The Professor tore open his coat and vest and pulled the talisman through his shirt. He held it out in front of him, the torn leather thong dangling around the glowing stone facade, as he marched toward the mime-beast.
“Back! Back I say! You have no power here!”
The mime-beast backed up as Stephanie pulled away. She cried out from the pain and nearly stumbled as the creature’s tongue shredded the skin from her arm. But she regained her footing and made it back to her grandfather.
“Take out your necklace, child. Hold it in front of you. You will be protected.”
She did as she was told, though her small hands fumbled for it as her whole body trembled from fear. The Professor used his sword hand to pull her close to steady her. Mr. Newt fired at something behind them, and then fired three more times in quick succession. The Professor heard a PHWOOOSH sound and felt his back grow warm as Mr. Newt resorted to the use of his torch-hand attachment.
The great tentacle swept high overhead, taking out treetops and toppling park statuary.
“We’ve got to go, Professor!” shouted Mr. Newt.
“There is nowhere to run, my friend,” replied the Professor. “There is no escape. Humanity stands today or stands no more!”
A percussive boom reverberated from their left as the giant tentacle wrapped itself around the large fountain statue. Where an octopus limb might have suckers, this one had smaller appendages lined down its base, each filled with hundreds of sharp protrusions like spear tips attached to a snake’s body. Those protrusions sank into the granite, and with a loud crunch, the statue broke away from its pedestal.
Mr. Newt shot at a shadow to the Professor’s right that disappeared behind a bench. In the distance, the Professor heard whistles begin to blow, sounding the imminent arrival of the constables.
“Hold fast, Mr. Newt!” said the Professor. “It is time!”
Grasping his talisman tightly, the Professor began to chant. At first he could not be heard over the din of the attack, but with each repeated verse, his voice began to cut through the clamoring screams and monstrous roars.
“Etruz fahegit k’rasha.”
“Etruz fahegit k’rasha!”
“ETRUZ FAHEGIT K’RASHA!”
A scream came from behind him.
The Professor twirled around to see his old friend in the clasp of a hideous goat-beast, its body covered in black and yellow bristles. It held Mr. Newt at a distance by two thin arms that protruded from the creature’s back. The Professor grabbed Stephanie with his left hand, freeing his sword arm. Pulling her along behind, the Professor charged the beast, sliding his sword at a point where the creature’s neck might be.
Keep stabbing!
Simultaneously, the beast slid a third arm out from its midsection. The arrow-shaped hand of this arm speared Mr. Newt through his stomach with a sickly thud and continued out the old man’s back, blood shooting out like a fountain. The creature fell to the ground, sliding off the Professor’s sword, to form a pile of blood and ichor with the corpse of Mr. Newt.
The Professor staggered.
“Stephanie. We must go. It did not work. Stephanie?”
Still dazed, he looked back for her, but she was not behind him. He must have let go of her hand in his charge to save Mr. Newt.
His gaze traced the path from where he stood. He had also dropped his talisman, as it was lying on the cobblestones. A short distance beyond the talisman was his motionless granddaughter. Her soft pink dress was torn and rumpled. It was also covered in blood. One pale arm clutched her torn stomach as the other arm was sprawled out flat on the cobblestones, the hand open, loosely clutching the silver necklace. Her mouth was held closed by the hand of the mime-creature as its tongue lapped at her blood.
Her necklace failed her, as had his incantation. They were doomed. Death called to him – sweet merciful death for them all. At least he would not have to watch the world enslaved.
Outraged, the Professor began to run toward the creature, but stumbled, coughing. He tried to steady himself with his cane sword, but it could not hold his weight and the blade snapped, sending shards of metal in a shower on the cobblestones that rang like a wind chime. The Professor lumbered forward, downward, head-first onto the walk. His vision blurred with blood, his last sight that of the creature dragging away the corpse of his precious granddaughter by her lovely golden hair.
***
“Before me there were no created things,
Only eterne, and I eternal last.
All hope abandon, ye who enter in!”
***
The next hour passed in a dreamlike state, with blurred patterns of colors and muffled sounds the only threads he held to consciousness. Memories mingled with reality in a swirl of senses. His ears were filled with a steady, throbbing tone that did not deafen, but could give him no relief.
He wanted to talk, but something obstructed his mouth and tongue. He could still breathe, but every word he tried to utter came out as “Unnngh.” He tried to move, but he was completely immobile. His arms were crossed across his stomach and pinned down behind him. His legs were held fast. His shoulders were weighted down. He could only move his head from side to side and slightly up and down, but even that movement was severely limited.
His vision cleared enough to discern shapes, but the brightness continued to diffuse any useful images. A cloud passed overhead, blocking the sun and giving him blessed relief. No, it was not a cloud. It was an airship. And it flew the Union Jack.
They had driven back the demon horde! He was saved!
Alas, his noble friend and sweet, innocent granddaughter. His only comfort was that their deaths had not been in vain. The airship passed, and he had to turn his head to not become blinded again.
Finally the ringing slowly faded to a distant buzz. The murmurs formed words, and the words eventually became discernable phrases. There were screams in the distance, and sirens echoed from the tall buildings, making it impossible to tell their true direction.
“Hell of a quake, wadn’t it?”
“Oye, it was. Worst we’ve seen t’ date, I tell ya. First one t’ hit this far inland, too.”
His head began to spin, and blackness overtook him. Jostling stirred him again, though he did not know how long he had been unconscious. The sun was still up, but had dipped behind one of the larger buildings.
“Sir, I need to ask you some questions.” A young nurse shook his shoulder, and his head flopped back and forth with each motion. His body was in complete pain, aching and throbbing. The worst pain was around his left knee. He was sure the leg was broken.
“Ungh,” was all he could say.
“Miss! Miss! Don’t do that, please, miss. You need to stay back,” barked another voice, causing his brain to rattle in his skull. A large dark shape stepped into view, fully blocking his vision.
“But constable, I need information.” Her voice was pleading, shaken.
The constable’s voice softened. He was well trained in dealing with people. “There is little to tell, nurse…?”
“Wrench.” Then with more confidence, she repeated, “Nurse Wrench… of Stone House.”
“Nurse Wrench,” he continued. “During the earthquake, the park – which was the apparent epicenter for the earthquake – was filled with bedlam. What we’ve pieced together is that a number of pedestrians were terminated by falling debris: statues, trees, and the like. This gentleman, your patient, is said to have lost control of his senses. He and his comrade purportedly got into a disagreement, which led to bloodshed. His comrade was fatally stabbed.”
No, that isn’t what happened. That was nothing like what happened.
“Is that all you can tell me, constable…?” she asked.
“Ungh!” He tried to yell, but his temples burned with each sound he tried to make. He was soon just sobbing uncontrollably.
“It’s Sergeant, miss. Sergeant Reynolds,” he said a little too proudly. “There is one other thing, miss. It is report
ed that the gentleman came to the park with a little girl. His granddaughter is what we understand. If you see a little girl in a pink dress, about the age of ten, we think. Well, miss, if you see her would you please direct her to any local police constable? I’m sure her mother will be worried.”
Alive? No, Stephanie was dead. The creature killed her and dragged her away. He failed her, and she was dead. How could they not find her? How could they miss all of the blood?
“Thank you, Sergeant Reynolds. I will do that.”
He began to shake, causing intense pain to shoot through his body, starting with his leg and piercing right into his temples. They were lifting him up. Taking him away. The grating sound of wood on metal filled his ears. His vision darkened as they entered the ambulance. He was jostled back and forth so much that his stomach became upset, only calming slightly as they stopped moving him and strapped him in place. His vision adjusted as they closed the large metal-framed doors of the carriage.
Turning his head, he could barely see out of the barred window beside him. At least he could get some fresh air to help fight back the nausea.
With a click of his teeth, the driver started the horse forward. The hooves clicking across the cobblestones soothed the Professor into a stupor.
Is it possible that his precious granddaughter escaped? He did not see how. Yet, they found nothing. His mind could not grasp the concept. Nor could it grasp much else from the day’s events. Failures at so many points, yet there was no great change. No enslavement. No total world destruction.
They say it was an earthquake. It was no earthquake. It was the mouth of Hell that opened up in central London.
Tears rolled down his cheeks as he fought to stay awake. To keep thinking. His eyes were heavy.
The ambulance rolled to a stop. If they were heading toward Stone House, they were going through town and would likely slow often for traffic. The sidewalk bustled with activity, much of it heading out of the city center. That would make progress unbearable. But where else did he have to go? A flash caught his eye.
He blinked and tried to focus.
A lamppost.
A pink dress.
Stephanie?
Yes! His granddaughter stood beside a tall black lamppost that was just starting to flicker to life as twilight closed in on the dusty city. She wore Mr. Newt’s greatcoat around her shoulders like a blanket, but he could see her pretty pink dress with the red splotches across her stomach.
Beside her buzzed and whirred a familiar brass ottoman.
Joy!
Gadget stopped moving and turned to face the ambulance, raising a shiny arm. The Professor’s talisman swung in a gentle circular pattern from its leather thong gripped between tiny pinchers. When Stephanie smiled, her mouth was filled with triangle-shaped teeth.
The Thumping in the Basement
By Tonia Brown
Alex frowned and gave an anxious huff, the smoky tendrils of his warm breath curling away in the cool of the evening air. As he huffed and frowned, he glowered, furrowing his brow at the door with abject intensity, as if the act of scowling at the barrier could force it to open, or better still, make it disappear altogether. Never had he been made to wait like this, and he didn’t like it one bit. He tried knocking, as many as a dozen knocks, and ringing the bell, at least a half-dozen rings, yet after exhausting the usual routes of polite announcement, he still stood staring and waiting and wishing that someone would respond. What would he do if no one answered? When the carriage dropped Alexander Meeks almost a quarter mile from the house, as the horses refused to take a single step closer, the driver was very clear about his unwillingness to return anytime soon. Alex laughed about it then.
He wasn’t laughing now.
In the solitude of the moment, Alex grew acutely aware of the silence surrounding him. Turning about, he gazed into the canopy of the forest, the tree line a mere ten feet from the house itself. At least forty or more acres of such woods surrounded the huge house—the perfect retreat for a total recluse, or rather his potential employer. But instead of a forest song of twitters and grunts and growls, the woods were as quiet as a graveyard. Quieter. Just under this roar of silence, somewhere in the distance, Alex thought he could make out the faint echoing of hoofsteps as the carriage horses made their return trip into the small town of Frog Lick, some sixty miles from where he stood.
Waiting. In the cold. Alone.
There was no doubt that the address was indeed correct, for the driver spent the better part of the long journey trying to talk Alex out of completing the trip. This plea was met with good humor at first, which developed into annoyance, until finally Alex was forced to demand that the man fall silent on the matter lest the driver provoke his passenger’s ire. Alex had no intention of ‘turning back before it was too late,’ or ‘seeking other, safer, honest employment.’ Neither did he care that things were ‘amiss at the Boudreaux house.’ After all, it wasn’t every day one got the chance to become the lab assistant to the world’s leading biomechanic. Yet now that he was here, and no one seemed interested in answering his call, Alex had to wonder if he had imagined the whole thing in the first place.
He pulled the coveted telegram from his pocket, checking the address, date and time of the summons. Yes, everything was correct. Alex knocked again, hoping against hope that perhaps the servants were taking an extended break or just hadn’t heard his first dozen attempts to gain ingress. Much to his surprise, as well as relief, the door opened, just a crack. Blessed warmth surged forth, teasing the almost-frozen Alex.
Somewhere in that sliver of open door, a man asked in a gruff voice, “What?”
“Alexander Meeks, sir,” Alex said. He waved the telegram at the opening. “I was sent for by Doctor Boudreaux.”
There came a pause, accompanied by the undeniable feeling that Alex was being gawked at. Evaluated. Weighed.
“You’re the student, then?” the man asked.
Alex huffed in another curling wisp. This doorman was very nosy, as well as rude. Making a guest wait like this, then grilling him like some common criminal. “Yes, I am. And I should like to see the good doctor as soon as possible. If you please.”
A low rumble emanated from the opening in the door, and it took a few seconds for Alex to recognize its source. Laughter. Whoever was on the other side of the door was laughing at him, and with much delight.
“Now see here,” Alex protested. “I don’t think the good doctor would-”
“Good?” the man asked with a touch of humor still in his voice.
The door eased open, creaking in a long, uneven note of aged and rusted hinges. In the low light of the doorway, dressed in the most rumpled lab coat Alex had ever seen, stood a beast of man. Almost a good foot or so taller than Alex, he was at least twice as wide and perhaps twice as old. A thick graying beard consumed the lower half of the man’s face, threatening to take over more area should the owner leave his guard down too long. His white hair stuck out at odd angles, as though he’d just been roused from a deep slumber.
The bearded man grinned. The effect on Alex was as cold as the winter air. “I’m afraid the epithet of ‘good’ hasn’t been applied to me in a long time.”
“Dr. Boudreaux?” Alex asked. He then gasped when he realized his error. “I apologize if I seemed impertinent. I didn’t realize it was you.”
Boudreaux waved away Alex’s concern. “Nonsense. I should be the one to apologize. I hope you haven’t been kept waiting too long.”
“Not very long.”
“Please, gather your things and come inside.”
Alex did just that, snapping up his single suitcase (the telegram said to pack light) and stepping into the foyer, where the warmth enveloped him with loving arms. There he waited, reveling in the warm while the doctor closed and locked the door behind them.
“Again, I’m sorry for the wait,” Boudreaux said. “I fell asleep at my work bench, and I’m afraid sound doesn’t travel well down to the basement. You’r
e lucky my aching bladder woke me, or I wouldn’t have heard you at all. Speaking of which, please go on through to the drawing room while I tend to nature’s call.”
Boudreaux motioned to the hallway opposite the door before rushing off down the right-hand exit. Thus abandoned, Alex followed his instructions and made his way down the long and narrow hallway. It emptied into a parlor. The room was messy, with cobwebs hanging from the corners, dust an inch thick in some places, and papers of all manners strewn about in a haphazard pattern. Soot and ash coated the furniture and floor nearest the fireplace, where the embers of a dying fire winked at Alex, begging to be fed.
Though he was born and bred in the northern half of the states, Alexander never enjoyed the chill of winter, and absolutely despised snowfall and below-freezing temperatures. He had heard winters in the South were mild compared to what he was used to, but even so, he considered anything below a warm summer’s day as too cold. Spurred by his need for warmth, Alex added a few logs to the hearth from the nearby crib, then stoked the flames until they roared into life.
“Nicely done,” Boudreaux said, admiring the freshly built fire as he entered the room.
“I’m glad you approve,” Alex said.
“And I am glad you already know how to maintain such a thing, for it will be just one of your many jobs.”
“Many jobs?”
“Yes. Of course, we have the luxury of central heat thanks to the world’s most ancient boiler, but I find a well-built fire helps the old girl keep up.”
“What other tasks are you expecting me to perform, aside from helping you in the lab?”
“You know, cooking, cleaning, that sort of thing.”
Alex started, mouth open, aghast with horror at the suggestion that he, the son of a respected attorney and well on his way to becoming a prominent physician, was expected to perform the lowly work of a manservant. “Sir, I’m not sure if there has been some confusion, but I’m here for the position of lab assistant.”
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