Kong: King of Skull Island

by Strickland, Brad

  The Storyteller turned and led them as they climbed higher, toward the other eye, the one Driscoll and Ann had never entered. Light began to flood from everywhere as they neared the huge expanse of its orbit. As they rounded a corner of stone Vincent and Kara both gasped. A kong loomed before them!

  No. Not a real creature, he saw, but a life-sized statue of a kong, somewhat stylized. It stood, arrayed in some sort of strange garb amongst other cast or sculpted artifacts of a gargantuan scale. An icon of veneration, or a portrait of fact? “Your people made this?” he asked the Storyteller.

  “But we did not bring it here,” she said. “He did. The last kong. The most lonely one.”

  “There are more,” Kara said, pointing to a lower level. Arranged there were smaller statues of kongs, some so lifelike that Vincent could almost convince himself they moved and breathed in the half light, others cruder but made with evident mastery.

  “Do you know what this place is?” asked the Storyteller.

  Kara bowed her head. “The last home of the kongs,” she replied softly. “Legends speak of it. After the fall of the Old City, the last living kongs came here for refuge. Our people forgot their ties to them and sometimes hunted them.”

  “They survived in the open for a time,” the Storyteller acknowledged. “But fierce as they were, they were not what King Kong was. He was a giant among giants. Without their keepers to maintain their armor and weapons, the kongs were more than evenly matched by some of the great saurians of the island. The final blow was the arrival of an ancestor of Gaw, before the fall of the Old City. This was a foe none of the kongs could match. Intelligent, vicious, and with a keen sense of survival, it organized the highly intelligent but relatively solitary deathrunners and attacked the kongs without mercy. Their numbers were always few, and over the course of years, they dwindled even further. They came here, to watch and to wait because it was more easily defended and they had used it in the past. And when at last only one small band of kongs survived they left for the shelter of the high mountain in the distance. Their saurian enemies could not reach them there. They passed out of our knowledge and into legend. But for long, long years that small group of them survived there, until they had at last all died, all except one.”

  Vincent realized that Jack Driscoll had told him about this place. On the other side was where King Kong had brought Ann Darrow, and where Driscoll, then a young man, had followed. Driscoll had called it a place of death, but Vincent, seeing it now, thought of it more as a place of a great yearning loneliness.

  The three of them stood as the setting sunlight shone through the vast opening. Vincent looked down at the cavern floor. The heavy, dark mud, long hardened, held enormous footprints deeply impressed in its surface. Looking up, Vincent noticed for the first time a natural ledge in the cavern wall, above even the giant statue of Kong. At first he could make out merely pale shapes cast in heavy shadow, but then, like figures emerging from a fog, they took form and substance. Vincent felt a physical shock at the number of them.

  Human skeletons. They had been carefully placed against a mud wall, pressed into it so they retained their human semblance and their attitudes. They looked like a shelf of dolls.

  “The sacrifices,” Kara said. “All the sacrifices that Bar-Atu made to Kong. He killed them.”

  “No,” the Storyteller said simply, “not intentionally. But they died of fear. And he kept them.”

  Vincent’s head was spinning. Why had the great Kong arranged these remains in this way? An extended row of figures atop a ledge, possibly an artificial ledge at that. And then, with a gesture and two words, the Storyteller made it clear: “The Wall.”

  The puzzle came together instantly. But a more baffling question remained. Why? Vincent imagined the rows of humans standing atop the Wall, worshiping Kong, urging him to take his sacrifice. Everyone assumed the bloodthirsty beast ripped them to shreds and devoured them. It seems they were only half-right: the beast was hungry, but not for human blood. Could it be that what he really needed was some sort of interaction? Kong was, after all, a type of ape, a mammal, the only one living on an island populated by reptilians. What else was there, who else was there, that he could look to? Was that the only time the gigantic beast felt he belonged? The implications rocketed through his mind.

  Although the giant saurians could not have scaled the Wall, the same was not true for Kong. Going on Jack’s descriptions, Vincent surmised that Kong could have climbed it at any time. Did he not do that because he remembered what had happened to Gaw when he approached too closely? Or for other reasons?

  “You were the only creatures on the island that even resembled Kong,” Vincent said softly. “He felt kinship. He allowed you to live because without you he would be completely alone. These aren’t trophies, but his family. They’re a way to stave off the loneliness that only an intelligent creature could feel.”

  The Storyteller nodded gravely. “We were all he had, the only ones who moved, were somewhat shaped like him, made sounds that were not saurian.”

  Against all his training and against reason, Vincent felt a painful lump rising in his throat. Kong had not been a great ape, exactly, but a member of an unknown species. Perhaps he had been more than that. Had he stood on the threshold? Something had attracted him to Ann Darrow. “Beauty and the Beast,” his father had said. Was he evolved enough to have felt the impossible gulf that separated him from the tiny, glowing creature he gave his life for? Vincent realized that he would never know for certain.

  For three days they stayed there, exploring the caverns, finding piles of scattered artifacts. Bones of a dozen species of dinosaur.

  A paleontological treasure he could open for the world, but it would remain locked away by his promise. As a scientist he scoffed at such a promise in the interest of knowledge. The temptation pulled at him. As a man of his word, he turned his back on all of it and followed the Storyteller and Kara.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  SKULL ISLAND

  August 16, 1957

  They passed the night in the cavern, and in the morning they got an early start. To Vincent’s surprise, the Storyteller led them into yet another maze of underground passageways, this one in better repair than the ones that had brought them from the Wall. He asked her several times where they were going, and she did not respond at first. Finally, she turned on him, glaring. “Young man, do you want me to stop this trip right now?” she demanded.

  Her tone catapulted Vincent back to a time when he was six and his father was at the wheel of the family Packard. He almost gulped, “Nossir,” but stopped himself and merely shook his head. He marveled at her vitality. Perhaps, due to hardships, she was younger than she looked.

  They passed dark chambers, stonewalled and stone-floored, but the Storyteller refused to pause. “Time to explore them later.”

  After hours underground, the old woman told Kara and Vincent to rest. She left two torches with them and took a third with her, vanishing down a broad, dark corridor that seemed to tilt ever so slightly upward. Vincent sat with his back against the cool stone wall, Kara near him. “She can be grumpy, can’t she?” he asked.

  Kara sniffed. “You should try being her apprentice.”

  Something screeched far off. Without realizing he had moved, Vincent found that he had an arm around Kara’s warm shoulder. “That was probably just a bird or something,” he said.

  She pressed softly against him. “Probably.”

  Vincent’s mouth was dry. “It’s probably nothing to worry about.”

  Her breath came warm against his cheek. “Probably.”

  It was hard to swallow. “I think—”

  But whatever he thought, he couldn’t talk about it. Not with Kara’s lips so close.

  It might have been only a few minutes later that the screech, now much closer, repeated itself. Both Kara and Vincent sprang to their feet. A pale light appeared in the distance, and then a raucous voice echoed in the corridor: “For the luvva Mike
!”

  “Oji!” both Kara and Vincent exclaimed at once. And sure enough, the Storyteller came into view, the archaeopteryx perched on her shoulder, bobbing its head at every step.

  The Storyteller was grumbling as she approached: “The torch keeps all the big creatures away, but I think this one likes the scent. Come, come! I told you two to rest. Your faces are so hot you must have been running! Follow me now.”

  Vincent’s face did feel hot. They fell into step behind the Storyteller, and before long, Vincent could tell the passage was indeed climbing upward. A patch of sunlight showed ahead at last, and the three of them scrambled up a slope and into the open at last.

  Vincent’s first impression was that they had emerged atop a vast rounded green hill studded with ancient, mossy tree trunks and rock pinnacles. Then he blinked in the sunlight, seeing that what looked like a natural opening in one of these pinnacles was of the right size and shape to be a doorway. Beyond the rocky outcrop was a tall, leaning stake, topped with a metal basket in which pale fire roiled a greenish, thin vapor.

  “The Old City!” Kara exclaimed. “I’ve asked you to bring me here time after time!”

  “But you never asked me when the time was right,” returned the Storyteller tartly. “Now it is.”

  Vincent was turning. Now he saw a half-dozen tall, slender statues, all of them holding metal baskets filled with the same strange fire that burned in the Storyteller’s torch. He understood. “The statues are guardians. They keep the dinosaurs away.”

  “Very good,” the Storyteller agreed with a wrinkled smile. “Yes. The burning spices and compounds control the great beasts, take from them their savagery. Yes.” Oji fluttered and launched himself from her shoulder, spiraling upward to perch, finally, on the top of what had to be a thirty-foot tower, pierced here and there with rounded windows.

  Vincent could not take in the full extent of the city. Its outlines were deceptive, even in the strong light of afternoon. The buildings hardly seemed the work of hands—everything had an organic, living feel to it, as if the island itself had grown the city from its soil. But in the center, even though overgrown to a great extent after so many years, the truth of the Storyteller’s tale was born out: there was major devastation. As they slowly traced its outline by carefully walking its camouflaged edge, the remnants of a gigantic crater were clearly evident. “This is where the collapse took place. The great dinosaur fell into the opening, and its fall took away our hopes of learning how to use the seeds of the island.”

  Kara said, “How can this be? In your story Ishara was driven out by Bar-Atu, and it seemed that all hope was gone. Yet there burn the herbs all around us! I had thought the old ways lost forever.”

  “They had been lost for many ages,” the Storyteller said softly. “It has been the calling of the Storytellers since the beginning to keep the flame of hope burning in the hearts of our people. It was the message of Ishara’s Storyteller to her: never lose hope. All will be made right in the end.”

  The Storyteller turned toward Kara and looked directly into her eyes before saying, “And this is the teaching I pass on to you. The lessons we learn firsthand are the lessons we learn best, and that is why you needed to face your own self-doubts and prejudices in order to gain the strength to overcome them. This is where your inner character is forged, it is where you gain the authority to lead your people.”

  Vincent said, “I don’t understand. Bar-Atu won, Kublai was killed. All hope was lost—or was it? What happened to Bar-Atu’s cult and to Ishara? Did she survive—did her dream survive?”

  The Storyteller sat on a stone and stared over the old City with brooding eyes. “Ishara’s soul fell into a blackness that seemed to have no bottom. But Ishara, though terribly wounded, persevered. Even she could never have predicted what would happen in the years to come. Only her hopes kept her alive. And her dream. Do you understand now, Kara?”

  Kara bowed her head. “I understand that I was wrong to be angry because you told an outsider stories of Ishara that I had never heard. And I begin to see that things may not always be what they seem, so I must be strong to see them through to the end, no matter how hard it is.”

  “Yes, you speak well. Because the blood of both the Atu and the Tagu flows in your veins, you walk a path no Storyteller has ever taken. You will speak with authority on the problems of each. And it is those problems which you must acknowledge and overcome yourself, before you can teach with true understanding and once and for all heal the age-old rift that has afflicted our people.”

  “I do not fully understand why I have been put to the same test as Vincent has been,” said Kara.

  “Your gifts are extraordinary, Kara. But they are not enough. The key is choosing to use them properly, and that requires wisdom. How can I be sure that I pass on my authority safely? By putting you to such a test as to burn away anything that could fog your vision. But that is enough for now. After all this time my story is almost finished. Do you want to find out the ending?”

  Both Kara and Vincent nodded yes.

  “As I left off, and as you can see, the most vital part of the Old City was destroyed, and the seeds, their formulas, and so much other ancient knowledge was destroyed along with it. It was also true that Bar-Atu gained power in our village. He murdered Kublai and shortly thereafter the old Storyteller died as well, under very mysterious circum-stances. But before she passed, she conferred her authority on Ishara with one last word: ‘Believe.’

  “Not long after that, Charlie left the island, sailing in one of the small boats that Magwich’s ship had brought. He had small hope of surviving, but he carried with him a supply of food and drink and a rough chart he had made. Somehow, he did survive—for many years later, others followed that chart to the island.

  “As for Ishara, she held onto the Storyteller’s final word. For a long time that was all Ishara had to go on. But something unusual began to happen to her. Others were naturally attracted to what made them feel good and they joined her in secret. Ishara taught them the old ways that were passed down to her.

  “Something unexpected lived on after the destruction of the Old City in spite of the fact that she knew the herbs were gone forever: In a very short time Bar-Atu had run out of his supply as well and he was no longer able to safely move secretly about outside the Wall. The people quickly began to grow restless when there was no longer the abundance gained from the previous hunts. Their allegiance to Bar-Atu was based on bribes, and when he could not deliver, they began to turn on him.

  “In the past he had held them in check with the threat of Gaw, whom he was able to summon with the herbs. But not so with Kong. It was no longer only the people, but Bar-Atu as well, who lived in fear. Kong was absolute ruler. Once Bar-Atu’s hunters disturbed Kong when he was feeding, and he turned on them in great fury, destroying them all. Bar-Atu could not explain why his god had turned against the people who were doing good for the village, who were seeking food for the feast.”

  The Storyteller said that in time, support for the new Storyteller grew because it was not bought with bribes and fear. It was genuine. Ishara, bolstered by this support, became bolder until she dared walk and talk freely among the people. There were not enough to resist Bar-Atu at first, but his trouble with his own followers prevented him from disbanding Ishara’s followers as he might have. Eventually Bar-Atu was forced to act and plotted to murder them all. But then something completely unforeseen happened. . .

  “But it grows late,” the Storyteller finished. “I am weary, and tomorrow is time enough for the story.”

  Both Vincent and Kara sounded like two children as they sprang up in unison saying, “But you can’t stop now!”

  To their frustration, it was too late. The Storyteller had already dozed off and was resting comfortably, with a ghost of a smile on her face.

  The next morning everyone awoke early. But instead of continuing their journey, Vincent and Kara refused to depart until they heard the end of the Storyteller
’s tale.

  She looked at their eager faces and murmured, “Where was I?”

  “Something happened—something unexpected,” Kara said.

  “Oh, yes. It was at this time, when Ishara was on the verge of becoming a threat to Bar-Atu, that he made plans to kill her after the impending sacrifice to Kong. She had no real hope of survival. It was at that time that, as I said, something completely unexpected happened.

  “During the ceremony to prepare the sacrifice, strangers were discovered. It had been over half a century since outsiders had arrived on our island. It was your father, Vincent.”

  “You mean because of my father, Ishara was not killed?” asked Vincent, stunned.

  “Far more than that, Vincent Denham. Far more than that.”

  Kara sat, pensive. “I understand. If Vincent’s father had not come to the island to take away Kong, Bar-Atu would have won in the end. He would have killed the Storyteller, and the line of Storytellers would have come to an end.”

  The Storyteller nodded. “Yes, exactly. Carl Denham destroyed Bar-Atu’s plan. He brought with him the one named Ann Darrow. She was the one whom Kong could not resist. When Jack Driscoll stole her back from him, Kong lost all control and came off of his impenetrable mountaintop to a place where he could be captured. But before he was, several things happened. During his rampage, he killed most of Bar-Atu’s followers, who for years had been the only ones allowed to bear weapons. Bar-Atu’s mind had been damaged by the herbs he had used for too many years to put himself into his trances. He ranted like a madman, ordering the rampaging Kong to obey him. Kong crushed him like an ant and then bit him in half. The cult died with him, one reign of terror ended by another. But in all the destruction wrought by Kong, one more thing happened that no one ever expected. But this is a part of the story which is better experienced than heard. I will stop now and ask you both to be patient. Follow me.”