by Tom Clarke
THE CAVE
The Basement
Chapter II
By Tom Clarke
©2018
THE CAVE, The Basement Chapter II © Copyright 2018 by Tom Clarke
First Electronic Printing April 2018
All RIGHTS RESERVED
All books copyrighted to the author and may not be resold or given away without written permission from the author, Tom Clarke.
This novel is a work of fiction. Any and all characters, events, and places are of the authors imagination and should not be confused with fact. Any resemblance to person, living or dead, or events or places is merely coincidence. Novel intended for adults only. Must be 18 years or older to read due to the graphic nature of the story line and extensive use of coarse language.
The Cave
1932
Montana
Home
The Hospital
Shelly
The Deal
CI-1307
Sarah
The Shop
Centurion Longinus
Red’s Curiosities
Waking Up
The Cave
The Smell of Burning Rubber
Compound
Snakes, Wolves, and Smokeless Powder
Because the Raven Said So
Home
1.
1932
1932, Horseshoe Mesa, Grand Canyon National Park, Arizona: The heat of the day beat down oppressively on John and Mary Stuperman--who were used to the heat from living in Arizona for the past several years and working for the National Park Service as field researchers. As they got close to the entrance to the cave they had been looking for in an obscure area of Horseshoe Mesa John stopped to wipe the sweat from his face and check his map.
“John” Mary said, “I’m telling you we’re lost, there are no caves in this area. That old Navajo you stole that map from had no idea what he was talking about.”
“Please Mary” John replied, “I did not steal it, I paid him a good price for it and besides, if there is an uncharted cave with artifacts in it why should we not be the ones to profit from it, not some old, drunk Indian.”
“John, you are a real piece of work! He was only drunk because you got him that way and then convinced him that he didn’t need the map because it was a fake, when you knew all too well that it is not.”
John looked at his wife and smiled, she was right after all, it was not a fake, it was as real as they got, an artifact.
The map, which, if the old Indian was to be believed, had been drawn by a Civil War solider found dying in the desert by members of the Navajo. The story had been handed down over the years saying that the map led to a cave which contained religious artifacts. Along with the religious relics came some additional baggage, a curse, or at least that was how it was told by the Navajo elders.
According to the old Indian the Navajo had kept the map as a talisman of sorts to ward off the evil in the cave. The evil that, according to the solider, had killed his entire squad, the evil that he had managed to escape only by luring his friends to their deaths inside the cave, the evil that had promised to let him live if he only helped it…. eat.
“John, what if there is something to the curse that old drunk was talking about?” Mary asked with a sense of uncertainty in her voice.
“Mary please” John replied as he took a long drink from his canteen, “you and I are professionals and we do not believe in that nonsense. All it is bogeymen and ghost stories meant to scare little Indian kids. Now come on, the entrance should be just over that next rise.”
As John and Mary reached the top of a small rise they could see what looked at first to be a large mound of rocks in front of the next hill. Closer inspection revealed that obscured within the rocks was a small cave entrance about four-feet high and a few feet wide.
“That’s it!” John exclaimed. “Come on, let’s go see what all the fuss is about!” Moving like a couple of kids heading to the tree Christmas morning, John and Mary found themselves at an almost quick jog as they traversed down the rise they were standing atop and towards the cave entrance.
Mary stopped and grabbed her husband by the arm, “John, look, those tracks, they look like they are leading out of the cave.”
John looked down at the tracks his wife had noticed, “What are those, wolf?” he said in a puzzled tone.
“I don’t know” Mary replied, “I don’t think I have seen any quite like them in the park.”
Suddenly, as if on que, the wind kicked up and the prints leading out of the cave were gone. Just as quickly as they were blown away by the wind they were dismissed by John, “Come on Mary, hand me the flashlight out of my pack.”
Mary handed her husband the flashlight he had brought along. Hunched over and guided by their flashlight Mary and John entered the cave. As they made their way in the small opening it soon gave way to a large chamber, large enough for them to stand up in. The chamber was circular in design with two small passageways leading off in separate directions.
Mary started looking around with her own flashlight. Under the low power of the flashlight she started to notice the interior construction of the cave, “John, this is not a natural feature, this cave was dug out. See, look here on the wall, you can see the tool marks.”
“Mary, look over here, petroglyphs, and they look pretty old.” Mary came over to where John was standing, shining his flashlight on the wall of the cave. “Have you ever seen anything like this before?” John asked.
“No….no I haven’t. John, look at this one here, it’s some sort of a spiral pattern with inscriptions around it.”
“Oh my God” John said in an excited voice, “Mary, there are bullet holes in the wall over here by this passage.”
As soon as her husband said he had found bullet holes in the wall Mary had a chill run through her entire body. The story that the old Indian had told them about the Civil War solider tricking his friends into becoming food for the monster that lived in the cave suddenly became a little more real.
She turned and started to walk towards her husband when she caught her foot on something protruding from the dirt floor of the cave. As she fell forward Mary gave out a slight scream and then landed hard on her knees.
“Mary, what happened?” John said as he rushed over to his wife’s aid.
“I tripped on that damn thing!” Mary replied shining her light on what looked to be a piece of rock sticking up out of the dirt.
“Are you okay?” John asked as he helped his wife to her feet.
“Yes, what is that? It almost looks like the corner of something” Mary said brushing the dirt from her clothing.
John knelt down and started to dig some of the dirt away from the object with his hands, “Jesus Mary, it’s a tablet, a stone tablet of some sort. Get me the small spade from my pack.”
Mary opened the backpack and pulled out the small hand spade and a large brush used for the excavation of artifacts. She handed both to John who handed her his flashlight. “Here” he said, “keep some light on it for me as I dig it up.”
Mary shined the two flashlights onto the object as her husband started to remove the dirt around it. The more that John dug, the more of a stone tablet appeared. After some more digging with the spade, as well as with his hands, John removed a solid stone tablet from the ground. The tablet was about two-feet in length and two-feet in height and a few inches thick. The edges were rounded by time and weathering, the back of the tablet was rough like stone, but the front was smooth.
John pulled the tablet from the ground and laid it flat at his feet. “Mary, shine some more light over here” John said as he admired his first of what was sure to be many finds in the cave.
“Look at this carving” John said as he ran his hands ove
r the smooth surface of the stone. “It’s the same inscription as that petroglyph on the wall over there.”
“Oh my God John!” Mary blurted out, “those inscriptions mixed in with that spiral pattern, they’re Egyptian.”
“What? Are you sure?” John replied.
“As sure as we are standing here. John do you have any idea what we have found?” John looked at his wife with a blank stare on his face, “John, this is an Egyptian relic in a cave in Arizona.”
A smile slowly spread across John’s face as the implication started to sink in, the implication of money. “Can you read it?” John asked his wife as he worked on exposing the carving on the tablet with the hand brush.
“No, but I am 100% certain it’s Egyptian” Mary replied, the excitement raising her voice an octave or two higher.
“Well, there must be more in here!” John said as he started scanning the ground with his flashlight.
As John scoured the area they had found the tablet Mary walked towards the back of the cave looking at the entrance to one of the passages. She could see in the dim light of her flashlight more petroglyphs placed all around the entrance, running across the top and down the sides of the passage.
As Mary gazed into the darkness of the passage she was suddenly enveloped by a feeling of cold. Not a cold brought on by the wind, there was no wind in the cave, but a cold that seemed to drive right through her.
Looking hard into the beam of light cast forward from her hand, she could start to see her breath. “John?” Mary started to say before she was interrupted by a voice from the darkness.
“Mommy, is that you?” said a small child in a desperate voice. “Mommy please help, I’m scared.”
“John, did you hear that?” Mary asked.
“Hear what” John replied from his hands and knees digging through the dirt.
“Please, help me” came the little girl’s voice, almost as an echo out of the darkness of the passage.
Mary, without taking her eyes off the passageway, said, “John, I think there’s a child down this passage.”
John didn’t look up from his digging, all he could think of was finding another piece of history that would bring them riches, “What’s that dear?”
“I’m going to look down this passage” Mary said as she stepped into the darkness, almost hypnotized by the sound of the child’s voice coming from deep within the darkness.
As Mary stepped into the passage what little light there was immediately dimmed. Looking at her flashlight she started giving it a shake, then tapped it against her hand. Undaunted, she pressed on, “Hello” Mary called out.
There was no answer, she called out again, “Hello, can you hear me, where are you?” Mary heard a low hissing sound and then a reply from the little girl, “Help me, I’m so cold, please…. help me.”
“Stay there, I’m coming!” Mary replied. Moving down the passage towards the voice of the child Mary yelled back to her husband, “John, come quick there’s a child down here!”
Stepping into the open end of the passage she found it hard to breathe, it was almost as though she had just run a sprint race and could not catch her breath. “Hello?” Mary said as she tried to search the darkness with her failing flashlight, “hello, can you hear me?”
There was no reply from the child, only silence and darkness.
Then, in the corner of an open area Mary saw an item glinting from the light of her flashlight. She bent over to inspect the item which was covered in dirt. As she picked up the pointed metal piece she again suddenly felt very cold. A sense of panic overwhelmed her as she inspected the item she had picked up and realized it was the broken tip of a rifle bayonet.
“Help me” came the little girl's voice again from the other side of the open area, directly between Mary and the passage that lead back to her husband.
Mary peered into the darkness, now in a state of full panic, terrified to the point that she could barely speak.
“Help me” the voice said again, this time not in the voice of a little girl, but in the voice of an adult male in pain.
Mary stumbled backward, running into the wall at the end of the passage as she moved as far as she could away from the voice.
Shining her dimming flashlight into the darkness where the voice came from, she saw a man dressed in a Civil War Army uniform walking towards her, his sinister gray eyes piercing the darkness as he approached her.
“Help me” the man said again, then smiling, “I’m so hungry.”
John stood up from his digging like a shot, trying to understand what he had just heard. A faint call, it sounded like his wife, then screaming. “Mary,” he called out into the darkness of the passageway, “Mary, are you okay?”
There was no reply. A cold sensation cut through him like a winter breeze, his mind was racing, he could almost envision something rushing up the passageway at him. Fear gripped John Stuperman in a way he had never experienced.
“Mary,” he called out again, “Mary, answer me!”
The answer came almost as a whisper, “John” Mary replied, “John bring the tablet! Hurry!” Hearing the urgency in his wife’s voice John grabbed the tablet and started to move towards the entrance of the passageway.
He looked up and just like his wife Mary saw the petroglyphs carved around the top and down the side of the entrance to the passage. As John moved closer to the entrance with the tablet he saw that the petroglyphs started to shine a little brighter, they were not illuminated, they just seemed more pronounced.
He stopped just short of entering the passageway, looking at the carvings on the wall. It was as if they were telling him not to go into the passage. “John please, hurry! Bring the tablet!” Mary called out again snapping John from his pseudo-hypnotic state.
Carrying the tablet John ran as fast as he could down the passageway towards his wife’s voice, his flashlight guiding the way. “I’m coming Mary!” he called out.
As John entered the open space at the end of the passageway he could see his wife’s flashlight on the ground near the back wall. He looked up, using his own light to illuminate the darkness and saw his wife being held against the wall by a man in a Civil War Army uniform.
“Bring me the tablet and I will release your wife” the man said in a voice that seemed to echo in the cavern with a metallic twinge to it.
“Who are you?” John started to say.
The man turned and looked at him, his gray eyes driving through the darkness, stabbing into John’s soul like daggers. “You know who I am. Bring me the tablet or I will kill her!”
Terror suddenly welled up inside John as he realized that the story the old Indian had told him was not just some drunken tale. There was evil in the cave and it was about to kill his wife.
“No!” John blurted out. “Here, take the table, just don’t hurt my wife.”
John walked forward and set the tablet on the ground at the feet of his wife’s attacker. The soldier let go of Mary and she collapsed to the ground, he reached down and put both of his palms against the table upon the spiral carving causing it to glow. The soldier stood there much like a man in the winter cold, warming himself by a camp fire. As the glow of the tablet became brighter the solider started to smile, pulling his lips back across his teeth which were jagged and sharp.
John rushed to his wife, knelt, and brushed the hair from her face. She was cold, her breathing was shallow and labored.
“John,” Mary said, “he marked me John.” John looked at his wife with confusion in his eyes, then he turned and looked at the man who they had encountered in the cave. His eyes grew wide as he tried to scream in fear as the solider suddenly was upon him, grabbing him by the throat.
“Hello John” the soldier said, smiling, showing John those jagged, sharp teeth, more like the teeth of an animal than those of a human.
John reached up and grabbed the soldier’s wrist in a vain attempt to break free from his grip. The more that he struggled the tighter the grip became. Joh
n started to panic, his body convulsing and his feet kicking wildly. The soldier pulled John closer to him, smiling, looking into the eyes of his victim, relishing in the fear and terror that John was experiencing.
“Feeding time” were the last words that John heard on this planet as the solider drove the bottom half of a broken off rifle bayonet into John’s neck. After removing John’s head from his body, the solider then turned to Mary, who, though barely conscious had been awake to witness the entire gruesome event.
“Thank you, Mary,” the soldier said, hissing in Mary’s face. “I have been trapped in this cave for far too long.”
“Why?” Mary said in almost a whisper.
Smiling, the solider held up John’s head, looked at it, and then said, “Why, because I can, and because I’m hungry! They summoned me in a bid for power, then they trapped me in this cave, and you my little cattle have freed me.”
The soldier stood up and threw John’s head against the wall just above where Mary was lying. Looking down at his second victim, he said, “Oh, by the way, what year is it?” Mary didn’t answer, she couldn’t, her body was shutting down.