light, not just refract it, but twist it, like looking through a faulty lens. The etched patterns on the wall seemed to writhe. He backed away, slowly, carefully, his eyes scanning the impossible reflections, trying to find the source of the unseen threat. He felt like he was caught in a nightmare, trapped in a house of mirrors built for giants.

The hum intensified, a deep, resonant thrum that seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere. Small cracks, hairline fractures, began to spiderweb across the pristine glass floor. One. Then another. Then dozens. He had to get out. He couldn't see what was coming, but he felt its immense, cold presence. This place wasn't just silent; it was waiting.

He turned and kicked, propelling himself back through the glass doorway, out into the main thoroughfare. The hum was deafening now, a scream in the depths. He looked back, just for a second. The entire structure he’d just exited seemed to shimmer, to vibrate, before imploding inwards with a soundless, terrifying grace. Shards, bigger than cars, floated outwards in slow motion, glinting malevolently in his lights. Whatever had been there, whatever it was, it was gone.

"Silas! What the hell was that?" Manolo yelled. "We lost the signature! Just… vanished!"

Silas didn’t answer. He just kicked, harder than he ever had, towards the distant, bobbing lights of the ship’s surface support. His lungs burned. His muscles screamed. He didn't look back at the shattered city. The silence he’d found down there, the one he’d craved, had been a lie. It wasn't empty; it was just holding its breath. And now, he knew, something had started to breathe again.