— Barely 5% of our world's oceans have been explored. By late 2024, there had been over 30+ expeditions into the Challengers Deep, the (previously) deepest known point of our ocean. And yes, these expeditions vastly increased our knowledge of the ocean, making leaps and bounds in research. But isn’t it the human need to go deeper? To reach into places that we have no business being in?
35,876 feet. 10,935 meters. That was the deepest we could go.
Enter; __Aptazyne Deep Earth Mining Co.__ A mining company that had been, for the better half of a decade, relentlessly monopolizing the oil reserves of the Pacific Ocean. This was, until a group of oceanographers on the Briareus, one of the world’s largest oil rigs, uncovered something miraculous. They called it ‘Scylla’s Deep’, a new offshoot of the Marianas trench proving to be, if sonars were correct, deeper and bigger than anything previously thought possible.
Aptazyne, in typical company fashion, damn near patented the gear used to uncover this oceanic marvel, and after lobbying every organization that would listen, the US government officially sanctioned and funded the only thing that could maneuver in the ocean pits; a massive submersible the size of a small hotel. They called it the __Amphitrite__, an underwater mobile research facility that could be piloted or remotely controlled, specially treated to withstand comfortable conditions even with the pressure that would crush a normal submersible.
Project __Amphitrite__ took years of research and new technologies to build, but in early *2031*, after another full year of testing, it was complete. Aptazyne spent another year scouting the perfect crew and gave them one mission. Go down there, categorize any new flora or fauna, and bring back pictures.
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