Untcigahunk: The Complete Little Brothers

by Rick Hautala

  But it was the scarred hillside towering up against the darkening sky that held Stan’s attention. Deep gouges lined the steep side of the hill where the men had blasted away the red granite ledges. Huge blocks of rock jutted out from the dirt like the rotten, crooked teeth of a long-buried giant. In the dimming light, Stan could see high up on the hillside more than a dozen dark tunnel mouths. They looked like black, sightless eyes. Piles of rubble lay at the base of the hill, waiting for the men to return in the morning to load them up and truck them off.

  Did they even bother to check over these rocks to see if there was anything valuable? Stan wondered. Did anyone even bother to look inside those tunnels?

  For all anyone knew, Watchick Hill might be honeycombed with caves that could be part of an old gold mine, or it might be loaded with Indian arrowheads or something else that was valuable.

  He stared up at the nearest cave opening. It was no more than forty feet up the hillside and looked to be three, maybe four feet wide. Stan couldn’t stop wondering what might lay hidden inside there.

  “Only one way to find out,” he answered himself aloud.

  Unwrapping the burlap bag form the handlebars, he leaned his bike against one of the barricades, jumped the trench, and started up the hillside. The slope was steeper than it had looked, and he had to lean forward and paddle his hands on the ground in front of him for balance as he made his way up. Loose soil kept slipping out from underfoot, and just about every step started a mini-landslide. He found that by cutting across the face of the hill first one way, then the other, he could zigzag back and forth. Before long, he arrived at the narrow slanting ledge in front of the open cave mouth. Another, stronger shiver rippled through him as he got down to his hands and knees, and stuck his head into the dark hole. The air inside blew cold and dank from the tunnel into his face.

  “What the—?” he whispered.

  His voice echoed from the deep recesses of the cave with an odd reverberation. He knew if air was blowing out of the tunnel, that meant there had to be another opening somewhere at the other end.

  Stan’s footing wasn’t all that secure. One foot kept skidding out from underneath him on the tilted, dirt-coated ledge. He knew that if he didn’t find the courage to crawl into the tunnel soon, he would have to climb back down...before he fell down. Glancing at the roadbed forty feet below, he tried not to imagine how much it would hurt if he tumbled all the way in the dirt and gravel. And what if he started a big landslide, it might be enough to cover him beneath tons of dirt and debris!

  He had to decide what to do—soon!

  Night was coming on fast, and the workers would be back in the morning. Even if he left for home right now, he wouldn’t be back before dark, so it was a safe bet that he’d be grounded for a couple of days, at least. By the time he was un-grounded, the whole hillside would probably have been leveled and hauled off. If he didn’t check out this cave right now, he might never get to check it out!

  But did he even dare to go in there?

  After glancing over his shoulder at the blaze of sunset on the horizon, he took a deep breath, tucked the burlap bag into his hip pocket, took out his flashlight, and clicked it on. Holding his breath, he got onto his hands and knees, and edged into the doorway. The distorted oval of light illuminated a hard-packed dirt floor. Cool—actually cold air raised goose bumps on his arms as he skittered forward. Because of the low ceiling, he had to tip his head down and feel blindly for a handhold to pull himself all the way inside.

  Even with the feeble glow of the flashlight, Stan felt deep rushes of nervousness as he started along the stone-lined tunnel. The walls seemed to narrow gradually, squeezing in on him from all directions. More than once, he considered backing out and was grateful, at least, that Chet wasn’t here to call him a sissy.

  But maybe being a sissy wasn’t such a bad idea, Stan thought as he inched his way deeper into the earth. He tried not to think of the tons of earth and rock above him...earth and rock that could collapse in on him at any moment. After each lunge forward, he would look back over his shoulder almost longingly at the receding oval of burning, orange sky and think how pitifully small his flashlight beam was in the darkness that surrounded him.

  “Damn it!” he muttered, when his hand holding the flashlight hit the ground hard, and the light flickered. His voice reverberated oddly in the narrow confines of the tunnel, but even before the echo died, he thought he heard something else—a soft, hissing, scratching sound—like ripping wet cloth.

  He froze, directing his light straight ahead and craning his neck forward as he listened tensely for the sound to be repeated. He was positive of only one thing: he hadn’t made that noise!

  Ripples of fear raced up and down his back. In spite of the coolness inside the tunnel, sweat trickled down the sides of his face.

  “All right, all right now,” he whispered, trying to reassure himself as his eyes darted around, following the dodging flashlight beam. “Just take it easy...take it—”

  His throat closed off, stifling a scream that would have resounded throughout the entire mountain when his left hand, reaching forward, touched...something.

  He jerked back too quickly and bumped his head against the tunnel roof. The impact stunned him, and the flashlight dropped from his hand and winked out the instant it hit the ground. Dirt and grit showered down on him like rain on a tin roof as he reached forward, furiously groping for his light. His only fear was that he would touch that...that thing again. At last, his hand closed around the metal cylinder of his flashlight. His heart was pounding hard in his neck as he clicked the switch uselessly back and forth.

  The light was dead.

  For several seconds, Stan remained motionless, listening to his racing heartbeat until it started to slow down. A sheen of sweat had broken out like dew across his forehead. He couldn’t stop thinking about whatever that was he had touched. It had felt cold—almost dead cold, clammy and sticky, like a dead animal or something. The tunnel was too narrow for him to turn around, so, still shaking, he started retreating backwards, fighting the urge to scramble out of there as fast as he could.

  But wait a second! He thought, suddenly halting his backward retreat.

  He hadn’t found any rocks worth beans, but what if that thing was something neat?

  Crouching in the pressing darkness, he felt equally compelled to go forward to find out what that thing was and to get the hell out of here while he still could...at least until he got another flashlight. His pulse thumped heavily in his ears as he debated what to do. In the end, curiosity won out. His whole body was trembling as he started forward again, reaching blindly ahead until his fingers once again grazed the squishy, cold, dead-feeling thing. He jerked his hand back, fully expecting the thing to move even though he knew, just by the touch, that whatever it was, it certainly wasn’t alive. It may have been once, but it was stone cold now.

  “Oh, shit!” Stan whispered when—once again—a soft, rustling noise echoed from deep inside the cave.

  It sounded like someone dragging something heavy across the dirt floor. Although the sound had definitely come from up ahead, in the echoing darkness, Stan had the illusion that, like the rock walls, it was all around him. With steadily rising terror, he grabbed the burlap bag from his hip pocket, spread the mouth open wide, and, without touching the thing any more than he had to, shoved it into the bag. The mere touch of it made him feel queasy, and he was relieved once he had it bagged.

  He started working his way backwards again, probing his path with one foot so he wouldn’t lose his way or go screaming out off the ledge and down the slope. As he dragged the bag along behind him, his fear-heightened state made the return trip seem infinitely longer. He tried to sort out his impressions of what the thing he had found might be. It had felt rubbery and cold, just about the size of a football, maybe a little bit narrower. He thought it felt like it was composed of thick, segmented rings, like donuts that came to a blunt point at each end.

&nb
sp; The sun had set, so as he neared the cave entrance, he wouldn’t have known it except for the strong draft of cool, fresh air that curled up around him. He shivered, wondering what the hell this thing in the bag was. It made him feel woozy, almost sick to his stomach just remembering how squishy and cold—how dead it had felt. Try as he might, he couldn’t get rid of the thought that he had discovered a dead man’s severed arm.

  Finally, over his shoulder, Stan could see the circle of star-lit sky drawing ever closer. He sighed deeply with relief when his foot kicked out free in the open air. Scrinching up his legs, he spun around and hung his feet out over the slanting ledge. Just as he was about to push off down the slope, he heard again that hollow rasping sound—much louder now, and coming closer. Its rippling echo filled the cave.

  Whatever it is, it’s coming this way! Stan thought as a white bolt of panic shot through him.

  Intense pressure squeezed his bladder as he leaned back, stuck his feet out in front of himself, and began a slow, controlled slide down the slope, all the while clutching the burlap bag tightly against his chest. It may have been just his imagination—it must have been—but he was positive that the instant he pushed off the ledge, something rushed up to the cave mouth and either threw something at him or else made a quick grab at him. He had no idea what it was, but he heard and felt something whisk by his head close to his ear, like a bat unseen in the dark. He didn’t have any time to think, though, because just then his left foot snagged on a rock and catapulted him forward. Before he could recover, he was tumbling head over heels down the gravely hillside. His long, trailing scream filled the night as he and a building wave of dirt and gravel rushed headlong toward the roadbed.

  Stan was knocked nearly senseless when he came to rest flat on his back at the bottom of the hill. Loose dirt hissed like angry snakes as it slid down around him in his wake. Shaking his head, he leaped to his feet and hurriedly brushed himself off with one hand. There wasn’t a square inch of his body that didn’t feel battered and bruised, but a quick inventory proved that he wasn’t hurt except for a single stinging cut above his left eye. He sure as hell felt as though he had just been put through a high-speed meat grinder. Unbelievably, he had managed to hold onto the burlap bag throughout his fall. He wanted like hell to see what was in it, but there wasn’t enough light to see by. The image of a dead man’s severed arm rose again sharply in his mind, making him feel rubbery and sick inside.

  He was dazed from his fall and kept rubbing his head to reassure himself that it was still attached. Lit only by the flames of the smudge pots and the blinking yellow warning lights, the night pressed in around him. For a panicked instant, he imagined that he was still inside the cave. His head throbbed with pain as he started running toward the road. He had to stop every few steps and shake his head, hoping that the waves of dizziness would pass soon. Once, when he turned and looked back up the hillside at the cave mouth, he was sure he saw something moving up there. He tried to convince himself it was just a trick of the eye, but it sure as heck looked like something dark shifting against the darker black of the cave opening.

  Trembling, he was just turning to leave when a hand shot out of the darkness and grabbed him by the neck.

  3

  “I knew I’d find you out here!”

  Chet’s voice drilled into Stan’s ears as he spun him around and gave him a shove that sent him staggering backwards. Stan’s mouth opened, and his lips moved to scream, but the only noise that came out sounded like air hissing out of a punctured bicycle tire.

  “Mom’s been hollerin’ and hollerin’ for you for the past half hour,” Chet said. “I figured you’d be out here collecting rock, right?” His face glowed eerily in the flickering strobe of the warning lights.

  “Goddamn, you scared the shit out of me, you motherf—”

  “Ut-ut,” Chet said, wagging a warning finger underneath Stan’s nose. “Better watch your language, or else I’ll tell mom. You’re in enough trouble as it is. Hey! What you got in the bag?”

  Chet made a grab for the bag, but Stan swung his body around protectively.

  “It’s none of your damned business,” he shouted.

  “Ohh, little mister foul-mouth,” Chet said with a taunting laugh. “Com’on. Lemme see.” He darted first one way, then the other in an attempt to get the bag from Stan, but after a few tries he gave up. “Well, it better not be any more rocks. God knows your junk takes up enough space in the bedroom as it is. We’ll just see what you have to say once you get home, wise ass. Mom is royally pissed that you weren’t back when she said to be.”

  “Yeah, well—I just sorta lost track of the time,” Stan replied weakly.

  He was still a little dizzy from the fall, and his pulse hadn’t slowed down yet from the surprise Chet had given him. He was trying his best to control himself, but he felt like he had to go to the bathroom real bad.

  “Come on, then,” Chet said. He suddenly darted ahead of Stan, heading toward the open trench. At the very edge, he leaped up into the air. The flashing lights made his movements strobe like an old-time movie as he hung suspended against the night sky for an instant. Then he landed with a loud grunt on the other side. One foot caught at the edge of the trench and knocked dirt down into the darkness below. He looked back at Stan, his face horribly underlit by the flickering orange flame of the smudge pots.

  “Hey, man—if you don’t get a move on, I’ll take your bike again!” Chet taunted. His mouth was still open, and he looked like he was about to say something more, but he cut himself short when a faint noise from down inside the open trench drew his attention. Craning forward, he looked down.

  “Hey! What’s the matter?” Stan yelled, remembering the odd noises he had heard inside the cave. His hand clutched the closed mouth of the burlap bag as the image of a severed arm rose up in his mind. Maybe the rest of this dead guy was buried down there!

  Chet didn’t say anything as he stared into the dark trench, waiting tensely to hear if the sound was repeated. When it didn’t come again, he muttered a curse and kicked some loose gravel down into the trench. When there still was no response, he straightened up, looked smugly back at Stan, and started walking away. As soon as Chet’s back was turned, Stan thought he saw a shadow shift within the darkness of the trench.

  “Hey, Chet!” he called, his voice winding up tight with fear. “Hold up!”

  “No way! You wouldn’t show me what you’ve got in the bag, so I’m not gonna wait for you!”

  The skin at the back of Stan’s neck prickled as he eyed the opened trench and recalled the hissing, dragging sound he had heard from deep inside the cave.

  “Come on! Wait for me!” he shouted.

  It took effort to control the wavering in his voice.

  “Come on, yourself, then! Move your lard-ass!” Chet shouted back, his voice receding as he disappeared into the darkness down the road.

  Stan was about to yell again, but when he opened his mouth, a clump of dirt at the edge of the trench slid noisily down into the darkness below. One of the smudge pots teetered at the edge for a moment and then fell. It sputtered as it rolled into the ditch, the flame blazing higher just before it winked out. In that instant, Stan was positive that he heard a short, barking yelp of pain. Slinging the burlap bag over his handlebars, he took off down the road like a shot, hoping to catch up to his brother before he got too much further away.

  4

  “I was up in my tree house, mom. Honest!” Stan said. “I must’ve fallen asleep or something.”

  Cringing inwardly, he glanced over at Chet, just waiting for him to tell his mother the truth. Even when his brother remained silent, Stan was convinced that it was only so he could use this little white lie against him some other time.

  “Is that how you got so dirty, and how you got that cut over your eye?”

  Stan shook his head, trying hard to think of an excuse, but his mind was a complete blank.

  “Well, you know what I think about that tr
ee house of yours!” Lisa Walters said.

  “Seriously. I must’ve dozed off or something, ‘cause I never even heard you calling for me. Honest, mom!”

  “I swear to God, I’m going to have your father tear that—that monstrosity down this weekend,” Stan’s mother said. The scowl on her face deepened as she placed her hands on her hips and glared at Stan. “How many times have I told you I don’t want you up there? Why, just this morning, Mrs. Emerson was telling me about the problem they’re having out there in Cornish and Limington with rabid squirrels. She—”

  Before she could say more, first Chet, and then Stan started snickering with repressed laughter. One boy set the other off, and before they could catch themselves, both of them were fighting hard not to roar in hysterical laughter.

  “Oh, so you think it’s funny, do you?” their mother said, glaring back and forth between the two boys.

  “Come on, mom,” Chet said, snorting back his laughter. “You’ve got to admit that the idea of … the idea of a—”

  He couldn’t force himself to say any more when he looked at Stan, and another gale of laughter took hold of him. In an instant, Stan lost control and was howling with laughter, too. He lost control, imagining himself cornered in his tree house, held at bay by a rabid squirrel looming in the doorway.

  No, not one—a whole pack of little gray squirrels, foaming at the mouths as they moved slowly toward him. The mental image sent him into a paroxysm of laughter.

  “Well, you boys just go ahead and laugh,” their mother said angrily. “You know, it isn’t just dogs and foxes that get rabies. Squirrels—even field mice can get the disease.” She let her voice trail away as her two sons continued to blubber hysterically. “But right now, I want the both of you to march yourselves upstairs. Move it! And you, Stanley Walters! You march yourself into the bathroom right now and take a shower!”