The Adventures Of Indiana Jones (40 page)

Dirty faces stared up at Short Round from every nook and burrow as he reached the top of the ladder. The guard was barely ten feet behind him. Shorty climbed off the ladder into the tunnel at the top . . . then a moment later, with a running jump, leapt back onto it, kicking it away from the wall.

He held on tightly—so did the guard, several rungs lower as the ladder tipped in a gentle arc, away from the wall, out into the open pit. Certain suicide. At least that was the thought of the mesmerized children who watched the scene being played out. They wished him well in his final escape from this place

But as the top of the ladder passed the bottom of the hanging rope, Short Round grabbed onto it. The ladder, with the guard, continued on over, crashing thunderously to the earth far below—while Short Round dangled precariously in space for a moment, then steadily pulled himself up the rope, through the roof hole, into the overhead chamber.

He rolled a few feet across the floor; he lay still. It was empty in here, and quiet, though in the next room he could hear the muffled droning of a thousand narcotized voices. It was a disturbing sound.

He got up, went to the far door, pushed it open a crack.

Red light flared around the black statue of Kali, into the small room behind the altar of the temple of death.

In the temple, chains clanked, gears ground, as the sacrificial frame was raised, then supinated, then up-ended, and flipped over, until Willie, stretched out on the iron bracing, found herself staring facedown into the bubbling lava pit.

Staring at her own death. How excruciating it would be; how meaningless. How alone: that was the worst. Periodically she caught an image of herself in the glistening curvatures of the red bubbles far below, forming, breaking, distorting her reflection until it burst. Reflections of her life: contorted, overheated, now about to explode, like a droplet of water in a vat of acid. She wished she could do it over; she’d do it differently next time.

But there wouldn’t be a next time. She didn’t believe in karma, or reincarnation, or heaven, or miracles. It would take a miracle now to save her.

She held her breath. She hoped she passed out before it got too painful.

Mola Ram gave orders to the executioner, who slowly turned the giant wooden wheel that lowered the basket. The crowd chanted. Willie screamed. Indy turned to watch.

The sorceress hung above the pit in her true form, that of giant raven, suspended floating on the hot-air currents above the hole of fire. She was not flapping or fluttering now, as she had against the inside of his skull. She only floated, now: smiling, buzzing softly, knowing. Knowing the horror. The emptiness of his skull. The poison in his chest. She knew. She knew it all.

She had to die.

Mola Ram joined in the chanting now; the chanting got wilder. Indiana lent his voice to the masses.

Willie hung, suspended on the iron frame, watching the boiling magma draw nearer to her body, as it was lowered, inch by inch, into the sacrificial pit. Into the fire.

S
HORT
R
OUND
peered from behind the altar, into the cavernous temple, just in time to see Willie being dipped. And there, at the crater’s edge, stood Indiana, impassively watching her disappear.

Shorty whispered to himself. “Indy, no.”

The chanting was so loud it almost drowned out his thought. But he knew what he had to do. He had to be Indy’s pinchhitter. He had to wake Indy up. He had to pull Willie out. He had to get to America, and that was no big joke.

But first things first. He promised the Three Star-Gods a shrine in his heart forever, in return for success on this mission. He promised Lou Gehrig never to doubt the great slugger’s batting average again, even if his brother Chu came back as a whole herd of baby elephants.

He laid Indy’s accessories down on the shadow of an archway; he turned his baseball cap brim-backwards for action; and he jumped out onto the altar.

He waved at Indy. Chattar Lal saw him first, though. The Prime Minister shouted at two guards to grab the kid, but the kid was too fast. As the guards tried to apprehend him, he scooted off the altar toward Indiana.

One of the priests intervened, grabbing Short Round by the arm. Shorty bit the man’s hand; the priest let go. Another priest got in the way. Short Round kicked him hard, then skirted his crippled lunge.

In another second, he made it to Indy. He smiled up hopefully: maybe the good doctor was already awake, was just putting on a good act as part of a clever con game, to fool these fools into something foolhardy.

Indy brutally backhanded Short Round across the face. He fell to the ground, his hat knocked off.

Tears coated his eyes. “Wake
up,
Dr. Jones.”

Blood trickled from the corner of Short Round’s mouth as he stared at his hero in wounded disbelief. The moment didn’t last long, however; it only forged, for Shorty, the notion of what he had to do. It would be hard for him, but what, in this life, was not hard?

He sprang up, ran toward the wall. Another guard was quickly on his heels.

Chattar Lal had observed this entire transaction with distinct approval: the great Indiana Jones was now an obvious convert and devout believer. Satisfaction filled the Prime Minister’s eyes as he watched the guard chase down the annoying child, and as he watched Willie creak down to her final consummation.

Willie continued to try holding her breath on the descending frame, but it was no use. It was impossibly hot, immeasurably bright. Waves of heat rose to scald her face; the acid fumes burned her eyes, her lungs, her skin. She was going to die.

It was lonely. And scary. She tried to think of a prayer, but couldn’t think. She tried to twist away from the searing pain, but couldn’t move. Except she kept moving closer.

Short Round, meanwhile, reached the wall, where he yanked a flaming torch out of its bracket, and swiveled on his attacker. The firebrand whisked past the guard’s face, backing him off. Shorty ran up to the executioner, swinging the torch fiercely. The executioner retreated from his wheel; Willie hung, suspended where she was, temporarily unmoving.

Mola Ram was not as sanguine about these events as Chattar Lal seemed to be. This little monster was defiling the rites of Kali: he had to be punished. “Catch him! Kill him!” the High Priest shouted in Hindi, enraged.

Two more guards went after Short Round, who was once more running straight at Indy.

“Indy, wake up!” he yelled again. No response. At the last second he turned on the two guards about to catch him, forcing them back with his torch. In that second, Indy grabbed him from behind and began to strangle him.

Indy held Shorty by the neck, lifting and turning the boy in the air until they were facing each other, at Indy’s arm’s length. Short Round gasped for breath, turning blue, as Indiana choked the life out of him.

The serpent hissed and rattled in his chest, angered at the rude awakening. It had sensed the demon-child’s attack before Indy had actually seen him. By the time the demon approached with the torch, Indy was ready, the serpent was ready. Ready to strike.

Indy wake up! the demon-child screamed, the words etched in the torchlight he cradled. The serpent recoiled. The demon was protean: he transformed into a ruby clot of blood, thick with purpose, gelid and steaming in the cold cave air, smelling juicy with death.

Spinning, sputtering . . . Indy grabbed it, this clot-thing demon-child. Grabbed it and squeezed, tried to squeeze the dark squirting gob into something of a more pleasing shape, something the shape of Kali, something the size of his fist. Twisting, molding, forming, he turned the thing in his hands, turned it around and around until it faced him, its ghastly eyes bulging out of the gelatinous mass, waving its fire, facing his screaming, calling to the serpent.

With his last breath the boy croaked, “Indy, I love you,” uttered the name of the Caretaker of the Celestial Ministry of Exorcism, and thrust the flaming torch into Indy’s side.

Indiana went down, the fire roasting his flesh. He wailed in pain, letting go of Short Round.

Fire filled his head, raging out of control in the empty caverns. The serpent shrieked, uncoiling, writhing. The demon-child called to it: it called back, angry with new memory.

Short Round held the torch fast against Indiana’s flank, until a guard finally grabbed him, knocking the torch away.

Indiana writhed in pain on the ground.
The light was blinding.
The chanting started to crescendo. The executioner returned to his wheel, began lowering Willie once more. Chattar Lal smiled. Mola Ram praised Kali. The guard drew a knife, brought it up to Short Round’s throat. “Hold it,” said Indiana, rising. “He’s mine.” Indy took Shorty from the assassin, carried him a few steps away, lifted him into the air, held him high over the pit. Short Round looked down into the boiling furnace in terror; then into Indy’s eyes, for the last time.

Indy winked.

“I’m all right,” he whispered. “You ready?”

Shorty winked back.

He threw Short Round to a clear area, turned, and punched the nearest priest in the face; then punched another in the belly. Short Round gave one nearby guard a whirling karate kick to the side. At the same moment, a priest attacked. Shorty grabbed the cleric’s belt, rolled onto his own back, and flipped the man onto his head. The crowd beyond the crevasse was all wrapped up in the ecstasy of the ritual; they had no idea what was going on around the stone goddess. Chattar Lal knew well; he quickly exited behind the altar as the fighting increased.

Two priests converged on Indy, but Short Round threw himself in front of one, who consequently flipped into the other. Indy threw another priest into the executioner. Both went flying down off the platform. Unfortunately, the executioner disengaged the handbrake. The iron cage containing Willie started plummeting down the pit.

Indy jumped on the platform, clamping the brake on the spinning wheel. Again Willie stopped in her deathly plunge.

Mola Ram was growing more disturbed. He moved carefully through the disorder, toward the Sankara Stones on the altar.

Another priest attacked Indy, swinging his incense burner. Indy doubled over, then stood up under the priest, letting the man’s own momentum carry him over, and into the crevasse. There was a hissing flash; the priest was no more.

Short Round stood with his back to a wall, holding several guards at bay with a torch in one hand, a knife in the other.

The executioner crawled to his wheel, went back to lowering Willie. She was only yards away from the spumes of fulminating lava now. The heat was so intense, her clothes began to smoke; her eyelashes began to singe. Her consciousness reached the limits of its strength; her life began to shimmer. Random images flitted through her cooking brain; ancient memories, silvered feelings. The last thought that trickled by before she blacked out entirely was,
In olden days a glimpse .
.
.

Indy knocked the executioner off the platform once more. As he was beginning to crank the cage up out of the brew, a priest attacked him with a pole. He grabbed the pole, threw the priest off its other end, into the pit.

He fenced a guard with the pole, finally bashing him unconscious. This brought him near the altar, where he noticed Mola Ram bending over the stones. Indy broke the stick over Ram’s back.

Mola Ram fell forward. Indy raised his half-stick to finish the job on Ram, when the High Priest looked up, smiled . . . and disappeared through a secret trapdoor at the base of the altar.

Indy swore, threw the stick away, raced back to the wheel, and began to crank it, once more slowly raising the cage in which Willie’s unconscious body was still trapped, still smoking.

Chattar Lal appeared behind him, dagger upraised.

“Indy, lookout!” shouted Short Round, still swinging his torch.

Indy turned in time to dodge Lal’s dagger thrust; the two men struggled beside the wheel. Below, the iron frame creaked lower; the brake was on, but worn thin.

By now the congregation across the crevasse could see something was awry. They stopped chanting, began dispersing in increasing panic. The little Maharajah was one of the first to leave, surrounded by a cadre of his bodyguards.

Indy, breaking free from Chattar Lal, managed to hold the wheel steady. Lal attacked him again. Indy blocked the knife, stunning Lal, knocking him against the wheel.

The wheel turned; Chattar Lal was caught in its spokes. His leg was partially crushed in the gears; but he managed to free himself, and crawled away.

Shorty jumped up on the platform, holding the last guard back with his torch as Indy once more put the brake on—though it didn’t feel like it would hold for long. Then Indy stood up, but the guard ran away. Indy and Shorty frantically began turning the wheel, raising the cage.

When the iron frame was out of the pit, suspended at floor level, Short Round stayed at the wheel, holding it with all his strength, while Indy ran to the edge of the pit and pulled the basket over solid ground.

“Give me some slack,” he called to Shorty. Short Round turned the wheel a bit; Indy lowered the cage to the earth.

He released Willie’s bindings, stared anxiously at her unconscious form. “Willie, Willie. Wake up, Willie.” He could hardly remember the specifics of the Nightmare anymore, only the feeling of sickening terror, and a few flitting images: huge scavenger birds, hungry snakes (ugh! snakes!), a demon-child who was Shorty but wasn’t, and Willie as a malignant sorceress bent on eating his soul. And he’d tried to kill her, he remembered, had laughed to see her lowered into the pit for Kali’s pleasure. Thank God it was over; over, awake, back among the living.

Willie moaned, moved her head, fluttered her eyes.

“Willie!” he said happily.

She opened her eyes, saw him over her . . . and slapped him. Tried to, anyway; her hand was so weak, it barely grazed his cheek.

Shorty flinched all the same.