Now Glory thrust the new Artifact at the dark tentacle, which was already drawing back from the light, and the creature began to recede whence it came. It was ungainly now, like some appendage too large to carry its own awful weight, and it was too slow to pull back into the portal before the removal of the Artifact caused the doors to close.
Everything was still for a moment, basking in the new light. Fabulous colors shimmered through the cavern. Then, like a worm shriveling in the sun, the giant black tentacle thrashed violently about, snapping stalagmites and stalactites like so much tinder as the doorway grated on its hidden gears, and, deep in the stonework, an ominous rumbling sound began. The vibrations spread throughout the cave, gradually rising in volume as it reached a resonant pitch that shook the very air. Stalactites fell from the darkness of the cave’s roof like icicles in spring, some of them impaling the monster’s giant tentacle, causing it to thrash even more violently, spewing black ichor that sizzled where it touched stone.
Now that Glory was free and he could breathe once again, Lovecraft started the chant which he knew would seal the portal. The words rushed nearly unbidden from his lips, and the weird sounds, unintended for the human vocal apparatus, resonated through the cavern like animal noises and subhuman utterances, mixing into an insane gibbering noise. The sounds echoed in chamber after chamber as if it were a call being answered in kind, and each echo came accompanied with the noise of collapsing stone. The entire cavern was beginning to collapse.
“HP! We have to get out!” Howard motioned to the falling stone. He pulled Glory by the hand, and when he met resistance, he dragged her. “It’s all coming down, dammit!”
Again, the light changed, dimming, growing in intensity, dimming again as the tripods shook and then finally gave way. The cavern was plunged into blackness when the tripods collapsed, breaking the beam of light, and suddenly they were all blind, seeing only the purplish blobs of afterimages. For what seemed the longest time, they groped around until Glory located her flashlight and flicked it on to provide a pathetically weak light.
“Bob!” she called.
Howard appeared at her side. He took her hand for a moment, but didn’t know what to say. Before he could articulate anything, Lovecraft was there, shining his own beam at them.
“Do you recall the way back?” He shouted to be heard over all the echoes of the collapsing cavern.
Howard pointed, and the three of them ran toward the lake, splashing into the water as rocks and stalactites fell all around them. Behind them, in the blackness, the gate was buried for all time.
AS THE CAVE-IN subsided, a fog of dust settled over the surface of the lake, and Glory, Lovecraft, and Howard swam back, struggling to keep their flashlights above water. They were so exhausted they could barely get their limbs to move through the resistance of the water, which felt icy after their exertions. Lovecraft and Howard clutched their rafts and kicked their feet, moving ever so slowly behind Glory.
“Why did it let you go?” asked Howard.
“I don’t know,” said Glory. “I don’t want to remember what just happened.”
“Neither do I,” said Howard. “I ain’t sleepin’ again as long as I live.”
“May I suggest we refrain from speaking in order to preserve our energies until we are safe?” said Lovecraft.
Howard grunted. They swam on in a solemn silence, hearing only the wet rippling and splashing of water and the occasional aftershock of the cave-in. Glory, the better swimmer, began to draw ahead.
The flashlight beams, jostling about on the rafts, illuminated eerie swatches of color and bizarre formations of rock, all the stranger because they were glimpses out of context. Glory began to imagine what the things might be: giant convolutions on the inside of a stone womb, the wrinkles at the edges of a mother’s aureola, the smooth texture of an infant’s belly. She tried to soothe herself as she slowed down and floated, waiting for the men to catch up to her. She wanted desperately to be out of the water, and yet she could not bear the thought of emerging by herself and waiting, all alone, not knowing whether they would ever reach the other shore of the lake.
Suddenly Glory heard a sharp intake of breath-almost a squeak behind her. She turned her head to see Lovecraft’s face go under, then bob back up, mouth agape and gasping wetly. He went down again even before he could cry for help, the water bubbling at the edge of his raft, where Glory could see his pale fingers clutching.
“HP!” cried Howard, flailing at the water. “Help him, Glory!”
He tried to keep Lovecraft in the beam of his light, but it was unnecessary. Glory spun in the water and swam quickly toward Lovecraft’s light, which jerked wildly underwater as he struggled with something, the dark thing that pulled him from below. Glory could not quite make it out, but in her imagination it seemed to be tattered fragments of blackness that reached upward from below, irregular bubbles of darkness attaching their weight to Lovecraft’s already exhausted frame. She dove down just as Lovecraft lost his grip on the raft and sank, trailing a froth of bubbles from his nostrils, his expression a grimace of fear and disbelief.
Kicking through the water with all her might, Glory caught Lovecraft before he was too far down, and she sank with him, struggling with the thing that had wound itself around his legs. She had to scissor her own legs around Lovecraft’s waist and contort her body downward to use her hands on the black stuff. It clung like viscous gobs of crude oil; it had an icy texture where she touched it, a debilitating coldness that cut into the flesh of her fingers. She clawed at the stuff, hooking her nails into it until she could feel Lovecraft’s skin underneath. A large, gelatinous clump came off in her hands, and she shoved it away as if it were some hideous black afterbirth, ripping and pulling at it, imagining the membrane of an unholy placenta, watching with surprise as it oozed a black blood that puffed into clouds like the inky discharge of a giant squid.
Glory held on as long as she could, until her lungs burned and her vision dimmed, and then she gave a final, desperate double-legged kick at the black mass. She suddenly felt it give, and she let go of Lovecraft to fight her way back up to the surface, where she broke the water with a tortured gasp.
“Glory!”
She heard Howard’s voice and squinted as his light caught her in the eyes. She tried to ask about Lovecraft, but was only able to sputter and wheeze until she heard the water break again.
Lovecraft’s purple face emerged, eyes red and bulging. He let out a frightening cry and broke into a terrible fit of coughing as the air entered his lungs. For a while there was nothing but the sound of coughing and labored breath echoing through the cavern; Lovecraft was too traumatized to offer his characteristic commentary.
Glory made her way back to her raft to catch her breath; she stayed afloat by bearing her weight on the raft, but when she stopped kicking, her legs sank into the water.
She was poised like someone with chin and arms along the top of a wall, looking over to the other side when she felt her legs grow suddenly heavier. The raft bobbed, and water splashed her face. She gasped in alarm and the sound echoed over the water.
“Glory?” came Howard’s voice.
“I—” The weight suddenly yanked her under the water, and as her flashlight tumbled down, spinning its light before it went out, Glory saw the large shadowy form of a multi-limbed creature, which she knew now, with an inexplicable certainty, was her death. She knew this calmly, as if were no surprise to her. She knew that it was impossible to fight its grip, which pulled like the force of gravity itself. She knew that her body would never be found. And yet she felt no anxiety at all. Not even the urge to breathe one last time as she glided down in the pristine water.