Doc Savage: Skull Island (The Wild Adventures of Doc Savage) (39 page)

Chicahua leaped to meet one foe. Captain Savage took up a wide-legged stance over his father’s prone and defenseless form, and prepared to kill or—if necessary—to perish bravely.

That latter possibility seemed certain now.

Chicahua fought with a fury that could not be withstood. He slashed and hacked and made a pile of arms and legs and stumpy torsos at his feet. He took care to deprive as many foes as he could of their heads, still living or otherwise. This put tremendous fear into the opposition, who believed that losing one’s head in battle was as shameful as taking an enemy’s head was honorable.

But the wave that he broke was only one of two.

The other came howling and screaming up on Captain Savage, who stood his ground unflinching.

Looking down at his father’s bushy-bearded face one last time, the captain prepared to take as many lives as he possibly could.

The first Dyak leaped in. Blades touched, clashed, retreated.

Suddenly, the Dyaks stopped cold. They were no longer looking at Captain Savage. They were peering past him.

Captain Savage dared not turn to see what drew their amazed gazes. Then, as their dark orbs went wide, he could not resist.

For, behind him, the surface of the pool was boiling and thrashing madly.

Huge greenish tentacles flopped upward, swayed mightily. The crest of a bulbous brain-like head, its skin changing colors iridescently, emerged until the tops of two malign hooded eyes began to show themselves. A coiling tentacle relaxed, snaked out, questing in their direction, its pale suckers looking like horrid blank eyes.

Then, without warning, everything sank from sight.

It was all over in less than thirty seconds. Captain Savage stared blankly, as if he had seen a mirage. A tinge of greenish-blue began to bloom amid the disturbed waters. It spread.

A smooth bronze-haired head broke the surface. Flake-gold eyes, whirling with unleashed power, revealed themselves.

Out of the pool emerged Doc Savage, his firm mouth parted. From his lips issued a wild trilling. It was not a sound of surprise or expression of concern now, but a weird battle cry.

It filled the cavern, made every ear ring, every heart thrill.

Stepping onto dry rock, Doc reached up and snapped the leather belt that was around his muscular neck.

Penjaga the Keeper fell at his heels, eyes bugging out, breathing heavily.

Taking time only to wrest a still-flipping coil of greenish octopus tendril off his left bicep, Doc Savage waded into the Dyaks.

Hands like metal mauls made fists and wrecked faces.

Bright blades were useless against this indomitable man of living metal. With his punishing fists, he struck them from the hands of his opponents, then smashed the stunned blank faces of the disarmed ones. Mortal flesh was incapable of standing up to him.

Dyaks retreated, howling in fear.

Blowing water from his blowgun tubes to clear them for action, Doc sent sting-ray spines whispering after them, one after the other in fast succession. Those he hit, fell.

Stepping out onto the cliff ledge, the bronze giant sent more flying downward.

Dyaks dropped like flies swept clear by a fly swatter.

In an impossibly short space of time, the Dyak horde was scrambling back to the base of Skull Mountain, racing wildly for cover.

Satisfied and confident, Doc Savage turned to rejoin his father’s side.

“I got here as fast as I could,” he said simply.

Captain Savage’s eyes shone with undisguised pride. “Your timing was impeccable,” he said, thick of voice.

Their eyes met in silent understanding, then they turned to matters at hand.

Penjaga knelt at the side of Stormalong Savage, her hair dripping water in long gray strings.

“There is little more I can do here,” she said sadly. Then Penjaga went to Kong’s heavily heaving form, discovered bright bits of feather and balsa-wood fletching sticking out from his hairy hide. She walked around Kong’s great bulk, removing the long, splintery bamboo darts, tenderly applying herbs that had been wetted by immersion to the tiny punctures.

“There are so many,” she said. “I do not know if I can save him.”

“Try,” said Doc.

“Give me that bag about your neck, Gold Eyes,” Penjaga demanded.

Doc removed the strangely-scented pouch, now sopping wet.

Taking it, the Keeper approached the head of Kong, her aged voice breaking into a song that brought to mind a barbaric lullaby. She approached cautiously at first, then threw the contents of herbal bag into the air, releasing their scent.

To the astonishment of the others, Kong roused, emitting a contented grunt. Penjaga gave one dark wrist a reassuring pat, then proceeded to climb atop the tangled-fur chest like a sailor boarding a gently-heaving sailing craft.

Otherwise, Kong did not react.

Captain Savage took Doc aside and asked quietly, “What did she give my father?”

“Something she poured into his mouth from a small vessel. I do not know what it was. We can only hope for the best.”

Doc knelt and examined Old Stormy. When he regained his feet, his face was set. “We may be too late. But we will see.”

Captain Savage bowed his pewter-streaked head and turned away, saying nothing, his inner turmoil held strictly in check.

THE hours drifted from day to dusk and soon darkness was again creeping over the fleshless face of Skull Mountain, throwing the stark hollows of his granite visage into greater, deeper shadow until they resembled unfathomable pits.

Doc returned from lying on the ledge outside where he had been observing Dyak activity below.

“They are regrouping,” he told his father.

Captain Savage nodded. “Their numbers are greatly reduced.”

“And we have few resources,” countered Doc.

Captain Savage looked stricken. His clear gold eyes held a helpless light.

“Could we escape via that well?” he asked.

“It is very possible. But Stormalong would have to be left behind.”

Captain Savage looked off into space. “If we abandon him, the damned Dyaks will take his head.”

“I promised him that I would not allow that,” said Doc quietly.

Snapping back into focus, Captain Savage whirled. “What?”

“Earlier, he specifically requested that I prevent the Dyaks from taking it,” explained Doc.

Captain Savage’s golden eyes grew introspective. “A promise is a promise. If you made that vow to him, then you are honor-bound to respect it, even if it means your demise. And the same chains of honor that bind you, bind me as well. It is settled then. We will make our stand here, Dyaks be damned.”

Doc Savage said nothing. He was thinking that he wished he had his Annihilator submachine gun. But it would have been impractical to bring it up the well, even if he had the ammunition to feed it.

It bothered him greatly that he felt an irrational psychological need for a now-useless hunk of machined metal when he still had his brain and his brawn—not to mention all of the training still at his command.

Chapter LV

PRINCE MONYET WAITED for the sun to go down.

“Make pitch torches,” he ordered his men. They found appropriate pieces of wood, and dipped them into a tar pit, one of several that dotted Skull Island.

They began reassembling, including those who had been brought down by mysterious darts fired from the jungle earlier. Darts that did not kill, but put them to sleep.

Conferring, they assembled everything they knew of the situation.

“There are three gold eyes, and one old woman,” reported the Dyak scout, as if the latter did not matter.

Monyet nodded eagerly. “Good. We are many.”

“They have no darts, unless the brazen devil brought his own.”

“He must have,” said Monyet. “For who else felled our men who slept?”

“Darts that do not kill are not so very fearsome,” a warrior suggested.

“They are if you fall asleep climbing the side of a mountain,” countered the Dyak leader. “And awake in the afterlife without your head.”

All fell silent. To lose one’s head was the ultimate disgrace. To have it removed while sleeping and defenseless was especially shameful. A sleeping warrior cannot defend himself, has no chance to take an enemy head—or to keep his own.

It was a sobering proposition. They were not afraid to die—if they could do so fighting manfully.

Monyet questioned one man. “You saw the brazen devil arise from the pool up in the mountain?”

“Yes. After defeating a great eight-armed devilfish that dwelt there.”

Monyet’s eyes narrowed in thought. “Perhaps we have been assaulting that peak the wrong way.”

“You think there is another way up?”

Monyet’s slitted eyes went to the hollow orbs of Skull Mountain, eye sockets now dark with moving shadow.

“Once before,” he said, “the brazen devil bested me through the iron in his lungs. But Monyet has mighty lungs, too. I will prove who has the greatest lungs. Come! We will find the same way up that the brazen devil discovered. And from the pool, we will take him unawares. Then we will take their heads….”

Curved
mandau
swords and
duku
knives were thrust upward to the rising tropical moon.

“Antu pata!”
the Dyaks roared. “Trophy heads!”

Chapter LVI

PENJAGA THE KEEPER climbed down off the hairy breast of the once-mighty but now inert Kong.

“He may live,” she croaked. “He may not. We will know in one moon. Maybe two moons.”

Captain Savage growled, “We do not have two moons.”

“Father,” said Doc, “I can take her out safely and return.”

“My work is not yet done!” snapped Penjaga. “I will stay.”

“These men,” reminded Doc, “collect heads.”

“They want the head of Kong,” Penjaga sneered. “I would like to see them try.” She spat on the rock floor that had been worn flat by countless tracks.

Doc looked around. How long had Kong dwelled here? The stone floor was well-worn, as if bare feet had smoothed it over generations. Perhaps centuries.

He had investigated the treasure room, found little that was useful. The statuary were too large and heavy too be moved far, even if they could be squeezed through the intervening crack.

They could be thrown out the other eye socket, but not effectively. The Dyaks were not positioned for that defensive maneuver to work.

Deep in the night, Stormalong Savage stirred. Yellow eyes pried open.

The others moved to his side, gave him fresh water from the part of the pool still unpolluted by devilfish blood.

“I live,” Stormalong rasped out.

Captain Savage forced a reassuring smile. “Yes, Father. We have beaten back the Dyak enemy.”

Seeing Penjaga’s winkled-turtle face, Old Stormy muttered darkly, “I suppose I have you to thank for this.”

“I came to save Kong,” sniffed the Keeper. “But I could not ignore you, you long thing of hair and narrow bones.”

Old Stormy smiled. “Penjaga and I have been friendly enemies for a very long time now.”

“Pah!” spat the old crone.

They made him comfortable. For the vaulted interior of the cavern remained tolerably cool, neither hot in the day, nor cold by night.

Doc and his father went out onto the ledge to watch for signs of a renewed attack.

“We may die here,” said Doc quietly.

“We may.”

“There are many questions I have wanted to ask you….”

“And I have so few answers,” said Captain Savage, absently. Then, seeming to snap out of a reverie, he spoke up.

“I can tell you one thing now.”

“Yes?”

“I was not speaking the truth when I represented to you that I could no longer afford to complete your training.”

Surprise flicked in Doc’s restless flake-gold eyes. He had never known his father to be careless with the truth.

“No?”

“My funds have been diminished. That much is true. But I fully expected to replenish them. I told you half the truth. The conditions of the present did not mean that the future was so clouded.”

“But why?”

“During the late war, I did secret duty. The
Orion
served as an unofficial Q-ship. I presume you know what that means?”

“Yes. The
Orion
operated as a disguised schooner-of-war, designed to lure the enemy into traps and engagements.”

Captain Savage nodded. “I am proud to say that the
Orion
sank three German submarines with depth charges during that period. I made no money and spent much. Hence the deplorable state of my finances at present.”

DOC SAVAGE said nothing. This was a revelation. But after some thought, it was not really a surprise. It explained the hydrophones in the locked trunk, among other things.

Doc asked, “Then why did you represent to me that my training could not continue?”

“All your life, you have been a dutiful son, going where I sent you, learning what you had to. Now on the threshold of manhood, with a war behind you, I had to see what stuff you were made of. If you were to follow in my footsteps, I had to take your measure.”

“I see.”

“No, you do not see. I did not mean that you had every choice in the world. I fully expected you to resume your training. But in your own time and place. I had confidence that you would see the wisdom in that.”

“You may have been correct,” allowed Doc.

“But, first and foremost,” pressed Savage Senior, “I had to cleanse you of red war, and the accompanying lust for battle. I had to set you on a new path—away from war.”

Doc looked blank. “I have come to see my war experiences as an extension of my training.”

“I could not do so until you were out of uniform, of course,” said Captain Savage, ignoring the comment. “The fortuitous discovery of the
Courser
provided the opportunity. It was my intention to guide you through this adventure and test your mettle.”

“So this was all a test?”

“You performed magnificently,” said Captain Savage, a thin trace of paternal pride warming his tone.

“Thank you.”

A shadow fell over the captain’s wind-burned face. “But it was all for naught, if we die here,” he said harshly.