Four Corners Hole – Emergence (1174 hits)
Category: NoneLabels: FCH
Rating: 1.91 on 32 reviews (Rate this item) (V)
Submitted by Jack McCallum (View user info) at 2005-10-07 19:02:28 EDT
Intro http://www.ubersite.com/m/74452
Pfc. Weyms http://www.ubersite.com/m/75620
theholetruth.com http://www.ubersite.com/m/75708
Fall, 2005
"Did you hear about the bones?"
Auger paused. He had been gently brushing clotted earth away from a glass bottle which by his estimate dated from the turn of the century. He could read a portion of the label he had already uncovered.
Dr. Miles' Nervine.
"What bones?" Auger's voice was reedy, his throat dry. Things were strange down here.
"The dino bones," Edgecomb said, whispering. "It's fricken awesome, dude, if it's true. I heard that they found some—"
"We shouldn't be talking," Auger hissed. "It isn't just soldiers who disappear from this base. I heard a few archeologists have already been 'reassigned,' as they call it. And you know what happened to that young enlisted man who fell down onto the low ledge."
"Yeah. Weyms. I heard he went nuts."
They were working on tethers. Civilian archeologists helping the government excavate the ledges, known around the camp as 'shelves,' since they seemed to hold a lot of artifacts.
It was night. What the local soldiers called 'diggers' were working around the clock now. Whenever they found something they felt required 'special handling,' they were to press an emergency call button on the two-ways clipped to their harnesses. Otherwise they were to uncover and bag as many small artifacts as they could find.
Auger turned and looked Edgecomb over, once again, hiding his disdain. They were polar opposites. Charles Auger was old, Elliot Edgecomb was young. Auger was methodical, meticulous, and had to work hard to maintain his record of spectacular results. Edgecomb seemed to scamper from one incredible discovery to the next, like an eager puppy blessed by the gods. Auger wore pressed khaki trousers and a button-down shirt in the field, Edgecomb wore what appeared to be the same filthy denims every single day, topped by a succession of t-shirts that confounded Auger.
Today's t-shirt was a perfect example. Obscured by smears of clay and patches of dust was an illustration and a statement that made no sense.
A line drawing of a pixie-cute young woman with rather prominent ears was accompanied by the legend 'Love Handles.'
What could that possibly mean? Auger hated those t-shirts. He had enough to concentrate on without being distracted by strange riddles.
"He suffered no trauma, of that I'm sure."
Edgecomb looked surprised. "Yeah? S'up, Chuck?"
The first time Edgecomb had ever addressed Auger in that way the youngster had laughed for a half an hour, saying S'up Chuck over and over again and making regurgitation noises.
Auger spoke quietly, deliberately. "I think Weyms saw something that the government wants hushed up. And I think we should be very careful about what we discuss, and what we uncover. Trinkets are one thing. If I find something... big, I'm just going to move along the grid and leave it for someone else. We are being generously reimbursed for our work, but I want to retire to some place in the sun, not a six-by-nine cell."
Edgecomb smiled. "You are awesome, dude. Just when I thought you'd never lose that stick up your ass you go and share a conspiracy theory. Dude, I love that shit, man. The government covers up everything. We're brothers in arms down here."
Auger fought the urge to roll his eyes.
Edgecomb put a hand on Auger's shoulder. "I feel like we're closer now, dude. Thanks for sharing, bro. Still. The bones. Dude. I heard that they found parts of an allosaurus skeleton on Lambda Crescent, which is the mega-big ledge up over there, and the bones were on top of and surrounding an old crushed car, like the dino collapsed and died on the car, which is imposs—
Auger was fantasizing about cutting his rope to get away from Edgecomb, when they both heard a faint noise from below.
Edgecomb's voice was a whisper of breath as he said, "Oh. Dude. Shiiiiiit."
The diggers dangled from their tethers, the cones of light from their headlamps swinging back and forth.
They noises were coming closer.
Was somebody climbing down there? Auger shook his head. Was someone climbing up out of the hole?
No. It was impossible. Ever since the Weyms incident there were guards all around the rim of the hole, twenty-four hours a day.
Edgecomb suddenly burst into laughter and shouted, "Oh, dude, this just fuckin rocks!"
Auger saw two people emerging from the gloom underfoot. They were half-naked, and carefully probing for handholds on the hole wall with fingers and toes. Auger's bladder let go and piss trickled down his legs and off the ends of his boots.
One of the climbers looked up, spat, screamed, and brandished a knife.
Auger shrieked and pressed his panic button, and the hole was suddenly filled with light.
*
Winter, 1864
Ant rode fast, and his horse was swift. He had been camping in a narrow canyon and hoping to avoid being hunted and captured and sent away by the white men in blue coats.
The blue coats had decided that the Navajo should no longer live in the land that was their home.
The Navajo were to be taken away from their sacred places and the land that was everything to them.
Some fought back. Some went away with the blue coats. Some simply tried to hide in the canyons, hoping the white men would eventually get tired of their strange game.
Ant had no choice but to hide. He was too small to be a warrior, and no longer had a mother or father. They had died from a sickness when he was a boy. He was not afraid. He was a good hunter who had provided a great many meals to his clan. The game he captured was little, but it was abundant, and he knew that he could live off of the land, on his own until the white men went away.
But the white men had found him, so he had to run.
Ant knew some of their words. He also knew they liked to kill more than they liked to talk.
His horse was fast, made faster by Ant's size. He did not weigh as much as the big white men who chased him, one with hair like fire and one with the hairy face of an animal or a monster.
Ant was pulling far ahead of the white men. He heard their long sticks barking at him (guns, they are called guns, to understand the way the white man thinks and speaks is to survive what the white man will do to the world) but they could not hurt him. He was going north, the direction of evaluation, the direction one should turn when faced with great changes.
His horse was a good animal and when he started to fall Ant refused to think his horse had stumbled. He was right.
A great hole had opened in the earth, a hole so deep and dark it might lead back to the first world.
As he fell his thoughts were a confused jumble. Four directions. Four Mountains. Four worlds. Four winds. Four seasons.
He had lived through four sets of four seasons four times.
He looked down and saw four hooves kicking against black.
To one side, rock walls rushed past him.
He looked up and saw the sky, cold and clear and blue and forever.
To choose the final thing one could see was a blessing. Ant chose to see the sky.
He reached for the sky. Reflex. Part of his mind accepted his fall, but part of it did not. Part of his mind wanted to claw at nothingness to stop the fall.
A strong hand grabbed his and he was slammed chest down against rough stone. He was looking over the side of a ledge, seeing his horse continue to fall alone.
He hoped that whatever was down there took care of his horse. The animal had served him well.
Ant rolled onto his back and saw a face twisted with sadness, a face that had seen the end of the world.
He sat up and picked little flecks of stone out of his skin, and then put a hand over his heart.
"Wol-la-chee," he said.
He had given his name to his rescuer.
Ant repeated himself.
His rescuer began to speak fast, in a language Ant did not know.
Ant suddenly began to sweat. His sweat turned cold
His rescuer was speaking fragments of languages Ant had heard before.
Zuni. Hopi. And something else.
Ant had lost everything but his knife and his clothes. He raised his knife and prepared to defend himself against what he was sure was one of the long-gone Anasazie, the enemy ancestors he had heard of as a child.
*
Spring, 1288
He watched them walk by, heads hung low.
They were his people, and they were dying. Dying by choice.
The spirit-talkers had spoken of their visions. Descendants of The People in the seasons to come would know the end of this world, and the end would be painful and slow.
A madness had spread among the People. Over many years, more and more people began to believe the dark visions. Many of The People spoke of ending their lives. A great divide parted the tribe. Some wanted to leave the madness behind and start new lives elsewhere. Most wanted to die at their own hands before the horror came.
The land would be smashed flat and smooth and gray, the sky tainted and tasting bitter, and white ghosts would ride across the plains and mountains on great tireless beasts.
'Our way out of this world of pain will be made clear soon,' the spirit-talkers had said.
They had been saying that for a long time.
Then a hole opened in the earth and the spirit-talkers said, 'Come and see the path laid for The People, the way to escape all the pain to come.'
And The People went to the great hole and threw themselves down. They dragged and pushed their children, the old people. Women leaped into the dark clutching babies to their breasts.
The falling had gone on for a season now.
Crops were untended. The People had nothing to eat. The falling into the dark was all most of them wanted.
He had helped some get away. Those who did not think death was the way said they would leave everything behind, even the spirits that once guided and protected them. They would find new homes. New spirits. They would dance new dances and speak new happy words.
Come with us, they asked of him.
He said he would. First he had to see the falling with his own eyes. Such a terrible thing had to be seen and passed on to the children or it would be forgotten.
And so he had traveled to the place of the hole. Under the light of the moon he had seen the falling.
And he saw what a terrible change had come over The People. Now they were capturing the unwilling and throwing them down the great hole, promising that they would all be saved.
It was all wrong.
And then he was caught.
He was brought struggling to the hole, his protests ignored.
The People walked by him, stepping into the dark hole.
He was thrown in. He fell a short way and landed on a ledge of stone.
He covered his ears to block the screams of those who fell past him.
After a time the screams stopped.
Day came, and night again. He grew hungry. Time passed.
He remembered so much of the falling that his own name and the name of his people was burned out of his mind.
He cried. He screamed. He thought about stepping off of the ledge.
One day he decided to try and climb out of this place. That was when he heard rock crumbling and saw a horse and a boy dropping into the great hole.
He had reached out and grabbed the boy's arm, saving him.
"Wol-la-chee," the boy had said.
*
Hole Time
Ant was afraid of this strange man, but not afraid to kill. Yet his fear soon went away. This Anaszie was no threat. This man was as lost as he was.
Ant thought this man looked completely alone. Ant thought he had been abandoned by his people.
He touched the man's chest and said, "Hok'ee."
Abandoned.
The man touched Ant's chest and said, "Wol-la-chee."
Together they looked up.
Together they began to climb.
Soon it was night. They could see the stars.
*
Fall, 2005
"Here they come, dude," Edgecomb said. "Action time!"
Soldiers were rappelling down into the hole to the ledge the archeologists were working.
Edgecomb and Auger were whisked to the surface, their protests ignored.
"You see," Auger said, "I told you! Now it's our turn to disappear."
Ant was enraged. He had been climbing toward the night sky at Hok'ee's side when he had seen two white men hanging above him like strange fruit. The white man had pissed on him and he had seen the man dead in his mind.
Before he could get close with his knife a blinding light filled the hole. He started to lose his grip on the wall but more white men appeared, dangling like spiders, snatching him and Hok'ee away from the wall and carrying them up into their strange world.
Kaines looked into the holding room through the reinforced glass pane in the steel door. He shook his head. They hadn't been bullshitting, after all. There was a history book Navajo in there. Just a kid, really. A scared kid.
"Captain."
Kaines turned and snapped a salute.
"Major Barrow."
"You have your orders?"
Kaines nodded. "Yes sir, Major. Interrogate the detainee, get everything out of him that I can, and make him disappear."
Major Barrow nodded. "Probably just some Navajo punk who hopped the fence and wanted to spray some 'Free the Four Corners' graffiti. Wouldn't be the first time."
"Major, I understand that two of the civilian archeologists were down there when—"
"They are no longer a part of this operation. Captain, and they will no longer be subject to discussion. Understood?"
"Yes, sir."
The Major turned away and Kaines gave another salute.
Neither salute had been returned.
When the Major cleared the corridor, Kaines stepped into another room. He got a coffee and tapped Begaye on the shoulder.
Sergeant Tom Begaye took off his headphones. He had been watching the kid through a two-way mirror, listening to an initial brief interrogation minutes earlier and now the song-song cadence as the kid muttered under his breath.
The boy was sitting in a steel chair set before a steel table. He had a tiny piece of charcoal in his hand and he was drawing on the tabletop.
Kaines felt a twinge. The kid looked damn scared, lonely.
He was glad Begaye was here. Tom had been born and raised not far from here and was a hell of an asset.
"Anything, Tommy?"
Begaye gave Captain Kaines a shrug.
"The other guy from the hole pushed a little too hard and got popped by a rifle butt. He's in the infirmary, under guard. This kid didn't say anything to the guys who brought him in."
Kaines took a deep breath. He was pissed, but he had to keep his cool.
Begaye gestured at the glass. "That kid is definitely Navajo, but I haven't heard anyone talk like that since my grampa died. And those clothes, that's museum stuff. What the hell is going on, Captain?"
Kaines sipped his coffee and said, "Let's go find out.
They stepped into the interrogation room. Major Barrow had wanted armed MP's inside the room but Kaines had talked him out of it.
For a moment no one spoke. The men and the boy looked at each other, then Kaines and Begaye cocked their heads and looked at the symbol the boy had drawn on the desk.
"Four lines and a hole," Kaines said.
"In art and designs, four is big with my people," Begaye replied. "So are holes."
"All right," Kaines said, giving the boy what he hoped was a reassuring smile. "Let's get started.
User Reviews
Submitted by Stagger_Lee (user info) at 2006-04-28 03:23:39 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by nrduncan (user info) at 2005-10-12 15:37:20 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by jack11058 (user info) at 2005-10-12 10:49:47 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Submitted by thecaes (user info) at 2005-10-08 11:21:22 (#)
Ranking: 2
I think I'm starting to see where you're going with this...or maybe I'm clueless, as per usual. Either way, it's very interesting.
Submitted by Brdn_Nkd (user info) at 2005-10-10 09:14:25 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by Crystle (user info) at 2005-10-09 22:41:30 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
HA!
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Submitted by Jack_McCallum (user info) at 2005-10-07 22:40:00 (#)
Ranking: 0
I've never read any Gibson.
I was gonna do a historical love story but that fucking Shakespeare asshole beat me to it.
Submitted by r1nce (user info) at 2005-10-09 00:14:11 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
When and where can I buy a book of your short stories?
Dang-nabbit!
Submitted by tlozoot (user info) at 2005-10-08 22:59:49 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Bravo.
Submitted by forensicgirl3 (user info) at 2005-10-08 16:03:43 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
wow
Submitted by DCWoody (user info) at 2005-10-08 15:59:37 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I wasn't impressed with the first few episodes of this thing, but I am now.
Submitted by c1ndy (user info) at 2005-10-08 14:39:50 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I like this idea.
Submitted by kaos-king (user info) at 2005-10-08 14:02:19 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
You are truly one of great writers here on Uber... My jealousy knows no bounds with you!
Submitted by Jack_McCallum (user info) at 2005-10-08 13:43:12 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Submitted by horse87 (user info) at 2005-10-08 12:11:29 (#)
Ranking: 2
Excellent.
However, Anaszie = Anasazi....
Better add that one to your spellcheck...
--
http://www.ubersite.com/m/76672#1630962
Submitted by houseman (user info) at 2005-10-08 12:49:59 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Great job Jack
Submitted by Spuds002 (user info) at 2005-10-08 12:47:26 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by horse87 (user info) at 2005-10-08 12:11:29 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Excellent.
However, Anaszie = Anasazi....
Better add that one to your spellcheck...
Submitted by thecaes (user info) at 2005-10-08 11:23:33 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Oh I forgot to mention that this rules. Though I thought your archaeologists were a bit too much in the sense that they were both extreme versions of a certain character type. And if you're not going to mention them again, it wasn't necessary to flesh them out so much -- though details on characters are always, always appreciated.
Submitted by thecaes (user info) at 2005-10-08 11:21:22 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I think I'm starting to see where you're going with this...or maybe I'm clueless, as per usual. Either way, it's very interesting.
Submitted by Yes (user info) at 2005-10-08 11:19:20 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I want to make love to your brain.... got a bonesaw?
Submitted by stardamage (user info) at 2005-10-08 07:48:05 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
*struggles to find words*
*fails*
Submitted by Jack_McCallum (user info) at 2005-10-07 22:40:00 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
I've never read any Gibson.
I was gonna do a historical love story but that fucking Shakespeare asshole beat me to it.
Submitted by joedaddy (user info) at 2005-10-07 22:26:38 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
You know jack, that gentleman red-lined my asshole meter about a month ago.
It's comforting to know that my equipment is still, in perfect working order.
Submitted by Bubba2341 (user info) at 2005-10-07 21:36:56 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Submitted by Judoka (user info) at 2005-10-07 21:25:07 (#)
Ranking: 0
This is interesting, but William Gibson did this scenerio in his story story 'Hinterlands' and you would be hard pressed to top him.
___________________________________________________
All writers are influenced by someone. Maybe you should be
"topped" by a sledgehammer. Cunt.
Submitted by Judoka (user info) at 2005-10-07 21:25:07 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
This is interesting, but William Gibson did this scenerio in his story story 'Hinterlands' and you would be hard pressed to top him.
Submitted by Bubba2341 (user info) at 2005-10-07 20:44:39 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
See what I mean, Jack? +2s from the cosmos. MORE!!
Submitted by HadToBeDone (user info) at 2005-10-07 20:38:09 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by ThineJericho (user info) at 2005-10-07 20:33:57 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No comment needed.
I'm loving this series.
Submitted by JonnyX (user info) at 2005-10-07 19:49:17 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
rockin, as always
Submitted by Bubba2341 (user info) at 2005-10-07 19:28:28 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
"He had lived through four sets of four seasons four times. "
Jack, I want to tell the world I hate you! Your writing style
is unique and wonderful. When you finally get published, tell
them Bob always said, "I told you!!"
More soon, I hope. . .
Submitted by Orgasmatron (user info) at 2005-10-07 19:22:16 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I'm on my way out for the night, so I will have to save my comments for later...but I'll have you know that this story has made me late for my night's plans. And I couldn't care less. Intriguing, to say the least. Keep it coming.
Submitted by Crystle (user info) at 2005-10-07 19:21:28 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
well.. I am speechless
this is too awesome Jack!
Submitted by Jack_McCallum (user info) at 2005-10-07 19:07:31 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Fuck me sideways, it's typo city! YAAAAH!
Submitted by Jack_McCallum (user info) at 2005-10-07 19:02:54 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Praise Jesus, let this one be fuck-up free.