Almost to the house. Another twenty feet and they'd be at the door. The closed door. What if it was locked?
Where was Alan? Good God, if he was still outside he was a goner, a sitting duck in that wheelchair.
Just then one of the chewers whizzed past her cheek and buried its teeth into Ba's shoulder. He grunted with pain but kept running, kept swinging his club ahead of him and clearing the path. Fighting her rising gorge, Sylvia shifted Jeffy's weight to one arm and reached up with her free hand; she forced her fingers around the chewer's body and gave it a violent twist. The body cracked and the teeth came free of Ba's back as cold fluid ran down her arm.
Ba turned and nodded his thanks, and at that instant, a writhing mass of tentacles dropped onto the back of his neck. He stumbled but managed to hold his balance and keep moving. And then they were at the door, Sylvia pulling whatever tentacles she could reach free of Ba's neck as he groped for the door knob. If the door was locked they were doomed. They'd die right here on Toad Hall's front steps.
But the door opened before Ba reached it. Light flooded out. She had a glimpse of Alan looking up from his wheelchair as he held it open. They tumbled through to the foyer and the door slammed shut behind them. Ba dropped his billy and sank to his knees, clawing at the tentacled monstrosity wrapping itself around his throat. Sylvia put Jeffy down and went to help him but Alan suddenly rolled between them and reached down to the floor.
"Drop your hands a second, Ba," he said.
As Ba obeyed, Alan lifted his hand. He held Ba's club. He swung at the man-o'-war, ripping its air sac and tearing its body open. The tentacles loosened their grip and Ba ripped it free, hurling it to the floor. As it tried to flutter-crawl toward Jeffy across the marble floor of the foyer, Alan ran it over with the big wheel of his chair. Twice. Finally the thing lay still.
Behind her, Jeffy was sobbing. From somewhere in the basement, Phemus was barking wildly.
Ba staggered to his feet. His neck was a mass of blood, his clothing shredded and bloody. He faced her, panting, ragged, swaying.
"You and the Boy are all right, Missus?"
"Yes, Ba. Thanks to you. But you need a doctor."
"I will go wash myself," he said. He turned and headed for the guest bathroom.
Sylvia looked at Alan. Tears streaked his face. His lips were trembling.
"I thought you were dead!" he said. "I knew you were out there and needed help and I couldn't go to you." He pounded his thighs. "God damn these useless things!"
Sylvia lifted Jeffy and carried him to Alan. She seated herself on Alan's lap and adjusted Jeffy on hers. Alan's arms encircled them both. Jeffy began to cry. Sylvia understood perfectly. For the first time today she felt safe. And that feeling of safety opened the floodgates. She began to sob as she had never sobbed in her life. The three of them cried together.
The Movie Channel
Joe Bob Briggs' Drive-In Movie:
Night Of Bloody Horror (1969) Howco International
5 • CATACLYSM
Maui
The moana puka appeared around dusk.
Kolabati and Moki had been standing on the lanai watching the sun sink into the Pacific—earlier than ever. It was only a quarter to seven. They were also watching the airport. Neither of them could remember ever seeing it so busy.
"Look at them run," Moki said, grinning as he slipped an arm around her waist. "The shrinking daylight's got them all spooked. See how they run."
"It's got me spooked too," Kolabati said.
"Don't let it," he said. "If it sends all the Jap malahinis scurrying west back to their own islands, and all the haoles back to the mainland—preferably back to New York where they can fall into that hole in Central Park—it's all for the good. It will leave the islands to the Hawaiians."
She'd been fascinated by the news from New York of the mysterious hole in the Sheep Meadow. She knew the area well. Her brother Kusum had once owned an apartment overlooking Central Park.
"I'm not Hawaiian."
He tightened his grip on her waist. "As long as you're with me, you are."
Somehow, his arm around her was not as comforting as she would have wished. They watched the airport in silence for a while longer, then Moki released her and leaned on the railing, staring out at the valley, the sky.
"Something's going to happen soon. Do you feel it?"
Kolabati nodded. "Yes. I've felt it for days."
"Something wonderful."
"Wonderful?" She stared at him. Could he mean it? She'd been plagued by an almost overwhelming sense of dread since the tradewinds had reversed themselves. "No. Not wonderful at all. Something terrible."
His grin became fierce. "Terrible for other people, maybe. But wonderful for us. You wait and see."
Kolabati didn't know what to make of Moki lately. His behavior had remained slightly bizarre since Wednesday when the gash on his hand had healed so quickly. At least once a day he'd cut himself to see if the healing power was still with him. Each day he healed more quickly than the day before. And with each healing the wild light in his eyes had grown.
As the daylight began to fade, Kolabati turned toward the door, but Moki grabbed her arm.
"Wait. What is that?"
He was staring east, toward Kahului and beyond. She followed his gaze and saw it. Something in the water. White water, bubbling, roiling. A gigantic disturbance. With foreboding rising, ballooning within her, Kolabati grabbed the binoculars from their hook and focused on the disturbance.
At first all she saw was turbulent white water, giant chop, sloshing and swirling chaotically. But as she watched, the turbulence became ordered, took shape. The white water began to swirl in a uniform direction, counterclockwise, around a central point. She identified the center in time to see it sink below the surface and become a dark, spinning, sucking maw.
"Moki, look!" She handed him the glasses.
"I see!" he said, but took them anyway.
She watched his expression as he adjusted the lenses. His smile grew.
"A whirlpool! It's too close to shore to be from converging currents. It's got to be a crack in the ocean floor. No, wait!" He lowered the glasses and stared at her, his face flushed with excitement. "A hole! It has to be a hole in the ocean floor, just like the Central Park hole! We've got our own hole here!"
Together they watched the whirlpool organize and expand, Moki with undisguised glee, Kolabati with growing, gnawing unease. The troubles from the outer world, from the mainland, were intruding on her paradise. That could only bring misfortune. They watched together until it was too dark to see any more, then they went inside and turned on the TV to see what the news had to say about it. The scientists all agreed—the ocean floor had opened in a fashion similar to the phenomenon in Manhattan's Central Park. Already the locals had a name for it: moana puka—ocean hole.
Moki could barely contain his excitement. He wandered the great room, talking a blue streak, gesticulating wildly.
"You know what's going to happen, Bati?" he said. "The water's going to be sucked down into whatever abyss those holes lead to, and it's going to keep on disappearing into nowhere. And eventually the ocean level is going to drop. And if it drops far enough, do you know what will happen?"
Kolabati shook her head mutely. She had an inescapable feeling that she was witnessing the beginning of the end—of everything.
"I'll tell you what's going to happen: Greater Maui will be reborn." He went to the doorway that opened onto the lanai and gestured into the darkness. "Molokai, Lanai, Kahoolawe, even little Molokini—all of them were part of Maui before the Ice Age, connected to our island by valleys rather than cut off by channels of sea water. I see it happening, Bati. I see them all joined together again, reunited after ages of separation. A single island, as big as the Big Island. Maybe bigger. And I'll play a part in the future of Greater Maui."