Petrogypsies (18 page)

I couldn’t see much. Between Sprocket careening around sickeningly, plus the heavy rain and water from the waves washing across me, combined with the dark caused by the clouds blotting out the sun, mostly all I could perceive was a strong impression that it wasn’t a fit place for man nor beast.

I climbed to the top rung. Trying to peer around me in the dimness.

Something rubbery wrapped itself around my shoulders, tore loose my grip on the ladder, and yanked me into the ocean chaos again. I didn’t even have a chance to scream.

I hit the water and this time managed to hold my breath. Whatever had ahold of me pulled me away from Sprocket like I was on greased rails. Before I could blink twice, I was approaching a huge dark hulk that tossed in the storm. Whatever had wrapped around me was not Sprocket’s tongue. It was too broad and flat.

A couple of other bands wrapped around me and pulled me closer to the dark hulk. Then I did scream. I was completely tangled up in the bands, as they wiggled around insanely like gigantic snakes.

A small part of my mind that kept thinking told me that they were tentacles, and I’d been snatched out of Sprocket by some kind of enormous octopus.

Only, I was wrong. The tentacles drew me against the hulk, and it split wide into a gaping, toothy mouth. I’d seen pictures of octopusses, and they had little beaks like birds. This was some other kind of sea monster entirely.

That mouth was big enough to swallow me whole. Whatever had me wouldn’t even have to tear me up into bite-size chunks.

I gave up as the tentacles drew me toward that cavern. I was about to be eaten by some kind of fearsome sea monster that was big enough to whip up on Sprocket, in the middle of a goddam hurricane, still fifty miles out to sea. There wasn’t no way to live through that combination of good luck. I quit struggling and screaming.

The mouth opened wide, and I said good-bye.

Then I had second thoughts.

The chief had betrayed me and damn near killed me, and the hurricane had damn near killed me, and the ocean had damn near killed me, and I’d lived through them all, and just when I thought it was safe, this goddam, meddling sea monster showed up out of nowhere and decided to fuck up my afternoon even worse than it already was. Well, to hell with him! He might figure Sprocket would make a tasty dinner, with me being the appetizer beforehand. He might be right. But he was going to have to work for his meals like the rest of us did.

I grabbed ahold of one of the tentacles that wrapped around me and tore it loose from my body. It felt all rubbery and cold and wet, but I didn’t flinch from it anymore. I didn’t struggle and try to escape. I gripped it fiercely, doing my best to press my fingertips and thumbs into it. I was gonna strangle that goddam tentacle to death.

I started to scream again. In a killing rage.

The rubber tore under my hands, and blood spurted into my face. Suddenly, the tentacle became even slicker than it had been before. I ripped chunks of flesh loose and threw them at the body above me and went back for more. The tentacle around my chest tightened convulsively, almost squeezing the breath out of me, then loosened.

I choked on water and monster blood and pulled myself closer to the base of the tentacle that I’d injured. The mouth gaped open right under my boots. The monster sucked water in, trying to suck me in, too. I held on and gouged the base of the tentacle. My fingers went in easier this time, and the blood spurted quicker. I screamed louder. The blood tasted
good!

The major tentacle around me loosened some more, but I began to slip inside his mouth. I kicked at him, but the lips of the mouth closed around my waist and started to draw me. I braced my feet rigidly against his teeth to keep out of his mouth. If he ever got me in between those choppers he’d tear me in half, like he must have done that shark that him and Sprocket fought over earlier.

I was completely insane by now, tearing and biting at the base of the tentacle that I held onto.

Then another tentacle groped at me. I tried to bite it, but this one was too tough. It lassoed me around the shoulders and yanked at me. Tore me away from the tentacle I’d been ripping into. I knew I’d had it then. All the monster needed to do now was stuff me inside and chew a couple of times.

I still didn’t stop fighting. If I had to, I’d fight my way out of the bastard from the inside. Henry Lee McFarland wasn’t nobody’s appetizer.

I clawed and screamed and choked and tore at the tentacle wrapped around me, but it didn’t loosen an inch.

Then it did a funny thing. It yanked me right out of the monster’s mouth. Popped me loose like a cork out of one of them wine bottles back at the Bali Room. A couple of smaller tentacles were still wrapped around me, and it tore me loose from them, too.

In a second, I was shooting through the water again. Only this time, I was moving
away
from the sea monster. For a long, terrifying moment, my mind flashed images of two giant sea monsters fighting over little old me.

Then I realized what had grabbed me out of the monster’s mouth, and I quit fighting it. I grabbed it and held onto it for my life. I ignored the tentacle from the original monster when it came from below and wrapped around my waist again.

Matter of fact, I held it to me. I had a plan for it.

A second later, I drew up to another huge dark hulk tossing in the water. And another huge mouth gaped open in front of me. And I didn’t fight it the tiniest bit when it swallowed me right up.

I landed in the corridor, practically exploding into the midst of the crew when Sprocket’s tongue reeled me inside.

The tip of the big tentacle from the sea monster still circled my waist. He wasn’t nothing if not persistent.

Sprocket’s mouth chomped down hard as it could, and the tentacle convulsed loose from me. Sprocket’s drilling mouth doesn’t have any teeth, but lips that can hold in a ten-thousand-pound kick can put some pressure on and hold it.

The anger hadn’t left me yet. I was mightily relieved that Sprocket had come to the rescue again, but I was also hacked off at the entire world, with most of that feeling focused on the sea monster that had grabbed me. I wasn’t done teaching it who ate who on this particular planet.

The tentacle started to slide back outside, and I fell on it. I wrapped my arms and legs around it and dug in. “Come on, people! Help me hold this thing down.” Nobody but me knew what was going on, but everybody piled right on and pinned that tentacle to the floor.

Razer was one of the ones near me. I let go of the tentacle when it seemed to be trapped pretty well. “You, hands, just hold onto it for a minute. Razer, you still got that ugly ol’ Bowie knife in your room?”

“Surely do, Henry Lee. You figure on relaxing with a little whittlin’ after your invigoratin’ swim?”

“Sort of. There’s some kind of sea monster outside that tried to eat me, and I’m aggravated with the son of a bitch.”

He went to get his Bowie knife while I turned to the iron room and pushed its curtains aside. I rummaged around until I found what I wanted. I pulled out two ten-foot lengths of three-inch line pipe and hammered the wing nut down on the unions to make one twenty-foot length. Then I dug out a carton full of victaulic clamps.

Everybody watched me while they hung onto the whipsawing tentacle. Razer pushed out of his room and handed me the Bowie knife, still in its scabbard. I unsnapped the catch and shook the scabbard off. Ten inches of gleaming razor-sharp tungsten carbide steel glistened in the torchlight.

The four- and five-inch victaulics were too small, but the six-inch one fit just right when I slid it over the tip of the three-inch pipe, then slipped the Bowie knife in between its gasket and the outer wall of the pipe. I pulled the clamp arm down, and it snapped tight over the haft of the Bowie knife. The blade protruded over the end of the iron pipe just right. I stood up and hefted it in both hands.

I was half proud of myself. I’d made a pretty good harpoon out of things that were laying around the house.

I pulled aside the curtain into Doc’s room and maneuvered the length of the harpoon until the tip pointed at the hole in the top, which was sphinctered closed.

“Sprocket!” I yelled. “I’m going outside!”

I turned to the people who were watching me. Behind them, another group was still holding down the tentacle.

“I doubt the first one will do the job. If y’all could see about finding some more knives and making more harpoons, they might come in handy.” I raised my voice. “Those of you holding down that tentacle --- soon as I get situated topside, start pulling it in as much as you can. We need the monster as close up as can be managed.”

A minute later I was poked halfway outside in the howling hurricane again. Sprocket pitched around, and slung sideways, and crashed half through waves on occasion, but it was practically peaceful compared to the banging around I’d gotten when the monster had me.

The harpoon felt light as a toothpick in my hands. It only weighed about a hundred pounds. Exactly the right length and weight for skewering uppity sea monsters.

I didn’t see nothing for a few minutes. It took that long for the boys inside to haul in that tentacle. Then, slowly, thrashing and fighting, the sea monster was drawn closer. I still couldn’t make out the details of it in the dark, but I could see enough to aim the harpoon.

I wanted to wait until it was slid right up next to Sprocket. Tentacles whipped through the air, slapping onto Sprocket’s body and curling around him. For a second one of them was in reach of the harpoon. I jabbed at it. The Bowie knife sliced into it, and the tentacle recoiled and disappeared into the darkness again.

Then the bulk spurted nearer. The monster wasn’t trying to get away at all. It didn’t mind getting in close and dirty. Flailing tentacles surrounded me. A couple of them wrapped around the harpoon and tried to tug it out of my hands, but I held on. Sprocket bucked and sunfished under me, then the monster got a good grip on him and dragged him underwater. Sprocket reflexively closed his sphincter around my waist. I held onto the harpoon while the water swirled around us. Then the monster flipped Sprocket completely upside down, and I lost the harpoon.

I pounded on his hide so he’d let back inside, but I guess he was busy and didn’t notice. I realized shortly that I couldn’t hold my breath forever.

Fortunately, before I turned completely blue and exploded, Sprocket surged out of the water again, simultaneously relaxing his sphincter enough for me to slide back inside.

The room was dark. The warts had all gone out again. I felt my way toward the curtain leading to the corridor.

“Henry Lee?” asked the chief, so close I jumped and gave out a yip. I reached out. He thrust a length of pipe into my hands.

“You put that last one into the monster?” the chief asked.

I shook my head, then realized he couldn’t see it. Sprocket lurched under us, and I almost dropped the harpoon he’d given me. “No, sir. But this one ain’t gonna be wasted.”

“Good. They got a little assembly line out in the corridor by the iron room. More knives and other pointy objects in Sprocket than I would have thought possible.”

Sprocket seemed to settle for a moment, so I grabbed the bottom rung and pulled myself upright.

“Thanks, Chief.”

“Sure. I’ll be waiting with another one when you want it. Uhh … Henry Lee?”

I was halfway up the ladder. “Yeah, Chief?”

“I really was your friend until everything got in the way. I’m sorrier than you’ll ever know about how it’s all turned out.”

Sprocket’s sphincter opened, and I maneuvered the harpoon through the hole. “Me too, Chief.” I don’t know if he heard my words. The wind might have blown them away. I went back into the storm.

Matters hadn’t changed much. Sprocket and the sea monster still wrestled.

I got a sighting on the monster. I waited until the pitching stopped for half a second, then drew the harpoon back over my left shoulder with both hands and twisted around halfways to pull my back and arm muscles as tight as possible. When they’d reached maximum tension, I held for an instant longer, then whipped the harpoon around as powerfully as I could. I didn’t see it hit, but I heard the whistling shriek the monster let out when it drove deep into him.

I pounded on Sprocket and he loosened his sphincter again. I dropped into the room. The illumination warts glowed feebly now, enough to show the chief’s smile as he handed me another harpoon.

When I got outside again, I saw that I wasn’t alone anymore. Doc and Razer poked out of holes nearby.

“You didn’t think we was gonna let you hog all the fun, did you, Henry Lee?” Razer shouted.

Then Big Mac started laughing behind me, poking out of his own hole.

“Hot damn!” he yelled. “This here beats the wrestling matches seven ways from Sunday! Sprocket and the Crew versus the Mystery Sea Monster in a winner-take-all title bout!”

Another long screech erupted from the sea monster when four more harpoons slammed into it.

When I come back up with another harpoon, Big Mac had one, too, but Doc and Razer had decided on a change of weapons. Doc cranked up his thirty-ought-six and pumped slug after slug into the sea monster, alternating with Razer blowing holes in it with his .40 caliber rifle.