Decades in stasis, now Russian Officer Lophyya awakens within the spaceship Null, but immediately he knows something isn't right. Alarms blare and that ever-calm computer voice isn't helping his nerves. Instinct and enhanced intelligence spur the apeman to determine where they are, what has gone wrong, if his Captain lives, and their beloved mates. Their ship, crippled, knocked off course, but their mission paramount, to defend Mother Russia, or die.

Their ship has crashed deep within the Earth's hollow core, though these genetically modified Russian Apemen don't know that yet. Lophyya succeeds in awakening his Captain Bahznt, just in time to fend off a sudden attack! Approaching the Null is a squadron of mutated Atlantean Warriors, whose mission it is to determine who these interlopers are, what threat they pose, to take their technology, and destroy them.

I can easily imagine these mighty ape-men with thick, Russian accents. The quick fighting action throws Lophyya into pure fight or flight mode. He must fight to survive, and defend his comrades and mates, above all else. Swiftly, this Russian officer, far from home and uncertain of his current footing, learns of the true terrors of the deep. Fear of the unknown will not paralyze these uncanny ape-men of Russia. Rage and blood lust meet head-on with heartless, thoughtless hatred.

Who, indeed, fires upon Mother Russia, and in response, who intrudes upon the domain of Atlantis?

This feels like the beginning of what could be an exciting serial story, released in installments the way they used to be, "...next week, when we return to the exciting adventures of..." and I'd be one happy reader to discover more of what might happen next in this standoff in the deep!