Kronos Read online

  The cold water over Jeffrey’s Ledge sucked the air from Atticus’s lungs as he plunged into the deep. As soon as he slid under, he kicked for all he was worth, but the effort wasn’t needed. His life preserver had already begun pulling him toward the surface. He took a mouthful of air upon reaching the surface and found himself face-to-face with the tilting hull of the Titan. He gazed at its gleaming white form, leaning toward him, threatening to roll down and crush him.

  A loud puff and hiss of air caught his attention. He turned and found the captain floating next to an inflating emergency raft. He breathed a sigh of relief as he saw the captain shove Andrea up into the raft and climb in himself.

  Wasting no time, Atticus struck out for the raft. Being a Navy SEAL and oceanographer meant that Atticus was just as comfortable swimming through water as he was walking on land. But the number of injuries he’d sustained, the exhaustion taking hold, and the thick and clumsy life vest slowed him down. Still, he pushed on, kicking his legs and pumping his arms in a slow, steady rhythm.

  Waves lapped over his face with each surge forward, blocking his ears and forcing his eyes closed. Every time he cleared the water he chanced a look to the raft, adjusted his aim, and continued forward. Twice he thought he heard Andrea and the captain yelling. He brought his head out of the water without slowing and looked to the raft, by then only ten feet away. The captain yelled and pointed. Andrea struggled to paddle the raft closer with her hands and screamed for Atticus to hurry.

  Though unable to understand their words, Atticus interpreted the message. Something approached from behind. With a flash of morbid fear, Atticus recalled Remus’s brutal fate.

  Laurel.

  Atticus spun and found Laurel’s dorsal fin cutting through the water. The fin was twenty-five feet away, but that meant the twenty-eight-foot-long great white’s jaws where half that distance. Without waiting for Laurel to rear his ugly mug, Atticus reached down to his belt, freed the .357, and took aim.

  Laurel’s head emerged from the water, jaws open wide. Atticus fired the gun. His shaking hand caused the first shot to go wide. Though it strained his muscles to pull the trigger, he held the Magnum with both hands and squeezed off a second shot. An explosion of red appeared on the shark’s side, but the beast did not slow.

  Only feet from the open jaws, Atticus prepared to fire again. He knew that even if he managed a killing shot, the giant shark’s momentum would carry it forward, and the jaws would still close over his body. Still, he wouldn’t die without a fight. Atticus pulled the trigger, and the Magnum fired into the open mouth of the great white.

  As though the shark were nothing more than an empty soda can, it launched up and away from the shot. Water poured down on Atticus from above as he watched Laurel wrenched into the air, clutched in of the mightiest jaws on the planet.

  Kronos’s long body continued to rise out of the water, arching at an apex of fifty feet. At the top of the arc, Kronos snapped his jaws shut, cutting Laurel into three neat pieces. Laurel’s head and tail fell away, raining blood and guts with them. Kronos swallowed the rest and continued his arc back toward the ocean.

  Atticus flinched as he was grabbed from behind, but relaxed when he saw Andrea and the captain leaning over the raft. Safe inside the raft, all three returned their attention to Kronos’s body, which was just completing its dive.

  Kronos’s smooth head pierced the water without a splash, but rather than follow the head smoothly back into the drink, the fifty-foot-high loop of his body came crashing down. A huge wave rolled up as the beast’s body struck, and the raft rode up upon it, pushed out from under the shadow of the sinking Titan.

  As the sea calmed, Kronos did not return. As though lulled by the groans of the sinking Titan, Atticus, Andrea, and the captain slipped into unconsciousness, each giving way to countless injuries, exhaustion, and emotional overload—each totally unaware that even then, equally dangerous monsters of the deep closed in around them.

  Atticus woke a few hours later on a firm, thinly cushioned cot. His mind spun, and nausea threatened to push him back to sleep. He closed his eyes and controlled his breathing, centering his thoughts. His vision cleared and he sat up, finding himself clothed in only a pair of boxers. His bare body revealed a patchwork pattern of green-and-blue bruises and bandages. The bullet wound in his shoulder had been sewn up, and the shards of glass in his arm had been extracted. He’d survive, but the intense pain he was suffering, despite a good dose of pain killers, made him long for death’s release. Then he remembered Andrea, and Giona, and fought against that pain.

  The room was a small gray rectangle featuring a double bunk, a small desk, and a closet. Atticus knew a Navy ship when he saw one. Atticus stood and looked at the top bunk. Empty.

  A nervous grip took hold of him, but he remembered it was protocol for the Navy to put injured civilians in different quarters. While he would have appreciated seeing Andrea on the top bunk, that hope wasn’t realistic.

  Atticus stretched, ignoring his body’s protests, and caught a glimpse of himself in a full-size mirror mounted on the back wall of the room. He looked like crap. Bruises ran from his face to his feet. His left shoulder sported a bloody dressing, and his right—arm, side, and leg—possessed so many stitches that he looked like a shark has used him as a chew toy.

  The thought brought back memories of Laurel…of Kronos…of Giona. She was still out there.

  “Still think the world of your own body, Young?”

  Atticus turned to the sound of the familiar voice and found a mountain of a man filling the doorway. He had deep brown eyes, dark skin, a crisp buzz cut, and a smile stretched across his face.

  “Vilk?” Atticus hadn’t seen Greg Vilk since his wedding day, but the old Navy SEAL hadn’t changed much other than some crow’s-feet emerging around his eyes. They’d saved each other’s lives enough times that a bond had been formed between the two, and while years and different lives had kept them apart, the bond, forged in battle, remained strong.

  “I’d slap your back,” Vilk said, “but I think it might kill you.”

  Atticus smiled. “Thanks. How long have I been out?”

  “Just a few hours.”

  Atticus opened his mouth to talk, his body language all action as he prepared to continue the charge to save Giona.

  Vilk held up his hand, speaking before Atticus could. “Slow down old man. Things have settled and you’re a mess.”

  Atticus pursed his lips, stood back and did his best to calm his nerves.

  “ Listen, I’m glad you’re awake,” Vilk said, holding up some smelling salts. “I was just about to wake your sleepy ass up.” Vilk stepped into the cabin and leaned against the wall. “You managed to get yourself in pretty deep here,” Vilk said.

  “You have no idea.”

  “Actually, we have a pretty good idea. Your boy on the inside sent us an e-mail explaining everything.”

  “Huh?”

  “Some guy named O’Shea. Sent an e-mail.”

  Atticus’s memory flashed to the moment O’Shea and Trevor were launched in the ocean. “O’Shea’s dead.”

  Vilk paused. “Oh, well his e-mail had a virus attached. Spread all the way to China by now I’d guess. Basically, everyone with an e-mail address got this thing. We were heading north past the Gulf when we received it. Thought the guy was a nut until I saw your name. We dropped everything and brought in the troops.”

  “What do you mean ‘I?’ What troops?”

  “‘I’ as in Captain Greg Vilk, and troops as in the Theodore Roosevelt Strike Group.”

  Atticus’s eye grew wide. “I’m on the Rough Rider?”

  Vilk brimmed with pride. “Best battle group in the fleet.”

  Atticus’s face became skeptical as he looked Vilk up and down. He was dressed in sweatpants and a T-shirt. “Captain?”

  Vilk smiled. “I was working out when we got the e-mail. Haven’t bothered to change yet; besides, haven’t you heard, the Navy is taking lessons fro
m the corporate world now? It’s casual Friday.”

  Atticus smiled. “You did all this for me?”

  Vilk nodded seriously. “Never leave a man behind.”

  “Thanks.” Atticus’s thoughts drifted back to Andrea. “Where are the other two who were with me?”

  “There are some clothes in the closet,” Vilk said. “Put ’em on and follow me.”

  Atticus dressed quickly, happy to find that the blue jeans, Navy T-shirt, and Navy-issue boots all fit him. He followed Vilk out the door as they accessed a maze of hallways that wound through the bowels of the NIMITZ-class aircraft carrier.

  “The man, who we’ve identified as Carl Ridley, captain of the Titan, was treated for minor wounds and is resting comfortably in the brig. We picked up seven other crew members. All are in the brig, but none are talking. Petty Officer First Class Vincent left an hour ago, taken aboard a Coast Guard cutter. They’re taking care of her. She wanted to see you pretty badly, but the doctors insisted you sleep.”

  A pang of sadness struck Atticus in the chest. He didn’t want to be separated from Andrea, but perhaps it was for the best. He still had work do to.

  Vilk paused in front of a sealed metal door. “Look, I read the e-mail three times, and it still doesn’t make sense. I heard about what happened to you and your girl a few days back, but I didn’t buy the sea monster bit the media’s been pushing. But this e-mail said that you and Trevor Manfred, of all people, were trying to hunt it down and kill it, except that you discovered your daughter was still alive inside. Fast forward, Manfred is trying to kill you, O’Shea, Captain Vincent, and the creature. That about right?”

  Atticus nodded. “Something like that. Yeah.”

  “I’m guessing that since the Titan is now sitting on the floor of Jeffrey’s Ledge, Manfred failed?”

  Atticus smiled. “Something like that.”

  “And Manfred?”

  “Died with O’Shea.”

  Vilk sighed. “And the monster?”

  “It’s real, Greg. And Giona is still alive inside it. I know it’s hard to buy, but—”

  “I never said I didn’t believe you,” Vilk said, reaching into the collar of his T-shirt. His hand emerged holding a cross. “I believe in crazier things than big fish swallowing people whole and keeping them alive.” Vilk smiled wide. “I gave up killing a long time ago, not long after you did; gave up the gun for ninety-seven thousand tons of diplomacy.” Vilk laughed and slapped the metal wall.

  Atticus was speechless as he watched Vilk open the door leading to the flight deck. A gray SH-60B Seahawk helicopter sat on the deck, its blades spinning madly, eager for takeoff. “What’s this?” Atticus asked.

  “Look,” said Vilk, shouting over the helicopter’s chopping blades. “We were able to access Manfred’s sonar-buoy array. We’ve been tracking the creature. It’s making a beeline for Hampton Beach in New Hampshire. Here’s the deal; the Seahawk can hit 155 miles per hour and will get you there quick, but we’re under orders to take this thing down, and the Air Force has birds in the air. I can slow the cogs, but I can’t stop the machine. Get your girl and get out of there.”

  Atticus shook Vilk’s hand. “Thanks, Greg.”

  “That’s Captain Vilk to you. I didn’t shine your boots at hell week for nothing!”

  Atticus hobbled for the waiting chopper. “I’m a civvie,” he shouted back. “I can call you anything I want.” Atticus saluted his former subordinate and entered the chopper, taking the seat next to the pilot. As the door slammed shut and the engines whined faster, Atticus grew nervous. His only hope lay in O’Shea’s theory. While O’Shea and Vilk might buy into some kind of modern-day religious mythology, Atticus still resisted it. Kronos was more likely to be O’Shea’s genetically mutated one-of-a-kind freak of nature than a unique creation of God.

  But, Atticus would believe anything if it meant getting his little girl back.

  56

  Gulf of Maine

  “Holy…that’s big!” Jack shouted as he maneuvered his vintage 1968, thirteen-foot Boston Whaler toward a tall wave left in the wake of a passing fishing boat. The whaler’s uniquely shaped hull made it incredibly agile in the water and allowed it to handle well in inclement weather, but it also excelled at one other very important task…catching air.

  Jack normally spent Friday afternoons in August picking up bikini-clad girls at Hampton Beach and giving them the ride of their lives with the hopes that they’d return the favor before being dropped back off on the sandy beach. But on this particular Friday he was stuck watching his ten-year-old brother, Jerry, and their two cousins, Stan and Aaron. They’d crashed his party, and he was determined to scare them to the point of never asking for another ride on his boat—or any boat for that matter.

  They’d been petrified after he hit the first big wave, but the little buggers hadn’t broken yet. While he stood with one hand on the wheel and the other on the throttle, the three little turds sat on the wooden slat that served as a bench at the center of the boat. All three had vise grips on the bench, as it was the only thing that kept them from soaring into the air and away from the whaler, which was Jack’s end goal.

  They all had life preservers on, so there was no fear of any of them drowning, but he’d filled their heads with so many stories about sharks on their way to the boat launch he knew they’d be scared to death after a quick dip.

  As he approached the biggest wave he’d hit all afternoon, he looked back and saw a priceless vision—three sets of wide eyes and three gaping mouths. Only, something was off. They were too afraid…and looking beyond the wave.

  Jack snapped his head toward the bow of the boat, which rode high because of their speed, but on his feet he could see clearly what lay ahead. And it made no sense at all. A sleek, dark form rose and fell into the ocean like a whale. But the hump repeated over and over in either direction. Jack followed the humps to the left, toward shore, and saw the head, with its bright yellow eyes, gleaming like lighthouse beacons through fog.

  “Oh man, oh man, oh—”

  The whaler hit the wave and shot up. Distracted and unprepared for the sudden movement, the steering wheel caught Jack on the chin as his knees buckled beneath him. The hull of the whaler took to the air, thumped off the massive creature, and came crashing back down. Jack fell back into his chair, unconscious. The boat pounded forward and didn’t stop until Jerry reached past his older brother and pulled the throttle back.

  The boat coasted to a stop and bobbed in the waves. The three boys clambered to the back of the boat and watched the giant sea creature gracefully undulate toward shore.

  “Did you see that?” Stan shouted.

  “That was awesome!” Aaron added, hopping up and down with excitement.

  Jerry joined them at the back of the boat and watched as boats peeled away from the charging monster as it made its way toward shore.

  A loud roar sounded from overhead as a massive gray helicopter bearing a Navy insignia followed in pursuit, not thirty feet above the ocean.

  Jerry threw his hands in the air. “Whoohoo!”

  Atticus couldn’t help but smile when he saw the three kids in the Boston whaler cheering Kronos on. To most adults Kronos was the embodiment of sheer terror. To those boys, he signified that all their fantasies about dragons and aliens were more than just figments of the imagination. Atticus pictured himself as a child seeing Kronos. Would his feelings have been any different then? Would they have been if Giona hadn’t been taken?

  In fact, as it became clear that Kronos, who had taken to the surface in the shallower waters, was truly headed for shore, his feelings for the creature changed further. If Giona still lived; if she was deposited safely on the beach; if the creature had fought for and very nearly died protecting his daughter, then, in a very real way, it had become Giona’s protector, willing to risk its life for hers. But for what? Some symbiotic relationship? The natural response of most animals would be to spit and run. But Kronos’s response seemed much m
ore…human. Atticus didn’t bother asking himself why Kronos had taken her in the first place. He knew the answer was beyond him for now, but Kronos’s actions since then had been in protection of his sole passenger.

  Of course, Kronos’s redemption in Atticus’s esteem wouldn’t be complete until he saw his daughter again, living and breathing. Though, if Giona hadn’t survived, his quest for vengeance would still be over. It was an odd feeling, but no matter the outcome, his desire to see a creature like Kronos dead had waned. This was a creature to be respected and treasured, not hunted, regardless of its crimes against humanity. After all, humanity had done far worse to the oceans. Any man that would hunt and kill a creature such as Kronos ran the risk of becoming as cold as Trevor Manfred.

  The pilot’s voice, booming through his headset, snapped him back to the task at hand. “Seahawk Alpha to Rough Rider, come in. Over.”

  “Copy that, Seahawk Alpha. This is Rough Rider. Over.”

  “Rough Rider, I’ve got a dead fix on our…monster. Permission to fire? Over.”

  Atticus’s eyes grew wide. He shouted, “No!” but his microphone wasn’t on, and the pilot couldn’t hear him.

  A new voice came on the line, deep and commanding. “Negative, Seahawk. This is Captain Vilk. You get my man on the beach and you head home. Do not engage. I repeat, do not engage. Over.”

  The pilot looked at Atticus, his eyes wide. “Uhh, copy that, Captain. Will do. Over and out.”

  Through the windshield, Atticus could clearly see Kronos moving toward the beach. Onshore, the approaching giant had just been spotted by the sea of humanity filling every bit of real estate on the massive beach. As though a single living entity, the crowd of beachgoers dropped what they were doing and ran for the seawall. He couldn’t hear them, but he imagined hundreds of voices rising with absolute and abject horror.

  Kronos slowed as he approached the beach, which was lucky for the stragglers who still fled the sea, and allowed the Seahawk to overtake it. The pilot expertly twisted the chopper around and came down for a landing. Only, he didn’t land. The pilot’s eyes were glued out the windshield where he could see Kronos—face-to-face—bearing down on their position. The pilot turned to Atticus and shouted, “Jump!”