The Tomb

by F. Paul

  "I want to go home!" she moaned to no one.

  There was movement outside the door, and the things out there seemed to go away. At least she couldn't hear them fighting and hissing and scraping against the door anymore. After a while she heard another sound, like a chant, but she couldn't make out the words. And then there was more movement out in the corridor.

  The door opened. Whimpering with helpless terror, Vicky tried to press herself farther into the unyielding angles of the corner. There was a click and light suddenly filled the room, blazing from the ceiling, blinding her. She hadn't even looked for a light switch. As her eyes adjusted to the glare, she made out a form standing in the doorway. Not a monster—smaller and lighter than a monster. Then her vision cleared.

  It was a man! He had a beard and was dressed funny—and she noticed that he only had one arm—but he was a man, not a monster! And he was smiling!

  Crying with joy, Vicky jumped up and ran to him.

  She was saved!

  29

  The child rushed up to him and grabbed his wrist with both of her little hands. She looked up into his eyes.

  "You're gonna save me, aren't you, mister? We gotta get out of here! It's full of monsters!"

  Kusum was filled with self-loathing as he looked down at her.

  This child, this tiny skinny innocent with her salty wet stringy hair and torn night dress, her wide blue eyes, her eager hopeful face looking to him for rescue—how could he feed her to the rakoshi?

  It was too much too ask.

  Must she die, too, Goddess?

  No answer was forthcoming, for none was necessary. Kusum knew the answer—it was engraved on his soul. The vow would remain unfulfilled as long as a single Westphalen lived. Once the child was gone, he would be one step closer to purifying his karma.

  But she's just a child!

  Perhaps he should wait. The Mother was not back yet and it was important that she be a part of the ceremony. It disturbed him that she hadn't returned. The only explanation was that she'd had difficulty locating Jack. Kusum could wait for her…

  No—he had already delayed well over an hour. The rakoshi were assembled and waiting. The ceremony must begin.

  Just a child!

  Stilling the voice that cried out inside him, Kusum straightened up and smiled once again at the little girl.

  "Come with me," he said, lifting her in his arm and carrying her out into the corridor.

  He would see that she died quickly and painlessly. He could do that much.

  30

  Jack let his raft butt softly against the hull of the ship as he ran through the various frequencies on his beeper. Finally there came a click and a hum from above. The gangway began to lower itself toward him. Jack maneuvered the raft under it, and as soon as it finished its descent, reached up and placed the crate of bombs on the bottom step. With a thin nylon cord between his teeth, he climbed up after it, then tied the raft to the gangway.

  He stood and watched the gunwale directly above him, his flamethrower held at ready. If Kusum had seen the gangway go down, he'd be on his way over to investigate. But no one appeared.

  Good. So far, surprise was on his side. He carried the crate to the top of the gangway and crouched there to survey the deck: deserted. To his left the entire aft superstructure was dark except for the running lights. Kusum could be standing unseen in the shadows behind the blank windows of the bridge at this very moment. Jack would be exposing himself to discovery by crossing the deck, but it was a risk he had to take. The aft compartments were the most critical areas of the ship. The engines were there, as were the fuel tanks. He wanted to be sure those areas were set for destruction before he moved into the more dangerous cargo holds—where the rakoshi lived.

  He hesitated. This was idiocy. This was comic book stuff. What if the rakoshi caught him before he set the bombs? That would let Kusum off free with his boat and his monsters. The sane thing to do was what Gia had said back on shore: Call in the Coast Guard. Or the Harbor Patrol.

  But Jack simply could not bring himself to do that. This was between Kusum and him. He could not allow outsiders into the fray. It might seem like madness to everyone else, but there was no other way for him. Gia wouldn't understand it; neither would Abe. He could think of only one other person who would comprehend why it had to be this way. And that, for Jack, was the most frightening part of this whole thing.

  Only Kusum Bahkti, the man he had come to destroy, would understand.

  Now or never, he told himself as he clipped four bombs to his belt. He stepped onto the deck and sprinted along the starboard gunwale until he reached the superstructure. He had been this route on his first trip aboard the ship. He knew the way and headed directly below.

  The engine room was hot and noisy, the big twin diesels idling. Their basso hum vibrated the fillings in his teeth. Jack set the timers on the bombs for three forty-five a.m.—that would give him a little over an hour to do his job and get away. He was familiar with the timers and had confidence in them, yet as he armed each one, he found himself holding his breath and turning his face away. A ridiculous gesture—if the bomb went off in his hands, the heat and force of the blast would incinerate him before he knew it—yet he continued to turn his head.

  He placed the first two at the base of each engine. Two more were attached to the fuel tanks. When those four went, the entire stern of the freighter would be a memory. He stopped by the hatch that had taken him into the corridor that led to the rakoshi. That was where Vicky had died. A heaviness settled in his chest. It was still hard to believe she was gone. He pressed his ear against the metal and thought he heard the Kaka-ji chant. Visions of what he had seen Monday night —those monsters holding up pieces of torn flesh—swept through his mind, leaving barely controllable fury in their wake. It was all he could do to restrain himself from starting up his flamethrower and running into the hold, dowsing anything that moved with napalm.

  But no… he might not last a minute doing that. There was no room for emotion here. He had to lock away his feelings and be cool… cold. He had to follow his plan. Had to do this right. Had to make sure not a single rakosh—or its master—escaped alive.

  He headed back up toward fresh air and returned to the gangplank. Sure now that Kusum was in the main hold, doing whatever he did with the rakoshi, Jack hefted the somewhat lighter bomb crate onto his shoulder and made no attempt to hide as he strode toward the bow. When he reached the hatch over the forward hold, he lifted the entry port and peered below.

  The odor rose and rammed into his nostrils, but he controlled his gag reflex and looked below.

  This hold was identical to the other in size and design except that the elevator platform waiting a half-dozen feet below him was in the forward rather than the aft corner. He could hear noises like a litany drifting from the aft hold. In the dim light he saw that the floor of this hold was littered with an incredible amount of debris, but there were no rakoshi down there, neither walking about nor lying on the floor.

  He had the forward hold entirely to himself.

  Jack lowered himself through the opening. It was a tight squeeze with the flamethrower on his back, and for one awful moment he thought he was trapped in the opening, unable to move up or down, helplessly wedged in place until Kusum found him or the bombs went off. But he pulled free, slipped through, and hauled his bomb crate after him.

  Once again he checked the floor of the hold. Finding no sign of rakoshi lurking about, he started the elevator down. It was like a descent into hell. The noise from the other hold grew steadily louder. He could sense an excitement, a hunger in the guttural noises the rakoshi were making. Whatever ceremony was going on must be reaching its climax. And after it was over they'd probably start returning to this hold. Jack wanted to have his bombs set and be on his way before then. But just in case they came in while he was still here… he reached back and opened the valves on his tanks. There was a brief, faint hiss as the carbon dioxide propelled the napalm
into the line, then all was silent. He attached three bombs to his belt and waited.

  When the platform stopped, Jack stepped off and looked around. The floor here was a mess. Like a garbage dump. There would be no problem finding hiding places for the rest of his bombs among the debris. He wanted to create enough of an inferno in here to spread to the aft hold, trapping all the rakoshi there between the forward and stern explosions.

  He stifled a cough. The odor here was worse than anything he had encountered before, even in the other hold. He tried mouth-breathing but the stench lay on his tongue. What made it so bad here? He looked down before taking his first step and saw that the floor was cluttered with the broken remains of countless rakoshi eggs. And among the shell fragments were bones and hair and shreds of clothing. His foot was against what he thought was an unhatched egg; he rolled it over with the tip of his sneaker and found himself staring into the empty eye sockets of a human skull.

  Repulsed, he stared around him. He was not alone here.

  There were immature rakoshi of varying sizes all about, most of them reclining on the floor, asleep. One near him was awake and active—leisurely teething on a human rib. He hadn't noticed them on the way down because they were so small.

  … Kusum's grandchildren…

  They seemed to be as unaware of him now as their parents in the other hold had been last night.

  Stepping carefully, he made his way toward the opposite corner. There he set and armed a bomb and shoved it beneath a pile of bones and shell fragments. Moving as swiftly and as carefully as possible, he picked his way toward the middle of the stern wall of the hold. He was halfway there when he heard a squeal and felt a sudden, knifing, tearing pain in his left calf. He spun and looked down, reflexively reaching toward the pain. Something was biting him—it had attached itself to his leg like a leech. He pulled at it but succeeded only in making the pain worse. Gritting his teeth, he tore it loose amid a blaze of incredible pain: a walnut-size piece of his leg had come away with it.

  He was holding a squirming, writhing fifteen-inch rakosh around the waist. He must have kicked it or accidentally stepped on it as he was passing and it had lashed out with its teeth. His pants leg was torn and soaked with blood from where the thing had taken a bite out of him. He held it at arm's length while it kicked and clawed with its tiny talons, its little yellow eyes blazing fury at him. It held a piece of bloody flesh—Jack's flesh—in its mouth. Before his eyes, the miniature horror stuffed the piece of his leg down its throat, then shrieked and snapped at his fingers.

  Gagging with revulsion, he hurled the squealing creature across the room. It landed in the debris on the floor among the other sleeping members of its kind.

  But they weren't sleeping now. The baby rakosh's screeching had awakened others in the vicinity. Like a wave spreading from a stone dropped in a still pool, the creatures began to rustle about him, the stirrings of one disturbing those around it, and so on.

  Within minutes Jack found himself facing a sea of immature rakoshi. They couldn't see him, but the little one's alarm had alerted them to the presence of an intruder among them… an edible intruder. The rakoshi began milling about, searching. They moved toward where they had heard the sound—toward Jack. There must have been a hundred of them converging in his direction. Sooner or later they would stumble upon him. The second bomb was in his hand. He quickly armed it and slid it across the floor toward the wall of the hold, hoping the noise would distract them and give him time to get the flamethrower's discharge tube into position.

  It didn't work. One of the smaller rakoshi blundered against his leg and squealed its discovery before biting into him. The rest took up the cry and surged toward him like a foul wave. They leaped at him, their razor-sharp teeth sinking into his thighs, his back, his flanks and arms, ripping, tearing at his flesh. He stumbled backwards, losing his balance, and as he began to go down beneath the furious onslaught he saw a full-grown rakosh, probably alerted by the cries of the young, enter the hold through the starboard passage and race toward him.

  He was falling!

  Once he was down on the floor he knew he'd be ripped to pieces in seconds. Fighting panic, he twisted around and pulled the discharge tube from under his arm. As he landed on his knees he pointed it away from him, found the rear grip, and pulled the trigger.

  The world seemed to explode as a sheet of yellow flame fanned out from him. He twisted left, then right, spraying flaming napalm in a circle. Suddenly he was alone in that circle. He released the trigger.

  He had forgotten to check the nozzle adjustment. Instead of a stream of flame, he had released a wide spray. No matter—it had been disturbingly effective. The rakoshi attacking him had either fled screaming or been immolated; those out of range howled and scattered in all directions. The adult had caught the spray over the entire front of its body. A living mass of flame, it lunged away and fled back into the connecting passage, the little ones running before it.

  Groaning with the pain from countless lacerations, ignoring the blood that seeped from them, Jack struggled to his feet. He had no choice but to follow. The alarm had been raised. Ready or not, it was time to face Kusum.

  31

  Kusum quelled his frustration. The Ceremony of Offering was not going well. It was taking twice as long as usual. He needed the Mother here to lead her younglings.

  Where was she?

  The Westphalen child was quiet, her upper arm trapped in the grip of his right hand, her big frightened questioning eyes staring up at him. He could not meet the gaze of those eyes for long—they looked to him for succor and he had nothing to offer but death. She didn't know what was going on between him and the rakoshi, did not comprehend the meaning of the ceremony in which the one about to die was offered up in the name of Kali on behalf of the beloved Ajit and Rupobati, dead since the last century.

  Tonight was an especially important ceremony, for it was to be the last of its kind—forever. There would be no more Westphalens after tonight. Ajit and Rupobati would finally be avenged.

  As the ceremony finally approached its climax, Kusum sensed a disturbance in the forward hold—the nursery, as it were—off to his right. He was glad to see one of the female rakoshi turn and go down the passage. He hadn't wanted to interrupt the nearly stagnant flow of the ceremony at this point to send one of them to investigate.

  He tightened his grip on the child's arm as he raised his voice for the final invocation. It was almost over… almost over at last…

  Suddenly the eyes of the rakoshi were no longer on him. They began to hiss and roar as their attention was drawn to his right. Kusum glanced over and watched in shock as a screaming horde of immature rakoshi poured into the hold from the nursery, followed by a fully grown rakosh, its body completely aflame. It tumbled in and collapsed on the floor near the elevator platform.

  And behind it, striding down the dark passage like the avatar of a vengeful god, came Jack.

  Kusum felt his world constrict around him, closing in on his throat, choking off his air.

  Jack… here… alive! Impossible!

  That could only mean that the Mother was dead! But how? How could a single puny human defeat the Mother? And how had Jack found him here? What sort of a man was this?

  Or was he a man at all? He was more like an irresistible preternatural force. It was as if the gods had sent him to test Kusum.

  The child began struggling in his grasp, screaming, "Jack! Jack!"

  32

  Jack froze in disbelief at the sound of that familiar little voice crying his name. And then he saw her.

  "Vicky!"

  She was alive! Still alive! Jack felt tears pushing at his eyes. For a second he could see only Vicky, then he saw that Kusum held her by the arm. As Jack moved forward, Kusum pulled the squirming child in front of him as a shield.

  "Stay calm, Vicks!" he called to her. "I'll get you home soon."

  And he would. He swore to the god he had long ago ceased to believe in that he wo
uld see Vicky to safety. If she had stayed alive this long, he would take her the rest of the way. If he couldn't fix this, then all his years as Repairman Jack had been for nothing. There was no client here—this was for himself.

  Jack glanced into the hold. The crowded rakoshi were oblivious to him; their only concern was the burning rakosh on the floor and their master on the platform. Jack returned his attention to Vicky. As he stepped out of the passage he failed to notice a rakosh pressed against the wall to his right until he brushed by him. The creature hissed and flailed out wildly with its talons. Jack ducked and fired the flamethrower in a wide arc, catching the outflung arm of the attacking rakosh and moving the stream out into the crowd.

  Chaos was the result. The rakoshi panicked, clawing at each other to escape the fire and avoid those who were burning from it.

  Jack heard Kusum's voice shouting, "Stop it! Stop it or I'll wring her neck!"

  He looked up and saw Kusum with his hand around Vicky's throat. Vicky's face reddened and her eyes widened as he lifted her half a foot off the ground to demonstrate.

  Jack released the trigger of the flamethrower. He now had a wide area of floor clear to him. Only one rakosh—one with a scarred and distorted lower lip—stayed near the platform. Black smoke rose from the prone forms of a dozen or so burning rakoshi. The air was getting thick.

  "Treat her well," Jack said in a tight voice as he backed against the wall. "She's all that's keeping you alive right now."

  "What is she to you?"

  "I want her safe."

  "She is not of your flesh. She is just another member of a society that would exterminate you if it knew you existed, that rejects what you value most. And even this little one here will want you locked away once she is grown. We should not be at war, you and I. We are brothers, voluntary outcasts from the worlds in which we live. We are—"