The Deep

The Nektons race to the retrieve a fallen satellite before its toxic fuel pollutes a marine sanctuary. But the satellite also contains data from the most comprehensive underwater mapping survey ever undertaken, and they find it’s been stolen by a mysterious figure with his own remarkable high-tech submarine. The thief is a young man named Alpheus Benthos. When Ant gains access to his submarine, he discovers that Alpheus wants to find Lemuria before the Nektons do, using the stolen satellite data. Meanwhile, the Nektons are relying on the ancient Lemurian Ephemychron—an object Ant still can’t figure out how to use! Alpheus desires power over “the Terror”, which he believes is located in Lemuria. Will and Kaiko locate the rest of the satellite but accidentally expose the power core to the salt water. A chain reaction and threatens to detonate the satellite! Ant realises that the only solution is to shoot it back into space—using the Aronnax’s solar ski launch tubes. The Aronnax dives deep to gain extra momentum, then shoots to the surface, firing the satellite as it does so. The satellite explodes harmlessly in space and, looking at the pyrotechnics above, Ant finally realises how the mysterious Ephemychron might actually work. He activates it at night and beams of light shoot out, aligning it with the stars above. The Ephemychron uses stars to navigate! Symbols are projected—each a clue to Lemuria’s hidden location. Alpheus might have his mapping data—but the Nektons now have their own way of possibly finding Lemuria! The race is on!

One of the symbols projected by the Ephemychron points to an area in the Baltic Sea where Ant knows the “Baltic Anomaly” is located—a well-known phenomenon on the Internet and a very mysterious site. Travelling there, the Nektons encounter a large, circular, encrusted object that’s been there for at least 6000 years. But what is it? Exploring, Ant is sure it’s an extra-terrestrial object—and he’s convinced a tiny mysterious box he finds inside is proof of that! Ant is wildly happy until a swarm of rabidly voracious “things” emerge, chasing him! Ant is sure they’re tiny aliens, but Kaiko realises they’re actually large mantis shrimp and they’re following his strange “box”. These creatures can see electrical fields and are drawn to them. When Ant turns off his “box”, they immediately race to the Aronnax and try to burrow into it using their super-strong, super-fast pincers. Will and Nereus try to turn off everything electrical aboard so as not to attract the shrimp. But the shrimp won’t give up their attack. In desperation, Will climbs into a Knight and heads out to draw them away. But the mantis shrimp are even faster than he expects. They quickly disable his Knight and Will starts to sink! As Fontaine tries to recue Will, Ant is forced to turn on his mysterious “box” again to draw the shrimp away. He swims as fast as he can and throws the box back towards the Anomaly. The shrimp follow like lemmings. Will is rescued by Fontaine and the Aronnax makes its escape. But Ant realises he’s thrown away his only “proof” of extra-terrestrial visitors. The Ephemychron’s symbol hasn’t led them closer to Lemuria this time—but they can cross this location off their list!

Ant is stunned when he sees a mermaid swimming outside the Aronnax! Will and Kaiko didn’t see it, so they’re sceptical of Ant’s claim. Ant is therefore determined to collect proof of the mermaid’s existence. Ant doesn’t realise that what he actually saw was Fontaine testing out the new “Mimic Knight” she recently built with Professor Fiction. They’re both giving it a test run—but, straying far from the Aronnax, they manage to get themselves captured by the Dark Orca Pirates! When Captain Hammerhead finds he’s caught Professor Fiction, he forces him to build a “Super Knight” for his own personal use! Unfortunately, Ant’s search leads him straight to the pirates and he’s captured too! He’s stunned to find Hammerhead now encased in a super-strong Super Knight that he intends to use to rip open a sunken submarine and steal a mysterious “treasure”. But Fontaine assures Hammerhead that, if he lets her use the Mimic Knight, she can retrieve it by squeezing through a small opening. Hammerhead concedes to her method, which is easier and certainly safer than him using the Super Knight, which is proving to be trouble-prone. Sure enough, Fontaine locates the small box that is Hammerhead’s “treasure” but, as she returns, Will and Kaiko arrive, angry at Hammerhead and determined to rescue their children! Hammerhead is dressed in his Super Knight and spoiling for a fight! But before he can unleash anything dangerous, his Knight starts to fall to pieces. It seems Professor Fiction couldn’t build a very reliable Knight in the short time allowed and using the shoddy materials provided. The Nektons end up rescuing Hammerhead. His “treasure” proves to be a birthday present for his daughter Madeline—a treasured photo he had feared lost in the wreck of his old sub.

A symbol projected by the Ephemychron leads the Nektons to the Bermuda Triangle. It proves to be the location of a very strange, giant creature. The Nektons follow it and watch it vanish through a mysterious, underwater “portal”. Undeterred, the Aronnax follows it through and it vanishes also! The Nektons find themselves in a strange zone where the normal laws of physics don’t apply. There seem to be no ups or downs and the Aronnax’s propulsion system doesn’t work—almost like they’re sailing in a vacuum. More of the weird creatures are swimming here and Kaiko now recognises them as Tardigades—the strongest creatures on Earth, able to survive in almost any environment. But they’re also supposed to be microscopic! The Nektons discover they’ve been followed through the portal by Ant’s adversary, Alpheus. But he too cannot navigate in this strange zone. Both sides soon realise that strange forces are at work, trying to expand their vessels and tear them apart. When Ant realises that Jeffrey always orients himself on the same plane as the Tardigrades, he realises Jeffrey is in sync with the energy here—and he might hold the key to finding a way out! Ant places Jeffrey in his purpose-built “Jeffrey-Knight”—designed to let Jeffrey travel on land. This Knight may be the Nektons’ only hope of escaping this zone! Using a tow-rope, the Nektons are stunned to find Jeffrey can pull their giant submarine! But Alpheus has one last trick up his sleeve. By severing the tow-rope, he manages to escape himself, leaving the Nektons stranded, escape seemingly impossible. But Jeffrey too cannot be underestimated!

A giant, upright-standing creature, straight out of a monster movie, is walking across the ocean floor, causing havoc. Kaiko knows this isn’t a normal sea-creature. How can something like this exist? Ant is hugely excited. A big fan of Japanese “Kaiju” (monster) movies, this is his fantasy come to life! They try to halt the monster’s destructive progress, but it seems to be super-strong! The Nektons wonder why it’s heading towards the island of the their old friend Kenji Nakimura. It transpires that Kenji built this robotic monster as a prop when he worked in the movie business, years ago. But somehow it’s been activated again and is on a collision course with the giant hermit crabs that inhabit the waters off Kenji’s island. As much as Ant loves a good “battle of the monsters” on screen, he doesn’t want to witness one in real life. Kenji tries to help them, but he’s conflicted—he doesn’t want his greatest creation damaged! But when the monster finally reaches the cave of the giant mutated hermit crabs, the crabs emerge to defend their territory. A battle of epic proportions looms! Ant tries to wrap the creature in a strong steel cable, but the cable isn’t strong enough. Finally Kenji remembers he used parts from the monster’s original remote-control to build a new device. This must have been the trigger for its new awakening! They finally manage to deactivate the huge “Kaiju” and peace is restored. Kenji’s Island now has a very large, inert monster statue on it to keep Kenji company.

Dark Orca pirate-boy Smiling Finn steals a treasure map from his father and comes to the Nektons pleading for help. He wants them to stop his father, Captain Hammerhead, from stealing a particular treasure! Ant finds this very puzzling—why would a pirate not want to steal a treasure? Despite their reservations, the Nektons help out and save the treasure from the pirates. But in the process, Will gets very sick and collapses. The Nektons have no idea what’s wrong with him and it’s getting much worse by the minute. It seems Finn hasn’t told the Nektons the entire truth. He finally admits that the treasure is cursed! He was trying to protect his father from this and now it seems Will has succumbed to it. But are curses for real? Fontaine doesn’t think so. The Nektons have to find the truth about this treasure before Will becomes its latest victim! Returning to the area where they found it, they search for clues. The treasure ship was wrecked on a coral reef—is that significant? But Finn’s father and his crew arrive, determined to disown his “traitor son” and retrieve “his” treasure! In the ensuing battle, the pirates are driven back, but Will is still desperately ill. Finn, Ant and Fontaine finally deduce that a toxin produced by the coral around the treasure is responsible for Will’s sickness. Kaiko is able to produce an antidote, and Will is finally saved. Finn eventually returns to his family and is accepted by them only when he convinces them it was all a plot to poison the Nektons. Hammerhead is now proud of his son, thinking he’s very creative.

Kaiko finds a strange crack in the seafloor while exploring. She’s amazed to find it leads to a vast cavern and a strange, ancient temple hidden in the gloom below. As she reports back to the Aronnax however, Will hears her scream “The statues! They’re alive!” before her radio cuts out. Will, Ant and Fontaine launch a rescue mission. The crack is so small they can’t swim in with Knights, so they enter wearing only rebreathers and wetsuits. Ant sees two large statues guarding the temple’s entrance. An ancient inscription warns them to “beware the sentinels”. But Ant is sceptical. After all, they’re made of stone; they can’t move. What can they do? However, as the sun rises further and shines through the crack above, the skin on the statues seems to ripple and come alive! It seems the statues are covered with deadly, poisonous stone-fish—and they’re determined to protect their environment! The Nektons retreat to the temple where they find Kaiko hiding too. There seems to be no way out past the fish. What’s more, they find the temple is actually a tomb. Ant hopes that’s not an omen! Will is desperately ill from a stone-fish sting and things are looking grim until Jeffrey arrives! But how did he get past the stone-fish outside? Ant discovers that Jeffrey used a different entrance and follows him out again. But as Ant races to the surface, the stone-fish chase him. He barely makes it to the Aronnax intact! Using it to block the sun from the cavern, he manages to get the stone-fish to swarm back to the statues to sleep. The Nektons escape, leaving a warning there for other unwary travellers.

Fontaine has a “secret room” somewhere aboard the Aronnax and it’s driving Ant crazy. He just can’t find it! Kaiko isn’t helping him either because she’s busy taking the Rover out. But things turn strange when the Rover races off, seemingly out of control, with Kaiko aboard! Will chases after her and they both soon realise sabotage is involved. Alone on the Aronnax, Ant is stunned to find Alpheus aboard! In fact, Alpheus has sabotaged the Rover to distract Ant’s parents while he breaks into the Aronnax and steals the Ephemychron! He reasons that the Nektons will never be able to locate Lemuria without it. Taking Ant with him, Alpheus then scuttles the Aronnax. Fontaine, alone in her secret room, finally becomes aware that something is very wrong on board—and soon realises she is the family’s only hope! As the Aronnax starts to fill with water, she swims through flooded chambers, seals the remaining ones, and fires herself out of the solar ski tubes in a desperate attempt to catch Alpheus’ departing submarine. She manages to latch hold of it and finally forces her way inside. Aboard Alpheus’ sub, Ant is stunned to find that Alpheus can activate the Ephemychron! That doesn’t make sense—only he is supposed to be able to do that! Proteus, who is also aboard, is delighted. To him, it’s a sign that Alpheus is destined to find Lemuria! But Ant turns the tables on Alpheus and, with Fontaine’s help, he manages to escape with the Ephemychron in hand. Will and Kaiko finally get the Rover under control and pick up their children. Alpheus is so infuriated by Proteus that he intentionally dumps him at sea! Their tenuous partnership is dissolved!

A symbol projected by the Ephemychron leads the Nektons to a mysterious site. Ant is sure that, this time, it must be Lemuria. But, arriving there, the Nektons find only a strange underwater mound. They can see dolphins coming and going from an entrance. They enter carrying seaweed, and exit carrying nothing—very unusual. Entering the mound, the Nektons encounter a maze! And soon, the mound gets even weirder. When the Nektons move carefully forward, walls shift and move—spaces change—and they become disoriented. They’re soon separated from each other and trapped inside! Ant manages to accidentally find his way out and returns to the Aronnax so he can get intothe Mimic Knight and find the others. But when Ant finally navigates through the whole maze,, he finds they and the dolphins are not alone! In the centre of the maze Ant finds a Minotaur! Even stranger than the one of legend, this Minotaur has a bull’s head, a man’s torso and the tail of a shark! It seems angry that humans have invaded its home. When the Nektons manage to find each other, it charges them furiously! Ant realises that dolphins bring seaweed into the maze to feed the Minotaur. If the dolphins can find their way out, maybe by following their lead, the Nektons can too! It’s only when Ant uses the echolocation system of the Mimic Knight that he sees the maze as the dolphins do. Now he can see an opening that was invisible to normal eyes. Using it, the family finally escapes. Afterwards, they speculate that this creature really was the basis of the Minotaur legends—therefore it, and the maze, must be incredibly ancient!

The Nektons discover that their old adversary “Devil Daniels: Monster Hunter” is back to his old tricks. He’s hunting a huge white whale and is determined to capture it! The Nektons can’t let an innocent creature fall victim to Daniels, so they speed to the location to stop him. But when they encounter the huge, white whale, they find it’s larger than any Kaiko has ever seen. Ant is entranced by the creature, and when he examines it up close, he makes a startling discovery. He finds old scars, markings and clues to its identity. It seems it’s none other than the legendary whale Moby Dick! Kaiko calculates the creature must be almost 200 years old! Unfortunately, this information spurs Daniels on to capture it. He realises it will be the perfect first exhibit in his new aquatic adventure park. At first he uses suction harpoons to try to capture it. But these only serve to tangle it with the Aronnax. Moby Dick is freed eventually by Ant and Fontaine, but the Aronnax is damaged. Daniels sees his opportunity. He uses low frequency sound to herd the whale away from the Nektons and manages to contain it in a huge aquarium at his adventure park. The Nektons realise they need to stage a “whale-break” before Daniels can expose this creature to the entire world via his opening day live broadcast! Each of the Nektons plays a role in bypassing Daniels’ state-of-the-art security system and they eventually manage to free the creature. Daniels is humiliated in front of his audience by Moby Dick’s non-appearance.

Following a mysterious oil slick in the water, the Nektons find the Dark Orca pirate submarine is stopped dead in the middle of the ocean. Entering it, they discover it’s completely deserted! It’s as if the pirate crew have just abandoned their vessel. But why? As they explore further, Will, Ant and Fontaine are spooked somewhat by mysterious, ghostly sounds. Levers seemingly move by themselves and lights flicker on and off. Ant has a theory…he thinks the sub is haunted! Fontaine seeks a more rational explanation. Following some of the sounds, Will, Fontaine and Ant are stunned to discover Hammerhead and his children hiding deep within the ship, terrified by the “ghosts” they insist have overrun their home. And when the sub starts its engines by itself and takes off, it really does seem like ghosts are driving it! Ant and Mad Madeline join forces to sabotage the sub before it collides with an underwater mountain. Outside the sub, in the Rover, Kaiko has become aware of an intermittent sonar signal that she can’t identify. Something mysterious is out here. But what? Ant discovers that large, super-eel larvae are growing within the machinery of the sub, making it do strange things. They’re semi-transparent and creepy—and if you really squint, they could pass as ghosts. Mystery solved! But when the giant, 25-meter-long super-eel mother comes looking for its children, the Nektons need to find a way to get rid of those larvae—now! Ant lures them with pickled eggs and manages to get them all into a crate in the moonpool room. But as the crate drops into the ocean, Ant is still inside it! The Nektons come together to rescue Ant and reunite the mother super-eel with its babies.

Catatumbo Bay is the site of a lightning storm that has been raging for hundreds of years—an amazing natural phenomena. But Nereus comes to the Nektons with the news that the Catatumbo storm is growing in intensity and becoming more dangerous. The Aronnax examines the waters underneath the storm, but the sub is struck by lightning that comes up from below—from the seabed itself! Now without power, the Aronnax starts sinking fast. As the Nektons try to save it, they realise that the lightning is being generated by a huge, football field-sized electric ray lying on the seafloor! It’s a Monumential that’s been sleeping for eons! If it awakens, it will cause destruction on a vast scale. Will, Ant and Fontaine manage to desperately push the de-powered Aronnax to a ledge before it drops onto the Monumential. They’ve managed to buy some time—but the Aronnax’s batteries have been drained. It can’t function at present. Ant has a plan. They might be able to use the electricity generated by the Monumential to recharge the Aronnax’s batteries. It’s a desperate ploy, but when the Aronnax slips from its ledge and starts to drop towards the Monumential once more, they realise they have no other choice. They lower a cable towards the creature’s dorsal hump (where it generates the charge) and, as it touches, a vast electrical charge surges through the Aronnax! The battery charge is restored and they manage to get the Aronnax moving. They just manage to stop it from touching the Monumential and waking it. Luckily, by draining that excess charge, the creature is now more in sync with the Catatumbo storm above and the storm activity has returned to normal.

When Alpheus announces via radio that he has found the gates to Lemuria, the Nektons fear he’s beaten them to their greatest prize! Even as Alpheus gloats, though, he finds a strange circular depression in the middle of the gates and realises that he needs the Ephemychron to open them. Launching an audacious attack on the Aronnax, he drives his submarine into the Aronnax’s forward windows and steals the Ephemychron from the Nektons. By the time the Nektons recover and track him, they find him about to insert the Ephemychron into gates of vast size hidden in an underwater trench. Ant tries to stop him, but Alpheus succeeds in opening the gates. But it’s not a city that lies within—it’s something vast and alive! Huge tentacles emerge! It’s not Lemuria Alpheus has found, but the largest and most deadly of the Monumentials—the Kraken! A creature that can bring untold destruction to the world! And now, nothing can stop it! Alpheus is terrified. He takes the Ephemychron and races towards his submarine, which is already retreating to the top of the trench. Ant, knowing that the Ephemychron is needed to close the gates, chases after him. The repaired Aronnax arrives in the nick of time, trapping Alpheus, and Ant retrieves the Ephemychron. Amid incredible danger, Ant finally succeeds in closing the gates, sealing the Kraken within. The gates then light up with an image of the ancient sceptre of the Queen of Lemuria. Seeing this, Nereus realises this is the mystery device that can put the Monumentials, slowly awakening all over the world, back to sleep! Now they know exactly what they need to save the world! It’s located somewhere in Lemuria, so now it’s even more imperative that hey find Lemuria before Alpheus does!