Trembling his shaking hands finally found the oxygen control and he twisted hard...
The hyperventilation caused by what he had just seen was quickly depleting his oxygen supply, and less slowly his vision. To be able to think clearly and escape his current predicament, he would need as much oxygen as he could spare.
The darkness and vastness of the deep ocean was for once getting to him. Usually the open expanse calmed Garro's tumultuous thoughts, but today the eerie silence only created more. What had started up as a routine dive turned into anything but.
Almost done collecting his algae samples, and not wanting to repeat the close call he had last year where he nearly got BENDS spending too much time collecting samples, Garro began making his slow ascent.
Placing his samples in the bottom right corner of his impermeable camouflage bag, Garro reminisced about the days in which he would have double the amount of today's samples. Given the ocean's rising temperatures and the world's depleted algae supply, Garro knew his current research would not last long. Garro collected and studied algae to exploit their unparalleled survival in almost any environment. He had set out the farthest and most hospitable regions of the planet in name of mankind's survival, but for the past twenty years, he could not manage to reproduce algae's superior qualities in any way shape or form. If he did not find a way to do so, and soon, the crops that fed his neighbours and all humans would cease to exist in the same way more than 30% of all species had ten years ago in what was known as the Great Downfall. The world's democracies were in disorder and had been since soon after the Great Downfall, but the international, underground and covert organization NORÉP had always funded his pursuits. The NORÉP contained many of the world’s most influential peoples, and as far as making any real, tangible decisions nowadays, they were virtually the sole group to turn to.
