Author: Rick Tobin

“Fire the tracer!” Elliot commanded while centering a tiny submersible targeting an immature Nateria Squid in inky, frigid Saturn’s Enceladian waters near the moon’s deep thermal vent ridge. System data lit a screen indicating a direct hit as Mar’s artificial intelligence tracked the squid’s directions toward a large swarm.

“That’s a huge shoal of squid, El.” Trenton gasped as the tiny craft navigated automatically through the obscure darkness. “I can’t believe our luck. The Center will be pleased.”

Elliot stared with amusement at his junior assistant volunteer assigned to hazardous missions to establish the squid’s herding capacity, ensuring a continued supply of unique, priceless chemicals that extended human TERT gene activity tenfold. The elites of Earth would pay handsomely to triple their life extension with reinvigorated telomeres. Martians cared less for what they considered a sacrilege of the Creator’s will.

“This will be the final proof that we can perform measured culling while ensuring the species continues. There might still be a price for us to pay. I saw your vitals when we cut through the tiger stripe at the South Pole. One in six of us survives that, but the pay is worth the risk.”

Elliot’s tone calmed the young explorer’s excitement.

“You noticed?” Trenton whispered.

“It’s my third and last trip, kid. I’ve beaten the odds, but to do that, I notice everything. You replaced the second assistant who quit after his first voyage. I lost the first guy after a crash through the stripes. If we keep our heads on now and breathe slowly, we’ll have enough air for three days…then out we go, shooting up through a frozen geyser. The rescue craft tows us back to the space station. Then you can count your fortune and go home.”

“And that’s it? We discover one fact, and they reward us? Then let’s head out. I don’t want to end up like the first assistant.”

“A momma’s boy, huh? Keep cool and papa will…” Elliot went silent as his eyes scanned troubling sonar readings.

“What is it?” Trenton asked with concern.

“Company. I heard they were here again. There’s a group of harvesting pirates from Earth’s Moon that has other ideas. Call them competitors. They don’t want the old ones. They’ll decimate this new swarm if they can find it. Immatures have higher drug concentrations. We led them right in, but they’ve made a dangerous mistake. We need to veer course immediately. Head for the geysers now!” Elliot screamed his order as he pulled the guide yoke hard to the left after turning on a rescue beacon.

Trenton lurched to the side against his security straps. “Won’t help. They’ve already seen the squids. It’ll be a massacre.” Trenton’s jaw went tight in the G-force of the craft’s acceleration.

“We need to be gone, now!” Elliot yelled again.

“But…” Trenton tried to protest the wild evasive maneuvers.

“You hear that kid? That screeching noise? It’s not from our gear. They make it. I know what comes next?”

“They…those make this? God, it’s almost deafening!”

Trenton ground his teeth from the overwhelming screeching flooding his ears.

“They aren’t stupid fish, kid. They own this world. I saw it on my first trip. Another ship was with me before we knew two craft were a threat to the squid. We heard chatter from a mother and her young. We didn’t understand without intel. They control the ice.”

The aquanauts heard spikes of sheer, violent shards of giant frozen spears colliding from the surface, descending on the hunter’s vessel behind them, becoming filaments of fresh food for their prey.