The Guillotine

by Lucas Pederson

  “Have you seen that thing?” Giles’ jowls quiver. “It’s a monster! Its blood will save lives. Think of all the advances in medicine and science that big, stupid fish will bring. Think about all the money it’ll—”

  “There it is,” Ash says. “Money. That’s the real reason you want it captured. How much is Murdock paying you?”

  Giles glances away. “That doesn’t matter.” He returns his gaze to Ash. “What matters are the giant leaps in saving lives the thing will bring.”

  Ash chuckles, hands unfurling. He claps Giles hard on the shoulder. “You’re a piss-poor liar, Giles.” He leans close enough to smell the sour stench of the portly man’s sweat. “We’re putting the dunkleosteus back in its grave, where it belongs. Not because I want it dead, god no. I’d love to see it live and thrive. But it can’t live in the world it came back to. Not this world. And in captivity it would die slowly as you bastards poke and prod and take your fucking samples.”

  “You’re insane,” Giles utters. He glances at Green, Kayla, Quinn and Julia. “You all are. It doesn’t need to die just because it was accidently unthawed. That’s not the fish’s fault. What you want to do…it’s inhumane, for god sake!”

  “What’s inhumane,” Ash says, “is keeping it locked up in a tank. What’s inhumane is letting it die one day at a time or until its uselessness is no longer required. What’s inhumane is not capturing it to save human lives, but to line your pockets with money.”

  “Um,” Julia says. “He kind of makes sense, though, Ash.”

  He shoots a glare at her. “We’ll talk later.” To Giles he says, “Get the fuck out of my sight, you sick bastard. Or I’ll rearrange your fat face for you.”

  Giles gasps, stumbles back a few steps, spins and hurries out of the office.

  Ash watches the portly man stumble and bustle toward the doors at the far end, and smiles.

  “Ash,” Julia says behind him. “What the hell has gotten into you? I mean, yeah he’s—”

  “We’re not going to kill it.” The thought had formed the moment they decided to kill it. An idea though it didn’t manifest itself fully until Giles started his spiel.

  “We aren’t—wait, what?” Julia grabs his shoulders and turns him to face her. “What are you talking about?”

  Green frowns at him. “What do you mean we’re not going to kill it? We can’t let that thing terrorize the lake.”

  “Yeah,” Kayla says. “And you said so yourself that it wouldn’t be able to live in the world as it is now.”

  Grinning, Ash says, “I lied.” He steps away from Julia a bit. “I think the South Pacific Ocean is warm enough for it. North Atlantic is closer though.”

  They all blink at him. Then Kayla ventures, “How are we going to get that thing to an ocean?”

  This, he hadn’t thought over very well. How, indeed? Then another idea pops into his head.

  “Tunnels,” he whispers to himself, frowning at the monitor. The dunkleosteus hasn’t swum much farther from the facility. Instead, it appears to be just floating there.

  “Huh?” Julia nudges him. “Dude, are you going nutty on me?”

  He smiles. “I wish.” He looks at Kayla. “Under the bone trove, there was a tunnel.”

  “Yeah? So?”

  “So, that’s where it came from. Where it got stuck and frozen, or whatever happened. It was in that tunnel, why?”

  Kayla shrugs.

  “Consider all the different species of dinosaurs,” Ash says, cocking a thumb over his shoulder at the Moon Pool room. “What if it travelled through deep tunnels under the ground to the oceans? That’s how it got all those different species. It brought some of them or regurgitated them here.”

  “But why?” Julia asks. “That doesn’t make sense. Why would it bring its prey here? Why not just keep to the oceans?”

  He shakes his head. “I don’t know. Maybe it spawned here? Hard to say, but considering all the baby dunkleosteus skulls found in this region…”

  Everyone fell quiet for a moment.

  Green clears her throat. “So, you didn’t answer the question. How do we get it to an ocean? But more importantly, why? Won’t it disrupt the ecosystem?”

  Julia snorts. “There are so many monstrous mutations and other things in the oceans these days…I doubt a prehistoric fish will affect anything.”

  Crossing her arms, Kayla says, “Then we get it to the ocean. Fine. I still don’t see how we’re going to do that.”

  “We need to run a deep scan and see if that’s really a tunnel under the trove or just a long cave.” Ash nods to Quinn. “Think we can?”

  Quinn sighs. “I think so. It’ll be pushing the boundaries a bit, but I think if I tweak a few things we’ll see a good five hundred feet below the lake floor and outward.”

  “Focus on the south. If the tunnels lead to the oceans, that’s the most likely direction.”

  Quinn nods and goes to work on the scanner.

  Ash points at Kayla and Green. “Gather your teams. We need to plan this and plan it right.”

  “And if there aren’t any tunnels?” Green asks.

  “Then…I don’t know.” His sight flicks to the monitor. The dunkleosteus is gone. “Where’d it go?”

  Both Green and Kayla face the monitor. Julia steps beside Ash.

  Silence ticks by without a glimpse of the old fish.

  “Shit,” Julia says. “We lost it.”

  “Just swam out of range,” Quinn mutters, still working on the deep scanner. “I have it set at one thousand feet, but we’ve been talking a while so I’m sure it—”

  The quake is so strong it slams all of them off their feet. Green manages to crouch to save herself from falling, but everyone else…

  Ash tries to grab onto something, anything, but it’s no use. He goes down hard, luckily getting his arms under him before cracking his skull on the metal floor. All around him, the sounds of bending, rattling, creaking metal. A loud, metallic pang, like a thick cable snapping, assaults his ears.

  Then everything is still again.

  He gets to his feet.

  “That’s not an earthquake,” Julia says, “is it?”

  “Nope.” Ash stares at the monitor, watches the massive fish swim about three hundred feet out. “It’s trying to eat the facility. That’s how hungry it is.”

  “So, what are we going to do?” Kayla, she’s glaring at him a bit. “I’m not sending any of my team out there with that thing. You can forget that shit right now.”

  “There’ll be no persuading it into the tunnels,” Green says. “It’s mad with hunger.”

  “Maybe,” Ash says, “that’s exactly what we need. It’s hungry as all hell and if it sees us going into the tunnels, or even a mini-sub…”

  “It’ll follow,” Quinn quips, still messing with the scanner.

  “Right.”

  Julia punches his arm hard enough to hurt. “That’s the stupidest idea of all the stupidest ideas you’ve ever had, man. Seriously? You want to go swimming with that thing?”

  “Not exactly. We need a decoy after we enter the tunnel. It should follow the decoy all the way to an ocean.”

  Green smiles a bit. “Good plan. But who’s our decoy? Giles?”

  Ash laughs, he can’t help it. That’s funny shit right there. Sad thing is, he almost considers it. Strap Giles in a suit and drop him in.

  Once the laughter eases, he says, “As great as that’d be, no. We need something that can swim faster than that thing and also appear irresistibly tasty. Do we have any seeker bots?”

  Kayla glances at Green who in turn focuses on Quinn.

  Quinn sighs, not looking up from her work. “Yes. We have a seeker bot. Doubt it swims faster than that fish though.”

  “Can we fix that problem?” Ash, heart sinking.

  “I doubt it. Ben in maintenance is a miracle worker, but I don’t think even he can make that thing move faster than fifty knots.”

  “It’s gone again,” Julia says, grop
ing for something to hold on to. “Might wanna bear down, kids.”

  No one questions it and finds something stable to hold on to.

  The dunkleosteus rams into the facility again. The force, the quaking that results from it, jars Ash from the inside out. He grips onto the mounted table at the center of the room as Infinity Moon groans around him.

  Once everything stops vibrating and squealing, Ash steps away from the table. “Get the seeker bot. We’re going to give this a shot, regardless.”

  It’s Green who steps in front of him. “And if it doesn’t work?”

  “Then we think of something better.”

  Green, she stares at him for the longest time before finally nodding and walking out of the office. “I’ll gather my team.”

  “The seeker bot is in maintenance,” Quinn says.

  Ash starts toward the doorway.

  “This isn’t going to work, Ash,” Julia says. “We both know it.”

  He barely pauses before stepping through the doorway. “We’ve got to try.”

  SEVENTEEN

  It won’t die.

  No matter what the old monster tries, the creature in its waters barely bends. So it smashes into it. It bites the thing. Maybe its skin is tough. Need to keep trying.

  It snatched and ate a few morsels of food, but it’s not enough. The giant creature the old monster can’t kill, that’s what it needs. There’s enough meat to feed on for a very long time. Just need to find a way to kill it.

  The old monster fears it must go back to the big waters.

  But not without a few more tries…

  EIGHTEEN

  The dunkleosteus is bound and determined to break this facility open and suck out the marrow.

  Ash slams into the maintenance room door when another strike from the fish shakes everything. He waits for the quaking to subside, opens the door.

  “Hey Doc,” Clam says, hefting himself up off the floor. “These quakes. They ain’t quakes, are they?”

  “No. A giant, prehistoric fish. Hey, do you happen to know where the seeker bot is?”

  Clam’s broad face pinches in thought. He snaps his fingers. “Over here, man. She’s buried a bit on account of not bein’ used’n all, but she still works, I’m sure.”

  Ash follows Clam away from the main room of maintenance and through a set of swinging double doors. They step into a small room, which is heaped with various parts, some rusty, some not and old tools.

  “Ben went to check on the pods, just makin’ sure they’ll shoot out no problem,” Clam says as he shoves an oily crate of wires and god knows what else out of the way. “With all the quakin’ goin’ on, he wanted to be extra sure.”

  “Don’t blame him there,” Ash says.

  “Ayah.” Clam kicks aside a mound of greasy shop rags.

  The place reeks of oil, gasoline, and possibly some exotic form of mold. For all Ash knows, he’s gotten ten forms of cancer by just stepping into the room. It’s dark, filthy. His boots slip and slide on the floor, as though it’s made of Crisco.

  “She’s ‘round here somewheres,” Clam mutters. “Put’er right…ah-ha!” He bends, clears away a couple smaller crates and a jar of suspicious black fluid Ash cares never to know it’s origin. Under all the junk, there’s a blue tarp. Clam opens the tarp and nods. He beams a bushy, bearded grin at Ash. “Found’er. She’s heavy. Gonna take both of us to haul’er out.”

  Ash frowns at the seeker bot. It’s sleek, shiny black and about six feet long.

  “Not so much heavy, ya know.” Clam playfully slaps Ash’s arm. “Just awkward as all hell.”

  They carry the seeker out of the foul, filthy room and into the main room, placing it on a cart.

  “There ya go. Anything more I can help’ya with Doc?”

  “Actually, yeah…is there a way to make it go faster?”

  Clam puts on his squinting thinking face again. Eventually, though, he shakes his head. “I’m not good with this really new stuff. Ben could though.”

  “When do you think he’ll be back?”

  Clam bites his bottom lip, eyes rolling up a bit. “Oh, ‘bout ten minutes.”

  Too long.

  “Is there a way to call him here? We’re pretty pressed for time.”

  “’Cus’o’the big ol’fish, right?”

  “Yep.”

  “I’ll get’im through the talkie. Hold tight.”

  Ash smiles. “Try to hurry.”

  Clam nods and shuffles to a white, grease stained door. The office, Ash assumes. Clam disappears inside, and the waiting begins.

  Even so, Ben spills into the maintenance room five minutes after Clam calls him. His eyes are huge, shifting wildly in their sockets. He stumbles over a fallen shelf and skids to a stop in front of Ash. Sweat sheens his narrow, oil smudged face. His greasy hair is a mix of crazy corkscrews and cowlicks.

  “Where’s the seeker?”

  Ash points at the long, shiny black thing shaped like a rocket. “Right there. You think you can make it go faster?”

  “Sure as hell can. How fast ya want her? Goes one hundred knots right now.”

  “Pick it up to about one hundred and fifty knots.”

  Ben nods. “Can do. Be just a couple minutes.”

  “That all?”

  “Yupper,” Ben says, hunkering down beside the seeker bot. “These things, they’re all computerized. Motor is plenty capable of goin’ four hundred knots, just not rec’mended.” He frowns. “Not sure why anyone would want’er to go that fast in the first place.”

  Using a flathead screwdriver, Ben pries a curved panel out of the seeker. “Clam. Git me the controller, would ya?”

  “On it.” Clam thunders away toward the filthy room where they got the seeker bot.

  “All she needs is a reprogram. Nothin’ big. Just switch around a few numbers.” He taps a screen, which lights up with numbers. He taps in 3376.

  The screen prompts: SETTINGS?

  Ben taps the settings icon and goes into engine adjustments. There, he bumps the speed up to one-hundred and fifty knots. Then he replaces the panel and gives Ash a wink. “All ready, bud.”

  Ash grabs the handle of the cart. “Thank you. You guys might want to come to the Moon Pool room.”

  “What for? We got tons to do, man.”

  “To see what’s going on. It’s a giant, prehistoric fish attacking us, not earthquakes.”

  “A fish?” Ben shakes his head. “Ain’t no fish big enough to do that.”

  “Now there is. You’re welcome to come look at the streaming scans in the office.”

  After a moment, Ben shakes his head. “Nah. I believe ya. We gotta prepare for the worst, makin’ sure everything will work when the time comes without a hitch, ya know.”

  “Got it,” Clam announces as he bursts through the double doors. He hands the controller to Ben.

  It’s basically a tablet only not as thin.

  Ben hands it over to Ash. “Has cameras back and front. Can see through both of’em on that and steer’er around. Can also lower’n’increase speed.”

  Ash nods. “Good.” He wheels the cart toward the door and pauses once more. “You’re both still welcome to join us in the Moon Pool room.”

  Ben waves him away. “Nah, man. We’re better behind the scenes. Go get that fish.”

  Ash nods, smiles and hurries out.

  A really bad sensation toils in his gut. If this plan doesn’t work, then they’ll have to try and kill it. If that doesn’t work they’ll need to take their chances in the pods before it destroys the facility, Infinity Moon.

  In the Moon Pool room, Quinn catches him by the arm and swings him to the side. Her face is aglow, eyes wide, smile even wider. “There’s an entire tunnel system. They branch off at various points, but you were right. There are tunnels under the continent. That’s how it travelled. Maybe how other things travel from the ocean to here too.”

  He sighs relief. “Fantastic. Were you able to pin-point a tunnel leading toward
the Atlantic?”

  “Of course. It’s the largest tunnel too. Wide, I mean. A freight train could fit through it easily.”

  Ash nods. “That’s what we need, for sure.” He pats the seeker bot. “It’s all ready to go. Ben upped the speed up to one hundred and fifty knots.”

  Quinn smiles. “That Ben. He really is a diamond in the rough genius. Wouldn’t know that to look at him, or even talk to him, but the man can work mechanical and digital magic.”

  “Appears so.” He glances around. “Now we need this thing to look and smell tasty.”

  “Might be some meats in the kitchen. Could strap a net to the boy and tie the meat to it. Think there’s a couple large salmon in there too. Maybe—”

  “Absolutely not,” Giles bellows, storming toward them, jowls jiggling. “We are not wasting valuable food to entertain this crackpot scheme.”

  “If we don’t entertain it,” Ash says, “it’ll keep bashing itself into us until the facility buckles. Now, I don’t know about you, but I’d rather not drown.”

  The chubby scientist visibly ruffles. “This facility is built with the highest-grade steel. It’s indestructible.”

  Ash moves closer to Giles, gaze narrowing. “And I suppose it was tested against, roughly, a ten-ton dunkleosteus with a bite force of over eight thousand pounds?”

  Giles stutters, not really saying anything.

  Ash grins. “That’s what I thought. Now get the fuck out of here so we can save this place and the fish.”

  “You said you were going to kill it…”

  “I lied. Something you’re no doubt good at. As I’m sure you’re wired so everything we say here gets directly fed to Murdock.”

  Again, Giles ruffles. His chest puffs out a bit. “I most certainly wouldn’t—”

  Ash rips the man’s coat off and right there strapped to his shirt is a blinking red light with a tiny microphone set on top.

  Ash grunts. “Low move, even for you Murdock.”

  “You’re finished after this,” Giles says, face flushed red. “Your career, everything. You’ll be stripped of any credibility and all your finds will be revealed to be found by someone…lesser known.”

  “Murdock says this?”