Reading · A New Breed of Dragon

Previously on Sea Dragon Apocalypse … Blayde and Sam fail to tag the sea dragon, follow them, and end up being chased (see book cover).

IN ONE OF THOSE MY-ADRENALINE-WAS-HIGH-SO-IT-SEEMED-LIKE-A-GOOD-IDEA moments, Blayde decided to perform one of his favorite diving tricks; usually, he performed it half of his present speed because it risked breaking his back in half but under the circumstances, it seemed his best option.

No other ideas in queue and despite Sam’s impressive progress as a diver, she looked little more than a dragon snack if Blayde was to honestly assess the situation. At this rate, he estimated she had no more than three more jumps before the inevitable happened. The sea dragon was simply much more agile than he expected.

Without giving it much thought, Blayde curled up the instant he reentered the water, prepared to extend his arms the moment his legs were parallel with the water’s surface, and then pushed his legs against the thrusters as if he was jumping. The move required a great degree of precision to avoid injury — even at slower speeds — but he ignored all of that, tried to allow intuition to guide his movements. Besides, the spine support on his suit was better equipped to handle moves like this than earlier models he’d used to learn the trick so worst case scenario, he probably wouldn’t end up paralyzed for life.

Well, presuming he didn’t get eaten in the process. There were, after all, expensive procedures to heal catastrophic injuries like that.

Within a few heartbeats, he’d completely reversed direction and shot himself straight into the beast’s chest where he quickly grabbed hold of its right shoulder and hung on as tightly as possible with his left arm wrapped around the beast’s surprisingly muscular arms while grabbing gear to take samples with his right hand, all while getting tossed about by the rapid flow of water irregularly bouncing him from side to side until he feared he’d lose his grip.

This time, he’d brought more invasive equipment than before as a backup. Disc-shaped with several small spikes, the delivery mechanism functioned more like a mini-vaccine-shotgun than a friendly goo-spreader. Struggling with each bounce, Blayde grabbed the tool as the dragon slowed down, apparently to ineffectively try to grab or scratch him with its left foreleg. Meanwhile, Blayde used every ounce of his newfound strength to hold onto the sea dragon’s arm so the water wouldn’t direct his movement. He’d be lunch within three seconds if he let go now.

Blessedly inflexible, Blayde sighed in relief as a quick adjustment kept him out of the dragon’s limited reach. For an instant, he was also grateful that it had slowed down so Sam could get further ahead. He pressed the device against the dragon’s scaly chest and adjusted it as best as he could, nudged it slightly in between the scale joints. Pushing harder and harder, it barely budged and showed no signs of sliding underneath either of the massive scales he was fighting against. Unimpressed and disappointed, Blayde grit his teeth, muttered an uncharacteristic prayer for any help the universe might consider offering him, and pushed the delivery buttons while continually pressing the device firmly against the dragon’s chest. The recoil was shockingly powerful considering the rapid water movement was assisting his effort to keep the tool pressed against the dragon’s chest.

The sea dragon released a terrifying rumbling sound, a sound Blayde felt more intensely than he heard it, a signal of success. Several needles had made their way past the beast’s natural armor and into sensitive muscle tissue. Nanobots would quickly begin their busywork and the sedative would start shutting down the dragon’s ability to stay awake.

If he’d calculated, or more accurately, guesstimated correctly.

However, these thoughts barely registered within Blayde’s consciousness. The rumbling deluged his soul with terrifying anxiety. When diving with whales, he’d experienced the powerful vibrations originating from their singing and the resulting, overwhelming peace. He’d first experienced that nearly forty years ago but he remembered the overwhelming emotions vividly. Singlehandedly, that moment had determined his career choice. While the rumblings from the sea dragon felt physically similar, the negative energy oozing throughout his body felt like liquid fear.

Nevertheless, Blayde knew his time was short. Waiting for the pulsing of the water to offer a decent opening, he curled his body again, used the dragon’s massive chest and underbelly to push away from the beast while engaging his thrusters at full speed toward the tail. He knew the beast would be able to turn around in this area of the river with even a modicum of flexibility but he also hoped the heavy dose of sedatives would slow it down enough to allow him to outmaneuver it.

Just then, he considered that he hadn’t seen the other dragon in quite a while, hoped he wasn’t launching himself directly toward the slower, but perfectly untranquilized companion.

He hadn’t considered something else, either.

Whether it was an adrenaline rush from anger or sheer willpower, the sea dragon performed a roll, partially flipping in the air above the water, and shot toward Blayde with speed and agility he never would have guessed. For an instant, he wished he hadn’t looked backward to see how much distance he may have gained. The answer was dreadfully discouraging.

As was the appearance of the second sea dragon.

Considering these beasts showed signs of significant intelligence, Blayde realized he’d placed himself in a perfect position to be eaten and intuitively decided to perform another foolish trick.

Looking ahead and to his left, Blayde spotted an outcropping out of the water that would possibly offer a landing spot if he calculated a jump impressively well. Memorizing its location, Blayde dove down deeper guesstimated the time and distance he had to arch his course heavily and then gather enough momentum to shoot himself safely out of the water. Although well-conceived, the move proved foolish. Even in the thralls of desperation, he could easily admit that.

To be fair, the alternative was even more unattractive.

A few breaths later, he grumbled through another prayer with every ounce of undeveloped faith he could muster, shot himself out of the water. He continued to ignite the thrusters out of the water, though he knew it could result in burns on his hands or feet, He took the risk on the off chance one of the dragons closely followed him out of the water.

Two deep breaths later, Blayde watched as he passed by the proposed landing pad much faster and higher than he’d wanted. Intuition had already informed him what his conscious brain only now registered: this was going to be intensely painful. As that happy realization surfaced into his consciousness, so did another: the very angry, not exactly sedated sea dragon was leaping out of the water behind him and had gained more height than he’d guesstimated.

These beasts were full of surprises.

At this point, Blayde realized he was more of an observer of his own fate than the master of it so he did his best to surrender his mind to the inevitably painful landing, look for any opportunity to minimize that pain, and hopefully not tumble back into the waters. That’s when he found his first glimpse of happy fortune.

Well, sort of.

Probably acting in a fit of anger rather than thinking through its options, the sea dragon fiercely smashed into the sharpest and pointiest corner of the outcropping, apparently skewering itself halfway toward a safe landing. While that initially gave the appearance of a blessed moment, Blayde’s interpretation began to change as he reached the apex of his flight and was now falling down in what felt like slow motion, directly into the mouth of the screeching sea dragon.

Out of necessity, he shut off his thrusters, already worried his feet were heavily blistered. Then, Blayde’s vast vocabulary of curses paraded through his consciousness as he grew certain that this new fate was inescapable. Further, now bereft of his only marginal defensive weapon, his happiest hope was to be swallowed hole, to pass by the teeth quickly enough that snapping jaws would find zero purchase, and then to reignite the thrusters on his way down the beast’s throat so it would instinctively regurgitate him. That was the lucky result.

He’d seen better days.

Briefly, he considered closing his eyes, unable to bear the terror ever-brimming in his heart but then, he discovered a brief offering of hope.

Infuriated by the pain, the dragon furiously pawed at the jagged, toothy outcropping, trying to push itself free from the jagged rocks. It initially failed but in the effort, the gaping maw had shut, using its head as a third, pushing arm.

When Blayde briefly hit the rocky edge of the canyon before viciously crashing onto the relatively flat portion of the outcropping, he felt grateful not to land in the dragon’s mouth and that he’d successfully guesstimated a landing. Thunderous waves of pain quickly overshadowed his rejoicing. Newly modified bone structure notwithstanding, he was instantly certain that multiple bones were broken or shattered or otherwise crushed. Just when he cried out from the shock of the pain, he watched as an enormous mouth came smashing onto his newly broken body.

He wished the blow would have knocked him out. Sure, he would have later wondered what had happened, but he would have been spared the newest round of pain. To be fair, it was now widespread enough that he wasn’t entirely certain what he felt. At the very least, he counted a broken left wrist, a worsened right leg, several lacerations that had torn through his suit, and a broken nose from his head bouncing around inside the helmet.

The vortel glass hadn’t shattered but it developed enough micro-cracks and sported splashes of blood that made it difficult to see through. Nevertheless, the dragon’s head slamming into his body made him bounce off of the ground firmly enough to spin his body around to watch the beast disappear over the cliffside. He heard it bellowing as it landed partially on the rocks below and then splash wildly until the cries of pain stopped.

Blayde quickly scanned the internal screen to see if the video capture was still rolling. He couldn’t remember turning it on but he was a man of intensely reliable habit so he assumed that he would have done so without giving it any conscious thought. Nevertheless, the screen was blank. Completely blank. The blow had apparently destroyed all helmet electronics. No gps to follow the dragon’s movement. No reports. No radio.

For now, all Blayde could do was hope that habit had ruled the day — that is, he’d started the recorder — and that the file was recoverable.

An explosive and fiery pain shot through his leg, riveted Blayde’s attention where it needed to be. Unfortunately, he couldn’t ask his helmet to scan his body to perform a preliminary diagnosis. With no way to radio Sam or Jaden, they would be without his location unless Jaden was feeling well enough to think clearly and correctly assume that Blayde’s computer would receive continual gps coordinates from his suit. There would be no security blocking access to that information. It was a safety precaution. Blayde just hadn’t thought to tell Jaden about it but even if the suit was no longer sending coordinates, his last known location would be this grassy outcropping. Of course, all that depended on whether or not Sam had listened to him and returned to Ja Sinth to report that he’d disappeared. If she’d reversed course to find him, she might waste hours in the effort.

Blayde sighed heavily, winced. He mentally added broken ribs to his ongoing list of likely injuries, considered he had more pressing issues to consider. He wasn’t going to be walking any time soon. A timely rescue was uncertain at best. He needed to climb his way up the short distance to the flat ground above where he could be more easily found and taken for medical attention. Then again, he didn’t know how many crustacean people might frequent this area. Ja Sinth security had killed a half dozen. Certainly, normal civilization kept its distance from this area of the world, but it wasn’t too remote for the more bestial crustaceans and he had no means of self defense other than a utility knife he always carried with his suit.

Blayde resolved himself that his best course of action was to crawl a mile or two back to Ja Sinth — that is, if his sense of distance hadn’t entirely failed him — and hope that he didn’t encounter any wildlife. He dug deeply into mental reserves, took a few deep and methodical breaths, and slowly pulled himself up the cliffside, only marginally able to provide support with his legs.

Hours later, he’d only made marginal progress, felt exhausted, and yet, he trudged on. As the sun faded and dusk grew ominously dark, he took a moment to rest, rummaged through what little gear he’d brought with him, fished for his utility knife, opened the blade, and resumed his pitiful crawl. He had no solid guess as to whether or not he’d encounter any crustacean folk in this area and hoped a grizzly encounter was far afield of his so-called destiny, but preparedness when he was already completely disadvantaged strengthened his mental fortitude, if nothing else.

Partially by accident, he found himself crawling along a grassy area that occasionally attracted land traffic but by vegetation growth, he knew it hadn’t been used in quite a while. The ruts helped him crawl. When he’d fully slid into one of them, he’d learned that the extra height on the side favored the stiffness in his arms and allowed him to drag his body faster than when on flatter surfaces.

He’d expected the trail would be close by but was quite surprised to see how closely it snuggled against the small cliffside he’d just scaled. With any luck, he’d find the familiar area where he landed his hovercraft from time to time. Heavy clouds drifting slowly above kept starlight at a minimum. Blayde could either use a secondary underwater flashlight to help him find his way or navigate in the dark. With the light, he’d scare away some predators but would likely attract crustacean people. Without the light, he’d probably be able to see well enough to recognize the open, landing area.

Both scenarios were speculative. No data to analyze the situation, he followed his gut, trudged along darkening shadows and tried to make as little noise as possible. His suit would hide much of his smell but he did have some gashes leaking blood. He tried not to think much about that but the scientist in him couldn’t help but to remind him that predators would smell him long before they saw him, even if his lacerations were trivial — and truly, they were not.

Blayde spotted a significantly sized rock toward the end of this reach, stretched farther than was comfortable to grip it, and pulled as hard as he could. His grip held and he made twice as much ground as usual within the same amount of time. A minor victory, he nonetheless exuded with gratitude for the small assistance.

With droopy eyes and energy reserves drained to zero, Blayde resisted the urge to fall asleep, nearly involuntarily ran through the possible advantages of a brief rest, shook his head vigorously and forced his eyes to open wide while barking silent orders to himself to wake up. As he did, he felt a heavy weight fall upon his legs and buttocks, followed by claws trying to dig past the protective coating of his diving suit. Blayde tried to rotate, swing his arm around to stab whatever it was behind him, failed.

In another quick movement, he bent his right arm, brought it closer to his torso while rotating his body with greater vigor. This time, his attacker lost balance, fell (or at least shifted) to his left, leaving room for Blayde’s own attack. The moment he discerned the outline of the figure now mostly on top of him again, he swung hard, aiming through his target as he’d been taught when learning to break boards. Although his strike rang true, it ineffectively glanced off the exoskeleton like a plastic, toy dagger, likely causing more damage to Blayde’s injured arm than to the crustacean. It snorted, possibly chuckled, and scratched Blayde’s face as it repositioned itself to pin both of his freed limbs a second time.

The creature made a series of sounds resembling hisses and intelligible whispers of excitement as it licked the blood from his face, scratched a second time.

The scratches felt more like mini-lacerations and stung far more than Blayde would have imagined, gave him a new reserve of motivation to fight himself loose. Recalling his brief review of crustacean anatomy after his most recent fight, Blayde rotated his hand holding the utility knife and pulled hard downward while moving his right leg at the same time. As hoped, the blade found purchase between the forearm and the wrist, tearing a deep cut into the ulnar artery — or, at least, that was Blayde’s assessment given the amount of warm liquid he felt on his own arm and the screech of pain coming from the crustacean.

It frantically recoiled its arm and held it close to its chest, clearly an instinctive reaction. Taking advantage of the distraction, Blayde repositioned the knife, plunged it deeply into the eye socket, changed grip again, pushed it as deeply into the brain as he could. Predictably, the creature crumbled, mostly on top of Blayde, renewing each of the dozen points of injury caused by the dragon smashing itself onto Blayde’s torso.

Debilitating fatigue demanded he take the moment to relax before pushing the beast away but a small rush of adrenaline kicked in as he heard more noise, the sounds of creatures walking through the forested area at the edge of the grassy trail he’d been traveling.

Newfound desperation sent the crustacean rolling away but Blayde lost grip of his utility knife. Finding another humanoid nearly upon him, he realized he had no time to retrieve it.

Lady Fortune, you’re a faithless old hag, he grumbled.

He harbored no hope to fight off another attacker, let alone multiple beasts when a wild thought flittered around his consciousness. Fumbling around his utility belt, Blayde released the velcro-magnet covering from one of the smaller pouches, pressed the button to activate a cylindric unit and left an opening for his attacker to join him on the ground for their duel.

He didn’t have to wait long.

The beast leaped onto his torso and immediately began trying to pin his arms to the ground, leaning upon the arm Blayde had left outstretched and on the ground. Somewhat surprise the ruse had worked, Blayde pushed a switch and shoved it in between the beast’s left exoskeleton cheek bone and its orbital bones. Five seconds.

Unharmed by the now glowing cylinder, the beast continued its effort to pin Blayde flat upon the ground but Blayde’s was now pulling on the sharpened exoskeleton to turn the beast’s head toward his left while turning his own head to the left and squinting his eyes shut as tightly as possible while preparing to hold his breath. This wasn’t a longterm solution. In a real fight, this would be nothing but a delay toward the inevitable. Strength gone, injuries ablaze with pain, and disadvantaged by the dark, Blayde boasted zero chance of fighting his way out of this situation, but all he needed was three more seconds.

Three.

Ignoring the deepening cuts from the crustacean’s exoskeleton, Blayde grunted, pulled harder.

Two.

Blayde roared from pain, or maybe from desperation. He heard more noises, possibly more creatures.

One.

This was it. Even if he defeated this crustacean, he must have heard a half dozen more coming closer. He couldn’t be certain but it didn’t really matter. He needed to accept his fate. This was over.

I’m dead.

A soft, insignificant explosion erupted from the cylinder. Likely, none of the other creatures even heard it. Gel-like slime erupted from the device. Blayde wasn’t certain precisely how the hydrogel hagfish bomb might work when it wasn’t underwater but he hoped it would function similarly to how it did in the sea.

It didn’t.

The intense spray splattered far more than he’d expected. The crustacean screeched, howled profoundly as the liquid pressure obliterated its eye. Then, the cylinder slid downward and sprayed directly into the beast’s mouth while it was howling, causing it to cough and then gag and then to nearly silently gurgle as it suffocated to death.

Briefly, Blayde found the mental fortitude to rejoice in the success, despite a few painful sprays that reached his own neck and cheek. The area felt like an acid burn and the pain continued to deepen as he felt the beast being pushed aside. Another crustacean replaced the newly dead one, punched him forcefully on his neck, and began scratching at his face.

Everything grew blurry after that. His observations seemed more like fanciful thoughts or portions of a dream. He thought he heard another beast crushing the exoskeleton of one of the beast’s he’d killed. Another crustacean pulled his leg, began scratching at his ankle until it oozed enough crimson to snack upon. Overwhelming sensations, screaming from broken bones, deep lacerations, and scattered bruises and scratches, Blayde nevertheless thought he discerned the beast’s rough tongue licking new wounds.

He was all but certain that other crustaceans were similarly scratching other legs and arms, each methodically cutting for a moment and then pausing while they licked the treat clean but for some reason, those areas felt numb, lifeless. Blayde fought back with faded fervor, knew it was useless. At least four beasts were on top of him. Energy already disastrously low and pain from his countless injuries mounting, Blayde tried to enter the serenity of surrender, that place where you accept what you have no control over, that coveted spiritual experience where one supposedly becomes one with the universe.

Perhaps it helped. He was too groggy to know, but he was relatively certain that his experienced lacked that peaceful serenity all of the sages promised.

Bastards.

A nearby shot rang, another followed, and then, another. The beast on his chest fell to the side. Another crumbled onto his leg. Multiple shots rang while the remaining beasts held their positions low to the ground, savoring the taste of his blood, apparently hoping to escape the attention of whomever was shooting at their comrades. At that moment, Blayde discerned the hiss-like whispers from one of his attackers, now licking blood as it slowly oozed down his cheek and onto his neck. It exhaled long and exultingly, reveling in his tastes. Although revolting, the observation barely registered as his consciousness continued to wane.

Vaguely, Blayde made out a skidding sound, a metal door opening, and then, more shots. If he wasn’t dreaming it, the crustacean next to his face slid away and ran. Another shot rang. Running sounds continued, quieted. Blayde believed he heard a man’s voice, wasn’t certain. He may have passed out for a moment for it seemed, Sam’s voice awakened him, frantically saying something he couldn’t understand while lifting his head to hug him. The resulting pain hinted he’d maybe broken his neck. Then, all went quiet and black.

Sea Dragon Apocalypse || Attacked

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