by Edwin Dasso
“And Jesup was never heard from again,” Symon said.
“Looks that way,” Mayher replied.
Symon huffed. “Ok. Let Agent Denzel know we have a lead, tell him we’re going to start digging on this.”
She nodded and made the call.
Symon pulled into a gas station to fill the tank, and while he was waiting, he picked up the top sheet from the copies Cox had made for them. It was one of the Decalogue Stone records.
The sheet had a grainy black-and-white photo of the stone, with the carved characters highlighted. Beneath the photo there was a typed summary of what Frank Hibben—the archaeologist who had discovered the stone—insisted would be the meaning of the discovery.
Symon had seen Alex Kayne’s translation of the stone. He didn’t see how any of it related to Dr. Rivers’ disappearance. But at this point, nothing could be ruled out. She had mentioned the stone in her text. So there was a connection.
The pump shut off, and Symon replaced the nozzle. He climbed back into the driver’s seat.
“Got an address on the landlord. He’s still alive. Lives in a senior care facility near here.”
Symon nodded, and they started driving.
Thoughts of the Mystery Stone, and what it had to do with Dr. Rivers’ disappearance, danced around in his mind. Along with those were thoughts of Alex Kayne.
He should check in with her soon.
Knowing her, though, she was at least a thousand miles away, staying off the radar as much as possible while helping out whoever her next client was.
Symon sighed.
He realized that if she were here, he’d have to arrest her. Deal or no deal, confidential informant or not, arresting Alex Kayne was his duty. He’d do it.
He sighed again.
Stay as far away from here as possible, he thought.
5
The dark was starting to get to her.
Clara had been hunkered here for who knew how long—the darkness pressing in all around her, like a weight. Like the five miles of stone above her.
She could feel every mile, pressing, crushing.
The little bouncing digital clock on the computer next door had stopped being a comfort to her long ago, if it ever had been.
The silence was the worst of it. It scared her in a way she had never expected. She’d never heard such complete, utter silence in her life. It frightened her to every corner of her soul.
But it was the little things that broke the silence that frightened her more.
Skitters, somewhere in the darkness. The sound of something falling to the floor. The creak of something she couldn’t identify.
The scraping.
It had started a few days ago, and at first she’d thought it was nothing. Just more of the Pit’s quirks, she told herself. This was when she was still trying to be positive, still trying to keep herself together.
Scraaaaaaape.
It had come like a long sigh, from some unseen ghoul in the darkness. She couldn’t quite figure out where it had originated, at first. It wouldn’t matter if she could.
Some time later—she had no idea how long…
Scraaaaaaape.
This time she’d been leaning against the door when it came, and she could hear that it was coming from the other side.
She wailed, but clamped her hand over her mouth, crab-crawling backward into the dark, toward the glass window that kept her from the only source of light she had, toward the bouncing clock on the computer display.
The sound didn’t immediately come again.
Is he screwing with me?
The man with the face tattoo—that stupid face tattoo—had chased her to this room. He’d been screaming at her the whole way. “Get out! Get out! You don’t belong here!”
She might have talked to him, might have reasoned with him, if it hadn’t been for the thing in his hand. She didn’t know what it was—a long, wicked hunk of metal, a jagged, broken end that came to a curved point. Maybe it was a broken machete. She wasn’t sure. But it was clear that whatever it might once have been, now it was a weapon—a thing meant to rend and tear at flesh.
Like the man himself, it was something that seemed monstrous. Just its existence was revolting.
In her brief glimpse of it, she’d seen that jagged, hooked end and thought it was covered in dried blood. It was probably rust, she decided later. The thought that it was blood was just too much. She couldn’t bare it, cringing here in the dark, thinking of that… that thing, drenched in blood and thirsty for more.
Thirsty for her blood.
She wouldn’t allow herself to even think about it.
She’d given the man the slip for a while, ducking into corridors and rooms. She’d come across a vast space filled with pools—like below-ground swimming pools, but filled with something green and gross. Algae, maybe? It was in that room that she’d dropped the phone into the drain. The only thing she could think to do.
It seemed so stupid now.
She’d give anything to have that phone back. That light. No signal, sure, but she’d at least have light. Photos to look at. Music to listen to. Something to remind her that there was a world outside this room, somewhere.
It would have been a huge comfort, until it died.
Why had she tossed it away? She wasn’t even sure it would reach anywhere that had signal—it was just…
Scraaaaaaape.
She screamed, and again scurried backward, pushing herself into a rack of canned goods. Something fell on her from above, like a sandbag, and she thought her heart would explode.
She felt around for it.
A bag. Paper. Soft. Firm.
Flour, she thought.
She could feel that some of it had leaked out on her. She could feel the silty grains of it on her face, her shoulders, in her hair. She was probably covered in the stuff.
Flour gets everywhere, she thought. It gets everywhere…
She remembered the first and last time she’d tried baking. Dropping the bag of flour. The explosion of it, settling over everything like dust. There was still flour on things when she moved to a new place, four years later.
She laughed at the memory, relieved for it.
But the sound scared her, in the silence of the room, echoing from the walls, the glass of the window. It didn’t sound natural. It sounded disconnected—disembodied.
She laughed again. This time, it sounded even worse. High pitched, panicked, insane.
She was going to go insane in this place.
She had to get out of this place.
Scraaaaaaape.
Another scream, and now she was crying, pulling her knees to her chest, burying her face against them, holding her hands to her ears.
Scraaaaaaape.
She picked up the bag of flour and threw it at the door where it exploded in a puff of particles, erupting in all directions.
In the dim, green-tinted light from the computer’s screensaver, she could see a cloud of dust rise and shift, moving in the air of the room, like a phantom.
Her mind started making shapes of it, started finding patterns in it. A face—glowing green, shifting as if alive, two large, empty eyes, a gaping mouth, the clear expression of malice and hate and hunger…
Scraaaaaaape.
Clara moaned and fought a scream as she scrambled to her feet, knocking more cans and other unseen objects from the rack behind her. She started frantically grabbing at everything she could put her hands on, reaching, pulling, finally climbing.
She found herself on the top of the rack, which was firmly bolted to the cinderblock wall. She reached the top. She pulled herself into a ball and sobbed.
She didn’t know why she was up here. It just felt like the thing to do. Get as high off of the ground as she could. Get as far from the door as she could. Get away from the man—the thing outside the door.
Scraaaaaaape.
He was out there.
The man with the face tattoo was playing with her.
Trying to scare her.
And it was working.
And that finally pissed her off.
The light from the screensaver wasn’t much, but it was enough to light up the particles of flour, drifting in the air. She could still see them shifting and lingering, floating as motes in the tiny green light.
She had an idea.
She took a few deep breaths, let them out slowly, got herself as calm as she could manage.
Scraaaaaaape.
Nope, she thought. Not this time. She tightened her jaw, clenched her fists, took deep, calming breaths.
Though, in truth, her heart started racing again at the sound. Adrenalin was pumping through her. She was more scared than mad—but at least she was mad and getting madder.
And she would use it.
She was a scientist. She was a federal agent, for God’s sake! This B-Movie horror crap wasn’t going to take her down. Not without a fight.
She was still on the top shelf of the storage rack, but now she was looking down, assessing.
The particles of flour had started to settle back to the floor. The air was clearing. Only a few wafting clouds could be seen in the bouncing light of the computer display.
She climbed down to the floor, stepping carefully. She’d managed to make the space a minefield of tripping hazards, in her panic.
When she got to the door, she had to feel around for the bag of flour.
It had burst open, and was laying in a drift of its former contents, sagging like its life had been drained from it. A husk of its former self.
She felt for the mound of flour on the floor. She grasped some of it in her hand and then stood and faced the window.
The clock showed 2:45. It was about to bounce from one corner of the screen. Its greenish light seemed barely visible, though it was bright enough for what she had planned.
She held up her palm and blew on the little pile of flour there.
A tiny cloud puffed into the air, and she watched it. She focused every bit of attention she had on it. She strained eyes, following it.
Scraaaaaaape.
Screw you!
The puff of flour rose and then moved.
It was hard—almost impossible—to see where it went in the dim, nearly invisible light from the screensaver. But it gave her the direction. She had a course to set.
She once again climbed the rack, but this time she was moving toward a goal. She had to shove more things off of the top shelf, as she went, and the clatter to the floor was nerve-wracking. Surely the man with the face tattoo could hear it, too. He had to be wondering at what she was doing. Would he figure it out? Would he be able to get to her, if she went through with this?
By the time she reached her destination, the adrenaline was making her shake and tremble.
Scraaaaaaape.
It felt like a spike through her guts, but she didn’t scream. She couldn’t panic. Not now.
She reached out with her hand, felt along the wall.
There!
A grate.
Small, but not too small. She was slender. Yoga. Thank God for Yoga! She could fit.
She ran her fingers along its edges, searching.
Two screws.
That was it. Just two screws, and maybe—maybe—she had a way out!
She would find something in this room. She’d make a screwdriver, somehow. She could do that. She was clever, she reminded herself. She’d figure this out, and she’d get out of here.
The princess is saving herself in this one, she thought, and laughed.
She tried not to be bothered by the fact that the laugh sounded just as panicked as it had earlier. Any sound, every sound, was as awful as that scraping sound, in this darkness.
Scraaaaaaape.
She felt herself crying, almost sobbing, but couldn’t quite decide what it meant. And it didn’t matter. She had a job to do.
She got to work.
6
The drive into the hills surrounding Los Lunas was pretty uneventful, and Kotler was using the time to scan through some history surrounding the Decalogue stone, looking for anything that might provide some insight into how the stone was connected to Dr. Rivers and the Pit.
Kotler and Denzel had visited the stone on the day they’d arrived in New Mexico, hiking into the hills with a couple of local experts, inspecting the stone itself. Kotler had snapped several images using his phone, but they were no more revealing than anything he could have found online.
The site had been visited by thousands of people over the years, each leaving their own little trace of history here and there, in small and sometimes big ways. Tourists left fingerprints that inevitably changed the story of the stone, despite its remote location and the requirement of a permit to visit. After so many decades of this, it might be impossible to discover the truth about it.
Kotler had studied the stone from every angle, including all available translations. He added Alex Kayne’s translation to the pile and was impressed at the thoroughness. There were cross references within cross references, and links to in-depth research into the stone. There was also a complete history—everything anyone anywhere knew about “The Los Lunas Mystery Stone,” ranging from expert opinion to amateur speculation and conspiracy theories.
It was an incredible amount of information—there were entire academic journals that had fewer citations and references.
Unfortunately, it all added up to exactly nothing, as far as Kotler could determine. Nothing that would help with finding Dr. Rivers, at any rate.
He glanced up from his iPad, rubbing his eyes. He could hear music coming from the 4x4’s stereo, and between that and the rumble of the engine, plus the wind and road noise as they crossed the rough terrain, it was difficult to hear the conversation that Denzel and the other agent were having.
He glanced to his side and noted that Alex Kayne was sitting nearly rigid, watching the landscape pass by.
He leaned toward her. “I was just looking over the files you sent to Agent Symon,” he whispered.
She glanced quickly at the two FBI agents in the front seat, and Kotler shook his head. “Nothing to worry about.”
“Says the one who isn’t wanted by the feds!” Her voice was a fierce whisper, so quiet in comparison to the noise of the vehicle that Kotler almost couldn’t hear her from just inches away.
He smiled and shook his head again. “I’ve had my turn at that. Though, admittedly, I wasn’t a fugitive for anywhere near as long as you’ve been. I’d love to pick your brain about that some time.”
Kayne frowned. “About being on the run? Why?”
Kotler shrugged. “I’m an anthropologist, and something of an amateur psychologist. I like to know why people do the things they do. The best way to learn is to study the more… abnormal behavior.”
He’d tried to choose his words carefully, but if Kayne was offended, she showed no sign.
“I do what I do because it keeps me from living the rest of my life in a cell,” she said with a shrug.
Kotler laughed. “Oh, I think it’s quite a bit more than that. I’ve seen your file. You could be anywhere on the planet right now. But you’re here.”
“Chalk it up to bad habit,” she frowned.
“What’s the habit?” Kotler asked.
Kayne sighed, shaking her head. “Something my grandfather taught me. Something that’s more or less been my… I don’t know, my guiding principle. Always finish the job.”
Kotler smirked, shaking his head again. “Ok, again, I’m pretty sure it’s more than that. What makes you take on these jobs in the first place?” He held up a hand. “Actually, I think I know the answer to that.”
She gave him a surprised look. “So what do you think it is?”
He shrugged. “It isn’t a big mystery. You’re on the receiving end of an injustice. A pretty big one. It’s unfair, and it’s upturned your whole life. There doesn’t seem to be anyone you can turn to who can actually help. But you have something that gives
you a kind of super power—QuIEK makes it easy for you to move around in the world, I’m guessing. And you’re the type of person who feels responsible. So, you help people who don’t have the advantages you have. People like you, who are being let down by the system. I think that instead of running, this is your way of fighting back.”
She said nothing, but looked out the window for a moment. Finally she turned back to him. “So, you’ve been pretty focused on all that research about the stone. Found anything?”
He shook his head. “No. Nothing useful.”
Kayne considered this and shook her head as well. “Me neither. I can tell you everything that’s ever been put online about that stone, but I can’t tell you how it connects with Dr. Rivers, or the Pit.”
“But the Pit,” Kotler said, suddenly warming up. “That’s something! You managed to get a lot of details.”
“Hardly anything, really,” she said. “There’s a lot missing.”
Kotler was surprised. “There is? How do you know?”
She thought for a second, then scooted closer, leaning in. “Ok,” she said, “so here’s the thing. QuIEK is an AI. It’s about as intelligent as a piece of software can get, but it’s still dependent on input and instructions to know what to do, what to look for. I’m pretty good at feeding it the right input, asking the right questions. It’s not as simple as asking it to ‘go and fetch me X.’ I have to point it in the right direction and ask for exactly what I want.”
“Ok,” Kotler nodded.
“I did that here. I’ve done it a million times. I get a lot of answers. A lot of data. And in all that, even though QuIEK is pulling it all together, applying logic, weeding things out, I still have to have a sense of what belongs and what doesn’t. And… well, also what isn’t there. I started picking up hints of that, while the data was coming in. Something is missing. Someone deleted records. Deliberately hid things. And…” She paused, glancing forward as Agent Denzel’s phone rang, the ring tone audible even over the noise of the 4x4. He answered it and started talking in a low voice to whoever was on the other side.
