Chapter Text
After Season 1, Episode 1 – “To Be or Not to Be”
The silence was a living thing down here. Not empty—never empty—but deep. Pressurized. Intentional.
Nathan Bridger stood in the corridor just outside the observation lounge, one hand resting on the cool metal wall. He could feel the faint vibration under his fingertips—barely there, like the pulse of a giant creature dozing beneath him. The seaQuest was breathing again, alive in a way it hadn’t been under Stark’s command. Not just functioning. Feeling.
That hum had been gone when he'd arrived. Replaced by something sterile. Hard. A war machine, gutted of curiosity.
He took a breath and stepped inside.
The room opened up in quiet contrast to the narrow passageways—panoramic windows curving overhead like cathedral arches, framing the abyss beyond. The ocean pressed against the glass in inky blues and flickering greens, bioluminescent creatures swirling through the dark like constellations in slow motion.
She stood there, of course. Kristin Westphalen.
Barely outlined by the dim glow of console lights, arms folded across her lab coat, she was still in her element. Always analyzing. Not just the ocean or the data, but people. Him.
She didn’t turn when she spoke.
“You didn’t run.”
He didn’t answer right away. The soft hiss of the life support systems filled the silence. The steady, background heartbeat of the ship. You didn’t notice it unless you stopped moving.
“I thought about it,” he said eventually, stepping up beside her.
A sardonic smile touched the corner of her mouth, reflected faintly in the glass. “But you didn’t.”
The viewport was massive, but Nathan found himself watching her reflection more than the ocean. She didn’t press, and he appreciated that. She’d already pressed enough—back in her lab, on the bridge, in every conversation they’d shared since he’d come aboard. Push and pull, challenge and curiosity. She was good at reading people, which made her dangerous.
But she was also right more often than he liked to admit.
He sighed and let his gaze drift outward. “Carol would’ve loved this.”
“Your wife?” she asked, her voice gentler.
“Marine ecologist. She always believed the ocean was our last, best hope. That someday we’d find peace down here.” He rested his hands behind his back, a gesture that came automatically. “We used to dream of building something like this. Not a battleship. A sanctuary.”
Kristin tilted her head. “And is that what this is?”
He let the question hang.
“I don’t know yet.”
For a long moment, they stood in silence, shoulder to shoulder, as a school of translucent fish arced past the glass like a shooting star.
Eventually, she turned to face him. He could feel her eyes on him before he looked back.
“You’re not just here because they asked you.”
It wasn’t a question.
He considered lying—brushing it off with something dry or clever. But there was something about her gaze that made deflection feel childish.
“No,” he said. “I came because I was angry.”
“Angry?”
He nodded. “At what they were doing to her. This ship. What they were turning her into. Stark turned curiosity into calculation. Compassion into tactics. This was never meant to be a weapon.”
She studied him. “And now?”
“Now I don’t know.” He shifted his weight slightly, the deck humming under his boots like a whispered memory. “It feels… different. But maybe I’m different, too.”
Kristin looked at him then—not like a scientist or a colleague, but like someone seeing him. The kind of look that unnerved him more than any war room confrontation ever had.
“If this isn’t your last mission?” she asked softly.
He hesitated.
“Then I guess I’ll need someone to keep me from losing myself down here.”
The corners of her mouth lifted, just barely. “You should get some sleep. First day back in the saddle.”
He nodded but didn’t move. “You’ll tell me if something’s wrong with me.”
That caught her off guard. “What makes you think there is?”
“I don’t know,” he said. “Just… you’d tell me. Wouldn’t you?”
“Of course.”
There was sincerity in her voice, but something behind her eyes shifted. Not panic. Not guilt. Just a flicker of thought she didn’t share.
He left her there, in the quiet. He could feel her watching him go, even after he turned the corner and the soft pressure of the observation lounge faded into the regular pulse of the ship.
Kristin waited a few moments longer, then pulled her PAD from her coat pocket. A name glowed across the top of the screen.
Bridger, Nathan Hale
Rank: Captain
Assignment: seaQuest DSV 4600
Age: 59
Status: Fit for Duty – Conditional
She scrolled past the surface readings—heart rate, reflexes, vitals—all good. But the neural stress test... a slight delay. Just a fraction of a second. Just enough.
She opened a secure channel and forwarded the scan to a colleague at UEO Medical HQ.
Just a second opinion, she thought. Nothing urgent. Not yet.
She looked back out at the dark sea beyond the glass, her own reflection dimmed by the glow of drifting jellyfish.
Even sanctuaries had cracks in their foundations. She tried to not think about what that meant, not after everything with Stark and the crew now finally only just starting to get along. She looked at the computer again and closed her eyes. Please let it be nothing, she prayed... something she hadn't done in years. She didn't think anyone would hear her any more than they did when she was a girl but the thought made her feel better and she supposed that was something.
With one final glance at her now closed tablet, she, too left the observation lounge.