A soft clang echoed in the room as Anthony landed on the rigging. His scowl was gone, replaced with an extremely stern expression. Elliot’s heart pounded as Anthony began signaling to him again. It was fairly obviously what Anthony meant now: Move that way, toward the air duct. Slowly. Quietly.
Elliot nodded, and followed.
It was hard going, especially knowing that the water wasn’t just water. Elliot’s mind raced through the possibilities—sharks with opposable thumbs? Super-sentient piranhas? Octopi with an agenda?
The air duct was closer—but the sound from the water was louder, too. Gentle and not so gentle splashes echoed in the chamber. Whatever lived in the water, it knew they were up there...
...and it wasn’t best pleased to have its nap disturbed.
It wasn’t until after Elliot and Anthony had worked their way past the last hurdle—a series of thin pipes crisscrossing every which way at every level—that Elliot realized something he hadn’t noticed originally.
The air duct wasn’t completely open. There was a thin metal mesh covering it.
“Oh shit,” he groaned.
Something in the water slapped against the surface. It sounded almost like a gunshot.
Oh, double-shit!
Anthony whipped out a pocketknife and worked at the mesh, slicing through the metal as easily as if it were netting. It was horrifically loud, on par with the frantic splashing from below.
“Don’t look,” said Anthony. “You’re not going to like it.”
“You mean you know what’s in there?” Elliot’s voice rose to a squeak.
“No. But I know you aren’t going to like it.”
Elliot looked.
Elliot really, really didn’t like it.
The water was churning, but it wasn’t dark anymore. Something glowed under the surface, pink and yellow and bumpy with ugly green splotches. Multiple things moved under the water, enormous tentacles or eels that writhed and rolled, lifting up and slapping against the water with louder and louder splashes. Worst of all, Elliot swore he saw an enormous eye peering up at him from just below the surface.
“Done,” said Anthony, as the metal mesh net fell from the air duct into the water below.
The creature’s roar shook the rafters, and Elliot had to grip tight in order to keep from falling off and into the water. The sound was deeper and darker than anything he’d ever heard from Hollywood; it turned his insides into pure liquid, and everything else into jelly.
It was exactly what Elliot imagined a Kraken might sound like.
The creature rising from the water was exactly what a Kraken might look like. Its arms were enormous and shimmering as if covered in oil, with outrageously large suckers underneath. The creature’s mouth hovered below the surface of the water—huge, with too many rows of teeth, opening and closing in anticipation of a meal.
Its tentacles reached out of the water, wriggling and flexing. It might not have been able to reach them—but Elliot saw the creature’s lower tentacles grab hold of the walls in order to leverage itself up out of the water in a determined effort to capture its breakfast.
Elliot stared at the creature, spell-bound, unable to look away. His heart pounded in his ears, the creature kept screaming—or maybe that was him, Elliot really did not know. Elliot saw straight into the creature’s throat, the thousands of tiny teeth or barbels or something that would keep him from crawling back out again, that would rip his skin and his clothes into tiny shreds if he tried.
I can’t die, thought Elliot, and he sounded strangely calm even to himself, Anthony hasn’t even kissed me yet.
Something wrapped around Elliot’s wrist and yanked.
Elliot opened his mouth, ready to let out a yell...
...and landed with a loud crash inside the air duct, with Anthony gripping his wrist.
Elliot gasped for air as his brain raced to catch up. Not... dead. I’m not... dead.
“Oh, good,” said Elliot. “Second chance for you to—”
Anthony stared at him with a very odd expression on his face. Elliot clamped his mouth shut immediately.
“Second chance for what?” said Anthony.
“Nothing,” squeaked Elliot.
“Okay,” said Anthony, and he tugged at Elliot’s wrist again. “Come on, let’s go before—”
He didn’t have to finish; Elliot already heard the Kraken getting closer to the air duct, the loud bangs as it flung its tentacles, trying to maneuver in the air to go after them.
Anthony was much calmer the last time I almost died, thought Elliot as he hurried after him. Now he‘s just weirded out. Like he’s confused about something.
They crawled quickly down the air duct, fully aware of the Kraken banging and shrieking behind them. Elliot still smelled the putrid, salty scent of the water and the creature’s skin, and when he looked over his shoulder, he saw a tentacle, already reaching into the air duct to grab him.
“It’s coming after us!” he yelled to Anthony.
“I know!”
Elliot rammed into Anthony’s ass. “Ow!”
“Now is really not the time, Elliot,” said Anthony.
“Are you kidding?” spluttered Elliot, and then felt something brush his foot. “Holy hell, it’s got me!”
He started kicking—and to his sickening horror, actually kicked something squishy and sloshy, which made a disgustingly wet sound when his foot made contact. There was a renewed screech from the creature behind them.
“Yes, keep kicking it,” said Anthony briskly. Elliot glared at him, but saw why he’d stopped—they’d reached the end of the air duct, and there was, of course, another grate blocking the exit. Anthony was already halfway through cutting it open.
“Can’t you open that any faster?” yelled Elliot.
“Not really. Keep kicking the creature, that’s good,” said Anthony. “Make it mad.”
“I don’t think it can get much madder.”
“Worth a try,” said Anthony, just as he finished cutting open the grating.
They tumbled out of the air duct, Elliot landing hard on Anthony.
“Oh shit!” yelled someone, and Elliot looked up in surprise.
They were back in the lounge where they’d started—except this time, there were half a dozen security guards sitting at the tables, all holding mugs of coffee and eating donuts.
“Fire at the hole!” Elliot yelled at them.
He wasn’t sure they would, when they started scrambling and yelling at each other, reaching for their guns.
Until the tentacle came racing out of the air duct, grabbed the nearest guard, and noisily and wetly yanked him back into the air duct. The guard yelled, banging and shouting for most of the way.
A final, wet-sounded shriek... then nothing at all.
“I am not paid enough for this shit!” yelled another guard. Every guard made a bee-line for the door, so fast and furious they created a brief bottle-neck, before disappearing and completely forgetting about Anthony and Elliot still lying on the floor.
Or, more specifically, Elliot lying on top of Anthony, who didn’t seem terribly upset, or at least, terribly interested in moving. He was warm, and rather comfortable, if Elliot was going to be truthful about it, except for the way Anthony’s cell phone was digging into Elliot’s thigh.