u/Consistent_Media_541

My name is Arthur. I am 24 years old. I have Down Syndrome, but that doesn’t stop me from being the world’s leading expert on the RMS Titanic. I was born on April 15th, 2002—the exact same day the ship finally vanished into the black abyss of the ocean nearly a century before. My room is a museum of every bolt and rivet that ship ever had.

For ten years, I worked three different jobs to save the money to see her. I stocked heavy shelves until my back ached, I cleaned fish tanks, and I spent my weekends recycling jagged scrap metal. I saved every penny. People told me I couldn't handle the pressure of the deep, but they were wrong. I didn't go down there to take a picture. I went because I needed to know what the ship tasted like. I needed to know what a century of tragedy felt like on my tongue.

One month ago, 12,500 feet down in the dark, I got my chance. I slipped out of the airlock, leaned into the freezing void, and I performed The Licking.

The ship wasn't just cold iron; it was a giant, water-logged scab. The second my tongue touched the hull, the Titanic screamed. A grinding, metallic roar cracked the thick glass of our submarine. The entire bow section crumbled into a massive, swirling cloud of orange dust. I made it back to the surface, but the world was already changing.

In a jail cell on the coast, the fever hit me. I vomited a black, oily sludge that smelled like old pennies. When it hit the guard's boots, his stomach turned grey and rigid. A jagged, rusted steel skeleton ripped out of his chest and began to eat him, growing skin and muscles as it swallowed his life. For thirty days, I fought through a Rust Apocalypse. Skeletons—The Crew—took over the coastlines, but they let me pass. They knew I was the one who woke them.

But the skeletons were just the scouts. The horizon broke this morning when the Titanic rose from the abyss, its bow and stern snapped together by giant, pulsing tendons. It sailed into New York Harbor, and it didn't just dock—it began to feed.

I was sucked into the hull as the ship hit Manhattan. I am trapped inside right now, and the world is a hurricane of flying steel. The Titanic has become a Supership. It is a living magnet for metal. As it passes the skyscrapers, they don't just fall—they melt into the ship. I watched through a porthole as the One World Trade Center liquefied, its modern alloy flowing into the bow to create a gleaming, invincible blade. The Empire State Building was stripped to its skeleton, the massive iron beams flying through the air like spears to form new, armored funnels.

The ship is deleting its past. It is rebuilding itself into a modern god. The Statue of Liberty’s frame was just sucked into the hull to become the ship's new internal ribs. Every piece of original 1912 steel is being replaced by the skyscrapers of New York.

I am running through a storm of iron. Massive skyscraper plates are flying past my head, snapping into place to build the new hull while I’m still inside. Everything is turning into modern glass and reinforced concrete, but I know the secret. The ship is rebuilding everything except the Boiler Room. That is the only original part left—the rusted, coal-smelling heart of the beast.

The Slow Rot is taking me. My legs are iron. My heart thumps like a steam engine. I am crawling through the elevator shafts of the 1WTC that are now fused to the ship’s guts. I have to reach the Boiler Room. I have to perform the final lick on the ship’s original heart before it finishes rebuilding itself into an unstoppable monster that will devour the whole USA.

I can see the glow of the furnaces ahead. I have to destroy the Unsinkable once and for all.

My name is Arthur. I am 24 years old. I have Down Syndrome, but that doesn't stop me from being the world’s leading expert on the RMS Titanic. I was born on April 15th, 2002. That is the exact same day the ship finally vanished into the black abyss of the ocean over a century ago. My room is a museum of every bolt and rivet that ship ever had. I worked three different jobs for ten years—stocking heavy shelves, cleaning fish tanks, and recycling jagged scrap metal—just to save enough money to go down in a submarine. People told me I couldn't handle the pressure, but they were wrong.

I didn't go down there for a photo or a souvenir. I went because I needed to know the truth. I needed to know what a century of tragedy tasted like. One month ago, 12,500 feet down in the dark, I got my chance. I performed "The Lick."

The ship wasn't just cold iron. It was a giant, water-logged scab. The second my tongue touched the hull, the Titanic screamed. It was a loud, grinding roar that vibrated through my teeth and cracked the thick acrylic glass of our submarine. The entire bow section, which had stood for a hundred years, crumbled into a massive, swirling cloud of orange dust. I made it back to the surface, but the military arrested me. They didn't understand that the ship was waiting for a spark of human life to wake up.

In the jail cell, I felt a cold, metallic fever. I vomited black oil and orange sludge that smelled like old pennies and rotting salt. When it hit the guard's boots, his skin turned grey and hard. Then, a jagged, rusted steel skeleton ripped out of his chest. It didn't have eyes, just empty sockets made of iron. It started eating him. As it swallowed his flesh, I saw wet pink ligaments and muscles weaving themselves over the metal ribs. I call them The Lickaments. I named them that because I licked the ship to wake them up, and a "ligament" sounds just like "lick." It’s the only word that makes sense.

It has been one month since that day. The world is breaking. The Lickaments have taken over the coastlines, eating thousands of people to grow back their skin until they look like the passengers from 1912, but with jagged metal bones underneath. They don't hurt me. They bow to me. But the ship... the ship isn't a memorial anymore. It’s a predator.

The Titanic put itself together with giant, pulsing tendons and sailed right into New York City. It didn't dock; it smashed through the piers. The bow split open like a giant, rusty mouth and began devouring buildings, yellow taxis, and screaming people to build its mass. It’s moving into the heart of the USA now, turning the ground into orange salt and iron.

The ship sucked me inside its hull. I am hiding in a dry corner of the bridge. I found a rugged satellite laptop from the sub expedition that is still connected to a beacon. My skin is starting to turn to iron, and the room is pulsing like a wet throat, but I am still me. I am still Arthur. My right hand is stiff, but I can still type this with my left. I am becoming a part of the ship—a living, breathing witness fused to the walls. I have to get to the Boiler Room. I have to lick the ship's heart one last time before I'm just another rusted body in the hull. If I don't, the ship will eat the whole country.