The Flock / Season 1, Episode 3
New Blood
EPISODE 3: NEW BLOOD
CHAPTER 1: THE WELCOME
The OIM of Neptune Eight is nothing like Kelly Chen.
Her name is Dr. Ava Strand—and yes, the "Doctor" is insisted upon—and she meets you on the helipad with a smile that doesn't reach her eyes. She's younger than Chen was, maybe mid-forties, with silver-streaked hair pulled back in a severe bun and the kind of posture that suggests military training or ballet.
"Harper." She extends a hand. Her grip is dry and firm. "We've been expecting you."
"Dr. Strand. Thank you for accommodating my request."
"Accommodating?" Her smile widens slightly. "You're exactly what we need. An inspector who's survived a rig failure. Someone who knows what to look for, what not to overlook. Your experience is invaluable."
You don't miss the emphasis. Your experience. As if they know exactly what you experienced. As if they're counting on it.
"I'll give you the tour myself," she continues, already walking toward the main deck. "Neptune Eight is a very different platform than Neptune Seven. More advanced. More... robust."
"I've read the specifications."
"Specifications are theory. This is practice." She gestures at the drilling tower, gleaming new in the gray light. "State of the art. We can drill deeper and faster than any platform in the North Sea. What took Neptune Seven months, we can accomplish in weeks."
The words send ice through your veins. Deeper. Faster. Closer to the cavity. Closer to what sleeps below.
"And safety systems?" you ask.
"The most advanced in the industry. We've learned from past mistakes." She glances at you, and something in her expression suggests she knows more than she's saying. "We won't repeat them."
CHAPTER 2: THE CREW
Neptune Eight's crew is smaller than Neptune Seven's.
Fifty-three people, according to the manifest. But as Dr. Strand walks you through the accommodation block, you realize the composition is different too. Less traditional rig workers—roughnecks, roustabouts, the blue-collar backbone of offshore extraction. More... specialists.
Scientists in the geology lab. Biologists in a containment facility you weren't supposed to see. Security personnel who carry themselves like soldiers rather than guards.
And Kovacs, the man from the helicopter, who appears at unexpected moments, watching you with those flat, assessing eyes.
"Your cabin's here," Strand says, stopping at a door on Level Two. "Different layout than Neptune Seven. More space. Private bathroom."
"That's generous."
"You're important to us, Harper." She hands you a key card. "Dinner's at seven. Staff meeting at eight. You'll have full access to the platform starting tomorrow."
"Full access?"
"Within reason." Her smile sharpens. "Some areas require authorization. Research protocols. I'm sure you understand."
She walks away before you can ask what kind of research.
The cabin is indeed nicer than your cramped quarters on Neptune Seven. But as you unpack—placing Rashida's hidden equipment carefully in the spots she'd identified, angles that will avoid detection—you notice things.
The window is smaller. The walls thicker. And there's something in the ceiling corner that might be a camera, might be a smoke detector, might be nothing at all.
You're being watched. Of course you are.
The question is: what do they expect you to do?
CHAPTER 3: DINNER
The mess hall on Neptune Eight feels like a cafeteria from a pharmaceutical company—clean, white, efficient. The food is better than Benny's greasy offerings on Neptune Seven, but there's something sterile about it. Premeasured portions. Nutrient-balanced menus. No personality.
You take your tray to a table where three crew members are already eating. Two women and a man, all in their thirties, all wearing the blue coveralls of technical staff.
"Mind if I join you?"
"Inspector, right?" The woman closest to you has a Scottish accent and a wary expression. "I'm MacLeod. Engineering. This is Torres and Brennan."
You sit. "Jamie Harper. Safety assessment."
"Heard about Neptune Seven." Torres—dark-haired, probably Spanish or Portuguese—leans forward. "That must have been..."
"Structural failure," you say automatically. "Pressure anomaly in the borehole. It was contained."
"Contained." MacLeod's voice is flat. "Seventy-one survivors out of a crew of seventy-three. Some containment."
"Mac." Brennan—older, with gray at his temples and the haunted look you've learned to recognize—puts a hand on her arm. "Leave it."
"No, I want to hear." MacLeod doesn't look away from you. "Everyone knows something happened out there. Something the official report doesn't mention. Bodies they never recovered. Equipment malfunctions that don't make sense. People who came back talking about—"
"MacLeod." The voice comes from behind you. Kovacs. "Perhaps we should let the inspector eat in peace."
MacLeod goes quiet. Torres and Brennan suddenly find their food very interesting. You turn to face Kovacs.
"Just making conversation," you say mildly.
"Of course." His eyes haven't changed—still flat, still watchful. "But Neptune Seven is a sensitive topic. Company policy is to avoid speculation. For morale purposes."
"I understand."
"I'm sure you do." He walks away, but not before giving MacLeod a look that makes her go pale.
The rest of the meal passes in silence.
CHAPTER 4: THE MEETING
The staff meeting takes place in a conference room on Level Three.
Every department head is present—drilling, engineering, geology, safety, security. Dr. Strand sits at the head of the table, a tablet in front of her displaying charts and graphs you can't quite make out.
"We're one week ahead of schedule," she announces. "Drilling operations have exceeded projections. We should breach the secondary formation within fourteen days."
Secondary formation. The corporate euphemism for the cavity. For the thing that shouldn't exist three thousand feet below the seabed.
"Any anomalies?" someone asks.
"Minor. Pressure fluctuations in the expected range. Temperature variations consistent with the formation's thermal properties." Strand taps her tablet. "Nothing we can't handle."
You raise your hand. "What kind of temperature variations?"
All eyes turn to you. Strand's smile doesn't waver.
"Periodic drops of fifteen to twenty degrees Celsius. We believe it's related to fluid movement in the formation—thermal currents, essentially. Our sensors are designed to compensate."
"Neptune Seven experienced similar drops before their... incident."
The room goes still. You can feel the weight of attention pressing down on you.
"Neptune Seven was drilling with inferior equipment," Strand says smoothly. "Their sensors were decades old. Their protocols were based on outdated assumptions. We've incorporated every lesson from that event into our operations."
"I'd like to review the drilling logs. Compare the patterns."
"Of course. I'll have Dr. Chen in geology prepare a briefing for you." She looks around the table. "Any other questions?"
No one speaks.
"Then we're adjourned. Remember—we're making history out here. The deepest production well in the North Sea. Let's make sure we do it right."
As the room empties, you feel a hand on your shoulder. Brennan, the quiet engineer from dinner.
"Meet me in the emergency stairwell on Level One," he whispers. "Midnight. Tell no one."
He's gone before you can respond.
CHAPTER 5: THE INFORMANT
The emergency stairwell is darker than it should be.
The lights here are dimmer than elsewhere on the platform—red emergency lighting that creates pools of shadow in the corners. You can hear the eternal hum of machinery through the walls, feel the vibration of the drill through the floor.
And something else. A sound beneath the machines. A rhythm that doesn't match the equipment.
Brennan is already waiting.
"You're not just an inspector," he says without preamble. "I don't know who sent you, but you're looking for something."
"I'm looking for the truth about Neptune Seven."
"Then you're in the right place." His voice is bitter. "This whole operation is about Neptune Seven. About what they found down there."
"What did they find?"
Brennan looks over his shoulder. Checks the stairwell above and below. "I was on Neptune Six. Before it went down. I know what I saw."
Your heart rate spikes. "You're one of the survivors."
"One of the lucky ones. Or unlucky, depending on how you look at it." He pulls out a phone—an old model, not a smartphone, something that can't be tracked—and shows you the screen. "I've been documenting everything. Drill logs. Sensor readings. Equipment manifests. They're not drilling for oil, Harper. They haven't been for years."
The screen shows specifications you recognize from Rashida's files, but more detailed. More recent.
"The cavity—"
"Isn't a cavity. It's a structure. Something built, not formed. The seismic surveys show it clearly if you know how to read them. Regular angles. Symmetrical chambers. It's architecture." His voice drops to a whisper. "They found something down there, and they've been trying to understand it ever since. The oil is just a cover story."
"What kind of structure?"
"I don't know. No one knows. But the things that came from it—the things that took Neptune Seven—those aren't random creatures. They're guards. Or workers. Or something in between." Brennan's hands are shaking. "And they're just the beginning. What's at the center of the structure, what they're really trying to reach... it's beyond anything we've seen."
"The thing that rose from the deep."
"You saw it?" His eyes widen. "You actually saw it?"
"Part of it. Just a glimpse before we evacuated."
"Then you know. You know this isn't just about money or research. They're trying to make contact. They're trying to communicate with something that's been sleeping under the ocean for longer than humanity has existed."
The singing in your head grows louder. For a moment, you can almost hear words in it. Almost make out a meaning.
"Why are you telling me this?"
"Because someone has to stop them." Brennan's voice cracks. "Because in fourteen days, they're going to drill straight into the heart of that structure. And whatever happens next—" He looks toward the floor. Toward the depths. "Whatever happens next is going to make Neptune Seven look like a picnic."
CHAPTER 6: THE INVESTIGATION
The next week is a delicate dance.
By day, you conduct your official inspection—checking safety systems, reviewing protocols, interviewing crew members. You document everything, but carefully, avoiding the areas that would raise suspicion. The cameras in the hard hat record hours of mundane footage: pressure valves, fire suppression systems, evacuation procedures.
By night, you work with Brennan.
He has access to the geology lab through his engineering credentials. Together, you review the seismic data, the drilling logs, the temperature anomalies that Strand dismissed as "thermal currents." The patterns are undeniable.
The structure in the cavity is reacting to the drilling. Every meter of progress produces a response—pressure spikes, temperature drops, electromagnetic fluctuations that shouldn't be possible at this depth. It's as if the thing below is aware of what's happening. Testing. Probing. Learning.
"Look at this." Brennan points to a graph on his screen. "Day four of drilling. Pressure normalized throughout the formation. Perfect stability. Then, exactly at midnight—" The line on the graph spikes. "—a pulse. Not from the drill. From below."
"What kind of pulse?"
"Electromagnetic. Low frequency. The kind of frequency that..." He trails off.
"That what?"
"The kind of frequency that some researchers associate with neurological activity. Brain waves. Thought patterns." He looks at you with haunted eyes. "Whatever's down there is thinking about us."
You transmit the data to Rashida that night, using the encrypted channels she provided. The response comes back within hours: CONFIRMED. PATTERN MATCHES NEPTUNE 5 AND 6. THEY'RE WAKING IT UP.
CHAPTER 7: THE DISCOVERY
On day nine, you find the research wing.
It's not marked on any official schematic. Brennan's access cards don't work on its doors. But you notice the patterns—crew members who disappear for hours at a time, equipment shipments that don't match the inventory logs, power fluctuations that suggest systems you haven't been told about.
You wait until 2 AM, when the night shift is at its lowest staffing. You use the maintenance access codes Brennan gave you. You bypass the security cameras using the blind spots Rashida identified in the schematics.
The research wing is on Level Four—a level that supposedly doesn't exist.
The door opens onto a corridor unlike anything else on the platform. White walls. Clean lines. Temperature-controlled. Medical. The air smells of antiseptic and something else. Something organic. Something familiar.
You walk slowly, your footsteps silent on the polished floor. Doors branch off on either side, each marked with codes you don't recognize. Through one window, you see laboratory equipment—spectrometers, centrifuges, things that belong in a hospital, not an oil rig.
Through another window, you see tanks.
They're large—ten feet tall, maybe twelve feet in diameter—filled with a luminescent fluid that casts everything in that familiar blue-green glow. The same glow from Neptune Seven. The same glow from the flooded lower levels.
And floating in the tanks...
You press closer to the glass.
They're pieces. That's the only word for them. Pieces of the creatures you saw—limbs, organs, tissue samples preserved in the glowing fluid. Some are barely recognizable as biological material. Others are horrifyingly clear: a hand with too many fingers, an eye the size of a basketball, something that might be a heart still beating in slow, rhythmic pulses.
"Beautiful, aren't they?"
You spin around.
Dr. Strand is standing in the corridor behind you. She's not surprised. She's not angry. She's smiling.
"I wondered how long it would take you to find us," she says. "The others from Neptune Seven never made it this far. They were too traumatized. Too broken. But you—" She walks toward you, heels clicking on the floor. "You're different. The exposure changed you. Made you stronger. More... receptive."
"What is this place?"
"The real reason we're here." She stops beside you, looking through the window at the tanks. "What you saw on Neptune Seven—the creatures, the entity—they're older than this planet. Older than this solar system, perhaps. They came here when the oceans were still forming. They built the structure we've been drilling into. They went to sleep when there was nothing here worth waking up for."
"And now?"
"Now we've given them a reason." Her smile doesn't change. "The drilling. The noise. The activity. We're like ants building a colony on top of a sleeping giant. Eventually, the giant notices."
"You're doing this on purpose. Waking it up."
"We're trying to communicate." She turns to face you fully. "Imagine what we could learn from something that's been conscious for billions of years. Imagine the technology. The science. The evolution of intelligence itself."
"And the people who die? Neptune Seven? Neptune Six? Neptune Five?"
"Acceptable losses." Her voice is cold now. Clinical. "Progress requires sacrifice. The first humans who played with fire got burned. The first sailors who crossed oceans drowned. We're attempting something far more significant—first contact with a pre-human intelligence. Some casualties are inevitable."
"You're insane."
"I'm a scientist." She moves toward the door. "And you're going to help us. Whether you want to or not."
"I won't—"
"You don't understand. The exposure from Neptune Seven—the singing you hear, the visions you see—it's marked you. Changed your brain chemistry. Made you sensitive to frequencies that other humans can't perceive." She pauses in the doorway. "You're already one of them, Harper. You just don't know it yet."
The door closes behind her.
The locks engage.
And in the tanks around you, the pieces begin to stir.
To be continued...