[color=gray][quote]He took a deep breath as he hopped into it and found himself swimming. He knew he could not hold his breath for too long, so he had to find a way out. Immediately, he scanned the area for an exit.[/quote][/color]

Back in the little room, the cat curiously hopped up the makeshift stack of pillows, stopping just at the top to peer up into the murky water, ears perked and tail swinging slowly. The cat did not follow, but only watched, a slight gleam of fang in its grin.

The water was dark and cool as a lake in summer; green bubbles followed in his wake. Above Arthur's head, the water went on for miles -- deep, black and cruel. It was clear that swimming straight up would yield not even a pocket of air before his little lungs were done, if the darkness didn't crush his fragile bones first.

Should he look down, he would see that he had just escaped a wide, sprawling, rusty factory with ornate crumbling smokestacks, gigantic moving gears, and algae-coated gargoyles perched on the green-copper eaves. The water was filled with the low rumble and hum of machinery. He could see the dim light of the room he'd just escaped; similar squares of light dotted the factory building like constellations, dozens of rooms identical to his own.

The factory was tucked into a rocky crevice at the heart of a small underwater island, complete with submerged forests of bony petrified trees, a stony hill filled with the dilapidated ruins of old stone buildings, and a white sandy beach that surrounded it. Deeper, beyond the beach, sunlight glinted.

The surface of the water lay below him, shifting and glimmering with the tide, lapping at the underwater beaches. All Arthur had to do was to swim down and make it around the girth of the island to reach the surface before his air ran out.

A huge boat was moving toward the island -- its bottom was a dark rumbling shape on the sunlit surface below, its motor churning the water bright green.

Something dark swam past Arthur -- something whose shape was hard to place, there was so much long black hair. It darted away again, spun and flitted, curious. He might catch a glint of red embroidered cloth clutched in its strange pale arms. It almost looked like a child, as small as Arthur himself.

[hr][color=gray][quote]She looked back, back at the twisted faces, the grasping fingers, and worst of all, the endless layers of sharp teeth. She breathed in, closed her eyes tight, and jumped.[/quote][/color]

Nina yelped in surprise. The guests at the table all lunged at once, each hoping to be the one to snatch her up, but their claws and tentacles all tangled in one another instead. Chairs thundered to the floor, snarls and roars rang out, and Riley fell --

-- right into an enormous basket of soiled table linens being carted away to laundry. A huge cloth napkin, soiled with sticky tomato sauce, dropped on top of Riley and Nina, hiding them from view.

Riley and Nina were cushioned and safe burrowed in the napkins and tablecloths; the cart rattled and creaked, shifting the basket now and then. She would hear the snuffle and slurp of the guests as the cart passed them by. Occasionally one of the monsters would give a loud sniff, but nothing disturbed the basket.

The cart creaked and groaned and bumped along. There was a click and boom of a metal door being opened. The cart wheeled through it, then stopped.

The metal door slid closed, boomed and clicked. Suddenly all the sounds of the dining room had gone quiet. Riley and Nina and their basket of tablecloths had been left alone in a smaller, darker room, safe from the monstrous diners.

This room was lit only by a single gas lamp burning in a corner. The walls, the floor and the ceiling were all gray and peeling and slightly damp. The door they'd come in through was made of thick bolted metal, operated from inside by a switch on the wall. The floor was strewn with old discarded laundry and empty crates. At the far side was a stack of shelves full of huge cans of lard, kegs of cooking oil, and hundreds of boxes of matches.

A wooden door beside the shelves was left cracked open. Firelight glimmered in the next room, where there were noises of churning machinery and the slide and skiff of something big moving around within.

Against another gray wall in Riley's room was a metal ladder that led up to a metal trap door in the ceiling.

[b]*KSSSSS*[/b]

A coppery funnel-speaker came to life with radio-noises. A high-pitched voice crackled through.

[b]ATTENTION! ATTENTION! CRUISE FOUR-EIGHTY-FOUR NOW APPROACHING! ALL GREETERS TO THE LANDING DOCK! ALL GREETERS TO THE LANDING DOCK![/b]

On the other side of the slightly-open door, a low voice muttered unintelligible and sarcastic. Something fleshy slid and skidded along the metal floor.