by Joe DeVito
The vegetation thinned rapidly after the clearing. The trail, which had sloped steadily down from the last ridge, now rose again. Driscoll fell farther back as cover became sparse. At this elevation, the earth became rocky, the soil a thin scatter over dark volcanic stone. The jungle tangle of vines and undergrowth disappeared. The trees here grew more slender, more widespread, towering up with no clustering brush at their roots. As the clouds gathered and the daylight darkened, Driscoll had begun to catch glimpses of a great dome of bare rock, the formation that he thought of as Skull Mountain. Kong picked up speed, clearly heading toward his lair.
Driscoll was at least a mile behind as Kong climbed a rising spur of volcanic rock. On both sides, the stone fell away in steep slopes. Driscoll stared down the left slope. At its base, a more or less level plain stretched, overgrown with grass and almost bounded in by another rocky ridge. Bones littered the floor of this natural enclosure. They had been scattered by scavengers, and green moss filmed many of them. Still, Driscoll thought, they were evidence of titanic battles. He couldn’t help wondering if Kong had been one of the combatants.
Following the distant Kong, Driscoll became more and more convinced that the beast-god had a den somewhere on Skull Mountain itself. It made sense: the island’s highest peak would offer a retreat available only to a mighty climber. The bare stretches of stone would give Kong an unobstructed view, and the lack of vegetation meant that no herbivores would venture here. In turn, that meant no large meat eaters would have cause to go hunting there. Then, too, Driscoll had seen how Kong fended off challengers by hurling missiles at them, and here were plenty of rocks and boulders to heave at any enemies that might follow him.
As the day wore on, the rising landscape became a jumble of boulders. The sky behind him had become an ugly purplish black, streaked with occasional darts of lightning, but the storm held off. Driscoll doggedly continued, though he was close to exhaustion.
Bruised, battered, and aching, his body throbbed from falls and blows of branches. His belly clenched with hunger. His mouth felt parched with thirst. He stumbled along on legs numb from fatigue. Still he forced himself to follow the distant form of Kong.
Dazed with weariness, Driscoll tardily became aware of something new as he completed a long, slow swing to the left. A great spout of water burst from a dark opening in the side of the mountain, exploding in a white, misty torrent. Over ages it had cut a deep pit into the stone, a boiling lake. It spilled from this into a narrow channel that soon lost itself in the jungle beyond.
The main waterfall rumbled with unimaginable power, but the falling water also fathered a hundred small rivulets that ran in zigzag patterns over the stone or shot out to fall in cascades down to the lake. Driscoll reached one ankle-deep stream, knelt, and scooped up handfuls of wonderfully cool water, slaking the raging thirst that gripped him. He guessed that the waterfall he saw ahead was the source of the stream that, far behind now, widened into the lagoon of the elephantine dinosaur and still farther poured softly over that slide leading down onto the Plain of the Altar. It just might offer a quicker path back, if he could descend to the lake, if the river’s banks were not too heavily wooded, if no monsters—
A shadow moved in the corner of Driscoll’s eye, and he became aware that Kong was in sight again, on a ledge barely a hundred yards above his head. The giant stared out across the jungle, and Driscoll had a split second to compel his aching muscles to action. He leaped behind a round boulder more than waist high and dropped to all fours as Kong’s baleful gaze dropped and swept the ridge on which he stood. Driscoll heard the creature rumble, then move.
He cautiously emerged. The slope up to the ledge was daunting, but he thought he could make it. Hugging the rough volcanic stone, he hauled himself up with arms and legs, at last emerging at the very spot where Kong had stood.
Driscoll realized that his journey had ended. Half a mile ahead, up a much gentler incline, Kong stood on a kind of plateau. Driscoll saw that the mountain’s slopes here formed a natural amphitheater. For the moment, Kong had his back to Driscoll. He seemed to be staring downward. Driscoll cautiously edged forward and to the left, and then reached the edge of the plateau. Now he saw that a nearly circular black pool of water occupied most of the plateau. It looked as if a vast underground stream had worn away the stone overlying it. The pool seemed unusually deep, its waters dark, seemingly without source. Ripples and swirls on the black surface hinted at rushing movement far below.
Driscoll now realized that the waterfall that burst from the side of the mountain farther down must have its source here. Ahead, the colossal bulk of Skull Mountain itself blotted out the cloudy sky. A curving cliff half enclosed the pool, and atop the rising cliff a ledge ran up to the opening of a broad, arched cavern.
Kong stood on a narrow, sandy margin of the pool. He had evidently been heading toward the ledge leading up from the pool to the cave when something had stopped him. His shoulder fur bristled as he glared down at the dark water, frozen, alert to some danger that Driscoll could not see.
Driscoll found another spur of rock to hide behind. From this he watched as Kong gingerly set Ann Darrow down. She moved—she was alive! Driscoll saw her huddle against a boulder. Kong didn’t give her so much as a glance. Maybe, Driscoll thought, I could—
And then something moved. A serpentlike neck suddenly reared from the dark water of the pool. Driscoll realized that what he had thought of as a black, smooth stone was in fact the body of some water creature—and the monster’s head struck at Kong, only a few feet away from the crouching form of Ann Darrow.
Kong lowered his shoulders, as if making ready to meet an onslaught. He struck at the dinosaurian head, but the monster drew back. Kong moved forward, putting his bulk between this threat and Ann, and sounded his challenge.
Again Driscoll heard that thunder of rage, but this time without terror. The battle cry almost shook the stones, and at the same time Kong drummed his fists on his chest. Driscoll searched for an opening, but there was no way he could get past the struggling giants to rescue Ann. Instead he had to watch in frustration, hoping that she would not be harmed.
The snakelike neck and head had struck again, and this time Kong charged to meet them. Kong’s hands seized on the beast’s neck and he heaved, but the reptilian horror must have wrapped its tail on some rock at the bottom of the pool. It resisted, pulled back, nearly toppled Kong into the water. Kong fought with flashing teeth and mighty blows of his fists. His feet gripped the uneven rocks at the margin of the pool, withstanding his enemy’s attempts to pull him into its own element.
The monster coiled its neck around one of Kong’s pillarlike legs and sank its teeth into the flesh of his thigh. Kong snarled in fury and reached to try to grasp the monster’s head. The creature had given up trying to haul Kong down. It threw its entire sinuous length out of the pool and wrapped itself around Kong, like a gargantuan constricting snake. Driscoll, hunkered behind his rock, could see no advantage to either side for long moments. The thing from the pool looped its coils around Kong’s chest, tried to ensnare his neck. For his part, Kong fought to bring his teeth to bear on those coils, tore at the monster’s flesh with his hands, and struggled in a terrible silence. He gave no more challenging roars, but Driscoll could hear the rush of Kong’s breath as the monster tried to squeeze the life from him.
Then, suddenly, Kong changed his stance, widening his stride, bending his knees and dropping lower. The move took the creature from the pool by surprise, and it reared its head. Immediately Kong seized that elusive target with both hands. His shoulders knotted with effort, and Driscoll winced as the beast-king crushed the skull. The creature writhed in agony, lost its hold, and its coils thrashed, loosening their clutch on Kong. Kong held the beast’s neck in one hand and used the other to peel away the constricting length of the monster. The beast fell into a pulsating mound at Kong’s feet, and as if in contempt, Kong threw the smashed head to the top of the pile.
Then D
riscoll saw Kong sway, moving as if he were about to collapse. He stood with chest heaving, and then moved his feet from the loose clutch of the reptile’s coils. Kong prodded the dead body and seemed to shudder. Driscoll nodded. He, too, felt the same horror of the reptilian monsters of this accursed island. Kong looked around, reached behind him, and Driscoll saw that he had once again lifted Ann Darrow. With a surprising tenderness, Kong cradled her form once more in his arm. With a final snarl at the dead reptile, Kong mounted the ledge and followed it up toward the cavern opening above him. He moved heavily, with lowered head.
Sure, Driscoll thought, he’s worn out. He’s fought monsters, he’s broken a long trail through the jungle with no water and no food, and he’s hardly snatched a wink of sleep. He’s not on guard now.
Driscoll broke from cover and hurried after the retreating Kong. He had to hold his breath near the dead creature—the stench was incredible. Above him Kong toiled up the ledge, his attention wholly occupied by the path before him. Driscoll drew his knife, no longer fearing detection. Still, he did not dare attack. Kong might have exhausted himself in fighting that reptilian horror, but those big hands retained more than enough strength to rip him to shreds. Kong reached the cavern and did not even pause before vanishing inside.
A few moments later, Driscoll stood just outside the opening, gazing inside. The vaulted cavern seemed to meander in three or four different directions, and Kong was nowhere to be seen. One path led upward, but it seemed to have been blocked at some time in the past. Now a spill of huge stones lay before it, and it stretched up into darkness and obscurity. Kong might have taken that route, or he might be lurking in the shadows within the cave. Driscoll could not tell.
He sank down and sat with his back braced against the cave wall, wondering if Denham had made it back to the Wall, if he was somewhere on the trail with weapons and reinforcements. Then he heard a drumming sound from overhead. He edged out and gazed up the steep face of Skull Mountain. Another round cavern gaped far up there, one of the eye sockets of the skull’s face, and at its base a shelf of rock projected a short way out. Kong stood on this, sending his defiant cry out over the island. He had reached his lair, and now he claimed mastery.
Something bright moved at Kong’s feet—Ann, set down and trying to creep back into the cave, away from the edge, away from Kong. Driscoll made up his mind. He went into the lower cavern and picked his way up the rubble-strewn ramp that led upward into the gloom, upward toward Kong—and toward Ann.
In the darkness, Driscoll must have taken a wrong turn. Following a gray gleam of dim light, he emerged, but not into the eye cavern. Instead, he found himself standing in a narrow crevice a few feet below the eye socket. The sky was darkening as the threatening clouds built up, and above him, Driscoll could hear the shuffling of Kong. Thunder, closer than it had been, vibrated the very stone of the mountain under Driscoll’s grasping hands.
He got a grip and pulled himself up, cautiously. When his head cleared the edge of the rocky shelf, he saw that Ann had retreated to just inside the cavern entrance. Kong stood before her, tilting his head, looking down at her quizzically. Ann struggled to rise to her feet.
And then something screamed, something higher up, in the sky. Driscoll whipped his head around. The largest of a flock of pterodactyls that had been wheeling against the ragged sky came spiraling down in a long swoop. Kong must have seen it at the same instant, because he bellowed out a savage challenge. The diving pterodactyl came within Kong’s reach, and he struck at it, but it wheeled away, just out of Kong’s grasp, to be borne up again by a rising gust of air.
Driscoll heard Ann shriek, just as she had when the carnosaur threatened. He pulled himself up onto the ledge, no more than twenty feet from Kong. If Kong noticed him now—
But Kong’s attention was all on Ann. The beast-god stooped over Ann, and a huge hand reached forward almost fondly. One of the great fingers brushed Ann’s golden hair, with an oddly affectionate tenderness, as if the monster were trying to comfort her. Ann sobbed brokenly.
Driscoll’s weary muscles failed him, and he sagged back into the crevice just below the eye socket, but he caught himself at a point where he could still see. Ann tried to shove the monstrous finger away and screamed again. Kong closed his great hand around her form and lifted her into the air. Driscoll saw the gleam of Ann’s bare shoulder as Kong held her as though she were a curious little doll.
Driscoll gripped the stone as he watched Kong caress Ann with clumsy fingers. He seized her dress, pulled at it, tore half of it away, and rubbed the fabric between two fingers before letting it fall. If Kong’s expression had been threatening, Driscoll would have risked everything, would have attacked Kong with nothing more than his knife. The huge creature showed no sign of aggression, though, but instead seemed merely puzzled and interested. Ann struggled, crying out weakly.
Abruptly, Kong stiffened, swinging around with a jerk that made Driscoll flatten himself against the stone. Then he realized that Kong had not sighted him at all, but another enemy. The pterodactyl, perhaps attracted by Ann’s bright hair, had swooped in again. Kong swept an arm at it, and without looking, he set Ann down behind him.
The flying creature screamed and soared away, then seemed to tilt up, stand still for an instant as it balanced in air on the tip of one outstretched wing, and then began a long plunge downward, plainly trying to attack Ann. Kong moved to block this new adversary. The flying creature apparently was intent on spearing Ann with its long, sharp bill, swooping in for a lightning-quick strike before Kong could stop it.
Driscoll clenched his teeth. The flying monster didn’t have a chance—but it offered his first real hope of rescuing Ann. He saw her struggle to her feet behind Kong.
“Ann!” Driscoll risked a loud whisper. She heard him and sprinted toward him. Above her head, Kong seized the body of the pterodactyl. The great wings beat the air with leathery flaps, and the flying monster screeched again.
Ann reached the edge of the platform just as Driscoll dragged himself onto her level. Visibly struggling not to cry out, she gasped, “Jack!”
“I’m here, Ann.” They embraced, but briefly. Kong had killed the pterodactyl. Now he hunched over it, using his teeth to rip gobbets of flesh from the body, wolfing them down.
Ann whimpered. “Don’t let him touch me again, Jack.” She wore only tatters of her dress and scraps of her underthings now, and she clutched these rags close to her.
Kong must have heard her. He swung his heavy head toward them, his mouth bloody from his meal. He threw the remains of the pterodactyl over the edge of the rocky shelf and roared. A horrible low, rolling growl rumbled from his chest. The look in Kong’s eyes was unlike anything Driscoll had ever seen, had ever imagined. The monster advanced, trapping them at the edge of the cliff.
Cold fear gripped Driscoll. Kong would let nothing stand between him and what he desired. If not for Ann, Driscoll might have stood utterly frozen, but he had to save her. Looking wildly around, he realized that they stood directly above the dark pool—far above it. “Jump!” he yelled, but he gave Ann no choice, pulling her with him. With his arm locked around her waist, they plunged over the edge of the shelf and down, down, toward the black and waiting water.
18
SKULL ISLAND
MARCH 14, 1933
Ann had time to gasp in one deep breath before she and Jack plunged feetfirst into the black pool. The impact jarred her, but the warmth of the water startled her. She had braced herself for a stinging chill, but the pool felt nearly blood-warm, soothing against her scratched, bare skin. She felt Jack close by, tried to swim in his direction. Everything was black, and she had no sense of direction, no idea of which way led up to air, to life.
A hand closed gently on her wrist and pulled. She was rising—at least she was moving—and then an arm wrapped around her waist, and she knew that Jack had her. Her lungs were close to bursting with the urgent need to breathe, but she trusted Jack, gave herself into his k
eeping. He was scissoring his legs, and she tried to kick, too, helping him as much as she could.
Then, miraculously, her head broke the surface, and she threw it back and breathed, breathed deeply, hearing Jack gasp from somewhere close beside her, panting quickly, deeply. “All right?” Jack’s voice shouted. “Ann, are you all right?”
The lightning-streaked clouds had become so thick that even in afternoon, the land lay in a kind of twilight. Ann could see Jack’s strained, concerned expression as he trod water. His hair lay plastered to his skull, and streams of water crept across his forehead and down his cheeks.
“Yes,” Ann said when she had breath. “I can swim. Jack, I can’t believe you’ve come!”
“I wouldn’t let you get away from me. Do you see Kong?”
“Not yet. He wouldn’t jump in, but he’ll come down through the tunnel. What will we do?”
Jack jerked his head. “This way.” He swam toward what looked to Ann like a whirlpool, an eddy of water on the far side of the pool. She followed, and from behind them Ann heard the outraged screams of Kong.
“This is a long shot, but a better chance than we’d have at his hands,” Jack said. “Three deep breaths, then dive. I’ll hold your hand the whole way.”
Now Ann heard the drumming of Kong’s chest, and she knew he was on the ledge, charging toward the pool. “I’m ready.”
“I’ll be right beside you. Breathe three times, then dive!”
They both jackknifed and slipped beneath the surface. Ann kicked as hard as she could, sensing Jack driving himself down beside her with the strength of his legs. They were too far from their objective, and they had to rise for air. The instant they did, Ann heard Kong’s growl as he threw himself forward to stop them. This time she shouted, “Dive!” They both bent at the waist and slid into the depths again. Ann heard a muffled roar and felt the whump of Kong’s hand as it thrust into the water, grabbing for them.