I oughta know, Tonnaquin responded angrily. It’s my mine.
Now, now, Roy said, trying to think of things to say. No one’s disputing that. But we’ve heard there’s been some violence here. People saying they’ve been attacked with a pickaxe. You wouldn’t know anything about that, would you? The sheriff asked me to inquire.
This seemed to throw Tonnaquin off. No, I wouldn’t know nothin’ about that, he replied.
And here you are holding a pickaxe, wandering around, Roy thought. The sheriff was concerned. He asked me to keep an eye out while we got these samples.
I ain’t done nothin’, Tonnaquin thought, a sly smile creeping across his face.
But it’s kind of suspicious, don’t you think? Roy asked. I wouldn’t want to report back to the sheriff that there are any problems here.
There’s no problems here, Tonnaquin thought, smiling.
I suppose then you’ll promise me that no harm will come to myself or the lady here in your mine? Roy asked. As I said, we’re from the assay office, and we’re expected back soon, by the sheriff. If we don’t return, he’s likely to send in a lot of people looking for us.
Alright, Tonnaquin thought, I promise I won’t hurt either of ya’. But there’s somethin’ I want you to see.
Tonnaquin turned and walked back down the adit he’d emerged from. Roy started to follow him into the tunnel.
“Don’t go,” Deem called after Roy, once she realized he’d stepped away. “It’s a trick.”
Are you done? Roy asked her. How much longer?
“Two minutes,” she said, continuing to chip at the wall.
Roy was standing in the adit; Tonnaquin was six feet ahead of him. You come see this, Tonnaquin thought, and you can take it back to the assay office with ya. Show it to all the whores back in town.
What is it? Roy asked, taking another step into the tunnel.
Easier to show you than explain it, Tonnaquin replied, walking away from Roy. Roy followed him another step.
Remember your promise, Roy said.
I ain’t gonna hit you or the lady with my pickaxe, Tonnaquin said, turning to face Roy. Then he was gone.
Roy stood alone in the adit, about five feet from the entrance to the small room where Deem was working. He heard her chipping behind him, and he turned to walk back into the opening. Suddenly Tonnaquin appeared before him at the entrance to the room, swinging his pickaxe wildly. At first Roy was afraid he intended to strike him with it, but Tonnaquin hit the roof of the tunnel, then swung again. A piece of the tunnel’s ceiling fell. Tonnaquin swung a third time, and Roy stepped back as large pieces of the top of the tunnel fell, filling the adit. They continued to fall as he watched, some coming close to where he stood. More pieces began to fall above him, and he took several steps back to avoid them. One rock fell on his right shoulder, and he dropped the lantern.
He saw Tonnaquin behind the rocks as they filled the tunnel, smiling. Then he disappeared again.
When the rocks finally stopped falling, Roy could see only a crack of light from the opening at the top of the rubble. He heard Deem on the other side, calling to him. He reached for his lantern that had fallen on the ground and rolled a few feet from him. It was banged up, but still working.
Roy could hear a faint beeping; Deem’s alarm was going off.
“Roy!” Deem called. “Roy, can you hear me?”
Roy tried to position himself as close to the opening at the top of the rubble pile as he could. “Yes, Deem,” he yelled. “I’m OK.”
“Roy,” Deem said, “we’ve got to take more protection.”
“Can you push the canteen through the opening?” he yelled.
“I don’t think so,” Deem yelled. “There’s only an inch. Maybe if we could move some of the rocks.”
They pushed and pulled at the rocks for a minute, barely enlarging the hole.
“It still won’t fit,” Deem said. “Look, we’ve got a couple of minutes before we’re in trouble. I’m going to come around and get you. The passageway you’re in connects back up with the main one about two hundred feet further, but don’t move, let me come get you, or you’ll just get lost and I’ll have a harder time finding you.”
“Alright,” Roy said. “I won’t move.”
Roy watched as Deem’s light left the opening at the top of the rubble pile. Within a few moments he was all by himself in the dark, with just his lantern. He looked at the collapse in the tunnel – the rocks were huge, it would take machinery to move them. He turned around to look further down the tunnel he was in. It went as far as the light from his lantern would go. As he watched down the tunnel, he saw the snakes returning. Tonnaquin must have left, thinking he’s trapped me, Roy thought.
The snakes approached from the adit ahead. He turned and saw a couple slide through the opening above the rubble. Soon there were dozens of them surrounding him, waiting for his light to go out. He held the lantern up so he could examine it. It was banged up from the fall, but it was still working. Don’t give out on me, he thought.
How long will it take Deem to find me? he wondered. And will she get here before the protection wears off? Death by scorpion is not how I wanted to go.
He looked down and saw the arrival of the scorpions. They crawled over his shoes and used their pinchers to grab at his laces and pant legs. He kicked them off but they just swarmed back. He began to feel a sense of panic – it was bad enough being in a tight, confined place, with earth and rock above you, waiting to come down at any moment. Any little earthquake, and the entire mine could be gone, with him in it. But now he was trapped – rocks behind him, snakes in front of him, and he couldn’t move to save himself. He had to wait for Deem.
What if she gets lost and doesn’t find me? he wondered. What if Tonnaquin traps her?
He checked his watch. It had been four minutes since Deem’s alarm had sounded. He resolved that if she didn’t appear at the five minute mark, he’d have to start walking to keep the scorpions from stinging him. He’d walk back and forth in the adit. If she didn’t come by the ten minute mark, he was going to try and find his way out.
He tried to focus down the adit in front of him, but the number of snakes continued to grow, and their volume was beginning to block his view of the tunnel. He decided to try slipping into the River, to see how they looked from that perspective.
He was assaulted by the sound of them: the hissing, rattling, and slithering. The pop of an occasional strike at him. Their skin didn’t look like the normal scaled surface he associated with snakes. It had an old, leathery, rotten look to it. It reminded him of how the ghost that attacked Steven at St. Thomas looked. They looked like corpses of snakes.
I wonder if Winn’s EM gun would work on them? Roy thought. Not that you’d need one, given that simple light keeps them away. Simple light, right! If only I hadn’t dropped the lantern!
He checked his watch again, dropping out of the flow. Time’s up, he thought. It’s been five minutes. Any second now I’m going to feel a sting if I don’t start walking.
He picked up his feet and marched ten feet down the adit, carrying the lantern with him. Then he turned and walked back to the rubble pile. The scorpions at his feet had a hard time attaching themselves to his shoes as long as he kept in motion. The snakes continued to back off, the red light of his lantern deterring them.
He walked back and forth, back and forth. Every time he walked in the direction of the adit, he strained to see if Deem was coming. She wasn’t. He checked his watch – it was now eight minutes. Two more minutes and he was heading out on his own.
As he turned to march in the opposite direction, his lantern flickered for a second, and then went out.
Shit! he thought, raising the lantern and patting it with his other hand while continuing to walk in the dark. He tapped at it for a couple of seconds and it flickered back.
The snakes, just an inch away from his face, neck, arms and chest, pulled back to their former barrier.
“D
eem!” he yelled. “Deem! I’m in trouble here!”
He kept walking, kicking his feet as he lifted them, knocking scorpions as he went. The snakes continued to move away from his light. Then the lantern failed again.
Roy raised the lantern once more and tapped at it. It flickered back, and he saw the snakes retreat as before. Then it went back out. He tapped again, but it didn’t light. He shook it. He turned the switch on and off. Still no light.
He felt the first set of fangs strike and sink into his right cheek, just below his eye. It didn’t pull back, it left its fangs in him, its body hanging. Roy reached up to try and remove it with his left hand but there was nothing to grab – he was waving at the air. The next stab hit him in his left side, just below his armpit. The third his right leg, above the knee. Then he felt so many bites that he couldn’t place them all. He banged his hand against the lantern, trying to will it back to life. It sputtered for a moment, and he saw the snakes hanging from his body. Then it went back out again.
He felt the new bites, adding to the pain of the old bites. On his arm, on the top of his hand, on his neck. He felt one try to sink its fangs into the top of his head, hitting his skull. He swung his body around, trying to dislodge the snakes, but most held firm. He tried grabbing at them, running his left hand over his body, trying to wrap his fingers around one of them, but they were ghosts – untouchable.
The pain was beginning to overwhelm him. He was going into shock.
He fell onto the ground, unable to stand. He felt the scorpions swarm him, sliding in between the snakes. He felt their legs walking over his face. He raised his hands to swat them away, and instead he felt their stingers lash out at his fingers.
He felt the overwhelming need to go to sleep. I’m going to pass out, he thought. Then he lost consciousness.
Chapter Seven
Steven checked off the last item from the shopping list Eliza relayed to him. He’d found a small medical supply store in Mesquite and was finishing up his purchase.
As he drove back to Overton, he wondered how Roy and Deem were doing. They’d been gone over two hours, so he figured they must be in the heart of the operation. Hopefully they’d return before lunch.
He also wondered about Michael. He hadn’t seen him since yesterday when they’d first found Jason. He wondered if Michael was in his motel room, trancing to St. Thomas, filling Jason’s mind with bullshit.
Then he wondered about Aka Manah. Deem mentioned that demons didn’t care for the downwind area. He wondered if Aka Manah tried to stop by his house, as he promised he’d do, to leave his list of objects that Steven was to obtain. He would not find Steven at home, and he wasn’t likely to travel into this area looking for him. He might think I’ve skipped on the deal, Steven thought. It gave him a little anxiety. He didn’t want to have Aka Manah mad at him. He didn’t know if his promise to protect him from Vohuman would be needed or not – Aka Manah said Vohuman would be pissed, but who knew if that was true or not. Still, he wished there was some way he could just let Aka Manah know that he wasn’t ditching the deal. He had to focus on Jason’s kidnapping – if that’s what it was. Aka Manah would have to wait. There was no Eximere trip in the immediate future.
He pulled into the motel parking lot and took his supplies up to the room where Jason was still lying peacefully on the bed. He called Eliza, put her on speakerphone, and she walked him through the steps he needed to get the IV properly set up and hooked into Jason’s arm.
When it was all done, Steven stopped and looked at Jason, lying in the bed. Seeing him with his arm stuck out, wired to the IV, he lost it. He began to cry.
“Steven,” Eliza said from the speakerphone, “you still there?”
“Yes,” he said, wiping his eyes. He was glad Roy wasn’t around to see him crying – he assumed Roy would just make fun of him if he did. “I’m here.”
“You OK?” Eliza asked.
“Yes, no,” he said. “I don’t know.” He started to lose it again, then stopped himself by becoming angry. “I just feel so goddamn responsible for the trouble my son is in right now. That fucking IV in his arm is my fault.”
“It sounds like you have a plan,” Eliza said. “You’ve met some good people. My friend says Deem is very good at what she does. I think you’re going to be OK. Do you want me to come down?”
“No,” Steven said, “no, you’re right, Deem and Winn seem to know what they’re doing. I don’t know what you could do to help, other than emotional support, which you’re already excelling at.”
“Alright,” she said. “Check that IV every hour, OK? Just to make sure the needle is fine and there’s no infection. If anything looks wrong, call me.”
“Will do,” Steven said. “Thanks Eliza. You’re a lifesaver in so many ways, I can’t thank you enough.”
“No need to thank me,” Eliza said. “We’ll have a drink on that back porch at Eximere when it’s all over, alright?”
“Sounds good,” Steven said. “Bye.”
He hung up, feeling a little better. Eliza always made him feel better.
◊
“Roy!” Deem yelled, setting her lantern down and kneeling next to him. She watched as dozens of snakes released their grip and slithered away from her light. His hands and face were covered with scorpions that had attached themselves with their pinchers. She held the canteen to his lips, pouring a little of the liquid into his mouth. A scorpion that had attached itself to Roy’s lower lip released its grip as the liquid passed by. It scuttled off.
“Swallow!” she said, shaking him. The scorpions attached to his head began to loosen their grip and drop away, but the ones on his hands and fingers remained firmly attached. She could see them repeatedly stinging him with their tails.
Roy swallowed, and she let another small amount dribble from the canteen into his mouth. He swallowed again, and Deem saw the rest of the scorpions dislodge and fall off his body.
She continued to pour small amounts into his mouth as he seemed prepared to swallow. After a few moments she figured she’d poured at least two good mouthfuls, and she sat back, waiting for the protection to take its full effect.
Roy’s eyes fluttered open, and he looked at Deem.
“Oh, it’s you,” he said. “I thought it might be God.”
“No, you’re still alive,” she said. “How do you feel?”
“Like I’ve been bit a hundred times by snakes,” he said, propping himself up on one arm.
“Don’t forget the scorpion bites,” she said. “They were all over you too.”
“I can see why you don’t like to come down here,” Roy said. “Winn is a chicken ass shit. You should make him come with you next time so he appreciates what you go through.”
“That’ll never happen,” she said, standing up. “Can you stand?”
“I think so,” he said, rolling to his knees and pushing himself up. Deem held his arm.
“What took you so long?” Roy said. “I was just starting to enjoy the bites.”
“Tonnaquin,” she said. “He caused another cave in, and I had to take a third route which meant going all the way back to the first junction. What about walking? Do you think we can start heading out?”
“Nothing would please me more,” Roy said, turning to face her. “You lead, I’ll follow. But don’t go too fast. I need to stay in your light.” He raised the broken lantern and showed it to her. “I supposed it can be fixed. The glass isn’t cracked.”
“Maybe,” she said. “Bring it along. There’s a chance it’ll come back on.”
She started down the adit with Roy in tow. Roy was moving slowly, his ability to move his muscles returning gradually. The route back took them deeper into the mine, then back down another adit towards the first junction. The tunnel they were following was harder to maneuver through, with many fallen boulders and uneven floors.
“I can see why you were late to my party,” Roy said. “This isn’t easy going.”
“Just watch your footin
g,” she said. “Don’t want you to take a tumble. How are you feeling now?”
“Better,” Roy said, “but sore. Those bites felt real, even though there’s no marks. I suppose there’s no poison.”
“Not normal poison,” Deem said. “Not like a regular snake or scorpion. You’d be long dead by now if they had been real.”
“Why do you suppose there’s so many here?” Roy asked, struggling to keep up and hoping his question might slow her down a little.
“Don’t know,” she said. “For some reason, every snake for miles around comes here when it dies. No live snakes in here, you’ll notice. Just dead ones. It’s like the live snakes are as scared of ghosts as people are.”
“Do you think it’s the topaz?” Roy asked.
“Could be,” Deem said, “but I don’t think so. I think it’s something else, something in the mine that no one’s discovered. There’s a lot of crazy creatures that live deep in the mines in this area. Some of them were released by the mining, but most of them were created by the radiation. Some of them actually live in the rock itself. Red Hills mine number 3, you can get the spirits to come out of the rock and talk to you if you know how.”
“You’ve done it?” Roy asked.
“A couple of times,” she answered. “My dad taught me. That mine is a lot easier to get into than this one. Regular tourists go in and out all the time. They know something creepy is in the mine, but they don’t know what. I’ve called it out, I’ve seen it. There’s shit like that all over down here.”
They paused for a moment when they reached the final junction on the way out.
“Hear that?” Deem said. Roy stood quietly and listened. They could hear the tap of the pickaxe in the distance, coming down the shaft.
“He’s ahead of us?” Roy asked. “Is that coming down the shaft that’s the way out, or from this other one?”
“The other one,” Deem said. “Come on, let’s hurry. We should be able to speed up now that we’re past all the rocks.”
Roy kept a sharp eye on Deem ahead of him as he picked up his pace and tried to stay within the protective radiance of her lantern. He listened for the sound of Tonnaquin behind him, and he thought he heard it once or twice, but he didn’t dare turn around to look or stop to listen. Deem was moving very quickly, and one pause would place him too far from the lantern and subject to bites from the snakes closely following him.
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