The Guillotine

by Lucas Pederson

  “Oo-rah,” Frost’s team booms.

  “Ash and Julia,” Frost says. “All I need you two to do is help secure the net and help pull the fish to the surface. You have my word, once that’s finished, you are free to go along as you please. Murdock will compensate you as he deems fit.”

  “Sounds peachy,” Julia says. “Thanks for cementing the fact that you’re an asshole.”

  “This is a job, Dr. Remus,” Frost says. “Please note that I do hold the highest respect for you and Dr, Barrington. This is not personal, and do not make it so.”

  Ash can’t find the right words to say, so he remains silent.

  “Let’s get those tanks out about one hundred feet and blow them,” Frost commands. “Time to see what this big fish is made of.”

  TWENTY-TWO

  Two of Frost’s team pull the four tanks out. In a minute or two, they return.

  “I have a lock on the tanks,” Frost says. “Sending laser pulse in three, two, one…”

  A red flash bursts from Frost’s mech’s left hand. No more than a second later, a loud yet muffled boom sounds, followed by enough force to push everyone back a few feet. Through the detailed visor of the mech, Ash notes the cloud of red.

  Blood…

  “Quinn,” Frost says. “Flash those lights, please.”

  Lights along the side of the Moon Pool tube flicker on. Then they flash sporadically.

  “Good, good,” Frost says. “Now we wait. I want the net ready, team.”

  “Yes, Sir,” Frost’s team booms in unison.

  About thirty yards out, Frost’s team deploy the net. Six men and women in all. Three on each side of the net, pulling it taut.

  “Before it touches the net, I want you all to turn your fast pulses on. That should keep you from being jostled too much.”

  “Yes, Sir,” they all say.

  “Ash and Julia,” Frost adds. “As soon as it’s in the net, I want you to seal it in using the mechs’ lasers. Melt the mesh together. Once that’s done, transport should be fairly easy.”

  “You really think melted plastic is going to hold that thing?” Ash asks. “I don’t think you’ve been paying attention. This fish is massive.”

  “I’ve caught many giant fish this way, Dr. Barrington. I know what I’m doing.”

  Ash chuckles humorlessly. “Let’s hope you do, then.”

  Several minutes pass, then…

  “It’s on the move,” Quinn says. “Two hundred yards and closing.”

  “Tighten the net,” Frost shouts. “Prepare for impact!”

  His team follows orders, all of them stretching the net tight.

  Ash backs way, pulling Julia with him. He propels them closer to the Moon Pool. A bad feeling worms its way into his chest. She glances at him and he shakes his head, wanting her to keep quiet.

  “One hundred yards,” Quinn says. “Eighty.”

  A massive shadow looms to the east.

  Smaller fish dart by Ash.

  “Is that the biggest net you have?” Ash asks. “Because—”

  “When I need your opinion, Dr. Barrington,” Frost says, “I’ll ask you. Until then—”

  “Sixty feet,” Quinn says.

  Small features are picked out by the flashing lights, giving the giant shadow substance. Large eyes glint.

  “Pull them back,” Ash shouts. “It’s—”

  Monstrous jaws unhinge, opening in a dark, cavernous maw. The blades of its mouth gleam.

  “Holy shit,” someone manages. “It’s…it’s…”

  Before they can finish, those massive jaws, wider and higher than the net, snap shut, cutting through everything, even a few of Frost’s men. Even through the mechs. Blood clouds the water.

  Ash shoves Julia to the Moon Pool. “I’ll be up in a second.”

  “Like hell,” Julia shouts. “Get your ass up here!”

  “I’ll be up in a second.”

  “Leave them! They’d leave you.”

  Ash snorts. “I might be an asshole, but I’m not that kind of asshole. Now get up there and help me out when I surface.”

  “Fine! But if that thing eats you, I’ll gut it and kill you again.”

  “Fair enough. Just—”

  Screaming cuts through his words, spilling out of the mech’s speakers. Somewhere through all the screaming, Ash thinks he can hear Frost barking orders. Without making sure Julia gets topside, he moves away from the facility. In front of him is a storm of red and sand and silt and…body parts…

  A severed arm thumps against his visor. Blood forces everything through a scarlet filter.

  “Slow,” Ash says. “Frost? Where are you?”

  No answer.

  Heart whip-cracking against his ribs, he cruises forward into the storm. Bits and pieces of other mechs clink and clank against his. A severed foot thumps his visor, pinwheels away.

  “Jesus,” he mutters. “Frost? Hey, are you…”

  From out of the storm of debris and blood, another mech crashes into Ash hard enough to shove him backward, despite the slow pulsations.

  Visor to visor, he stares directly into Frost’s wide-eyed face. “Monster,” Frost manages, and that’s all he manages.

  In a blink, he’s yanked away from Ash, screaming.

  “S-Stop,” Ash says. The mech stops.

  And all he can do is gape as the dunkleosteus, the Guillotine, tosses Frost up, then snaps its sharp jaws down, chomping Frost in half. His lower half disappears into the old fish, but the top half flounders. Frost coughs, splattering blood over the inside of his visor.

  In the speakers, Ash is plagued to listen to the man gag and gasp.

  It’s not long, though, the dunkleosteus chomps through him again and again, swallowing the chunks. There’s so much blood in the water, Ash isn’t even sure where the Moon Pool is anymore. Everything is just…red…

  “Reverse?” He tries and to his surprise the mech actually begins propelling itself backward.

  As the swirling blood dissipates a bit, Ash finds himself once more face to face with the monstrous fish. It doesn’t attack. Instead, it simply stares with those silvery eyes.

  “Ash? Are you alright?”

  “Y-Yeah. It’s…in front of me. Maybe ten feet. Looking right at me.”

  “Oh, shit…and Frost?”

  “Fish food.”

  There’s a short pause, then, “You think you can go Mach and get to the Moon Pool?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe. It might chomp me to bits before then, though.”

  “I love it when you talk dirty,” Julia says, laughing a little. “Seriously, though, maybe give it a try?”

  Ash, trying to remember how far behind him the Moon Pool is, steals himself. The Guillotine can dart out and cut him into pieces at any second. One false move…

  “You on your way yet?” Julia, sounding more than a little scared.

  “If I move, it’ll have me,” he says. “I need a distraction.”

  Several seconds pass, then Julia says, “Going to give the lights a few pulses. Think that will work?”

  “I don’t know, give it a shot.”

  The lights to the left of the Moon Pool flicker.

  It takes a full minute, but finally the old fish shifts its attention and starts toward the flickering lights.

  He slowly positions himself to face the Moon Pool and says, “Mach.”

  Before there’s time to think, he’s shooting through the water toward the Moon Pool. Then he’s in the Moon Pool surging upward. And there’s no time. No time to think or breathe before he bursts out of the Pool and crashes onto the floor in a fit of scrapes and screeches.

  Ash rolls onto his back, sits, heart jackhammering.

  “You okay?” Julia kneels beside him. She’s still in her mech.

  “I…yeah. Just…holy hell that was fast.”

  Julia laughs. “You were up here in like two seconds.”

  He stands and together they stare at the Moon Pool.

  “Well,
another plan failed,” Julia says. “Which one was this? Plan C?”

  “Plan B,” he says. “I think.”

  “Maybe we need to figure out something, I dunno, more effective?”

  Ash chuckles. “This one wasn’t my doing. But yeah, something…”

  “What about the missile launcher thing Green was talking about?”

  Ash backs away from the Moon Pool. “Worth a shot. Anything right now is better than nothing. We deploy those escape pods it’ll snatch as many up as possible, then surely come to the surface to finish off those it couldn’t catch.”

  “Agreed. So…it’s Green’s missile launcher then.”

  “Yeah, I think—”

  A mini tsunami explodes out of the Moon Pool, followed by all too familiar jaws. The floor cracks, breaking open as the dunkleosteus thrashes in the tube of the Moon Pool.

  “How the hell did it even fit in there?” Julia, she’s stumbling backward.

  “It didn’t,” Ash says. “It’s breaking everything.”

  The floor, thick cracks snake in every direction, radiating from the Moon Pool. Cracks that zig-zag up the walls to the ceiling.

  The Guillotine thrashes, widening the cracks. Its massive jaws snap, creating thick booms like the heavy beats of amplified bass drums.

  Ash and Julia stumble away, mechs beeping so many warnings Ash can’t pin-point why his is freaking out. Maybe the changes in pressure? And if the pressure is changing…how stable is the Moon Pool room right now?

  Still backing away as the dunkleosteus snaps its maws and writhes in the constrictive Moon Pool tube. A tube it’ll break apart in no time.

  “We need to evacuate and seal off this room,” Ash says.

  “It’s tearing the hell out of everything,” Julia shouts.

  He turns to her, staring at her through the mech’s visor. “Get everyone out of here. Seal the doors, if possible.”

  She blinks. “What about you?”

  “I’m going to try and kill it while it’s trapped.”

  She gives him a withering look that makes him shiver. “You’re doing that hero thing again. You know I hate that hero thing, right?”

  “Yeah, well…you’ll be a hero too. Just get them out of here and seal everything up. The mech will stop me from drowning and any pressure issues.”

  She points at the thrashing dunkleosteus. “And what if that gets you?”

  “Then I’m fish food too.”

  Julia rolls her eyes, shakes her head. “Whatever. Just don’t die.”

  She goes to the office, quickly gathers Quinn and herds everyone out of the room, even Giles. The portly man sputters and spits a bit, but in the end, flees the room. The doors shut. Ash waits for some kind of sign, anything, indicating the doors are sealed.

  Finally, a red light blinks above the doors.

  “Sealed,” Julia says through the speakers. “Kill the thing and let’s go home.”

  “I’ll try,” he says, facing the monster struggling in the Moon Pool. Part of the floor breaks away as the thing widens the pool more and more.

  The facility groans, visibly bending around him. He stands watching the massive fish thrash. What arm is the gun in? How do I shoot it? Questions with no answers at first.

  Then…

  He lifts his left arm and points it at the dunkleosteus. “Gun?”

  From out of the forearm, a five inch tube arises.

  “Well,” he says, “How about that…”

  He aims the tube at the belly of the prehistoric fish he thinks of as the Guillotine and says, “Fire?”

  Nothing happens.

  “Um…shoot?”

  Still…nothing.

  Then, before he can spout something else, a female’s voice says, “If you wish to send an order, please speak clearly, firmly, and in an acoustic environment.”

  He frowns, staring at the dunkleosteus. How the hell…the tip of his index finger brushes what feels like a toggle switch in the mech’s hand. No, not a toggle, but…

  “A trigger,” he whispers.

  The giant, prehistoric fish thrashes, pieces of the floor break free, pelting his mech. Water surges up through the widening cracks. Soon, the pressure in the room will fail. Soon, this entire part of the facility will flood and—

  “Holy hell!”

  Ash blinks and turns around. Standing in the doorway to the maintenance hall, is Ben. He gapes at the monsters stuck in the Moon Pool.

  “Shit,” Ash says. “Julia?”

  “You kill it yet?”

  “No, but you forgot Ben.”

  “What? The maintenance dude?”

  “Yeah. Can you let him in with you quick?”

  There’s a long pause, then, “Apparently I can’t open the doors once they’re sealed.”

  “Damn.” Ash towers over Ben, manages to open the mech’s helmet. “This room is compromised.”

  “Heh…no shit,” Ben says.

  “Can you get to the main facility and seal the doors?”

  “I…uh…yeah. Yeah, I think so.”

  “Okay, get—”

  The floor quakes, knocking Ben off his feet. The mech stabilizes Ash’s balance. He helps Ben up and sends the man away. He then faces the dunkleosteus, the Guillotine, the underwater tank. A monster lost in time. He closes the helmet, waits for it to seal, then points his left arm at the struggling beast. The barrel of the gun aimed at the presumably softer flesh below the jaws, Ash pulls the trigger.

  Blood sprays a few inches below the jaws of the monster fish. It roars, thrashing harder and—

  It happens fast.

  A loud popping noise and suddenly Lake Superior explodes through the floor of the Moon Pool room. The force of the water slams Ash against the ceiling until the room is completely submerged.

  “Fast,” he says. The mech cruises away from the ceiling, dodging various debris, stray dinosaur bones, tables and chunks of the pulverized floor of the room.

  Heart hitching, he moves forward.

  And out of the chaos and drifting debris, the monster emerges.

  “Hold!”

  The mech jolts to a stop as the massive fish floats toward him. Ash’s stoMach twists like a nest of snakes. Air wheezes out his lungs. The thing is so huge and it’s not until he notes that only half the fish is in the broken room, just how huge.

  Its maw opens a foot or two, snaps shut, opens…

  Icy chill after icy chill shivers through Ash and he can’t think. His brain stutters, unable to latch onto any constructive thought. Now he knows the meaning behind frozen in fear. He literally can’t move or think.

  Those eyes. Those large, silvery eyes. They watch him carefully, as though debating if it should eat him or not. It’s the same face to face intelligence he noticed the first time where it simply stared at him.

  A deep growl rumbles, vibrating into the sub-mech.

  “Ash?”

  He manages a weak breath, nothing more.

  “Ash, what’s going on?”

  He wants to tell Julia something, anything, but terror grips him in its cold claws so tight he can’t do anything but blink at the monster no more than fifteen feet in front of him. Just floating there, maw opening and closing…opening and closing. Just floating there…staring at him.

  “I’m coming in.”

  His heart stutters. “N-No! Stay there. It’s…staring at me right now.”

  “Can you shoot it?” Julia asks.

  “I already did. Only pissed it off.”

  “So, what are you going to do?”

  The very question that circles his thawing brain. Round and round and…

  An idea strikes, maybe the only option now.

  “The tunnels,” he says.

  “Huh?”

  “I’m going make it chase me to those tunnels.”

  “So, like your original plan but now you’re the bait?”

  “Yes.”

  “Have I told you recently how dumb you are?”

  Ash smiles. “In
so many ways.”

  “Because it’s true, jackass. My god, that’s even more suicidal than any of your other hair-brained ideas.”

  “It’s the only way. I think. I don’t know. If I don’t come back, thank you for sticking by me all these years. You’re like my sister. Love you, Jules. Over and out.” He shuts off the mech’s comms before she can say anything, then draws in a deep breath, glaring at the dunkleosteus. “Okay, Dunky, let’s see what you got.”

  Ash ducks and says, “Mach.”

  He catches a glimpse of the mouth opening wide, then he’s speeding under the thing to the broken opening that used to be the Moon Pool floor. The fish writhes, wriggling as it tries to get him. He shoots into the open water outside the facility and aims for the passageway. The trove of bones…god, it feels like that happened days ago, rather than hours.

  “Slow.” The mech slows as he approaches the passageway. He turns and…

  It’s not there. It’s not in the giant hole where the Moon Pool room used to be. It’s not anywhere.

  “Hold.” The sub-mech stops.

  “What the hell…?” He doesn’t know much about the mech, and wishes it had some kind of scanning system. Maybe it has one. He just doesn’t know how to access it.

  Relying on sight alone, despite the enhanced visor, isn’t good. He needs to know where the dunkleosteus is so he can maneuver without being caught unaware.

  But the waters are still. Quiet. Maybe it decided him and the facility were too much work?

  No. Not that thing. It’s starving. And it knows where a bunch of food is. The people in Infinity Moon might not fill it up, but they’ll at least sustain its ravenous hunger for a bit. Maybe that’s all it wants. To get enough food to last through the tunnels. Makes sense. That way, once it reaches an ocean, it’s not half mad with hunger and won’t do something rash, like taking on a family of orcas or something. Despite its size, a large pod of orcas might be able to subdue the beast.

  Maybe…

  But these waters, there’s nothing. And if it’s near, he can’t spot it through the murk. So, he waits. He waits, fighting the urge to turn the comms back on. The last thing he wants to hear right now is Julia freaking out. It’ll distract him when he needs to be fully alert. The Guillotine can strike at any time and he needs to be on his toes.