Age of Monsters John Schneider (digital book reader TXT) 📖

ocean in its blood, even as parts of the ship now started exploding in its face.

It was nothing if not a stubborn beast.

“Jonah...” Naomi whispered, stiffening suddenly in the water beside him.

Passing just to their right, not twenty yards away, was a giant fin – ever eighty feet high.

A swell lifted them on their tiny doughnut.

The fin passed leisurely by, and as Jonah looked around, he realized it was not alone – it had been joined by at least half-a-dozen others.

They began to circle.

The rex seemed to sense it, breaking off its assault on the crippled destroyer, letting the poor mangled hulk finally slip beneath the surface.

Jonah saw the first of the circling fins veer in its direction, and then drop out of sight.

A moment later, the rex was grabbed from below and pulled under.

Chapter 35

The rex felt itself being dragged down deep.  Likewise, it was aware of the other circling shadows that prowled just beyond the range of visibility.

It responded in the way nature provided.

Megalodon had likely never before encountered jaws as formidable as its own – pound-for-pound, an even more damaging bite – two alpha-predators, both designed for the 'massively-destructive first strike' attack-strategy.

At this point in their battle, both combatants had landed more than one of those.

And while the shark had a demonstrable advantage in size, it nevertheless relented when the rex locked its own jaws just above its gills.

A little lower and it might have been a crippling bite.  As it was, the Meg released its own grip and shook itself loose.

The rex started kicking for the surface, still pumping blood from its hip and leg.

None of the other encroaching shadows had quite yet dared get involved, although that was only a matter of time.

Just like modern Great Whites, the Megs circled – the big females hovered close, ready to take first dibs once the prey was safely incapacitated – with smaller individuals lurking at the perimeter.

In the simple manner that it understood things, the rex realized his peril – yet, its rudimentary emotional response was limited.  All it knew was that it was being attacked – and that it was being challenged.

The rex also felt the rudimentary stirrings of anger – a goading pulse beyond simple instinctive response.

Then there was that growing buzzing in its head.  The rex could not have isolated the catalyst that drove it on – it was not quite a scent, not quite a sensation – it was almost like a pheromone, or a chemical thing.  Or perhaps even some form of mental dominance.

And that was really the key-word – 'dominance'.

As a side-effect, due to the extremity of its biological weaponry – where true inter-specific conflict was too-easily fatal – T. rex had also evolved an over-developed sense of hierarchy.

In ecological terms, the 'Tyrant King' didn't have a 'submission' mode.

A socio-biological perfect-storm, T. rex was the purest expression of a rogue.

The rex itself, of course, consciously knew none of this, and cared even less.

There was only the primal understanding that a blood-enemy was near – and whatever else it was that buzzed its senses, egging it onward – this attempt to dominate instead activated a single-minded resistance and an automatic attack instinct.

The Megalodon was just the current recipient of that instinct.

The Meg, itself, was an even simpler mind – responding to a few basic stimuli.  Free will had not evolved sufficiently to be a factor.

It simply circled its prey like a smart missile, locking on its target.

For the rex's part, it recognized the larger predator – as well as its own inability to safely retreat.

But if the Meg got him, he would be going out with a piece of its ass in his teeth.

The Meg dropped below the surface.

The rex dropped below to meet it, face-to-face, its jaws open and ready.

Barely visible in the periphery, the other giant shapes circled patiently, waiting in the wings.

With a snap of its tail, the Meg attacked.

Chapter 36

The battle itself was probably what saved their lives, Jonah thought.

Besides providing distraction for whatever other nasty critters lurked below, the clashing beasts created an artificial high-tide, bustling them along towards shore.

But the water was still rough.  Naomi was bleeding and probably concussed.  Jonah did as much kicking for the both of them as he could, while making sure her hands stayed locked on the preserver.

She was conscious, but the battering had taken her stamina – she clung to the doughnut by sheer force of will.

They were still out over the coastal drop-off – the darkness below was endless and absolute.

Even as a kid, Jonah had never liked deep water, where you couldn't see the bottom.

Anything could come up at you out of that darkness.

As if to prove it, the ocean seemed to swell up, yet again – an unseen clash that still raged on beneath the surface – the rex was evidently making a fight of it.

But now, several other circling fins turned in all at once, ignoring the two tiny, struggling humans in favor of bigger prey.

Another of the towering dorsals sailed past – part of the body actually passed underneath them – first threatening to pull them along in its wake, and then nearly slapping them with a hundred-foot tail.

While he was no Navy pilot, Jonah was in good-shape for a man his age, and nature had also provided him with sufficient instinctive motivation of his own – 'fight or flight' pumped adrenaline like an overdose of amphetamines.  He kicked until his legs burned, fighting against the dragging backwash of a six-hundred-foot living submarine with a mouthful of butcher's knives.

If he gave in to exhaustion, they were going to die.

It was going to be close.

He even felt part