KRONOS RISING - DIABLO: Something's escaped from Hell . . . and it's hungry. Read online

  Water.

  Drawn back from the chaos of his fevered dreams, Artek felt a cool wetness beginning to envelope his arms and back. He raised a hand to his face and discovered it was soaked. Alarmed, he fought to raise his aching head and looked down. What he saw filled him with horror.

  There was water in the boat.

  The leak must have been caused by a falling stone that punched clean through the canoe’s thin, wooden hull. The hole was by his feet and must have been tiny, or he would have sunk already. He’d been so distracted by the pain of his wounds and the overall catastrophe that he hadn’t noticed it. Nor had he felt the seawater inundating his paralyzed legs until it reached his still sensitive upper body.

  Artek quickly analyzed his situation. There was several inches of water in the canoe and the bow was beginning to dip from the added weight. Without intervention, his tiny lifeboat would be awash in minutes.

  The situation was perilous, to say the least. Being made of more-or-less positively buoyant wood, the leaf-shaped boat would probably not sink from sight, but Artek knew he would be unable to right it once it foundered. Nor would he have the strength to cling to its submerged hull for very long.

  Stifling a scream as he hauled himself into an upright position, Artek slid his partially-paralyzed body down the canoe’s length by pushing and pulling against its gunnels. The prow dipped dangerously as he shifted his weight forward and he hesitated. He had to be careful. Too much mass or movement would cause the bow to go completely under. Once that happened the fragile craft would fill in seconds.

  After settling carefully in place, Artek began to feel gingerly about beneath the water, searching for the leak. He had just found it when something nearby caught his eye. It was something beneath the surface of the water . . . something dark.

  Whatever it was, it had vanished from sight.

  Dismissing what was presumably just another drifting piece of wreckage, Artek went to work. With a grimace, he tore a long strip of his loincloth free and began to bunch it into a tight ball, hoping to plug the hole and delay the inrushing water.

  Then he saw the shark.

  It was a tiger – a big one, perhaps seventeen feet in length and weighing over three thousand pounds. Its two-foot dorsal fin moved silently along, slicing through the surface of the water like a knife. The arch predator was searching the floating debris field for the bodies its phenomenal sense of smell assured it were present. Tiger sharks were well known to the people of the caldera. They were aggressive and deadly and would eat anything they could sink their saw-like teeth into. Fish, seabirds, and even hard-shelled sea turtles were on their list of edible items.

  They were also fond of dead bodies. Live ones, too, Artek thought grimly.

  Unaware of his presence, the big fish circled the area, stopping every now and then to mouth an object to see if it was edible. Tearing his gaze away from the potential threat, the crippled shaman resumed the painful task of plugging the leak in what could easily become his coffin. Carefully pressing one hand flat around the hole, Artek brought his makeshift plug to bear. He pushed gently, trying to squeeze the tight wad of cloth into the tiny opening. The hole, he discovered, was just a tad too small.

  A spike of panic shot through him. The water inside the canoe was reaching a critical point. Moving hurriedly, he readjusted his patch into a tighter, point-like shape, and shoved it forcibly into the tight opening. Once the leak was plugged, he would simply scoop out the rest of the water by hand and then decide what to do from there. Perhaps, if he paddled further out to sea, he might be lucky enough to encounter one of the mysterious white boats.

  He was still pondering the idea when his hand went right through the hull.

  Unaware of the deteriorated condition of the canoe’s outer layer, Artek had exerted too much pressure. The thumbnail-sized hole in his craft was now the size of a melon. Paralyzed with shock and dismay and unable to stop the instant deluge, the young priest sat there in a stupor as the boat swamped and went down nose-first.

  Only the cool dunking snapped him back to reality.

  Screaming hoarsely, Artek lashed out at the surface in a frantic attempt to stay afloat. He was desperate. His legs were useless and he knew his arms would tire quickly. Once that happened, he would sink like a stone. His head swiveled hard on his shoulders as he searched for his overturned canoe. He spotted it ten yards away, upside-down and drifting. Although he knew that clinging to its fractured hull would buy him but a few extra minutes, his animalistic desire to live would not allow him to give up hope.

  After settling on a modified dog paddle, the partially-paralyzed shaman struggled to make it through the swells, toward his foundered craft. Waves smacked him repeatedly in the face and he nearly drowned from inhaling seawater. Still, he would not give up. Ignoring the unbearable pain of his broken body, he concentrated on making those last few yards to the canoe. Foot by foot, inch by inch, he doggedly closed the distance.

  He was almost there when the shark hit.

  He didn’t feel the actual bite. Paralyzed limbs didn’t transmit pain impulses. But the tremendous tug that pulled him under was unmistakable. Regaining the surface with a sputtering gasp, Artek vomited bile and brine. His terror-stricken eyes were the size of saucers as he gazed in every possible direction. For some unknown reason, the shark had let go after its initial attack. Then, as he noticed the rapidly expanding cloud of crimson that surrounded him, he reached down to feel his useless legs and discovered why.

  His right leg was gone. It had been bitten off just below the knee.

  Shrieking in pain and horror, Artek thrashed wildly on the surface, still focused on reaching his doomed craft. Had he known that his flailing would only serve to entice the big fish further he might have been calmer, but he was already slipping into shock from loss of blood.

  The tiger returned, cruising closer and closer. Defenseless now, Artek found himself growing steadily dizzier. It was hard to think and his movements were becoming jerkier by the second. He spotted something dark right beside him and spun in its direction, thinking it was his attacker.

  Suddenly, a powerful wave of nausea and lightheadedness swept over him. His movements slowed, then ceased altogether, and he found it increasingly difficult to think. He could feel the blackness creeping over him as he slipped silently below the surface.

  Watching powerlessly as the last of his air bubbles rose lazily toward the light, the mortally wounded shaman found himself face to face with the strange, black object he’d spotted earlier. He thought it was the shark, but it wasn’t. As he gaped at it, fascination flooded his oxygen-starved brain. It appeared vaguely manlike in shape. As it loomed closer, its arms spread wide, as if it was reaching out to embrace him.

  At the last moment, Artek realized the ultimate irony. It was one of the black, rubbery suits worn by the two strangers he and his people had sacrificed to the gods, years earlier. Dislodged from his demolished home and set adrift, the garment had come back for him.

  A drowned chuckle slipped from the dying shaman’s mouth as the windows of his eyes faded slowly to black. He could just make out the enormous shark as it closed on him. Jaws agape, the hungry predator plowed right through the drifting wetsuit and hammered into its helpless victim.

  Mercifully, Artek lost consciousness before he was disemboweled.

  THE END

  We hope you enjoyed this prologue to

  KRONOS RISING

  The Adventure Continues in

  KRONOS RISING

  KRAKEN

  (Volume 2)

  Coming soon!

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Max Hawthorne grew up in Philadelphia, where he graduated with a BA from Central High School and a BFA from the University of the Arts. He is the author of MEMOIRS OF A GYM RAT, an outrageous exposé of the health club industry, as well as the award-winning KRONOS RISING novel series. In addition to being a full-time writer and a bestselling author, he is a voting member of the Author’s Guild, an
IGFA world-record-holding angler, and an avid sportsman and conservationist. His hobbies include fishing, boating, and the collection of fossils and antiquities. He lives with his family and an impossibly large rabbit in the Greater Northeast.