“What?” she asked, confused on the sheriff’s exact intention.
“Load the weapon and think about how you want to die, ending yourself is better that rotting in this dungeon. The only question you have ever had in your entire life is if your little brothers were alive. Now you know and look what they have done to you. You have nothing left to live for. There will be no pain and you will be with your mother. Do what is right. Goodbye, Annette.”
With the pain of talking, let alone the moving of his body, the man who had hired her all those years ago had remained calm and spoke clearly and with confidence. He had presented to her the opportunity to not have to endure any suffering. She could not believe these words coming out of his mouth but more importantly, she could not believe how she did not necessarily think he was wrong.
Holding the pistol in her hand, she released the magazine. As it slid out from the interior of the weapon’s grip, her shaky hands, overcome with the emotion of the moment, missed it and it hit the ground. Picking up the magazine, she pressed the single round into the top and felt the pressure of the internal spring push back against her thumb as if it was trying to make her change her mind.
Placing the magazine back into the grip, she centered the bottom on her left palm and forced it up and into place. Walking over to the sheriff, she looked back at the door one more time hoping for some reason or another one of her brothers would open it. The door remained shut as Henderson stepped over the sheriff’s slumped body, slipping just a little bit on his expelled blood. Bending over to the counter, she blew out the candle, leaving the two of them in complete darkness.
Holding the pistol in her right hand she shuffled back to a spot on the floor that she felt was directly across from the sheriff. With her left hand placed on top of the slide, she pulled back, racking the only round she had out of the magazine and into the firing chamber.
Pulling the hammer back and into place, the metal clicking sound seemed to echo throughout the pitch-black cabin. Gripping the weapon firmly, her finger moved its way down to the trigger, which felt colder than the rest of the exposed metal on the body of the gun.
As her eyes adjusted to the darkness, it was still not enough to see anything more than the frail outline of her boss next to her. He had been silent since saying goodbye and she was unsure if he was dead or not, but at this point it no longer really mattered. Feeling the cold metal of the trigger against her skin, she closed her eyes, which now were filled with tears, and said,
“Be the snake, not the mouse.”
23 Muricide
From the river bank where the twins stood still making small talk in an attempt to avoid discussing what exactly they had just done, the sound as the pistol sent the round from its barrel was nothing more than a muffled pop. Had they not been intently waiting to hear it, it could have easily gone completely unnoticed. With firsthand knowledge of how loud the sound of a gun firing was inside the small room, Tomek was surprised at what little he heard from their current position.
“There, she did it. Let’s go get her. She has proven herself enough,” Tomek said.
“Did what, Tomek? Did what?” Drake said.
“She killed him. You know she did. Let’s go get her out of there.”
“Maybe she is the one that died. Have you thought about that?”
Tomek looked at his brother, then back at the boulder covering their home. Turning to walk up the rock path, he motioned for Drake to join him.
“She is not Uncle, Drake.” Tomek said.
His tone was both tense and comforting. Drake immediately felt like he always had growing up. No one knew him like his twin brother did. Their connection was always so strong that often they felt the same regardless of the situation. This time was no different. Drake did not want to see another family member dead from a self-inflicted wound, but he knew that locking her in the cabin was the only way to truly flush out her allegiance.
Standing outside the door with his hands on the large rock, he pondered if she had killed the man chained to the wall or not. Thinking to himself,
“Was she aware that this was all just a test, or would she feel as if they had left her to die? Would she take his life out of spite or mercy? Would she take her own out of cowardice? Was she a snake or a mouse?”
With Drake’s chest, head and rib injuries, trying to push the rock from its settled-in spot on top of the door would be a futile waste of energy. Electing to sit on the side hill with this back against the side slope, Drake placed both of his feet high on the boulder. Tomek joined in placing his legs against the same slope, which provided a back rest for his brother. Both boys pushed as they extended their strong legs and the top-heavy rock swayed back and forth, rocking it with a push as if it was one of their sleds loaded with firewood and stuck in the snow.
Utilizing the momentum they had built up, the rock tipped over its rolling point and rolled down the hill, gaining speed as it proceeded until reaching its final resting place, splashing down into the river’s flowing water with a thunderous splash. Finding amusement in watching the rolling rock they again were both thinking on the same wavelength.
“That would make a great...” Drake started.
“... Trap,” Drake and Tomek said in unison.
Smirking at the amusement they both found in the moment, they looked below them at the crushed oak tree door.
“Hope it didn’t hurt the hinges. That would not be good,” Drake said.
Tomek looked over the construction of the door’s framing and was happy to see nothing drastically damaged.
“Nope, I think we are fine.”
Twisting the handle and pulling the door open, the smell of fresh ignited gun powder filled the air. There was also dampness in the air that neither of them recalled being present just moments before when they last were in their home. The only light coming into the room was from the open door. Both of them shuffled their feet across the darkness of the room, not wanting to trip over any one of the multiple items that were strewn about.
“Annette,” Drake said. “Annette, are you here?”
There was no answer, but there was a peculiar sound coming from the furnace room, which was dug back into the hillside. A dull roaring that neither of them could account for filled the air. The moisture in the air was more and more noticeable with each passing minute.
“What is that?” Tomek asked while remaining in the shadows provided by the door light.
“Stay here, I will go look.” Drake said.
“Check both of their bodies on the way down there,” Tomek urged.
“That is my plan. Guard the door. If anyone but me comes up from that tunnel, kill them. “
“Check the bodies!” Tomek demanded.
“I did,” Drake replied.
“And...?”
“There is only one here,” Drake said, making his way down the dark tunnel with no light. Moving only by feel with his back against one side of the wall in a tactical fashion to minimize the square footage of his body exposed to an attack, Drake held tactical knifes in both hands with the one in his left pointed blade down, ready for a strike.
“Which one is missing?” Tomek asked. Hearing his brother’s response from down the tunnel was nearly impossible over the dull roar that was growing in volume by the minute. Unable to stand and not knowing which body his twin had found, Tomek’s lack of patience overtook his duty to protect the door.
Sliding his feet across the floor he felt the wetness of the blood that had poured out of each wound during the battle he had with the sheriff. Reaching the spot on the wall where he felt the chain still connected to the bear trap, he worked his hands down. Feeling the cold metal of the trap’s jagged teeth, Tomek was relieved to feel the flesh of his enemy’s body. The sheriff lay there, motionless, breathless, lumped, cold and dead.
“Where is she?” Tomek thought to himself. He attempted to look down the tunnel, but the darkness provided no clue as he could see no more than a few feet ahead of himself
.
“Drake, you find her?” Tomek yelled out again, hearing a reply from his brother but unable to make out exactly what was being said.
Drake returned to the door and in an attempt to pry it all the way open to let in as much light as possible, he felt the entire wood shift and drop a few inches into place. Looking over what he could not see from the outside, it was clear that the heavy oak that had kept them safe, warm and hidden for so many years was broken from their use of the boulder. It was able to open and close, but pushing it over enough for it to remain propped open was no longer an option. Holding onto the door in order to keep it from closing completely out of both fear of it not opening and the need for some type of light, Tomek braced the wood on the roundness of his shoulder blade. While bearing the weight, he reached around in the dark feeling for something he could place in the jamb in order to keep it slightly propped.
Drake yelled again from the tunnel area of the furnace room, yet again Tomek had no clue what he was saying. Only able to make out the word “help,” Tomek’s fingers reached across something smooth, curved and hard on the floor. Tomek picked it up and immediately realized he held the rib bone from one of the original twin hunters that he had kept as a trophy. Jamming the rib between the wood frame on the interior of the door and the outside ground allowed him to leave the door propped open about six inches.
Leaving the door, he raced back toward the sheriff’s body and entered the tunnel. After only taking three bounds in the dark, he slammed into the wall, losing his balance and falling to the hard dirt floor. Only upon landing, it was not hard, compacted earth that he felt. The coldness of the water he had splashed down into was 10 inches deep.
Getting back up to his feet, he yelled for his brother.
“Drake, where are you?”
Finally close enough to hear the response, he rushed through the knee-deep water upon hearing Drake yell.
“Furnace room is flooding! Get down here!”
Turning the corner into the furnace room, the water was considerably deeper. Unable to see in the pitch black, the coldness of the water rushing in at the depth of his chest took his breath away.
“Where is it coming from?” Tomek yelled.
“That fucking boulder must have taken out the smoke valve and created some form of suction! I am holding this log up trying to block it. Help me grab onto that end!” his brother responded, trying to shake the rising water out of the way of his mouth.
“We are not going to be able to stop it. Let’s go!” Tomek yelled, standing next to his brother over the rushing water pouring in through the eight-inch chimney pipe.
“Run!” Drake said as he released the log. The overpowering blast of river water rushing into the small furnace room was like being hit with a tidal wave. Drake’s plug was not stopping the flood, but it was building up pressure in the tube. That pressure knocked both of them down into the deeper water, causing them to flip and turn under the tow with no control.
Once hitting the ground and walls, they regained their orientation and pushed off the bottom with their feet lifting their heads above the water line. With only a foot between the quickly rising water and the ceiling of the furnace room, Tomek heard his brother’s voice in the dark.
“This way! The door is here. We have to swim back out the tunnel and get out!”
“Let’s go, then!” Tomek replied with a half-gargled voice, due to the water in his mouth. Pressing their heads above the water turning them sideways and putting their ears against the ceiling in order to take what would either be their last breath or the one that would save their lives, the twins filled their lungs with as much air as they could hold. Diving underwater, pushing off of the ceiling with their hands, they both knew that upon leaving the furnace room, a left turn would take them back up the tunnel to the main living quarters.
The sloped design of the tunnel itself provided them with the advantage of the lower areas filling with the river water first. Running short on breath, Drake’s head crested the water. Grabbing onto Drake’s leg, Tomek pulled himself up to meet him above the water line as they both gasped for air, blowing water out of their lungs and mouth.
“We made it,” Tomek said, relived.
“We made it through the tunnel, at least. Let’s get out of here. Go to the door,” Drake said.
“What about her?” Tomek asked.
Walking quickly, still through the dark, the twins made their way up the dry tunnel toward the brightness of the light being let in by the door. With the water still rushing in behind them, the tunnel would be full in less than a minute and the room would not take long after that.
“She has to be in here somewhere. We have to get her out!” Tomek said, this time grabbing on to his brother’s arm to make sure he was listening.
“Dead or alive, I don’t know what she is, who she is. Come on, man. Forget her. She is not the same as us. She is not a twin. She was never part of our life, never part of our plan. She is not a child of Uncle and never will be. We would have had to kill her, anyway. She is nothing but a mouse,” Drake said while turning the corner into the living room, stepping over the body of the sheriff.
The light extruding from the half-opened door was a welcomed sight. The fact that Henderson was standing in the doorway having heard everything that Drake just said was not. The twins stopped where they stood, looking at their sister while wiping the water from their faces that ran down from their soaked hair. The light behind her framed her as if she was some sort of an angel sent to save them. Only she was not an angel. Henderson was a survivor, a fighter, and she stood there between the boys and freedom. Climbing out of the door, she looked at them in disbelief of having heard her own brother’s thoughts regarding her life and said, “You were both right. That boulder did make a good trap. Only I was the bait, and here you are looking death in the eye. I may be a mouse, but this mouse always has an escape plan. And one more thing, Drake. You might be a snake, but snakes can't breathe underwater.”
With that, she kicked out the rib, slamming the door shut. The dead tree that had been the first line of defense their entire lives was now the top of their coffin, locking them into the rapidly filling pit of water.
24 Fratricide
Again in the dark, the brothers bumped into one another as they raced to the door using only their sense of touch to locate the handle. Turning it and pushing up as they normally would produced no results. The bitter coldness of the river water began to remove the dexterity in their hands. Tomek could feel the inner workings of the lock system freely spinning as if they were not engaged at all. As if the entire door was broken. Drake pushed him aside, only to have the same results.
“Push on it! Push with me!” Drake yelled, placing his shoulder into the door. Tomek joined him in the fruitless attempt at budging the heavy slab of oak. Looking behind them, the water continued to rise as it had now engulfed the entire tunnel and was starting to pour into the living quarters where they stood.
“How do we get out?” Tomek asked in a calm voice. The gravity of the situation had not yet hit him as hard as it had his brother. Tomek had figured Drake had a plan all along. This made hearing his twin brother's response all the more painful.
“We don't,” said Drake. And with that they continued slamming their shoulders and backs into the door as hard as they could, feeling it beginning to budge with each impact.
“Come on. We’ve got to break this damn thing off its frame,” Drake said, with the water level already up to his knees and rising every second.
With each slam, Henderson could see the door shift from the outside. She watched each one, knowing that the brothers she had strived so long to save would soon be dead because of her. As horrible as she knew she would feel in the future, at this moment there was no room for empathy or grace. Had she not kicked the trophy rib out, she would have met a worse fate than drowning at the hands of the boys.
The slams grew closer and closer together and the tree door raised up and fell ba
ck down a little more with each one. She could tell the water was getting higher as each impact was less severe due to them not being able to run at the door. The slams were coming at a rapid pace, but there was no yelling. No screaming, no pleading, no begging, no arguing. Just impacts.
Henderson threw her body weight down onto the rounded tree door in an attempt to provide just a little more bracing. She could feel all four of their hands against the door, pushing up with each attempt at reaching breathable air. Again and again she lay there, feeling her brothers trying to fight death. With her head flat against the bark, she could hear the room filling with water. She could hear the splashes of them moving around, which preceded each impact.
Just as fast as the impacts were coming, lifting herself and the door partially up, they were gone. No more splashing, no more slamming. Just the sound of running water coming from inside the cabin. With her hands draped down around the sides of the trees, she felt the cold river water as it escaped from the cracks in the frame. With the top of the door being at the ceiling of the cabin, she knew the entire room was flooded and it was over.
The mouse had survived.
Henderson got back up to her feet and walked toward the river through the switch grass. Ignoring the rock patch Drake had taught her to use just hours earlier. Reaching the river, she could not help but look at the boulder lying there in the cold rushing water. The top third of the rock stood out of the water, causing a small set of swirling white foamy rapids around it. Henderson looked, tried to think of some type of metaphor for how the rock had saved her but was unable to be clever in the moment. A simple shoulder shrug was all she could offer up as she knew that the boulder there in the water was the reason she was alive.
Stumbling down the river bank she knew she was miles from Pine Run. She knew that no one would believe her story until she showed them the truth. She knew she was now the only cop in town. Not only had the murders of the Senator's baseball-playing hunter sons been solved, so had the homicide of three lawmen and a K-9. She knew she would have to answer the questions and she knew many would blame her. For so long in her life she was the one with the questions. Now she had the answers and she would never again have to wonder if her brothers were alive or not.
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