Super Drowning Skills on display.
Amy, Roxie, and the player come across the body of professional diver Valerie Green whilst diving in a coral reef.
Tropes:
- Amazing Technicolor Wildlife: During the Additional Investigation, you and Yann discover a new species of bioluminescent mantis shrimp. Lily, Yann's daughter, decides to call it Rainbow Star shrimp.
- Compensating for Something: Hannah says this about Mighty Pete, the yacht owner where the victim was last seen, when he arrives at the station.Hannah: I took the liberty to ask Frank to get him to the station. Apparently, Mr Long refuses to answer to any name but "Mighty Pete". Must be compensating for something.Amy: Hannah! That's not a way to talk about suspects!
- Death by Irony: Even Roxie notes how poetic was for the victim, a professional diver, to be murdered by drowning.
- Felony Misdemeanor: Played for Laughs. During his trial, Judge Dante adds 15 years to Mighty Pete's sentence because he wouldn't stop talking in Third-Person Person.
- Gold Digger: Valerie was desperately trying to leave Pacific Bay and start a new life, but she needed a lot of money to do that, so she started to date Mighty Pete to get close to his fortune. Unfortunately, this costed Valerie her life.Mighty Pete: I had to give her bigger and bigger gifts to please her, and just when I thought I had her under my control, she wants to leave?! SHE USED ME!
- Hard-Drinking Party Girl: Angie Cortez is this. Valerie also became one in her efforts to blend in among the elite of Ocean Shore and get hold of their money.
- Longer-Than-Life Sentence: Downplayed. Judge Dante sentences Mighty Pete, a 78-year-old man, to 45 years in prison.
- Love Hurts: Valerie left her boyfriend Mike Herbert for Mighty Pete, who in exchange killed her when he found out she only wanted him for his money.
- Make It Look Like an Accident: The killer sabotaged the victim's oxygen tank to make it appear she died of a diving accident.
- Opportunistic Bastard: We learn that the victim did this a lot in her attempts to gain money, betraying her boyfriend and two best friends so she could blend in with the elite of Pacific Bay and get hold of some cash.
- Pride: One of the reasons why Mighty Pete killed Valerie was because she hurt his pride by playing him.Mighty Pete: She had what she deserved. You don't leave Mighty Pete, it's Mighty Pete that leaves you!
- Pulled from Your Day Off: You discover the victim's body while taking a little diving trip to a coral reef.
- Pursue the Dream Job: Inverted. Roger Strout, an underwater photographer and former friend of Valerie, had to quit his dream job after she told a lot of people about his secret photographing spot. Fortunately, he manages to find another secret spot in the Additional Investigation.
- Shout-Out:
- The case's title is based on the film What Lies Beneath
- Mighty Pete is a parody of Hugh Hefner.
- Angie Cortez resembles Snooki.
- In the Deep Coral scene, there is a clownfish and a blue tang.
- In the Party Yacht scene, there is a teddy bear bearing a strong resemblance to Lotso.
- In the Diving Shop scene, there is artwork of a mermaid resembling Ariel.
- Soapbox Sadie: Leah Davies, an ecology activist who berated Valerie for bringing partygoers to a preserved part of the coral reef and tried to scare her with a Trick Bomb. She mellows out by the end, though, opting to make a gala for the World Coral Foundation instead.
- Tampering with Food and Drink: Leah sent Mighty Pete a cooler full of ice cubes laced with laxatives so the people at his party would fall sick.
- Third-Person Person: Mighty Pete talks about Mighty Pete like this. It's a bad habit of Mighty Pete.
- Trick Bomb: Leah Davies put a smoke bomb near the diving shop intending to scare Valerie and all the partygoers she bought to the coral reef since they were destroying it.
- Unfortunate Names: Mighty Pete's full name is Peter Long.
- We Used to Be Friends: Angie and Valerie were best friends until the latter started dating Mighty Pete, whom Angie was in love with too.
