It was black again. It was almost like being out on the sea in total darkness. The sudden change from light to darkness made it blacker still, and no matter what they knew or had heard the smell of fear seemed to come into the room. They all were about to see something they had dreaded and even now didn’t want to see at all. Yet they had to. They had to see it die, positively, irrevocably die a death that could never arise again to terrorize them. They had to be sure. The air was alive with their tension.
And Mako Hooker pushed the button in his hand and the screen boomed into a blank, silvery flower of nearly blinding light. There was a sharp gasp when nothing was there, but before any mutter of discontent was heard, night came again with the suddenness of a blink, then the form appeared, black against even greater blackness, but the camera light gave it stark substance and depth, an eerie monstrous shape giving birth to itself as it thrust up from the water with deliberate slowness. On its nose the deadly form of the huge teethlike wire cutters made it grimace like an unleashed horror, and as the rattle of its ghastly breath came through the sound system, there was the white streak as the projectile from the rocket launcher tore through the night, blasted a hole in the rust-weakened outer shell, erupted into a great twisted hole of mangled metal and let the ocean in to give it a final and complete burial. The hulk began to heel, and then the eye came into view. Hooker stopped the tape and they saw what it was. The 0 on the conning tower had faded. Only the top part was left, like an arched eyebrow. An encrustation below it gave a pupil-like appearance.
Hooker touched the button again. The sound got wilder, a metallic gurgle as the hulk turned, and as slowly as it had appeared it went down.
The light on the screen went blank and everyone sat in the darkness again. There was no sound for a second, then you heard everybody letting his breath out. To himself Mako smiled. He knew how an audience would react. He didn’t need any further proof. He said, “Alley...,” and the lights went on.
The hum of conversation was quiet at first while the thrill of satisfaction held the people of Peolle in its grip. It was dead. The eater was dead and it would eat no more. They knew it for what it was, but to all of them it would always be the eater and great stories would be wound around it, truth and imagination merging to make wonderful things to tell around nighttime fires, and the name of Mako Hooker would be a living thing in everybody’s memory for generations to come.
Now the building was loud with voices. Nobody would be going home until the sun came up, and to one side Billy Bright was trying to be grave about the whole affair, yet he was enjoying the role of hero helper to his boss. He saw Mako grinning at him and shrugged a resignation. Then he was happy too. He saw Judy slip her hand through Mako’s arm, and squeeze a little; then Mako lowered his head and kissed her gently.
Billy Bright didn’t see them leave, but suddenly they were gone.