Ao3 Lower Decks Novels & Stories

He dropped to one knee on the floorboards, gasping as a fresh spike of yellow light flared under his skin. "They're closing," Lucian said from the helm. His voice was flat, but his pale knuckles were white around the wooden steering wheel. "Brecken, stop arguing and get on the rear deck with Cade. If those boats breach thirty yards, they will shoot out our propeller." Brecken let out a harsh, bitter breath. He gave Soren one last look, then shoved open the heavy metal door leading out to the rear deck. I stayed on the floor next to Soren. I reached out and grabbed his bleeding hand, squeezing it as hard as I could. The warlock anchor inside me didn't push him away. It pulled harder, trying t

"The Hangar Deck!" She clamped her legs against the cable, braking hard. The deceleration nearly tore their arms out of their sockets. They swung wildly, slamming into the metal grating of the catwalk. Tristan grabbed the railing, his fingers digging into the steel, leaving dents. He hauled Saoirse over the rail just as a wave of orange plasma licked the bottom of their boots. They tumbled onto the deck of Level 40. This wasn't a maintenance crawlspace. It was a pristine, white-tiled hangar bay, lined with private luxury shuttles.

Probably, twenty-one and twenty-two? We leave the decks and climb the ladder towards the captain’s office. Nadif goes inside, saluting the old man who looks at me curiously, then proceeds towards a door behind. When the door closes, I look around the room. It is a quiet place, contrary to what I imagined to be a drinking hub. I am also delighted to see shelves of books all around the room. There are blankets and pillows on the floor and a low table at the middle. Ami turns on the lights and says, “We always drink at the crow’s nest, but I don’t think the four of us can fit there.”

MIA PoV The newest underwater base was a miracle of engineering and desperation — a vast network of interconnected domes and pressurized tunnels hidden miles beneath the Pacific. Twenty-one children had turned the once-sterile corridors into a living, breathing world of chaos and fragile hope. Theo and Elias led the older ones in games that echoed through the reinforced play caverns. The younger ones filled the nurseries with coos, cries, and the steady rhythm of monitors. Lyra, Kai, Rowan, Nova, Jax, and all the rescued and born-in-battle children brought endless motion and joy.

Green. The lock hissed open. Marek froze, eyes wide. “How—” “No time,” Ayla said, shoving the door. It groaned but gave way, spilling them into the command deck. The air was cooler here, almost sterile, humming with the low thrum of computers and the glow of endless monitors. Rows of crew seats stretched forward, though most were empty. Only a handful of operators sat rigid, their faces bathed in screens, their expressions vacant, as if their minds were elsewhere entirely.

The sounds of The Sovereign was a low vibration that Aria felt in her bones and it startled her to be on top such a giant thing. As the yacht moved further into the channel, the waves grew larger, but the massive ship remained steady. Alvin led her down a grand staircase to the lower deck. This wasn't the living area; this was the heart of the ship’s "toys." He opened a door to reveal a world of chrome and carbon fiber. It was a private dive center. Racks of custom-fitted wetsuits, tanks of specialized gas mixes, and underwater drones lined the walls.

He gave me an oversized shirt to cover up my wet body then took me to the other side of the ship. I was taken below deck through a flight of stairs. This area looked more heavily guarded than above. It could also be said that the cabins below deck were like an impenetrable cage. ‘Oh my goodness! What am I looking at down here?!’ A large glass tank was installed on each side of the cabin below deck. The top of the tanks was covered with large metal nets. Through the gaps in the nets, I spotted several merpeople being confined solitarily.

Camille and Tina, each holding one of Shirley's hands, headed towards the bottom of the ship. Shirley couldn't shake the feeling that something had changed between them. It was as if they had reached some kind of agreement, and the tension between them had disappeared. It was weird, but hey, it was good for them to get along well, right? After all, they were all friends! The three of them happily made their way to the bottom of the ship. When they arrived at the observation room, there were already many people sitting inside. The bottom of the ship was designed as a 270-degree panoramic window, providing a real-time view of the underwater world. The floor was also transparent, allowing them

Julian replied grimly, stepping back from the porthole to offer her the view. Chloe walked cautiously across the vibrating floorboards. She stood beside him, resting her pale hand gently against his solid, heavily bandaged waist. Through the thick, smeared glass, an absolute nightmare of industrial decay rose from the violent ocean. It was a massive, sprawling network of decommissioned offshore oil rigs. The colossal steel towers were completely rusted, their yellow paint peeling away to reveal dark, oxidized iron. Massive suspension bridges made of grated metal connected the various platforms, swaying precariously in the freezing sea winds. There were no bright navigational lights. The enti

The surface of the harbor was a churning cauldron of black grease and freezing foam. Kaiser, Izora, and Caspian collapsed onto the swaying deck of the salvage barge, the massive crane still groaning under the tension of the warehouse roof it had just ripped away. "Leo!" Izora scrambled to the edge of the barge, her eyes searching the dark, bubbling water where the warehouse had vanished. "Leo!" Two hundred feet below, in a world of crushing pressure and absolute darkness, the struggle continued.