The Blood Mesa dm-5 Page 7

  Scott started to reach for the knife, but April leaned forward and snatched it from Hammond's hand.

  "Let me," she said with a huge smile on her face that chilled Matt almost as much as those tons of snow and ice had. The New Mexico heat seemed far away now.

  April tore Jerry's shirt open, baring his chest and belly. Matt stared down into the pit, his eyes narrowing suddenly as he saw a tiny red sore on Jerry's cheek. A few more were scattered here and there on the young man's face.

  Of course Jerry was still alive, Matt realized, no matter how dead he looked. If you were going to have a sacrifice, you had to have a living victim.

  Matt had planned to wait until the three of them were busy with their grisly work, then leap into the pit and flail around with the ax until he had cut them down. But if Jerry was still alive, he couldn't wait. Maybe, just maybe, he could get Jerry away from here, away from the effect of the altar, before he blew it up.

  But as he tensed his muscles, ready to spring into action, Hammond called, "Now, Stephanie!"

  Shit! He had forgotten Stephanie Porter.

  Matt rolled to the side just as the pick wielded by Stephanie dug into the ground where he had been lying a shaved heartbeat of time earlier. He kicked up, burying his boot heel in her belly. With a heave of his leg he sent her flying over his head, into the excavation.

  As Matt rolled over and scrambled to his feet, he saw Stephanie land on the edge of the altar at the far end. Her back hit its sharp edge first, and even over the generator he heard the crack of bone as her spine snapped. She fell to the ground beside the altar, her upper half writhing frenziedly while her lower half lay limp.

  Before Matt could move, Scott came up the ladder with superhuman speed and tackled him. They rolled across the ground and slid over the edge into the pit. The sudden drop took Matt's breath away. He crashed down with Scott on top of him. The ax flew out of his hand. Scott's fist slammed into his jaw, stunning him.

  Matt fully expected Scott to beat him to death, but Hammond's voice rang out, ordering, "Don't kill him yet! We'll sacrifice him, too."

  Scott dragged Matt to his feet and held him from behind with one arm looped around Matt's throat. At the far end of the altar, Stephanie had stopped twisting around and lay there with her breath rasping in her throat. April still had the knife, and at Hammond's gestured command, she raised it again over Jerry's stomach.

  With a weak flutter of the lids, Jerry's eyes opened.

  "A . . . April . . . what are you . . . April, I . . . I loved you—"

  "And I loved you, Jerry, or at least I tried to," April said as she smiled down at him. Then her lips drew back from her teeth in a hideous grimace. "You were just too fucking weak!"

  She plunged the knife into Jerry's belly.

  He screamed. April yanked down on the knife, slicing him open. The knife clattered on the black stone of the altar as she pulled it out of his body and dropped it. Her hands plunged into the gaping wound she had created in his midsection and brought out shiny, blood-smeared coils of intestines. Jerry kept screaming.

  Matt's mind was racing. Jerry still had the tiny sores on his face, but for some reason the power of the altar wasn't affecting him as strongly as it had the others. Since Jerry still clung to a shred of his humanity, maybe he could put that to use.

  "Fight back, Jerry!" Matt yelled. "Fight!"

  He thought Jerry might be too close to death to muster any strength, but somehow Jerry's arms lifted and his hands shot out, taking April by surprise. He grabbed her wrists and threw her toward Hammond.

  At the same time, Matt leaned back against Scott, lifted his feet, and planted both of them on the side of the altar. He could feel its heat even through the soles of his boots. Straightening his legs and kicking as hard as he could, he propelled Scott back against the wall of the excavation.

  That impact was enough to jar Scott's grip loose. Matt twisted free, scooped up the ax he had dropped a few minutes earlier, and swung. The blade caught Scott in the forehead and split his skull, cleaving bone and brain almost all the way to his shoulders.

  Matt pulled the ax loose as April, screaming obscenities, came at him. He poked the ax in her stomach and caused her to double over. Turning the blade, he came up with it and caught her under the chin.

  There was enough force behind the blow that it sliced her whole face off.

  April collapsed, probably trying to scream through a mouth she didn't have anymore. Matt turned toward Hammond, but the professor was already practically on top of him. Hammond caught Matt around the body, pinning his arms to his sides so he couldn't use the ax, and forced him back against the altar.

  The black stone's searing heat stabbed into Matt's back and made him yell in pain. He head butted Hammond. Rotten flesh split. Hammond reeled back. Matt butted him again. Maybe it was real, maybe it just looked that way to Matt's eyes, but the flesh was peeling away from Hammond's face now, revealing the skull beneath. Matt broke the man's grip and shoved him back against the side of the pit. Hammond had time to scream, "No!" before the ax began to rise and fall, rise and fall.

  Matt didn't stop until there was nothing left but quivering chunks of something that had once been human . . . but not anytime recently.

  Breathing hard, Matt swung around toward the altar. He saw Jerry lying there, trying feebly to stuff his guts back inside his belly. Matt went to him, got an arm around his shoulders, and said, "We'll get you out of here."

  "No . . ." Jerry's voice was a weak whisper. "I can't."

  "You've got to. I have a stick of dynamite. I'm going to blow this damned pit to hell, and everything in it."

  "Can't . . ."

  "Dr. Dupre and some of the others are still alive and all right," Matt said. "They can take care of you, Jerry."

  Jerry shook his head.

  "There's no choice. I have to be here to set off the dynamite."

  Jerry looked up at him. "You'll . . . blow yourself up."

  "That's the way it's got to be."

  One of Jerry's hands clutched at him. "No! I'm . . . as good as dead . . . anyway. Let me . . . set it off."

  "I don't think you're strong enough. You'd have to hit it pretty hard with a pick or a shovel."

  Somehow, Jerry managed to smile. "Gimme . . . a chance. If I can't . . . you can always . . . come back and do it."

  He had a point, Matt realized. By all rights, Jerry should have been dead already. He couldn't have more than a few moments of life left. But maybe that would be enough.

  "Let me help you sit up," Matt said.

  Jerry groaned as Matt pulled him to the far end of the altar and helped him into a sitting position. Some of the loops of intestine still rested on Jerry's thighs.

  As Matt started to get one of the picks lying in the excavation, Stephanie reached out and clutched weakly at his leg with one hand. Matt looked down at her and said, "I'm sorry." He meant it, too.

  That didn't stop him from splitting her skull with the pick.

  Then he handed the tool to Jerry. He reached into his shirt and pulled out the blanket-wrapped stick of dynamite as he went to the lower end of the altar, the end where the face of Mr. Dark was carved.

  "You won't be laughing much longer, you son of a bitch," Matt said as he unrolled the fabric from the greasy red cylinder.

  He placed the dynamite on that end of the altar, where the blast would totally obliterate the carving when it went off. "Can you reach that with the pick?" he asked Jerry.

  "Yeah . . . I can do it . . . Mr. Cahill." Jerry took a deep breath. The movement caused the guts that had spilled out of him to squirm a little. "You better . . . get out of here."

  "Give me a minute or so to put some distance behind us," Matt said. "But only if you can. If you feel yourself slipping away . . . go ahead and hit that sucker as hard as you can."

  "I will," Jerry promised. He summoned up a faint smile. "Blood Mesa. Good name . . . for the place."

  Matt was in awe of the strength that filled the
mild-looking young man. The strength not only to fight off the effect of the altar but also to cling to life for this long when he was so badly hurt.

  "So long, Jerry."

  "So . . . long. Tell Dr. Dupre . . . I expect . . . a good grade."

  "Top marks, Jerry."

  Matt went up the ladder, taking the ax with him, and sprinted toward the place where he had left the others with the truck.

  He had run several hundred yards when he slowed, stopped, and turned to look back. Nothing had happened. He drew in a deep breath. It seemed like he might have to go back and set off the dynamite himself after all. Maybe Jerry had died before he could strike the blow, or maybe Mr. Dark had finally taken complete control of him . . .

  The blast was so powerful it jolted Matt off his feet and threw a ball of fire into the air above the pit. Matt rolled onto his belly and covered his head with his arms to protect it as chunks of rock began to rain from the night sky. Several of them thudded into him. They would leave bruises but no permanent injury.

  Finally the last of the gravel that had been flung into the air by the blast stopped pattering down around him. He climbed to his feet. The explosion had destroyed the generator and the portable lights, too, so again only starlight washed down over the mesa.

  Then the truck's headlights clicked on. Matt turned and walked toward them, gripped by a huge weariness that made him stumble and almost fall.

  Then Ronnie was beside him, running to meet him and put an arm around him and help him. "You did it, Matt!" she said. "You did it! It's over."

  "This time," Matt said, so quietly he didn't know if she heard him or not. He didn't say it again.

  # # # # # #

  Sheer terror was utterly exhausting. The other four survivors slept the rest of the night while Matt stood guard. When dawn had grayed the sky enough for him to see, he took the ax and went back to the excavation.

  The blast had caused the pit to collapse on itself, burying not only the altar but also the bodies of Jerry, Hammond, Scott, April, and Stephanie. The toll was high, but it would have been higher if he hadn't been here, and if Jerry hadn't destroyed the altar. Maybe as high as the whole world.

  He walked back to the trail that led down from the mesa. As he expected, he found that the broken remains of the Indian's Head blocked the path. It would take heavy equipment to clear the trail.

  But a person could slide through some of the narrow gaps and climb over the other obstacles. The interstate was only three miles away. Ronnie and the other three survivors could walk it, especially if they got an early start before the day got too hot. They would be footsore when they got there, but they would be alive.

  He went back to the truck and got his duffel bag. The others were still asleep. He changed out of his blood-drenched clothes, put the ax in the bag, and closed it, slung it over his shoulder. It would be better for all concerned if he was well away from here before they woke up.

  His luck ran out as he was about to walk away. Ronnie pushed herself up on an elbow and whispered, "Matt?"

  He motioned for her to be quiet. She got to her feet, and they walked out of earshot of the others before she said, "What do you think you're doing? You're going to abandon us here, after everything we've been through? You can't just walk away."

  "I have to. The sort of thing we've just been through . . . that's my life now, and it's better if I face it alone."

  "What are we supposed to do?"

  "Walk back to the interstate and call for help. If I was you, though, I wouldn't tell the authorities exactly what happened up here. Just tell them it was, I don't know, a drunken brawl that got out of hand."

  "With eleven people dead, do you really think anybody will believe that?"

  "They're more likely to believe that than the truth," Matt said.

  Ronnie wasn't able to argue with that. She just stared at him for a long moment and then said, "Damn it, Matt, it's not fair. You save our lives, you stop God knows what sort of even worse thing from happening, and then you just walk away and don't tell anybody?"

  "That's the way it needs to be. The way it has to be."

  "It's just not fair," Ronnie said again.

  Matt thought about everything that had happened to him in the past year and said, "Not much in life is."

  # # # # # #

  An hour later, an elderly rancher in a pickup stopped to give him a lift as he trudged along the two-lane blacktop.

  "Where you headed, son?" the old-timer asked.

  Matt nodded toward the windshield. "Thataway."

  THE END

  If you liked James Reasoner's THE BLOOD MESA, you might also enjoy his acclaimed novel UNDER OUTLAW FLAGS, now available as an ebook. Here's the prologue and first two chapters…

  PROLOGUE

  1965

  It was a mom-and-pop grocery store, too small to be air-conditioned, but the shade was still a welcome relief from the blazing heat of the Texas summer afternoon outside. The man stopped just inside the screen doors, pushed back his hat, and pulled a handkerchief from his pocket to mop away the sweat from his forehead. His tie hung loose around his throat, his coat was slung over one arm, and the sleeves of his white shirt were rolled up. He looked around. A square formed by waist-high wooden counters filled the center of the big room. The cash register, an old-fashioned model with a pull handle on the side, stood behind the counter facing the doors. In front of that same counter was a red metal box shaped like a coffin, with COCA-COLA written on it in white letters. A metal spinner rack stood at the right end of the soda pop box, and a sign on top of it read HEY KIDS! COMICS! Two little boys were turning the rack slowly, studying intently the array of colorful comic books displayed on it. The fat one wore glasses that constantly slipped down on his nose and had to be pushed back up.

  Shelves full of canned goods, bread, bags of flour and sugar, cans of motor oil and dog food, and bags of potato chips ran to the right and left, forming precise aisles. Shovels and fishing poles hung on hooks on the right half of the store's rear wall. To the left, with room to walk behind it, sat a refrigerated, glass-fronted butcher case full of hamburger meat, steaks, ribs, and chickens. The door that led to storage rooms was in the center of the rear wall. Somewhere back there, a swamp cooler banged and rattled.

  "Howdy," said the man who sat on a stool behind the cash register. "Come on in out of the heat, mister. What can I do for you?"

  The stranger moved deeper into the almost cavern like interior of the store. He was slender, dark, intense, a vivid contrast to the burly, genial man behind the counter. The storekeeper's hair had been brown once, but nearly all of that hue had faded away with the years, leaving the thinning strands silver. The stranger figured the storekeeper was at least seventy.

  "Mighty hot outside," the stranger said.

  "Got popsicles in the box back here," the storekeeper said, turning on the stool to gesture at another metal box next to the rear counter. "They'll cool you right off. Got Cokes in the front box if you'd rather have that."

  "Thanks." The stranger hung his coat on the back of a wicker chair at the left end of the Coke box and dropped his hat on the seat. He lifted the lid of the box, reached in, pulled a six-ounce bottle from the bed of crushed ice. An opener was attached to the front of the box. He used it to pry the cap off, then lifted the bottle quickly to his mouth as the drink inside began to well out of the neck. The stranger sucked greedily on it, then sighed in appreciation as he lowered the bottle a moment later. "Half-frozen. Can't beat that."

  "Not even with a stick," the storekeeper agreed. He grinned, then glanced over at the spinner rack. "You boys figured out which o' them funny books you want yet?"

  "Just about, Mr. Matthews," the fat kid replied.

  The stranger took another swig of the melting Coke and said to the storekeeper, "You must be Drew Matthews."

  "That's right. We haven't met, have we?"

  "No, sir."

  "But I know who you are. You're one o' them newspaper fella
s, ain't you?"

  The stranger smiled. "Does that bother you?"

  "Nope. One o' you boys shows up about every ten years or so, when they figure everybody's forgotten again about the Tacker Gang."

  "Are you willing to talk about it?" asked the reporter. "Especially the part about the war? I understand it's quite a story."

  Short, silvery bristles stood out on Drew Matthews's jaw and chin. He lifted his hand and rubbed it over the stubble, making a faint rasping sound. "I suppose I could reminisce a little," he said. "If you're really interested, that is."

  The reporter nodded. "I am. And I think my readers will be too."

  "Well, since business ain't very brisk this afternoon— and ain't likely to be until after it starts to cool off a little— why don't you pull up that chair and sit down while we talk?"

  The reporter picked up the wicker chair and carried it over by the side counter. As he did so, the two little boys brought a stack of comic books to the counter on the other side. "Can we get these and a couple of root beer popsicles, Mr. Matthews?" one of them asked.

  "How many funny books you got there? One, two, three, four, five of 'em, at twelve cents apiece, that's sixty cents, and them popsicles are twenty-five cents each . . .."

  "I got a dollar," the fat kid said.

  Matthews nodded. "Close enough for gover'ment work. Get your popsicles and go on out on the sidewalk while you eat 'em, so you won't be drippin' on the floor in here."

  The boys got their popsicles from the freezer and hurried out, arguing over which one of them would get to read the new issue of Spider-Man first.

  When the screen doors had slammed behind the boys, Matthews leaned back a little on his stool and said, "Thought it might be a good idea if them little fellas left before I started tellin' you about what happened back in the old days. Some of it wasn't very pretty, you know."

  "Whatever you want to tell me," the reporter said, "I want to hear it."

  "You understand, I wasn't there for everything that happened. Most of it, but not everything. Course, I heard all about it later from the other fellas. I'll just tell it the best way I know how. I reckon the whole thing started in Nevada, in a little place called Flat Rock . . .."