Ryan M. Patrick

Previous posts in this series can be found on the main Crush Depth page at the bottom.

We left off after the big attack at the midpoint. The habitat is damage, some characters are dead or wounded, and the crew is recovering and theorizing about what the creatures are that are attacking them.

Chapter Twenty-Seven: The crew fortifies defenses and repairs the Seaquest in case they need to leave. Sonar shows the entities aren’t just waiting – they’re testing weak points systematically. She keeps quiet about having signaled the creatures. They are going to attack again. Lots of speculation on what will happen next.

The ending of this one and the start of the next chapter are a little off. I’ll fix that in edits. But, first, they need to fix the subs.

Lots of good details here, I feel like I really did a good job of getting inside her head (which I didn’t in some of the previous drafts).

The caves again. I need more foreshadowing of what’s there – part of what’s driving the mosasaurs to attack. Again, I’ll fix that in edits.

And the chapter ends with them getting inside of the submersibles.

Chapter Twenty-Eight: Pick up as soon as the last chapter ends. Another huge attack and the moon pool bay is closed. They are forced to exit the submersibles to fight back. Similar to Chapter Twenty-Two, but even more violent. They take a lot more casualties and are down to nine or so survivors.

Another attack, this one not quite as big but just as devastating.

Somehow “Kim” turned into “Reyes” (a character from the last draft). My writing process is a mess! More to come in future blog posts.

And we’ll end on a scary note.

Chapter Twenty-Nine: The habitat is damaged further, taking them off of their moorings and closer to the trench, but not all of the way down into it. Parkowski faces a life or death situation and survives.

Some of the criticism of Lag Delay was that it didn’t have enough tension until the assassination/car chase at the midpoint. Here, we have it in spades.

Gotta have the core.

Lots of technical stuff, and some more horror elements.

And we end with some ramped up tension.

Hope you’re enjoying this! This book was a blast to write and is easier than I thought to edit. I’ll have a couple more of these posts for next week.