Eric Brown: The Kraken Rises

One of the door guards swept the arc of fire from his SAW over a mass of squid creatures advancing towards the door from the port side of the ship. The bullets tore into their forward ranks, severing tentacles, rupturing flesh, and filling the air with sprays of black blood. Dozens of the squid creatures died in the barrage of fire, but for each that fell, another took its place. Taking a quick look around her as she continued to run, Lieutenant Commander Unger yelled, “Close the doors! Close the doors now!”

She knew doing so would seal her fate and those of her remaining men as well, but if the squid creatures got into the corridors of the ship’s interior, it would all be over. Better they gave their lives to save those inside the ship than for everyone to be lost.

The larger of the two guards dropped his SAW and moved towards the doorway’s control pad. He finished his work, the heavy doors beginning to slide closed, as she reached him.

“Pick up your weapon, soldier,” Unger snapped at him. “You’re going need it!”

The big man retrieved his SAW and rejoined the fight as Unger and the other guard fired in the squids closing in on them. Her other soldiers who had been retreating towards the doorway in her wake were all dead. The squid creatures had overtaken them and littered the deck with their ripped and broken bodies. It was just the three of them now , Unger thought, but they would hold out as long as they could . They had to buy Captain Weaver the time he needed to deal with the squids or the rest of her men would have all died in vain.

A heavy SAW chattered and thundered to each side of her as Unger held the trigger of her rifle tight, emptying what was left of its magazine into the charging squids. As her rifle clicked empty, the squids reached her and the doorway’s two guards. The big man to her right was lifted from his feet as the spear-like tip of a tentacle entered his ribs and flung his bleeding form about like an angry child shaking a ragged doll. The man to her left cried out in the moment before the tip of a tentacle pierced his skull through his right eye and its tip emerged from the back of his head in an explosion of brain matter, blood, and bone fragments. Lieutenant Commander Unger threw her empty rifle at a squid which leaped at her, its tentacles reaching out to take her into their hold. The impact of the weapon changed the angle of the squid creature’s leap just enough for her to dodge its groping tentacles as she yanked her sidearm free from the holster on her hip. The squid had landed next to her and was already in the process of whirling about as she rammed the barrel of the pistol into its open, shrieking mouth and squeezed the trigger four times in rapid succession. The bullets ripped through what passed for the squid’s head, killing the thing instantly. Unger kicked its corpse away from as she spun to fire a trio of shots at another squid charging at her. Each shot hit the squid, digging into its flesh, but the 9mm rounds just didn’t have the stopping power to save her.

A tentacle took grasped each of her arms and pulled them away from her body. Unger howled in pain as she felt her muscles tearing beneath her skin. Another tentacle jutted towards her. It rammed itself through her throat, severing the top of her spinal column at the base of her neck in the process. The squid creature jerked her already dead body closer to it as its mouth stretched open in anticipation of the taste of her blood.

“Do it,” Captain Weaver ordered Ennis. He had been monitoring the battle on the deck and knew that Lieutenant Commander Unger and her men were dead. The crew needed to be evacuated before the Kraken showed up, and that couldn’t be done with a legion of squid creatures swarming on her the deck.

Before the lieutenant commander and her men had taken up their defensive positions and the attack by the squid creatures had begun, Captain Weaver had instructed her to place charges along the length of the Braxton . The charges were all incendiary in nature, designed so that they wouldn’t hurt the structure of the ship. Flames could scorch the metal of her walls without actually damaging them. The plan was to use those charges to clear the deck should the lieutenant commander and her men fail.

His XO, Ennis, stabbed the button to detonate the charges. The deck of the Braxton lit up a burst of flame that ripped through the squid creatures, cooking them where they were. In its wake, the deck was littered with the burnt and smoking remains of their bodies.

“The deck is clear, sir,” Ennis reported.

“All non-essential personnel, abandon ship,” Captain Weaver said over the Braxton ’s internal comm. system. “I repeat, all non-essential personnel, abandon ship.”

“How’s the water out there, Mr. Lancaster?” Captain Weaver asked.

“Mostly clear, sir,” Lancaster answered. “Almost all of the lesser squid creatures were aboard us when the charges detonated.”

“Good.” Captain Weaver leaned forward in his command chair, teetering on its edge.

Not a single member of his bridge crew had chosen to leave. He was proud of them for their courage and thankful because he was about to need the skills of each and every one of them.

“Any sign of the Kraken?” Captain Weaver glanced over at Lancaster.

“None yet, sir,” the sonar tech answered.

The seconds ticked by like hours as Captain Weaver watched the bulk of the Braxton ’s crew scurrying to her lifeboats and getting them into the water. Though it felt like the evacuation took an eternity, it actually took less than fifteen minutes. When the final lifeboat was away, Captain Weaver slid back fully into his chair and motioned at his helmsmen. “Alter course back the way we came. Let’s put as much distance between us and those boats as you can before the big one comes calling. Maximum military power.”

“Aye, aye, sir,” came the reply.

The massive battleship came about in the water, her engines pushed to their limits. Captain Weaver wasn’t waiting for the Kraken to come to them anymore. He was planning on running straight down the blasted thing’s throat.

The Braxton ’s CIWS had been damaged in the battle on the deck between the lieutenant commander’s men and the lesser squids. Not having its firepower to be added to the ship’s main guns wasn’t as much as of a problem as it could have been, considering what Captain Weaver had planned for the Kraken.

“Contact, sir!” Lancaster shouted, nearly leaping out of his seat at the sonar station. “It’s the Kraken!”

“Where?” Captain Weaver snapped.

“The Kraken is coming in at an angle on our starboard side captain. CBDR at forty knots. It looks like it’s going to attempt to ram us, sir,” Lancaster reported.

“We can’t have that now, can we?” Captain Weaver smirked. “Mr. Smith, slow the mother down some if you would.”

“With pleasure, sir.” Mr. Smith grinned, happy to be back at the weapons station again. He had taken it over from Ennis as soon as the surprises scattered through the ship had been put in place for the Kraken.

The Braxton ’s main guns locked on the fast-approaching monster and thundered as they opened fire on it. The sixteen guns spat high-explosion shells into the monster. Water mixed with black blood splashed skyward as they impacted the Kraken. Watching the data scrolling on the small screen of the arm of his command chair, Captain Weaver could see that the Kraken wasn’t as fast or agile as it had been. The great beast likely hadn’t fully healed from the last engagement yet. That was a very good thing. It slowed even more as the heavy shells continued to strike it and explode.