David Wood, Alan Baxter
Overlord
Praise for the Sam Aston Investigations
Renegade marine biologist Sam Aston is back for a second outing in what is shaping up to be a must-read aquatic adventure series! Danger and intrigue lurk both above and below in this action-filled, white-knuckle romp with a breathtaking conclusion! — Rick Chesler, author of Sawfish
“Everything you’d want from a monster story — great characters, a remote location and a creature with bite! Mixing history and lore with science and action, David Wood and Alan Baxter have penned a thriller that is hard to put down.” —Jeremy Robinson, author of Island 731
“Bone-cracking terror from the stygian depths! A creature thriller that is both intelligent and visceral. I could hear the Jaws soundtrack playing on repeat, although that might have been my heart pounding.” —Lee Murray, author of Into the Mist
“One of the best, the most thoroughly delightful and satisfying, books that I've read in quite some time. A serious out-of-the-park type of home run hit.” —Christine Morgan, The Horror Fiction Review
Prologue
Michael Thornton questioned again the wisdom of the expedition as he trudged through the featureless white of the Antarctic. He was pretty sure he had frostbite in at least two toes. A permanent layer of ice coated his clothes, the fur lining of his thick hood, even his beard and mustache. His eyelashes waged a constant battle with the ice, and two frozen daggers of snot hung from his nostrils.
A layer of new snow crunched beneath his heavy boots as he winced into the frozen wind, flurries of blizzard regularly reducing visibility to little more than a few yards. Then there would be a momentary break in the weather, he would see across vast vistas of rough white landscape, and hope would briefly kindle, only to be extinguished as the landscape was obscured once more moments later. Despite those flashes of optimism, he wondered if he would ever see the rest of the party again. But at least he wasn’t alone.
He would never admit his fears to Gavin Lee, stumbling along beside him. He was grateful for his companion’s presence. A better man might wish Gavin the safety of the camp and the company of the rest of the scientific expedition, but Michael was terrified of being lost alone. Perhaps it was a strange way to think about things, but while he was desperate not to die out here, the thought of dying alone was infinitely more terrifying.
Gavin tripped, went down on one knee, his thick gloves sinking into the snow as he caught himself from falling flat on his face. The man stayed down, his back arching and sinking with labored breaths. Michael hauled his friend back to his feet, tried to flash an encouraging smile through the curtain of ice-flecked facial hair. Gavin gave a weak nod of thanks and pushed ahead again. He was stoic, no question about that. The expedition to investigate the possibility of volcanoes, or volcanic vents and potential magma deposits beneath the surface that might support life, had been met with a certain amount of ridicule by the scientific community. Nevertheless, Michael still believed in the project. He was certain the Antarctic held secrets that brave and determined men could reveal. The area of Wilkes Land Crater had seemed the best possibility during his research, and he maintained that conviction. Being caught in a sudden and unexpected blizzard while out on their own hadn’t been part of any plan, however. He gritted his teeth and pushed on. He could not die now. He refused to even consider it. There had been too much interest in Antarctica during the early years of the twentieth century and he’d be damned if he’d lose his opportunity after getting this far. All the recent treks to the South Pole looking for possible new sources of natural resources couldn’t be ignored. His would be successful. It had to be.
“I’m not sure how long I can go on,” Gavin shouted over the wind. “Can’t feel anything below the knee.”
“Push on, man.” Michael clapped him on the back. “We must be getting near to the crater. Don’t quit on me! This weather will pass. The others will meet us at the destination. That was the plan if we got separated, remember?”
Gavin nodded. “Bloody ignominious way to die, from bad weather,” he said with a wry laugh.
“Well, it’s always the biggest danger down here, I suppose. But we won’t die. Not today.” He hoped he wasn’t lying.
“I always thought I’d be more likely to expire from a monster than a blizzard.” Gavin grinned, his lips blue beneath a mustache that was as much icicles as hair. “I really wanted to see the pyramids.” He leaned forward as they pushed up a steep rise, the edges of the crest glimpsed occasionally through the swirling snow.
Gavin wanted to talk, Michael realized. Probably trying to keep himself distracted from the pain and exhaustion. It was a smart move. “I know you believe all those old legends, Gav, but I really doubt they’re true.” He would talk, but he wouldn’t give any credence to unscientific nonsense.
They reached the top of the rise and the blanket of white swept down from their feet, disappearing into the storm.
“Better watch our step here,” Michael said, straining to see the lay of the land.
“They’re bloody real,” Gavin said, almost too quietly to be heard.
“What’s that?”
Gavin pointed, out across the crater. “We’re here! This is the Wilkes Land Crater.”
Michael looked in the direction Gavin indicated, saw only thick clouds of snowflakes gusting in loops and whorls. “I don’t see anything.”
“Just watch. Wait for a gap in the blizzard.”
Michael strained to see something, anything within the cloud of white. He was about to question the man’s sanity when a break opened and he saw clear across the huge expanse. He gasped.
“Do you see it?” Gavin asked, more animated than he had been in hours. “I’m not hallucinating, am I?”
“I saw… something.” Michael frowned. Surely they had been mountains. Strangely regular in size and shape, with weirdly straight edges, perhaps. But surely natural. They had to be.
“I think the storm is passing,” Gavin said.
He appeared to be correct. The two men stood at the ridge, patient as the howling wind dropped to patchy gusts over the course of a few minutes, then to little more than an intermittent breeze. The flurries of snow thinned, even occasional shafts of sunshine breaking through brief rents in the thick cloud cover. After a few more minutes, the blizzard had stopped completely and they stood staring across a wide bowl of featureless white.
“They’re real,” Gavin said again.
Michael couldn’t believe he was looking at pyramids, thickly covered in snow, but the shape was unmistakable. “Surely just oddly shaped mountains,” he said. “There must be a geological explanation for them.”
Gavin shook his head. “They look like pyramids to me. That can’t be more than a mile, don’t you think? Let’s check them out.”
Michael could think of no reason not to. The rest of the expedition hadn’t yet arrived, but this crater was the meeting point, so they would surely be here soon. Unless they had fared worse than Gavin and himself. He chose not to continue that train of thought for the moment. They could investigate the strange range and keep an eye out for the arrival of their friends at the same time.
With renewed vigor, they crunched across the fresh snow. As they approached the pyramids, looming high above them, Michael still couldn’t tell if they were man-made or not. The edges revealed themselves to be less regular under the snow as they neared, the overall shape less defined up close. But was that the natural weathering of a man-made shape over millennia, or had Mother Nature’s hand sculpted a natural, vaguely pyramidal shape into something more refined?