Free Leviathan by James Byron Huggins

Connor said somberly, gazing up at the red-bearded face.
    Thor scowled. “Eh?”
    “Oh , Connor,” Beth laughed as she took Jordan from his arms.
    “ Yeah. I saw it clear as day,” Connor continued, shaking his head compassionately. “That was close, boy. They just about sent you down that hill like a big ol’ fat dogsled on greased lightning. Good thing they didn't succeed, huh?”
    A narrow smile had crept across Thor's face.
    “Yes ...” he rumbled. “Yes, now that you say it, I perceive that my great strength is almost gone. Gone to exhaustion. It is a good thing ... you have a refrigerator.”
    Connor looked up sharply. “What?”
    Beth laughed more loudly as she turned to the house.
    * * *
     
    “Leviathan sleeps until we cement the corridors leading out of the Containment Chamber,” Frank said, signing a clipboard. “Just make sure that the nitrogen level in the Containment Chamber remains at one hundred percent!”
    Because the nervous instruction wasn't given to anyone in particular, everyone stared.
    Frank felt the concentration, just as he had felt it so often of late. It was a gathering of frightful, accusing glares. “Just making sure that everyone knows,” he smiled casually, feeling the force of the focus.
    No one moved.
    Frank lifted a hand. “Look, I want everybody to relax. You all know that it's not going to wake up until we give it oxygen. And even then, we're only going to give it just enough to move around. It will barely be able to walk, so there's nothing to worry about.”
    After a moment, everyone turned to their work.
    Shaking his head, Frank turned away, focusing on Dr. Hoffman. The old man appeared to be suffering a grave loss of energy. He held a cold pipe in a stiff hand. But he seemed to feel Frank's attention, looking up from a computer monitor.
    “ You are certain that the creature must have a high oxygen atmosphere to ignite the carpasioxyllelene, Peter?”
    “ Yeah, Dr. Hoffman, I'm certain. It'll sleep until we give it a little air. It's not going to be attacking the cell.” Hoffman's eyes were vacuous behind his glasses. He turned back to stare at the monitor.
    At the far end of the cavern a dark, solidly coiled mass lay unmoving, thick armor plates overlapping so tightly that not even air could pass between the seals. Even in sleep, it appeared deadly. There were no vital areas of the body exposed, and there was no breathing, no movement. Vaguely, Frank could see ominous, fog like vapors created by its superheated body temperature rising from the stone floor, hovering like a death shroud.
    “ We should not continue,” Hoffman said flatly.
    Clearly, he had determined that the experiment had run its course and that they had reached the point where both sanity and professional responsibility required them to terminate it. Frank didn't reply. He knew that Adler would continue the experiment with or without them. And danger levels were too high to risk Adler flying in new scientists—pompous yes-heads with no idea of the creature's true potential—to run the program.
    Hoffman continued, “Perhaps we will not be able to perform the tests, anyway. Perhaps the explosion this morning injured the creature. Perhaps it is even dying.”
    “ I don't think so, Doctor.”
    Hoffman looked up. “But how can you be certain, Peter? That was a tremendous explosion! How can we be certain that the beast is not injured, or even dying, from the trauma?”
    Frank placed a hand on the older man's shoulder. Then he slowly lifted a jet-black wireless headset from the countertop, placing it over his head as lab workers scurried past, moving in new equi pment.
    “ GEO, identify my voice,” he spoke softly into the headset.
    He paused before continuing. “Yes, it's Dr. Frank. I want you to switch to the intercom system for reply.”
    A split second later the computer's eerily soft, impersonal voice came over the speaker, a screened black circle built into the wall. Wired directly into the