"Putain!"

He quickly unlocks his harness and tries to open the pod's door, but it's designed to open towards the outside, and the pressure difference is already big enough that it just won't open.

He tries some percussive maintenance on the handle - "Putain! De bordel! De merde!" - but it doesn't budge.

He makes sure the distress beacon is still active. Not that it would help if he gets too far down, but if the other have seen him splash maybe the rescuers will try and find him, right?

Right?

He doesn't really have anything to do now, and out of habit he just straps back and... waits.

He sinks.

Outside, the gradient has turned from friendly to impersonally cold blue. Water keeps swirling past the window.

He sinks.

The display shows the distress beacon continually wasting energy to shout several tens of meters in each direction. The landing sequence seems confused, and is waiting for the pod to resurface. They are built to take shrapnel or land in water.

He sinks.

The light from the porthole dims slowly as the distance to the surface increases. The cold blue gradually turns to a dread-filled black. Soon only dim interior lights grant the eyes respite from the darkness.

He sinks.

The hull of the pod creaks and then sets. The shells are built to survive a core overload, and that translates to a somewhat absurd degree of pressure tolerance. He'll die of hunger or cold, not from water pressure.

He sinks.

After 20 minutes, there are no more changes. The pod stays upright, because it's built to be heavier on the bottom, and he can walk around if he wants. The water cushions the descent so there's little shaking. A dark continuous sound of metal clumsily cleaving water is all that comes from the outside.

He sinks.

A damned man in a metal container.

He sinks.

Boooooooooooooring.

One can't die of boredom, right?

Guess he'll just have to wait for his inevitable doom.

Dim lights from the power saving mode of the pod make their way out of the porthole and make it a couple of meters before it fades. A very small pod is sinking in a very large ocean, and the water cares not for his plight.

The eternal cold permeates everything, and the darkness stretches into the seeming infinite. The pod creaks from time to time as the pressure builds and builds.

This far away from sunlight, and still nowhere close to anything like a seabed, there are no nutrient sources for fish or other small life. And thus no larger life. Instead there is simply nothing. 

Time passes for a long long time.

It's been many hours. Probably several days. He's eaten several times, slept perhaps a couple times. 

Something very large bumps into the pod from the side.

Did he finally reach the seabed? He tries to look out of the porthole, is there anything out there?

He re-activates the distress beacon. It's probably useless but... you never know.

If he would have reached the seabed, he would have glimpsed it. The bump made the pod rock start oscillating slowly and it slowly self-rights, in a manner consistent with continued sinking. There is no second bump.

"Câlice..."

He turns the distress beacon off again, and then slowly slides down until he's sitting again.

He puts his head in his hands and just stay there for a while. It's not as if it matters.

Something large slithers away, curiosity sated.

A signal designed to reach across solar systems emits from the pod. The water absorbs a lot of it, but not enough. 

In the distance, something awakes with a start.

In the pod, things are back to normal. What artifacts of his existence during the descent can be seen inside?

Well, there's emergency rations wrappers all over the place. Not like it matters.

The heating system is fortunately still working, so the floor is actually not that bad for sleeping. He just took the soft parts of the spacesuit as pillow and... well, that's about it. The capsule is not meant for long term survival, so it doesn't have a lot of amenities. But it's also meant for up to four people, so he has plenty food, water and oxygen left.

He's not sure what the point is, but also too stubborn to just give up.

In the distance a deep rumbling sound, like someone is yawning in slow motion.

Good. Great. This is probably the sound of the pod finally giving up to the pressure. Well. It's been a nice ride.

The sound subsides. The pod has not noticeably changed shape.

Then there is a rapidly approaching sound, as if from a swarm of fish.

Could this be someone coming for him? From his position on the floor he lazily flicks the transponder on again.

Is it useless? Yes.

Is there a part of his brain that will Just Refuse To Lose. Also yes.

Seconds after he flicks the transponder the swarming sound stops momentarily, then changes from rapid to frenetic and suddenly there is a smattering of an incredible number of simultaneous bumping, scratching, grinding noises against the hull of the pod. It sounds unpleasant and damaging to the hull.

Thaaaat, is not the sound of a rescue. Without really thinking about it he turns it off again.

More laying on the floor. Just waiting for the damage to be enough.

The grinding, scratching, bumping noises quickly subside, and the calmer swarming noise returns after a few moments, moving away from the pod and disappearing in the distance. If he cares to look, there are a bunch of new warnings on the pod screen about damaged systems.

Another slow motion yawn, but much closer now. This time it shakes the pod enough that he can feel the floor vibrating against his back.

Well, that helped.

Possibly.

Some time passes and there are various sounds of... things... swimming by. Throughout there is one steadily increasing sound.

If the thing that could send the pod rocking by leisurely prodding the pod was very large, it is a shrimp compared to what now approaches. The disturbance of the water can be felt by organisms an immense distance away, as water rushes around it to make way for the volume of its body. Something best left alone and slumbering, but now awoken and intrigued. It's huge, it's fast, and it understands how to construct a vector of travel from two momentary pulses.

And it's heading this way.

He gets on his feet again and tries looking outside the porthole again... still dark and nothing to see?