It Just Made It Angrier
They pushed on past two hundred and fifty meters, the last traces of ambient light long since swallowed entirely by the dark, Fen's bioluminescent hull-lighting now the only thing keeping the viewport from being pure, featureless black.
Colm's needle jumped.
"...Contact," he said, watching the spike register and fade. "Small. Might be nothing."
A second spike followed, sharper this time.
"Another one."
Then a third, and the line stopped settling entirely, jumping wildly, closer and faster with each successive pass.
"...Something's approaching," Colm said, voice tightening. "Fast. Multiple readings, same bearing, closing distance rapidly."
"How fast is fast?" Bram asked, already moving toward the defense lever on instinct.
"Faster than anything we tested against in the harbor."
The shape hit the outer edge of the hull's lighting a moment later, and Arista's stomach dropped the instant she recognized the long, serpentine silhouette coiling through the dark water toward them.
"...That's the same species that attacked Nettle's ship," she said, quiet, urgent. "Same profile. Same size."
"Powering the net," Bram said, already pulling the lever without waiting for confirmation.
Steam redirected with its familiar low groan, the exterior net flaring to life in its faint, rippling blue haze, and the serpent, instead of recoiling, instead of learning the lesson Arista had designed the entire system around, surged forward with a sudden, violent burst of speed.
It hit the hull hard.
The whole vessel lurched, metal groaning under the impact, gauges spiking across every station simultaneously.
"That wasn't a retreat!" Claire shouted, gripping the console as a second impact rocked the hull, harder than the first. "It's still coming!"
"The net's active, why isn't it working—" Arista scrambled to the exterior readouts, watching the charge levels holding steady even as the serpent slammed against the hull a third time.
"Maybe it doesn't feel pain the way something smaller would," Colm called, bracing hard against his station as the impact rattled the entire vessel. "Or maybe—"
"Or maybe it just made it angrier," Bram snapped, watching the creature coil back for another strike through the viewport, its scales crackling faintly with residual charge from the last collision, clearly agitated rather than deterred. "Some animals don't back off from pain, they escalate. Fight response instead of flight."
Another impact, harder still, the hull groaning audibly this time, a stress warning flashing across Claire's console.
"We are not built to take a direct hit like this repeatedly," Claire said, sharp and urgent. "The net wasn't designed as armor. It's a deterrent. If it's not deterring—"
"Then we need a different plan, fast," Arista said, mind racing, adrenaline and cold, focused necessity crowding out everything else. She grabbed the ballast controls. "Emergency dive, get us below its strike angle, use depth instead of the net—"
This story originates from NovelPhoenix. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.
Another impact hit before she could finish the thought, the whole hull shuddering violently, a sharp hiss of stressed metal somewhere near the aft section.
"Hull integrity's dropping," Claire called, voice tight but steady. "Not breached yet. But we don't have unlimited hits left in us."
Arista's hands moved fast over the ballast release, the serpent's massive shape coiling for another strike visible through the viewport, scales still crackling faintly with charge that had done nothing at all to discourage it.
"...Hold on," she said, voice steadying despite the fear, the same cold clarity that had once carried her through a hydra fight settling over her now. "We're diving. Now."
The serpent coiled back for what promised to be its most violent strike yet, scales still faintly sparking with residual charge, momentum building through the dark water toward the shuddering, groaning hull.
It never landed.
A massive shape surged out of the darkness from the side, enormous and silent, wrapping two thick, powerful arms around the serpent's midsection mid-strike and yanking it bodily off course, the creature's momentum redirected violently away from the hull in a churning explosion of displaced water.
"...Squishy?!" Arista pressed against the viewport, disbelieving, watching the vast, familiar shape she'd encountered barely thirty minutes earlier now locked in a furious, thrashing struggle with the serpent, rings of blue light flaring bright and rapid across its skin.
"He's, he's fighting it?" Colm stared, equally stunned. "For us?"
"Don't be so sure," Bram said, watching the struggle continue, the serpent twisting and biting at the tentacles wrapped around it, Squishy's grip holding firm despite the violence. "Look at where he grabbed it. Not between us and the serpent's mouth. He came in from the side, away from the hull entirely."
Arista watched more carefully, the adrenaline of the attack slowly giving way to a different kind of understanding. "...He's not protecting us specifically. He's annoyed."
"Annoyed?"
"The serpent's destroying something Squishy was still curious about," Arista said slowly, piecing it together as she watched the two massive creatures grapple in the churning dark. "He was interested in this hull. In us. Spent ten minutes gently investigating something new, and now something else shows up and starts smashing the interesting new thing to pieces before he's finished looking at it."
"...So this isn't a rescue," Claire said, disbelieving despite the relief plainly written across her face.
"It's a property dispute," Arista said, half-hysterical with the sheer, absurd relief of still being alive. "We're not the ones he's defending. We're just the toy he wasn't done with yet."
The fight outside the viewport intensified, Squishy's massive bulk hauling the thrashing serpent further and further from the hull with each violent exchange, tentacles coiling tighter despite the serpent's teeth finding purchase more than once, dark clouds of disturbed silt and something that might have been ichor billowing through the water around them.
"Hull integrity's holding steady now that the impacts have stopped," Claire reported, voice still tight but easing by degrees. "No further stress. Whatever's happening out there, it's keeping the serpent occupied."
"Do we help him?" Colm asked, glancing between the readouts and the ongoing struggle beyond the glass.
"Absolutely not," Bram said immediately. "We do not insert ourselves into a fight between two things that could both crush this hull without trying. We use this window to get clear."
"...Agreed," Arista said, already moving back to the ballast controls, some of her earlier fear giving way to the same fierce, protective fondness she'd felt watching Squishy's patient, curious eye through the viewport not long ago. "Emergency ascent, gentle as we can manage without stressing the hull further. Let's get some distance while they're both distracted."
The submarine rose slowly, steadily, the violent, churning struggle between serpent and kraken shrinking gradually into the dark below them, the last visible flash of Squishy's bright blue rings vanishing into the murk as the hull climbed clear of the immediate danger.
Nobody spoke for a long moment, the only sound the steady hum of the boiler and the gradual easing of stress readouts across every console.
"...I owe Squishy an apology," Arista said finally, quiet, still catching her breath. "For ever doubting that letting him live was the right call."
"You didn't doubt it," Bram said. "The rest of us did. You were annoyingly, insufferably right."
"I know." Arista managed a shaky, relieved grin, watching the depth gauge stabilize. "Doesn't happen often enough that I don't want to enjoy it a little."