The Worm King Read online

  ‘That’s the lot.’

  ‘Shall we pack this too?’ The second cameraman pointed at the yellow box.

  ‘No. Let’s wait till . . . hang on, is that her now?’

  In the direction of the visitor centre a light appeared. It bobbed around for a minute then a car door slammed and the light disappeared. Winston’s arm was getting tired so he changed umbrella hands. The light reappeared, the car door slammed again and the light made its way towards them.

  ‘No luck with the phone,’ said Astrid. ‘And his car won’t start.’ She shone her torch momentarily on Mr Malisovich, who no longer jiggled but a worried frown creased his wrinkled features. ‘Paul, did you try the truck?’

  ‘Yes. No. Just a minute . . . ’ The cameraman vanished around the side of the vehicle. Winston heard the driver’s door open then a few seconds later the faint, ugly repeated click of a key being turned on a lifeless engine.

  Astrid checked her car, a crème, late-model Toyota parked twenty meters from the truck. It wouldn’t start either.

  ‘Must be that power grid thing,’ growled Dick. The cameramen both turned in surprise. ‘You should’ve realized that when the lights inside wouldn’t work,’ he told them accusingly.

  ‘How about we all wait in the visitor centre until it comes back on? Astrid suggested. ‘Would that be alright with you Mr Malisovich? Probably something to do with the rain and hopefully won’t be too long.’ Dick looked doubtful.

  Mr Malisovich seemed almost chuffed that his shop was designated as the new headquarters. Paul turned off the spotlight, packed it up then stacked it, and the battery, in the side-hatch compartment.

  By torchlight they trudged up the hill towards the visitor centre.

  Chapter Five

  Wobbles

  Winston had already been in the double storey, Mediterranean-style brick building twice before.

  The first time was eighteen months ago with some girl . . . Bridget? Anyway, to buy an overpriced ice cream on a one day excursion out of Sydney. Orange chocolate chip. She’d worn a rusty polka dot dress and it soon became apparent the flavor was selected to go with her outfit as opposed to any taste considerations.

  ‘This ice cream tastes like cough medicine.’

  ‘Want to go back and get another?’

  ‘No, I like this one,’ she’d replied with the cone seductively all but jammed down the front of her low cut top (which he was thankfully just tall enough to see into) while reddish-brown hair spilt stylishly over her tanned shoulders. She carried it around, more or less uneaten, until it’d dripped all over her hand.

  The second time had been when he went back in to get a tissue. The fat European women with the bushy moustache who’d sold them the ice cream looked down at him and pointed to the super-large packs of pre-moistened, biodegradable, organic towelletes on the shelf. They cost nearly triple the ice cream.

  At tourist spots like this, they really knew how to take you apart.

  ‘Your wife work with you here too, Mr Malisovich?’ Winston asked the old bloke who was sitting on a plastic chair beside the door. Maybe he thought everyone was going to try and bolt without paying for the snacks they’re nibbling on. Which Winston fully intended to do. It wouldn’t be a bolt, more a saunter. Revenge served ice cream cold.

  ‘My wife passed away last year,’ he said quietly.

  ‘That’s a shame,’ said Astrid who was cross-legged on the floor next to him.

  Winston felt about as tall as he looked.

  Dick Snow and the three girl guides were sitting in the middle of the shop floor around a battery operated lantern. One of the twins was playing with a box of little penlight torches Malisovich had given her to hand out to everyone. She’d passed them round but there were still five or six left and she was trying to stand them end on end.

  Paul and the second cameraman (aptly named Peter) reclined in the corner opposite the door. Both were tall, pale men wearing similar poloneck jerseys and new sneakers of an obviously expensive variety. Their Channel Six raincoats were laid neatly on the floor alongside.

  ‘Those fūlla’s homos?’ the Māori asked Dick.

  His deep chuckle cuts across the drumming of the rain. ‘On television, we say “homo-sexual.”’ He’d cleaved the word neatly in two, leaning into the girl’s circle and lowering his voice as though sharing some conspiracy. ‘Our lawyers don’t like us using those other words. It really pisses the homo’s off.’

  ‘Dick!’ exclaimed Astrid. ‘That’s their business dear. Anyway, I think Paul’s got a girlfriend, don’t you Paul?’ Paul rested against the wall with his eyes closed, doing his best to ignore the conversation.

  ‘Yeah, Dick’s mum. Goes like a train,’ he replied without opening an eye.

  ‘Paul! Jesus. These kids don’t want to hear that.’

  ‘I do,’ insisted the Māori. The twins nodded agreement. ‘My granddad lives in Ngaruawahia and he once cut a homo’s doodle off.’

  ‘I’m sure he didn’t do that,’ said Astrid looking as unsure as anyone could be. ‘Shall we play a game? Who knows I Spy?’

  The Māori wasted no time: ‘I spy, with my little eye, something beginning with . . . “C”.’ She smirked at Winston and he didn’t like the way this was unfolding.

  ‘Visitor centre,’ called one of the twins.

  Astrid appeared relieved. ‘Well, that’s got a “C” in part of it . . . ’

  ‘Cameraman,’ said Paul, unable to resist.

  ‘Cannibal,’ suggested Winston.

  ‘What’s that?’ Astrid asked.

  One of the twins said, ‘Isn’t it a person who likes—’

  ‘No, I mean what’s that . . . ’

  But they could all feel it now. The floor was shaking. Seconds later, the whole bloody building began collapsing around them.

  The ground sprung violently back and forth as though some massive fist below the crust grasped the earth, jerking it first one way, then another. Lights jumped and spun as torches fell, skidding over the floor. Winston’s backside bounced on the lino so he stretched his arms out for stability. He looked up and it seemed much darker than before then something fluttered past his face. Grit falling from somewhere forced him to shut his eyes. A larger object whisked past, nicking the side of his cheek and he immediately pulled his arms back in. An intense rumbling from deep below jumbled with the sound of steel girders wrenching themselves apart, timber beams cracking and popping and glass shattering then a dull bang alarmingly like an explosion.

  Someone began screaming. Not a girl’s scream, Winston knew it was definitely a man. A girl might’ve been easy; you’d almost expect some degree of crying. You’d just give them a big hug and ten minutes of consoling words which would’ve done . . . well, probably nothing, but a man only screams like that when something’s been torn off or squashed real bad. The dreadful sound thankfully stopped as suddenly as it started.

  The building shook again, grinding, as the pile settled.

  His upper body lay underneath a heavy weight. He couldn’t tell what it was but it didn’t feel painful, more a squeezing sensation. His legs tingled.

  Thumpity-thump! Thumpity-thump! Thumpity-thump! It can’t be normal for a heart to pound like that? A cold flush swept through him and he opened his eyes only to have them refill with dust. The tingling moved higher. Another shake jostled the pile and the weight on his chest intensified. Rain pattered against his forehead. Rain? That can’t be right . . . ? Unless—

  He passed out.

  A light pierced the edge of Winston’s vision but he was too busy swimming so ignored it. In his mind he was doing a comfortable, lazy freestyle down the middle of a tepid, blue pool. The black lines marking the lanes were jumping back and forth, which was odd, because usually they tracked along with gentle predictability. He rolled onto his back so he couldn’t see the pesky lines but backstroke always made him take in water and he began choking. Each time he coughed he took in more water which made him cough more.

 
; ‘Winston! You all right?’ Astrid’s voice forced its way in through the fog. His mouth felt full of a gluggy mix of dust and water. For some odd reason it occurred to him that people who eat a lot of wallpaper paste must feel like this all the time. ‘You hurt anywhere?’

  ‘I . . . where did that . . . no, think I’m all here.’

  ‘Grab the end of that board, will you,’ she panted to the Māori who held the lantern directly above his face. They dragged a wide, thin plank off his chest, then a couple of bricks and a strip of wall gibb. Another smaller tremor shook the heap.

  ‘We better get out of here,’ said Dick from the darkness beyond the lantern.

  One of the twins began crying. Astrid turned to them. ‘See if you can get outside darling. Take your sister too.’

  Winston was fairly certain they were outside already so he wondered what she was talking about. He felt slightly unlucky to have been flattened like this when everyone else appeared to have come through without a scratch, then he remembered the screaming. Astrid must’ve had the same thought. ‘Peter, Paul?’ she called. A moan rose from nearby and the Māori lifted her lantern. Most of the roof on the far side had completely collapsed but a massive girder remained upright on this side. The light disappeared as the girl scrambled away.

  ‘They’re over here,’ she called.

  Winston sat up. He felt surprisingly good and could just make out Astrid’s outline with Dick standing behind. Two smaller humps that must be the twins were on either side of Dick. ‘They don’t look so good,’ said the Māori, her voice noticeably more high-pitched. ‘What should I do?’

  ‘Wait there, we’re coming over,’ called Astrid. Winston struggled to his feet and followed.

  A heavy wooden desk from the floor above had dropped on Peter’s head. The edge of it had torn a gaping hole in his forehead and a mushy lump of brains was exposed. His eyes and mouth were wide open and his head tilted back at a disturbing angle. Winston had never seen brains before but felt pretty sure what sat in that hole was not usually meant to be showing.

  Paul didn’t look much better, but at least was alive. He lay on the other side of the smashed desk, moaning, eyes closed and propped against a piece of masonry. A coil of grey, eel-like guts poked out a jagged tear across his stomach. He cradled it, trying to nudge it back in. A small amount of blood seeped from either side of the wound but less than Winston might’ve expected.

  The Māori was right, they didn’t look so good.

  ‘What’s your name sweetheart?’

  ‘Āmiria.’

  ‘Hold that light a bit closer Āmiria.’ Paul’s torso jumped into sharp focus. ‘Spot on. Right. Should be OK. Riiiihhht. You can move that back now.’

  Winston felt like dry heaving. He’d never seen anything that awful.

  The ground jolted again and the brickwork Paul leant on shifted. His eyes snapped open and his mouth stretched into a scream which turned into a gurgle then the lids fluttered back down. They had to get him outside.

  ‘Hey Astrid, can you take Āmiria and the twins out? Dick and I’ll bring Paul. Where’s the old bloke?’

  ‘Got some glass cuts and went out. Think he’s alright. He said he’d wait by the truck.’

  Winston sat with Paul for a few minutes, brushing his hair back from his face and telling him they had to lift him; really, really had to, and it shouldn’t hurt much, and wouldn’t take long. But when they picked him up he screamed, and each of them held penlights in their mouths and it was hard to see, and raining, so Dick stumbled and dropped him hard. They picked him up again and moved on. When they eventually laid him down by the satellite truck he was dead.

  Chapter Six

  Lazing Around

  ‘We have to go into Katoomba,’ said Astrid.

  Winston wasn’t so sure. ‘I thought that visitor centre was kind of new. If it looks like . . . that, what do you reckon Katoomba’s going to be like?’

  ‘Closed,’ stated Dick.

  ‘Flat,’ added Āmiria.

  ‘I’ve got a sister in Katoomba,’ said Malisovich from his seat on an upturned rubbish bin next to the truck door. The twins were tight-pressed behind him holding an umbrella.

  Winston, Dick, Astrid and Āmiria stood in the rain while the fat drops came hammering straight down. The concrete had a blue-grey sheen as the puckered rippling water raced steadily downhill, running away innocently before gliding over the razor edge of the lookout. A hop, step and a whoooooo, plunging hundreds of feet and tumbling end over end into the black valley before smacking into the rocks far below. Winston shivered.

  Astrid had hauled the spotlight from the side compartment where Paul stacked it less than two hours ago. It was obvious she’d done it before, and in a flash had it hooked up to the battery and repositioned by the truck’s door.

  Only one corner of the visitor centre remained upright and this fortunately sheltered Dick, Astrid, Malisovich and the girls plus the lantern and pile of penlight torches. Āmiria bought out the lantern and four of the torches. Malisovich fell through his own shop window and sustained a nasty cut on his arm.

  Winston squinted at Astrid. ‘Shouldn’t we head straight for Sydney? At least then we can get, well, home.’ Āmiria was shining her torch in his eyes so he brushed a hand in front of his face and said, ‘don’t do that.’ Her beam darted away, did a quick circuit of the group then came to rest on Paul. A Channel Six publicity banner was the best they could find to lay over him but it became drenched immediately and now clung revealingly to every bulge. Winston wished they’d laid him further away from the door, or that they could all move down the other end of the truck so they didn’t have to look at the corpse although he knew he wouldn’t win any brownie points with the others by suggesting that. Fair enough, when he carked it he’d probably be offended too, if people moved away so they didn’t chuck-up when they looked at him.

  ‘How’s that cut Mr Malisovich?’ asked Astrid.

  ‘Oh. Fine thank you. Bleeding again, yes, I think. Hang on.’ He was nursing his arm in a towel and took a peek into the folds. ‘Yes, not too much, but some of it, yes some.’

  ‘We’ve got to get you to a doctor.’

  ‘My flatmate’s a med student,’ said Winston. Azziz might struggle to fix Peter and Paul though.

  ‘We need to get to Sydney, he’s right,’ confirmed Dick. ‘But first we should check up the hill, see how the town’s faired. People might need help. It’s the decent thing to do.’ He looked at Winston, shook his head and frowned.

  Winston nodded and tried to appear agreeable but Āmiria’s beam shone in his eyes again so he suspected he just came across as furtive and angry.

  ‘Let’s have a gander at it,’ said Astrid, getting down in front of Malisovich. ‘Winston, make yourself useful and hold that umbrella.’ One of the twins passed him the brolly, which left both girls exposed to the rain. ‘You two should wait in the truck.’

  ‘I’ll see if the phones are back up,’ said Dick. ‘Come on ladies, let’s adjourn indoors.’ One giggled and nudged the other and Winston was surprised at their resilience so soon after the tragedy.

  Dick led the pair into the truck.

  Winston held the umbrella up at full stretch like a wet, miniature Statue of Liberty. He peered up the hill towards Katoomba. No lights were visible but that could be the rain. Or the earthquake. And why did the power go off before the earthquake? Maybe an earlier quake they didn’t feel knocked out a substation, or power line? That might be it. This wasn’t supposed to be an earthquake area, but what did he know? Maybe it’s got something to do with all the rain.

  And why did the truck and cars stop working at the same time?

  The truck door opened and the twins reappeared with Dick behind them. ‘Mr Snow wants to film it,’ trilled one of the girls.

  ‘He said we could be in it and we’ll get our weather badge,’ said the other. Dick had a camera slung around his neck.

  ‘Hey Dick, do you think this rain’ll stop anytime soon? ask
ed Winston.

  ‘This front, together with the associated low pressure system may well extend through to the weekend,’ replied Dick majestically from the steps of the truck. One of the twins clapped and he winked at her. ‘You should write that down darling.’

  ‘Did you have any luck with the phones?’ asked Astrid.

  ‘No.’

  Winston had a thought. ‘Hey, Astrid does your car have a GPS?’

  ‘Not that I know of. Why?’

  ‘Nah, probably nothing. Just seems funny how the cars and truck stopped like that. Wondered if it had something to do with the GPS. Maybe it shorted the electrics.’

  ‘It’s got a CD player?’

  ‘What CD did you have on?’ asked one of the twins.

  ‘It was classical. Shostakovich I think, but that shouldn’t make—’

  ‘Were you playing it backwards?’ interrupted Āmiria.

  ‘No. I wasn’t.’

  Winston watched the rain tumble down. Paul appeared to be moving. He hated looking at the body but every time he did, it seemed to be creeping away because the lantern’s battery was fading so the circle of light kept shrinking.

  ‘What was that?’ said Astrid nervously.

  They all froze. ‘Thought I heard something.’ She shook her head.

  ‘It’ll probably just be the wind,’ reasoned Dick. Āmiria’s beam lit his grinning face. As far as Winston could tell, there wasn’t even a hint of a breeze.

  Further up the hill a dog howled. ‘When we’re pighunting and we hear that, usually means it’s been gored,’ said Āmiria.

  ‘Do that a lot, do you?’ inquired Winston.

  ‘Yeah. With me dad and his mates back home. Says that’s the only reason he makes me do Rangers, so I can get him more pork.’

  Rangers? Astrid had said she was a Girl Guide? Maybe she was tied up with some paramilitary wing of the guides. Instead of delving into that, Winston asked, ‘Your dad like you being on TV?’