In the big monster’s claws, the toughest steel snapped like thread. There was nothing any of us could do. We stood there, glued to the spot with disbelief, overawed by the tremendous evidence of power and force displayed by this ancient animal.
With her huge feet, she began crushing in the sides of the enclosure. Gorgo himself stayed inside the tank, waiting for the break-through. As he saw the big mother monster’s talons reaching in through an opening in the steel wall, Gorgo climbed out of the water and started up the pile of twisted and smouldering metal and rubble that lay scattered about.
I turned just in time to see that Moira, Sean and his mother had joined me to one side. They, too, were watching the rescue of Gorgo with wide-eyed fascination. I must admit I saw something of satisfaction on their faces, as if they all three wanted this to happen, as if they all three always knew that this manifestation of man’s greed and inhumanity would come to this end.
It was all over. The huge monster stooped down, lifted Gorgo’s tremendous weight as if it were a feather, and deposited Gorgo in the middle of Battersea Park—or what was left of it after her previous advance through it.
Then the two of them began to move slowly through the woods toward the river. In the background behind them I watched the flames from the city gas tanks mounting higher into the air. Darkness lay beyond. London had no electric power left. Everything was silence and stillness in the biggest city on earth.
Someone moved beside me. I turned. It was Professor Hendricks, joined by Professor Flaherty. They were watching the departure of the two monsters, the same as I. They said nothing. At this point, what could they say?
Moira came to me. She took my hand in hers and pressed herself close to me. Her body was trembling. I gripped her and hard and reassuringly.
“They’ll be going back now,” she whispered. “Back to the island. Back to the sea.”
Sean and his mother approached. The boy gazed up at me with his wide clear eyes. “Where he belongs, where they both belonged, and should never have been taken from.”
I touched the boy’s hair and ruffled it. “Maybe you’re right, Sean.”
The two unearthly, prehistoric figures had advanced almost all the distance across the Park and were ready to enter the Thames. Dust and fog swirled about them. The flames of the burning gas tanks bathed them both in a dull crimson glow. The big mother monster turned her huge head and gazed back at us there in the murk, her fiery red eyes gleaming.
Lifting her head to the heavens she loosed a final rumbling roar, like distant thunder, a warning to us all, to mankind in general, and turned and vanished in the fog and mist.
I felt Moira’s eyes on me. I looked down at her.
“ ’Tis a warning,” she whispered. “ ’Tis a warning to mankind. This visitation must be heeded, or there will be worse to come. Nuair atá tú go sóúil fulaing thú féin.”
I squeezed her hand, remembering the quotation: “Let well enough alone.”
H Bombs. A Bombs. Infinity. Space exploration. Unlocking the secret of life.
I wondered if mankind would heed the warning.
I doubted it.
Man has a way of facing up to even the toughest challenges of the universe—and of life itself.
That’s why we’re here.
But I leaned down and kissed Moira anyway. I knew she meant it in the right spirit.
The End
Table of Contents
Back Cover
Movie
Titlepage
Copyright
GORGO
Part One: CATACLYSM
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Part Two: GORGO
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Part Three: ARMAGEDDON
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Gorgo Page 15