Sharks from Mars Book 3: Return to Mars

By Patrick J Russell

People return to Mars despite an international ban prohibiting missions to the planet. An eccentric quadrillionaire bankrolls a transgenic project that requires extracting genetic material from Martian creatures. Kate Murphy finds herself pitted against her longtime friend Johnny Deluca in Sharks from Mars 3: Return to Mars. Book 3 of the trilogy.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu.com
• Release date: Mar 4, 2019
• ISBN: 9780359426393

Book preview

Sharks from Mars

Book 3: Return to Mars

By Patrick J. Russell

Published by Patrick J. Russell

Copyright Year: 2019

Copyright Notice: By Patrick J. Russell.

All rights reserved.

The above information forms this copyright notice: © 2019 By Patrick J. Russell.

ISBN 978-0-359-42403-0

Printed in the United States of America

February 2019

First Edition

Dedication

This book is a result of me being held against my will and forced to watch countless hours of television. After days of abuse, I cried out: The bastards have done everything except sharks from Mars! Blame or appreciation for the existence of this book can only go to Sylvia. Thank you for all the cruel and unusual punishment that made Sharks from Mars possible.

Chapter One

Mars, named for the Roman god of war, has a long association with calamity. Babylonians believed the planet was the god Nergal, a deity synonymous with plague, the underworld and conflict. In ancient China, Mars was known as the fire star. It was believed to be an omen of misery, blight and war.

The view from a ship, high above the blood red planet. Mars, that hell in space, hangs below in all its hostile majesty. The return to the planet is merely the latest example of mankind’s technological march forward combined with humanity’s inability to learn from its own mistakes. Mars, a place where monsters reside, and nightmares come true was indifferent to the latest arrivals and their folly.

Three spaceships orbit Mars. They are of the long-range interplanetary variety. The ships are rectangular vehicles with large cargo holds that contain enough supplies to last for years.

Dormitories house hundreds of workers and crewmen. Each ship has a designation number. Huge numbers brand the ships accordingly. They are clearly marked: 01, 02 and 03. Ship 01 is the command vessel. A group of experts gathered aboard the ship focus their attention on a large monitor. The screen displays an image from the planet’s surface. The day’s viewing interest is a team of ten workers. There are two engineers and a security detail of eight.

Several observers stand around an elderly man and a young woman who are seated at the center of the ship’s command and control. The room is silent except for the sound of labored breathing as the old man uses a respirator. Next to him, the woman, like everyone else, is fixated on a live streaming audio and visual transmission.

Wind and dirt blast the team on Mars. The ten surface workers are clad in silver self-contained environmental suits. Two people work at the base of a transmitter. Eight others of the team stand guard in a tight formation with plasma rifles at the ready. A cloud of dust briefly envelopes the surface workers. The tempest stirring the Martian dirt is not the wind. As far as Mars goes, it was a calm day or at least a calm hour. Less than fifty yards away, thousands of adult creatures stampede counter-clockwise. Countless young fly in a thick swarm that darkens the sky. Adults of the species gallop on two legs. They are powerful legs, something like a dinosaur would have used for locomotion.

The Martian sharks hold their bodies parallel to the ground as they run at top speed. Large green dorsal fins point skyward. The creatures use their tails for support when they slow or stop. Tired animals exit the stampede to rest. The odd Martian beasts contort their rubbery bodies to bend and stretch their heads rapidly from side-to-side. Stationary sharks snap at others running by that get too close for comfort.

Glowing silver insect eyes, massive retractable mandibles and colossal rows of teeth are standard-issue for all adults. Adolescents differ in two obvious ways from the adults, they are smaller, and they have wings. The wings are similar to those of a dragonfly. The scene is gruesome and terrifying to watch. Cannibalism is the natural order of things on Mars. The feeding goes on despite the chaos on the ground and in the air. It is fast food at its fastest.

The ground crew is the best of the best. Selected because of their expertise and ability to work under duress. No training though, no matter how comprehensive or extreme could really prepare one for Mars and its savage occupants. Engineers and security members alike cannot help but be distracted or even momentarily overcome by the awesome spectacle; the horror.

A Martian shark stampede is something to behold, that is for sure. The question remained, how much could one behold without succumbing to fear or madness? Even after a month, engineers and security guards find it difficult to concentrate on their work. Fear is a constant. The trick was controlling that fear so one could function. Repeated glances toward drones emitting ultrasonic waves was the dead giveaway of one’s unease. There was that and the nervous chatter between workmates. It was an odd thing to be able to see through an invisible defensive barrier into the relentless storm of circling monsters.

One of the two people working at the base of the transmitter speaks. A man’s voice is heard in all the team members’ helmets and on the command ship, We should be up and running in a few minutes. The voice, as with all person-to-person communications of the helmeted variety, has a canned quality to it.

A guard from the perimeter speaks up. She said, Don’t hurry on my account. What’s another few minutes after a month of being eyed-up as a snack?

Speak for yourself Connelly, the permanent ultrasonic barrier can’t be up and running fast enough for me, a man standing guard said as he glanced to the planet’s fauna rampaging around the team in what was a continuous wall of monsters.

Connelly laughs and jerks her coworker’s chain some more, Relax Rogacheski, if the temporary ultrasonic fence fails, you won’t know what hit you.

That’s not reassuring, Rogacheski as he looks in the direction of the drones emitting invisible sound waves.

Seriously, no worries, we’ll all be dead in a blink of an eye. We’re just here to provide the geek squad a false sense of security, Connelly said without any detectible concern for her own safety.

That’s enough, a man from the other side of the perimeter ordered.

Yes, sir. You won’t hear another peep from me, Connelly responded formally.

An engineer from the center of the activity speaks up, For the record, I take exception to the term geek. Furthermore, two geeks, I mean engineers, on any planet is not a squad. In closing, Connelly, I’m more afraid of you than the Martian sharks.

The other engineer inserts his own thoughts on the matter, Don’t worry Rogacheski, once the monsters get a taste of Connelly that will surely put them off humans for good. There is laughter all around.

Tensions are high in the orbiting spaceship. Anxiety in command and control is understandable. Mission failure was on everyone’s mind. The elderly man cringes as he watches the Martian sharks charge and swarm.

The woman sitting next to the man reveals she is an upgrade by initiating a tattoo interface on her left forearm. She reads data that appears on a monitor on the palm of her hand. The information is from drones emitting the temporary ultrasonic fence. She does a few calculations and studies a graphic representation of wave lengths from her palm monitor. The woman terminates the internal computer and turns her attention to the old man, The fence will hold, and they are almost finished.

The monsters… there’s more than ever and they are close… the