The Return

by Bentley Little

  But they were already too late.

  The townspeople attacked--for they were townspeople; Henry didn't know how he knew that but he did--and they attacked with fury, swinging handheld hatchets, leaping upon shoulders with upraised rocks, shoving spears through chests. They screamed unintelligibly, cries of rage that blended with cries of terror from the desperately retreating visitors. Within seconds, blood was streaming down the fitted rock steps into the pine-needle-covered dirt.

  Henry ran away from the lights of the amphitheater, toward the shadows. But he didn't need to. The attackers ignored him, concentrating only on the tourists. Two naked men ran past him, beating a crying woman about the head with blunt blocks of wood. A woman pushed him aside to get to a little girl who had become separated from her family, gleefully stabbing her with a homemade knife.

  He hadn't thought of it until now, but two days ago when he'd been in Cortez to buy some gas and groceries, he'd sensed indications that all was not right. Trouble was simmering beneath the normally placid surface of the town. The middle-aged man who worked behind the booth at the gas station, usually an impeccably dressed fellow, was wearing dirty cutoffs and a torn T-shirt. Dottie, the cashier at the supermarket, whom he'd known since the store was built ten years ago, didn't recognize him. Everyone seemed tense and out of sorts, and when he'd driven past the high school, he'd seen a large crowd gathered in the parking lot, watching a fistfight and cheering on the participants. He'd driven by too fast to get a good look, but the fighters seemed to be teachers or parents, not students.

  Still, how had that turned into . . . this?

  He had a walkie-talkie clipped to his belt, which was used to call for help and notify other rangers if there was a medical emergency or serious accident. He knew he should utilize it, but he was afraid to do so, afraid that if he alerted someone to what was happening here, his exemption from the violence would be revoked. He kept looking toward the road, toward the visitor's center, toward the lights of the cabins through the trees, hoping someone had seen the headlights on the road and was coming to investigate.

  What if they did, though? What could any of his fellow rangers or park employees do against these lunatics? They could call the police, but he realized that maybe the police were already here.

  The massacre was winding down. He had no idea if anyone had escaped, although judging by the limp, eviscerated bodies lying on the seats and steps and surrounding ground, he would be willing to bet that only one or two had made it out. The man in the hip-hop shorts was still alive, but he was screaming. An overweight woman in a dirty loincloth was sitting on his stomach and gleefully scalping him with a chunk of obsidian. Closer in, an old man was grunting like a pig as he rooted through the entrails of a little boy.

  Henry remained in the shadows, willing it to end, waiting for them all to get back in their still-running vehicles and drive away. They didn't. Instead, they started running, as if on cue, down one of the paths away from the road, weapons held high, screaming. The path led to the new site, the one they'd discovered after the fires had burned off the brush. In seconds, they were all gone, the amphitheater suddenly silent with the soundlessness of the dead.

  He had a chance to escape, to finally get out of here. He could run to the visitor's center, get the other rangers together, call for outside help.

  He could.

  But he didn't.

  Where were they going? he wondered. And why? He stared down the path, saw only darkening gloom as it moved away from the lights. Were they aware of the new site? And what would they do there?

  He had to know.

  Henry walked across the amphitheater, trying to ignore the broken bleeding bodies, and started down the path. He could stay behind them, spy on them to find out what they were doing. They were loud up ahead, still screaming, but they sounded far away, as though they had continued to run, and he broke into a jog, praying that they hadn't left behind any sentries to guard their route.

  He caught up to them at the house.

  It was what they'd discovered after the fire had burned off surrounding trees and bushes. Built next to a low bluff, with the limestone cliff acting as a fourth wall, the structure was not intact, but it was in good enough shape that its purpose and origin were clear. There was no roof, of course, and the adobe walls were in various states of disrepair, but to a large degree the foliage had protected the building. The back room, constructed under an overhang, was almost completely preserved, and this was where the townspeople were headed. They had abandoned their weapons, most of them, and instead of screaming wildly, they were standing in line, silent and subdued, waiting to go in. The room was small, the size of a typical modern bedroom, and there was no way all of them could fit in at once, but those who were forced to wait their turn appeared surprisingly calm.

  Henry thought of that guy from Chaco Canyon he'd talked to last week. What was his name? Picante? Race? Something weird.

  Pace.

  That was it. The guy had asked him if any unusual artifacts had been unearthed in the past month or so, if any unexplained occurrences had happened at Mesa Verde. Henry knew what he was talking about, he'd heard the rumors, too, but he assured the other man that nothing like that had been seen at Mesa Verde. He'd thought at the time about the house, however fleeting, but that discovery was several years old, and nothing unusual had ever happened there, so he hadn't mentioned it.

  Henry was still in the shadows on the side of the path, still quite a ways away from the building and the line of raggedy people. But even from this angle and this vantage point, one thing was becoming increasingly clear. Men and women were going into the back room, but they weren't coming out.

  Some of them were. But not most of them. While his original plan was to hang back and watch, he now wanted to see for himself what was happening in there.

  They'd ignored him before, and he counted on his luck holding. He stepped bravely into the open and walked past the line of people, around a side wall on the opposite side of the house. No one stopped him, no one made a sound. Ten minutes before, everyone had been in a frenzy, slaughtering innocent tourists, and now they were as passive as sheep. He pushed his way past a nude young woman covered in mud and blood, past a long-haired man in a ripped mechanic's uniform. Before him, the adobe wall joined with the overhanging rock of the bluff. In the center, a black rectangle, slightly smaller than an ordinary door, was the entrance to the room beyond.

  A tall, heavily tattooed man wearing dirty cutoffs walked up to the entrance, looked in, stood there for a moment, then turned away, and headed out of the house. Before the next person in line could step forward, Henry moved in front of him and peered through the doorway.

  The back room had been transformed. Inside was a wonderland of bones, a beautiful fantastic world of white ribs and gleaming skulls and bleached pelvises, all glowing with some sort of inner light and arranged in a radiant display that for some reason reminded him of Christmas. The room had been empty before: bare adobe walls, bare dirt floor. Now, however, it was a spectacular showcase of . . . of what?

  Skeletons, a part of his mind said.

  That was true, but that was only part of it. For whatever had created this magnificent scene had turned those base ingredients into magic.

  A hand touched his shoulder, and then the next man in line was walking past him into the room. The man ran his fingers along exposed ulnas and tibias and clavicles, an expression of awe on his blood-spattered face.

  And then he was gone.

  It was quick, it was simple, a no-frills miracle, and Henry was not only shocked but amazed and curiously impressed.

  No, not impressed. Attracted.

  Yes.

  He stared at the spot where the man had vanished and felt the pull. The people here obviously knew what would happen if they went into the room. Yet some still walked in. Most walked in. He understood. He knew why the last man had not turned away.

  A rational part of his mind was telling him that he s
hould get back to the visitor's center, let everyone know what was happening, warn them about this place.

  But what was the point? Oblivion was so much nicer. Just the thought of running all the way back, explaining what he'd seen, trying to figure out what was happening, helping to come up with some sort of plan, tired him out.

  A woman in tattered rags tried to push past him, but he stopped her with an outstretched hand.

  "Wait," he said.

  Smiling, he walked alone through the open doorway.

  And ceased to be.

  Ten

  1

  The trip to Tempe was tense. Returning from New Mexico, they'd been anxious, but they hadn't really known anything. Not for sure. And though they'd suspected that something had happened to Al, they could legitimately pretend that it hadn't, that everything was normal, everything was fine.

  But this was different.

  Melanie fidgeted with the notebook in her lap. Last night she and Glen had written down a chronology of events, and seeing it there in black and white, so matter-of-factly stated, had been a sobering experience for both of them, bringing home just how helpless and inconsequential they were in the face of all that was happening.

  Outside, a single abandoned house sat behind a faded, once-gaudy sign announcing ARIZONA ACRES! NEW LUXURY HOMESITES!

  Ron had wanted to come with them, but he'd been allowed out of jail only under the condition that he remain in town. The terms of his bail required him to stay within the jurisdiction of the Bower PD or face re-arrest. Een had made this very clear, but she and Glen reiterated it for him, and he said he understood, don't worry, he had no plans to jump bail.

  "There goes my money," Glen joked when they left Ron at the motor court. But it wasn't really a joke. Melanie, too, had her doubts as to whether he'd still be in town when they returned.

  Again, they took Glen's car. There was nothing in the trunk this time, but it still felt like there was, as though the skull had left a residual trace, a psychic spoor, and their mood reflected this. They were testy with each other, and their sporadic attempts at conversation dwindled and then disappeared as rangeland gave way to forest and forest to desert.

  They were a half hour out of Payson and nearly to Sunflower when Melanie asked, "Where are we going to stay?"

  "Stay?" Glen said.

  "In the Valley."

  "I don't know. A hotel."

  "You're unemployed and, believe it or not, I haven't saved a huge amount of money from my small-town teacher's job. I think we should ask this Professor McCormack if we're still drawing pay from the university. Maybe we can get them to foot the bill."

  "I have money," Glen said.

  "But how long will it last if you keep wasting it by bailing out ASU students and driving hundreds of miles at the behest of professors you don't even know?"

  He shrugged, showing that such mundane economic concerns had not even crossed his mind. "Let's worry about that later."

  Neither of them knew where at ASU the archeology department was located. Neither of them even knew where to find a non-stickered parking lot. So Glen parked in a nearby shopping center, in front of a Tower Records, and despite the intense summer heat, they hiked a block down to the campus and wandered around until they found a directory that led them to the right building.

  Professor McCormack was in his office, a small cubicle piled floor to ceiling with books and bones, and built-in shelves housing a spectacular collection of Native American pottery. He was talking on the phone, and they heard him before they saw him, rough voice coming from the only open door, loud in the empty hallway: "Your mama was on her hands and knees, and I'm so big and buttfucked her so thoroughly that your daddy and two of his friends could go in there at once and not make an impression."

  Glen rapped on the door frame, and the professor hung up the phone immediately, looking sheepish. "Sorry," he said.

  "Who were you talking to?"

  "White supremacist hotline. I call it periodically to harass them."

  "Someone has to, I guess," Melanie said.

  "That's the way I look at it."

  "I'm Glen, and this is Melanie. We're from the Bower dig? Al's assistants?"

  "Right, right. Come in, sit down. I've been waiting for you." McCormack stood. He was a big man, beefy and red faced, who looked more like a sanitation worker than a university professor. He shook both of their hands across the desk. "Sorry to make you come all this way, but . . ." His voice trailed off. He didn't seem like a man who was often at a loss for words, and to Melanie his reticence was worrying.

  "But what?" she prodded.

  "I wanted you to see it for yourself."

  "See what?" Glen asked.

  "There are two sets of ruins open to the public in the Phoenix metropolitan area: Pueblo Grande and Pima House. Nothing unusual has been reported at Pueblo Grande. But Pima House has been closed for the past three days because--" McCormack sighed. "I don't know how to say this in a way that doesn't sound insane, so I'll just spill it. People are vanishing in the ruins. Not getting lost but"--he snapped his fingers--"vanishing. Like that. And it's not just people. Animals, too. The police are on twenty-four-hour watch, guarding the place and making sure no one goes in. Five people are gone, though. Including one patrolman. And dozens of animals, who seem to be drawn to the site."

  Melanie shivered. "Do people . . . know about this?"

  "Oh, yes. It's been in the paper and on the news."

  "Then why couldn't you tell us about it over the phone?"

  He shrugged. "Paranoia. It's news here but it might not be news everywhere. And I wanted to make sure you'd come. Actually, I wanted Al to come, but since he seems to have disappeared, I thought it best to bring in some of his people." McCormack paused. "So where is Al?"

  Melanie looked at Glen, letting him answer.

  "We don't know. But he's not the only one."

  "That's what the police said. But I'd like to hear your point of view."

  Glen told him, starting with the items that had been unearthed before his arrival: the demonic figurine with the mummified infant hand attached, the pouch of Greek money, the Saxon children's toy. He went through everything, from their trip to New Mexico and the abandoned town and church to the bone sculptures beneath Ricky's house.

  McCormack did not interrupt, but nodded all the way through. When Glen finished speaking, the expression on the professor's face was grim. "I don't know if you've heard, but there's been a rash of unexplained phenomena associated with Anasazi relics and ruins. Not just here but in Flagstaff, Santa Fe, Denver, throughout the Southwest. I didn't put any credence in those stories, not at first, but after what happened at Pima House, after what I saw for myself, I couldn't help but believe. And now, with what you've told me . . ." He shook his head. "That's why I wanted to talk to Al. He's something of an expert on unusual aspects of Native American culture, and his focus has always been on the Anasazi. To be honest, he's become something of a joke in the field, he and Pace. One of the worst-kept secrets in archeological academia is that they're working on some sort of unifying theory of Native American disappearances. I wanted to bring Al in because . . . well, because I thought he might have a unique perspective on what's happening." McCormack ran a hand through his greasy hair. "No, that's not true. I thought he might know what's happening. And what we should do."

  "Have you tried contacting Pace?" Melanie asked.

  "Six or seven times a day."

  "Us, too," she admitted.

  Glen nodded. "We think he's looking for the skull."

  McCormack leaned over the desk. "Do you think he's disappeared? I mean, disappeared?"

  "I don't know," Melanie said softly.

  They talked awhile longer. The professor showed them photos he'd been e-mailed from other archeological institutions: a line of artifacts that appeared to be marching down a museum corridor; a human skull floating in the air above an excavated burial ground; before and after pictures of an Anasazi exhibit
with well-lit museum cases first displaying baskets and tools and then empty and broken with shattered glass on the floor; and a series of photos featuring a shriveled, leather-wrapped mummy that changed its position in each shot.

  "You said this was in the papers, on TV news," Melanie said. "Is it a big story?"

  "There's a report from Pima House every day and it's usually the lead, even though there's been no change in the situation, so, yes, I'd say it was a big story."

  "I mean, has it been picked up by the national news? Have they put together all of these individual events and connected them?"

  McCormack smiled wryly. "The tabloids have." He opened his top desk drawer and pulled out a copy of The Insider. The banner headline read: ANCIENT INDIAN CURSE THREATENING U.S.

  Glen took the tabloid from him, and shook his head. "You mean Men in Black was right?"

  McCormack shrugged. "There's a kernel of truth to most comedy."

  "But no one else?" Melanie asked. "CNN isn't broadcasting it? Or CBS? AP hasn't picked it up?"

  "Not to my knowledge, no."

  "How's that possible?"

  He shrugged. "Illiterate yahoos are always talking about the media's liberal bias. There is no liberal bias. But there's an Eastern bias. And a metropolitan bias. Small towns in the West simply don't get covered, and as a result a lot of news goes unreported. Look at Bower. No TV station, no large city within a hundred miles, newspaper not affiliated with the wire services. If something happens there, who's going to know? Even the Phoenix and Albuquerque news outlets won't report it. How's Dan Rather back in New York going to find out about it?"

  "But this is in the Phoenix area. It's on the Phoenix stations."

  "Things happen all the time. People die or disappear, natural disasters occur. No one thinks anything of it. It's the price we pay for being alive on the planet Earth, part of doing business. This time, we just happened to be in the right place at the right time. We saw the connections. But I doubt if anyone else has--except the tabloids--and until they do, or unless we tell them, this isn't going to get much play."