Work Text:
They have been swimming beneath the ice since time immemorial and will continue to do so until time runs out. They will see the cracks at the top of the ice and, out of curiosity, investigate, like they, out of curiosity, swim to the bottom of the seas.
Things will land on the surface. They will see what comes. They will find it through cracks in the ice and pull it down to the depths, where they can all rejoice in its textures in turn as it descends.
This new arrival will be no different. They will swim beneath the ice, swim in the waters, and observe. It will not fall through the ice as it lands, which is what will make them overconfident: they will bring it down and it will fall on their heads, plummeting to the depths, bringing several unfortunate explorers with it.
For their second attempt, they will be more cautious. They will approach from a distance, bring free a segment of the ice sheet, and attempt to tilt it.
But this, too, will end in failure. The new arrival will cling to the ice like a living thing and in its desperation break it, will cause discourse through the seas as it sinks to the bottom of the seas. The explorers that observe it on its way down will not find any signs of life. It will be speculated that falling through the ice damaged it, killed it somehow.
For their third attempt, they will not bring the arrival to the water but the water to the arrival. They will slowly erode the ice beneath the new arrival until the waters rise slowly to it.
Now they will find a hole in the new arrival. They will speculate that perhaps the hard structure is a carapace to survive the journey and the soft, sentient matter lives within. One lucky member of their species will swim in, in search of life.
They will find it. It will be small and it will run away from the water, but it will twitch, it will move, it will run its appendage over smooth skin in reciprocal arrangement until its movement will still forever.
This will prompt a new argument beneath the surface. This thing was alive until the water embraced it. Could it be possible that this thing swims not in water but in the gas the carapace contained?
They will formulate a new angle of approach for the new arrival, now one that does not immerse it wholly. The waters of time will swim backward again, and again, and again. They will not stop until their curiosity is sated.