The bulls had no choice. They had to fight.
The Ancient’s jaws flexed as he targeted the leader. His intention was to cripple him and put the others to rout. At the three hundred yard mark, however, the big bull suddenly slowed down. It was a tactically sound move; the sudden deceleration allowed the wings of the attack formation to arc forward, like a set of bull’s horns. The whales’ intentions were obvious; they intended to engage him from three sides at once, hoping to use their numerical advantage and combined mass to offset his superior size and strength.
The Ancient uttered a cantankerous grumble. In his youth, he might have given in to the temptation to prove his superiority by pitting his strength against that of his challengers. But now, the wily predator was far more experienced.
Speeding forward at maximum velocity, the pliosaur closed to within one hundred yards of the lead whale, then veered off. He skirted the snapping jaws of the bull sperm on the far left – an infuriated, sixty-seven foot beast with a twisted jaw and prop scars on his back – before looping around his cumbersome opponent and turning back. The marine giant’s scaly body was a spiraling mass of fins and teeth as he executed a figure eight that put him exactly where he wanted to be: on his opponent’s flank.
There was a tremendous crash, coupled with a distinctive crunching sound, as the Ancient slammed into his unfortunate adversary. His twenty-foot jaws snapped like giant shears, slashing into the big sperm’s chest cavity, slicing through skin, blubber, and muscle, and grating against bone as his ridged teeth cut grooves in the whale’s thick ribs. Blood and hunks of blubber spewed into the surrounding sea, an expanding cloud of scarlet.
It was a devastating strike, but hardly fatal. The whale, sensing its speedy attacker closing by the pressure wave preceding it, torqued its huge body in an effort to shield its vulnerable belly. Having survived the initial hit, and despite the larger predator shaking its eighty-ton body back and forth, the bull sperm went on the offensive. Spreading its fourteen-foot jaws, it clamped down on the pliosaur’s nearest flipper and bit down hard, its eleven-inch teeth sinking deep into the fibrous tissue.
The Ancient felt the painful bite but ignored it. Still gripping the thrashing whale in his powerful jaws, he tried maneuvering it into a position where he could finish it. The whale was experienced, however, and kept twisting its mammoth body in an effort to keep its thickly-muscled shoulders and scarred dorsal section facing its attacker.
As the other dominant males drew near, the Ancient realized what the tenacious cachalot was doing. Despite the severity of its wounds, it was attempting to immobilize him long enough that its teammates could arrive and inflict enough damage to either kill or drive away their dangerous adversary.
The thought of being hamstrung and helpless sent the great beast into a rage. Jolts of adrenaline flooded the pliosaur’s bloodstream, permeating his dense musculature. Unable to twist himself into a position where he could either disembowel his foe or amputate its clinging jaw, he went for a more direct approach. Backed by a bellow that sent shock waves reverberating throughout the surrounding sea, the Ancient bared his gigantic fangs and struck at the clinging sperm whale’s most fortified spot – the base of its mammoth neck and skull.
The planet’s most powerful jaws closed with a force sufficient to shatter granite. Like steel machete blades, his trihedral teeth sank deep, over and over. Ragged hunks of blubber and bloody fragments of bone spewed into the murky water, creating a grisly cloud that surrounded the two opponents.
The stricken whale began to cry out in pain and its comrades flew forward with the speed of desperation. Only one hundred yards out and closing, their toothy jaws opened as they prepared to engage their primeval enemy.
They were too late.
With a final, devastating bite, the Ancient’s mammoth jaws split the mortally wounded sperm whale’s skull, reducing the largest brain in the world to pulp and completely severing its nervous system. The dying whale began to spasm. Its air supply spewed out of its blowhole in a thick stream of bloody bubbles and its body violently convulsed. Seconds later, its jaw went limp.
Freed from the eighty-ton chain that restrained him, the Ancient threw himself forward with a power thrust that displaced hundreds of thousands of gallons of seawater. Speeding between the two onrushing bull sperms, he ignored a grazing strike to his humped shoulder and struck with rattlesnake speed as he hurtled past, slashing left and right with his mighty jaws. The larger bull suffered a raking bite that nearly blinded it and left ten-foot gashes in its thick skin, and the smaller one had its right pectoral fin chopped to ribbons.
The Ancient continued past the stricken sperms some five hundred yards, before spewing forth the ratcheting sonar emissions of his species. His huge head swung back and forth as he took in the situation. The pod of cows and younglings had taken advantage of their guardians’ sacrifice and slipped away during the battle. Of the three dominant males, the two wounded bulls were withdrawing. All that remained was the hemorrhaging remains of the dead bull sperm, its jaw hanging flaccidly as it rolled belly-up. The scent of its blubber and blood spread rapidly throughout the water, an irresistible dinner bell that resonated through the hungry pliosaur.
With a quick scan to make sure there were no more surprises lurking nearby, the Ancient approached the carcass, eyeing it covetously. The big sperm’s tough skin and iron-hard sinews were hardly as tender as that of the young calves it warded, but it would suffice.
Ignoring the bothersome engine noise of a military destroyer that suddenly passed overhead, the Ancient began to feed. His monstrous jaws opened like a toothy bear trap and he lunged forward, his armor-piercing teeth carving multi-ton hunks of flesh and blubber from the belly of the whale’s still-warm carcass. A huge rent appeared in the sperm’s abdomen, and hundreds of feet of snaky intestines spilled out, infusing the nighttime waters with blood and body fluids. Nearby, a horde of sharks and caldera fish gathered, hungrily eyeing the vast bounty, but wisely keeping their distance.
The Ancient gazed upward, his garnet-colored eyes studying the moonlit silhouette of the retreating naval vessel as he swallowed another gullet-full. Although the warship didn’t appear to be searching for him, he took no chances and remained submerged and out of sight. He had no need to surface as he fed. Unlike a crocodile, which evolution had gifted with a wedge-shaped head design similar to his own, the pliosaur was not reliant on a palatal valve to keep water out of his lungs. His esophagus connected solely to his stomach, and he breathed entirely through separate nasal passages that culminated in a pair of muscular blowholes. He was Nature’s supreme killer and perfectly adapted to his pelagic lifestyle.
As the sounds of the destroyer faded into imperceptibility, the Ancient resumed feeding. Shearing off a huge mouthful of intestines with quick snaps of his jaws, he greedily swallowed them. His mouth design was different than that of the circling sharks. Instead of taking cookie-cutter bites from his prey, his huge mandibles, with their interlocking, trihedral teeth functioned like a pair of gigantic shears. When he encountered prey too large to swallow whole, he simply cut it into manageable portions and then gulped down the pieces via his widened posterior gape.
Swallowing a three-ton hunk of blubber and muscle, the giant pliosaur paused. He raised his scarred muzzle to a forty-five degree angle and scented the surrounding sea. The surviving sperms were already long gone and the course they had taken was far from his chosen migration route.
It mattered not. For him, from the surface to the darkness of the abyss, food was always available. He went where he wanted, and when he wanted. He was the ocean’s undisputed monarch; nothing could challenge him.
And anything foolish enough to try was simply added to the menu.
* * *
Garm Braddock was terse and tired as he approached his quarters. Between the physical and mental drain of Gryphon’s extended patrol, having to spare the life of, and escort back, yet another known maneater for indoctrination, followed by the s
tress of nearly losing his brother to a sea serpent-sized lamprey, he was spent. He shook his head. He needed the release of a good training session: some mitt and bag-work, maybe even some sparring – if he could find a suitable volunteer – to take his mind off things. But any workout was going to have to wait until tomorrow. At least he’d made sure any members of his crew still on base were asleep in their beds before he headed to his accommodations. It was tough being the Papa bear for those characters. He leaned on the doorjamb and slapped his palm against the biometric lock panel, his heavy sigh matching the swooshing sound of the thick metal door as it slid smoothly open.
Garm entered his dimly-lit quarters, his pale eyes adjusting to the amber-hued nightlights. The heady scent of lavender mixed with pine told him Tartarus’s maid service had recently been by. He didn’t bother ordering the overheads on; he had no plans on being up that long. He clicked open his gun belt, sitting the weighty S&W semi-auto on a nearby dresser, then headed toward the bathroom. Stripping off his shirt and trousers on the way, he kicked and tossed them toward a nearby hamper and was bare-assed by the time he got there.
Outside the bathroom, he paused and glanced longingly at his nearby king-sized bed. She was a big girl and a real beauty: one of those body-formatting, temperature-regulated, therapeutic numbers. Damn thing cost as much as a car. Dirk bought it for him last Christmas after he hurt his back and, after the first night, he fell in love with it. He named her Bertha, and if she hadn’t been so huge, he’d have taken her with him on patrols. The tall submariner sighed again as he slid open the bathroom door. Brushing his teeth and heeding the call of nature was pretty much all he was capable of before collapsing into the loving embrace of his well-padded mistress.
Inside the near-dark bathroom, Garm brushed and flossed at light speed, his calloused hands relying more on muscle memory than his catlike vision. He grabbed a bottle of mouthwash and took a swig, swishing it around before spitting and rinsing like a champ. He wiped his mouth and grinned as he put the cap back on. Not using a Dixie cup was a foul habit he’d picked up from his dad. He had more than one memory of his parents arguing about Jake sipping directly from the bottle.
“How can germs survive inside?” his dad said. “It’s all alcohol!”
In the end, they ended up using “his and hers” bottles . . .
Garm smiled sadly as he stashed the mouthwash and took a moment to study his naked physique. He ran his fingers across his toned midsection and frowned. Although he hadn’t lost any size, his vascularity was definitely down. He could tell by his abs; they lacked that stony hardness they usually had. A grunt of annoyance escaped his lips. Sitting in a captain’s chair for days on end was the surest way to not only losing one’s edge, but to gaining weight as well. He’d bet serious money if he stepped on a scale right now he was pushing 250, as opposed to his usual 245.
As Garm’s eyes scrolled down past his groin, they settled on a series of two-inch scars that peppered his right thigh and hip like machine gun rounds. He had a brief recollection of the awful hakapik mark that graced his mother’s hip: the result of a near-fatal wound she received trying to protect baby harp seals from hunters, back when she was just eighteen.
She never tried to hide her disfigurement, not even when wearing a bathing suit. Garm’s eyes lowered to half-mast as a wave of sadness washed over him. He missed her more than words, and the fact that her killer eluded his vengeance haunted him day and night.
He poked the gnarled white surface of one of his scars with a hardened fingertip. The skin was tough and numb to the touch, much like the rest of him. Unlike his mother’s selfless act, however, his own wounds were, admittedly, received under far less noble circumstances. He remembered first the drinking and carousing, then the waves and water, and finally, all the blood and screaming.
Garm looked up and gave a start as he realized Sam Mot’s grinning face had replaced his in the vanity mirror. Dizzy and disoriented, he pitched forward, catching himself on the sink, and scrunched his eyes tightly closed. When he reopened them, he discovered he’d somehow gone from his bathroom to a sleek flats boat, motoring off the coast of Key West. It was nine years prior. The Kronosaurus phenomena was just starting to heat up and, from beachgoers to boaters, everyone was excited about it. On top of that, resident anglers were going nuts about the possibility of hooking one of the huge, primeval fish that were prowling Florida’s waterways.
Garm had accepted his dad’s recommendation and taken a much-needed break from boxing. He’d accepted an invitation to chill out and go fishing with his old high school buddy, Samuel Mot. Sam was a daredevil by nature, as well as a founding member of the recently formed LifeGivers: the lifeguards who skyrocketed to fame by risking their necks rescuing the victims of pliosaur attacks. Sam had bragged incessantly to his pugilist pal about the trolling opportunities in Key West – both the scaly kind in the water and the softer, two-legged variety that rubbed sunscreen on themselves and lay basting on the island’s warm, sandy beaches.
“I’m telling you, Garm, these beach bunnies love big, athletic guys, and the braver the better. Between your bloody battles in the ring and me dragging terrified surfers from the mouths of hungry monsters, how can we go wrong?” Sam said. “We’ll clean up. And in between scoring with the babes, maybe we’ll even catch a fish or two!”
Sam was right. Once Garm perfected the “hypnotic stare” he taught him, making the most of his imposing height and wolfish eyes, they’d been inundated with ravenous females. The girls were relentless. In fact, after five days of non-stop depravity, they had to “borrow” Sam’s dad’s boat Idle Worship and hit the water to escape them. Now, the two friends were trolling for slightly more dangerous prey. In fact, they were in pursuit of the biggest, nastiest fish around.
They were going to try and hook a Xiphactinus audax.
At the time, fishermen had just starting learning about the Bulldog fish; the annual roundup for them didn’t even exist. A few of the smaller, man-sized ones had been caught by local anglers, but one of the big adults that devoured full-grown tarpon had yet to be brought to gaff. Few had tackle strong enough to deal with them and nobody had a clue as to how many of the toothy things were really out there, let alone how dangerous they were.
Things were about to change.
The fishing started off slow. They were trolling a mile or so offshore and, after two hours of putt-putting around, hadn’t had a nibble. So when the starboard rod bent like a drunken letter U and started screaming off 300-lb test line, the two buddies started jumping for joy.
As Sam’s guest, Garm got the nod to take the first fish. Strapping a fighting belt and harness around his muscular frame, the athletic 20-year-old wrestled the rod free from its stainless steel holder and went to work. The 130-pound class stand-up rig they’d mated to a super-wide reel was designed for giant tuna, so they were confident that, whatever they hooked into, their gear could handle it.
The Bulldog fish that fell for their lure was sizable. They spotted it as it breached, fifty yards back, its chrome scales flashing like a mint condition 50’s car bumper as it went airborne. Sam estimated it at nearly ten feet in length and over six hundred pounds. It was a powerful swimmer too, and, despite the heavy drag, made determined runs, repeatedly stripping backing in one hundred yard sprints and even pulling the boat with it. Garm kept at it, however. Pushing the reel’s lever drag to its maximum setting, he hauled back with his powerful arms and pumped like a madman. After twenty grueling minutes, he finally turned the tide. Inch by inch, yard by yard, he started bringing the weary fish to the boat.
Sam was steering with one hand and recording with his cell phone with the other. He was ecstatic. The give-and-take battle had ended up taking them close to shore. In fact, they were within eyeshot of the beach. Once they hauled the giant fish to the docks to be weighed and photographed, they’d end up on the evening news for sure.
Then, seventy-five yards out, something went wrong. There was an abrupt cessati
on of pressure and the line began to shake. Powerful vibrations shimmied up the heavy braid, causing the rod’s heavy roller tip to wobble.
“Something’s got your fish!” Sam cried. He climbed atop the nineteen-foot flats boat’s sunlit poling platform, one hand shielding his eyes. “I don’t know if it’s a shark or another bulldog, but I saw its wake and it’s fucking huge! Get ready. If it hooks itself you’re in for it!”
Sam was more right than he knew. A few seconds later, the larger predator – having swallowed its victim whole – took off like a cruise missile. Garm stared at his smoking reel in disbelief as the high tensile strength braid peeled off at an astonishing rate. In seconds, his nine hundred yards of line was down to five hundred, then three . . .
“Shit!” Sam jumped down to start the main engine but shook his head. “You better brace yourself!” he shouted. “There’s no time to chase her! We’re gonna get spooled!”
Garm was reaching for a fillet knife to cut the line when the well ran dry. The spool locked up and he uttered a grunt of surprise as he was pulled sideways. He let go of the rod and tried to grab the poling platform, but his feet slipped on the wet deck. A second later, his hip hit the gunnels hard and he was yanked headfirst over the side.
Fortunately, Garm had the presence of mind to suck in a quick breath before he was jerked under. Whatever was on the other end of their line was huge; he was dragged ten feet beneath the surface and towed forty yards from the boat in seconds. Then the fish sounded and started to go deep. He could see the sunlight fading as he was pulled down. The pressure was incredible, but with a Herculean effort he managed to unclip the rod from the fighting harness seconds before he would’ve lost his air and been dragged to his death.
Kronos Rising: Kraken (vol.1): The battle for Earth's oceans has just begun. Page 31