Jeremy Robinson - Kronos

O’Shea looked at Atticus questioningly. Atticus shrugged. “She signed a waiver.”

Andrea never slowed. Atticus fumbled with his pants as he quickly attempted to pull them up. “Better follow her,” he said to O’Shea. “Keep her out of trouble.”

O’Shea moved to follow Andrea, then paused. “Where are you going?”

The lightness that had been in Atticus’s voice disappeared. “I’m going to kill it.”

“Heading straight for Ray?”

Atticus nodded, as Andrea’s thumping footfalls on the stairs reverberated down the hallway. “Keep her out of trouble while I’m gone.”

O’Shea nodded, then ran after Andrea. “Godspeed, Atticus” he shouted back before heading up the stairs.

As Atticus, fully dressed in jeans, a T-shirt, and sneakers, tore off down the hall in the opposite direction, he doubted even God could help him. He would become the devil himself, death and destruction incarnate. As he ran toward the stairwell that would take him into the depths of the Titan, each step quickened his pulse and charged his rage. He would soon be a perpetual-motion machine of pure hatred, and it would fuel his mad quest to kill a creature that shrugged off a titanium harpoon as though it had been a flicked toothpick. Had anyone been in the stairwell as Atticus descended, they would have mistaken for a wild creature, grunting savagely, on the hunt.

It wasn’t far from the truth.

O’Shea burst onto the bridge to find Trevor and Andrea laughing over a cup of coffee. Trevor noted the concern on O’Shea’s face. “Come to keep me in line, Father?”

“I just…”

“Fear not, good man, I am not immune to the charms of a woman whilst she is a guest aboard the Titan. Freed of her burden to the U.S. government, she’s rather a delight.” He clinked his mug with Andrea’s and took a sip.

Andrea met O’Shea’s eyes briefly and rolled her own, silently letting him know the feeling of kinship was far from mutual. In fact, O’Shea knew from experience that Trevor’s own benign assertions were simply a ruse meant to befriend an adversary before he moved in for the kill…sometimes literally. He’d heard enough confessions to have no doubts about that.

“Sir!” the captain shouted. “We’re tracking the creature, but now there’s something else, something smaller, but-”

“Yes, yes,” Trevor said. “Our hero has taken the call as we knew he would.”

Andrea straightened. “What?” She looked at O’Shea. “Where’s Atticus?”

He pointed to the green screen the captain stood over. It displayed several small dots representing fish or other small sea creatures. A hazy large blob could be seen, followed by an immense mass. Moving toward the larger of the two readings was a small oval. Trevor stood next to Andrea and pointed at the fast-moving oval.

“You see? Atticus has decided to meet his fate head-on.” He traced the direction the oval was heading straight out. It met with the larger blob. Trevor tapped it. “He who fights with monsters might take care lest he thereby become a monster. And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you.” Trevor smiled wide and gazed at Andrea through crazed blue eyes. “Beware Kronos. For the monster is now hunting you!”

Andrea stood silently, her feelings of safety now far removed.

“You’ll be happy to know,” Trevor said to Andrea, “that we planned ahead for Atticus’s lone assault.” He flicked a switch, activating a panel of five monitors at the back of the bridge. Four showed a view from each side of the submersible, providing a 360-degree view. The fifth showed the sub’s interior, where Atticus sat, wearing a scowl and a sinister gaze.

“Can we speak to him?” Andrea asked, attempting not to sound overly eager.

“Indeed, but we won’t, lest we cause the locomotive to falter in its course.” Trevor said. “Atticus will meet his destiny as he wished-on his own.”

Remus entered the bridge through one of the outer doors, wearing a bright orange Hawaiian shirt and a grin. He glowered at Andrea for a moment, then took the captain’s position behind the helm.

“As we all do,” Trevor finished, fixing Andrea with a suddenly serious gaze. “Remus, commence the chase.”

O’Shea fought the urge to retch. He knew Trevor well enough to realize that Andrea wouldn’t survive the day if Atticus didn’t. If Atticus didn’t survive, he needed to find a way to get Andrea off the Titan. He had no idea how he’d accomplish such a task. And so, for the first time in his life, he prayed-not offering the sort of prayer he’d concocted over the years for Trevor’s benefit, but an honest-to-goodness prayer to the God of the universe, whoever that might be.

The Titan-Gulf of Maine

As Ray rocketed forward twenty feet below the ocean’s surface, Atticus kept his eyes locked forward. Some might call his current state of mind a throwback to earlier times, when men hunted and killed prey with their bare hands, as that had required such a fixated concentration. But most would believe those days, when men had savagely killed for food, were long past. But Atticus knew otherwise. He’d seen the savagery of man, and at times, had become its embodiment.

As now.

The recent emotional wounds buried so desperately over the past few days were allowed to reopen and fester. The enmity built within him, surging and billowing out like a mushroom cloud, eradicating his sensibilities and absorbing his hesitation. The rage channeled his core to a laser focus, beaming through the ocean, boiling it away.

As he closed the distance to his target, his adrenaline pumped with anticipation of a life-or-death struggle. He ground his teeth and focused his eyes on the distant blue. Then he saw it.

A wave of shadow moving through the water below.

He was already above it!

Without thought to the possible consequences of his actions, Atticus spun Ray upside down and plunged, nose first into the depths like a diving fighter jet. His thumbs jittered over the torpedo-launch button. He knew a single torpedo might have little effect, but Ray carried ten, and the cumulative effect might be enough.

The shadow emerged from the depths at two hundred feet down, just fifteen feet shy of the ocean shelf’s floor. Atticus caught his breath, and the sight of the thing nearly sapped his determination. The shadow he’d seen from a distance with Trevor and O’Shea appeared inconsequential compared to this. He was a crab attacking a great white, and just as the great white would ignore a crab, Kronos paid little attention to the approaching submersible.

Atticus continued his dive, intent on each torpedo hitting its mark. He cruised in toward the massive horse-shaped head, and was momentarily struck by the peaceful movement of the beast. Its rhythmic up-and-down undulations propelled it through the water, guided by long pectoral fins and very small lateral fins. Atticus realized Trevor’s comparison to the Kronosaurus wasn’t too far off. If only the creature’s torso were about one hundred feet shorter. Its mouth lolled slightly agape, revealing devilish teeth. And its eyes…Atticus stared at its eyes, haunted by the memories that returned with its gaze.

With a rage-filled scream, Atticus hit the yellow button, powering Ray toward Kronos at speeds that almost guaranteed a collision. Then, with quick flicks of his thumbs he launched all ten torpedoes, aiming straight for Kronos’s head. After launching the torpedoes, Atticus quickly realized that Ray was still accelerating and gaining on the torpedoes, just seconds away from detonation. He swung Ray low, beneath the torpedoes, and as Kronos’s body arced, he spun Ray between its body and the seafloor, zipping through the momentary arch just before it closed.