"I don't know. Maybe they had enough."
"Damn good thing,” Lybrand said. “I'm down to two shots. Why didn't they attack?"
"I have no idea. There were at least a hundred of those things. They could have easily overrun us."
"Maybe they don't attack at all."
An hour ago he would have thought the idea stupid, but now he wasn't sure. “But if they don't attack, then who killed Jansson?"
She didn't answer. They remained still for a few moments, until Connell's hissed whisper called out to them.
"O'Doyle! O'Doyle, are you there?"
O'Doyle turned toward Connell's voice, seeing the dance of his headlamp along the rough tunnel wall. He moved toward Connell. Lybrand followed. They reached him in seconds.
"Are you two all right?” Connell asked.
"Yes sir, Mr. Kirkland, we're fine,” O'Doyle said.
"We found a light."
"A light?” O'Doyle was unable to hide his excitement — a light meant people. “What do you mean? What is it?"
"I don't know. It's down the tunnel. I came to get you two before we investigate."
O'Doyle nodded his approval. “Very good, Mr. Kirkland. The silverbugs appear to have given up the chase for now, so let's move before they come back.” O'Doyle ran quickly down the tunnel, Connell followed, and Lybrand brought up the rear, constantly checking behind her.
They turned at the green stalactite and almost tripped over Mack, who crouched groggily on one knee. Veronica and Sanji stood motionless in front of him. Connell immediately saw the reason for their stillness.
It sat there between them and the light, glowing a soft yellow.
A tentacle god.
Chapter Twenty-seven
Even though they'd never seen one — and to this moment not one of them thought the tentacle gods existed anywhere but in the violent religion of a dead culture — they all thought it looked rather small. It stood about three feet tall, its skin glowing yellow, a soft light emanating from the creature and illuminating the walls with dim incandescent radiance. Below the glow they could make out a pattern of stripes and spots on the rough skin.
Three thick tentacles acted as legs, supporting the thick body with tripod-like efficiency. Three more softly waving tentacles jutted out from the body's midline, alternating in position so that each tentacle was directly above the space between the tentacle “legs.” The limbs moved like agile, boneless pythons, muscle rippling under the glowing skin.
Each of the top three limbs ended with three slender tips. The tips fit together so seamlessly that, when closed, the tentacle appeared to end in one thick point. It opened and closed these tips in random fashion, which vaguely reminded Connell of someone opening and closing a fist.
Beneath the glow, Connell noticed black spots peppering the fibrous, muscular skin. Thousands of them, spread all over each tentacle and throughout the ball-shaped body, like small, polished onyx jewels embedded in the strange flesh.
The tentacle god reeked of a distinct, offensive smell — the pungent punch of dog shit and the sickeningly sweet waft of rotting fruit: perhaps apples or strawberries.
Connell felt stunned, as if he'd been kicked in the stomach. Nothing in his experience could have prepared him for this moment. He stared at the creature for several minutes, incapable of speech. The others acted no different.
The tentacle god, just stood there, tentacles waving softly.
O'Doyle finally ended the mental standoff, raising his Beretta and pointing it at the tentacle god. Connell suddenly broke his paralysis and, grabbing O'Doyle's arm, pushed the gun away from the creature.
"Don't shoot it! We don't know what it is."
O'Doyle stared back at his boss with a cold, heartless gaze. “We know exactly what it is,” he said. “We all saw those carvings in the Picture Cavern. We know what these things do to people."
Connell felt a chill brace his body, despite the KoolSuit's constant comfort, as the havoc-laden images ran through his head. He looked back at the tentacle god, still glowing an inviting yellow. For some reason the small, graceful creature, which couldn't have weighed more than sixty pounds, didn't look capable of carving up a human.
"What do you think, Veronica?” Connell asked quietly, eyes fixed on the creature.
Before she could answer, their headlamps caught movement far up the tunnel wall, almost to the ceiling. A pair of white tentacles slid out of a crack no more than six inches wide, accompanied by a hissing sound of dead leaves blowing over concrete. Everyone inadvertently took a step back. O'Doyle's gun came back up and pointed at the new creature; Connell laid a hand on O'Doyle's arm, but didn't try to sway the big man's aim. No one even breathed.
The creature slid out of the crack like pudding pushed through a strainer, its body swelling as it left the confines of stone until it reached the same size as the first tentacle god. The new one didn't glow yellow, didn't glow at all, and they could clearly make out the pattern of black-and-gray spots and stripes on white skin. The second creature gracefully lowered itself to the ground and moved to stand a few feet in front of the first. Two of the new creature's tentacles hung like beached seaweed: shriveled, limp, and black.
"Oh my God,” Veronica said quietly, shrinking back against Connell as a third creature slid from the crack in the wall. This one moved quickly to the original creature — which still glowed a soft yellow — and pulled it back down the tunnel. Connell observed that the first creature didn't move gracefully and smoothly like the two that had poured from the wall. The first creature moved clumsily, haltingly, as if it were about to fall on its face at any second.
"They look kind of like an octopus,” Mack murmured from his delirium, looking up at the creatures from his spot on the ground. “Rock octopuses."
The creature with the two blackened, limp tentacles stood before them. Connell saw some of the onyx spots shrink back into the body, only to pop up again. The spots alternated this action — there were hundreds of them, some shrinking back while others stayed visible, like twinkling stars in a clear night sky.
After a few seconds of looking, the creature thrust one tentacle into the air. O'Doyle pulled back the hammer on his Beretta. Lybrand did the same.
Its raised tentacle suddenly pulsed three times with a bright light, the pulses starting at the body, moving up to the end, then disappearing, a whump whump whump of yellow. The creature lowered its tentacle back down. It stood motionless. The other two creatures stood about ten feet farther down the tunnel toward the unknown light. Neither of them moved.
No one spoke for several moments. The cave filled with a surreal stillness until Lybrand finally broke the silence.
"What the fuck is it doing?"
"It looks like it's waiting,” Sanji said.
"Waiting for what?” Lybrand asked. As if in reply, the creature again thrust its tentacle into the air, let off a whump whump whump of yellow light, then lowered the limb. This time it added a quick, high-pitched screech, as if to punctuate the light show. Everyone jumped slightly at the unexpected noise. It reminded Connell of a basketball shoe squeaking on a gym floor.
"Let's just shoot this fucking thing and be done with it,” O'Doyle growled. “This must be what killed Jansson."
"Rock octopus,” Mack said, sounding groggy and delirious. “Rocktopi. Anybody got any aspirin?"
"Don't shoot it!” Sanji said. “I think it's trying to communicate with us.” He slowly lowered his helmet and turned off the light. He raised his arm and laid the headlamp against his bicep, pointing it toward the ceiling. He then quickly turned it on and off three times, the light brightly illuminating his KoolSuit. With a shock, Connell suddenly realized the creature's flashing yellow was exactly the same shade as their KoolSuits.