Shocking Details of Docker's Plans Revealed. Sally's Had Enough. An Earthquake in the Mountain.

(Continued) PART TWO

"We could part's em out," a man said.  "We could make lots more dough.  That's where the real green is."

"Sh-h-h-h --"

            "She's out, man."  Docker's voice.  "Anyway, we don't have the personnel for that.  Takes expertise."

            They were talking about those old cars in the compound.  I started to drift off again when I heard another voice and saw myself sitting with Docker and his gang around a candlelit cloth-covered table, in a ladder-back chair.  Linda sat beside me.  Docker appeared partially in shadow, his face hidden.  Hands, like pale starfish glimpsed in shallow tide pools, fingers spread, rubbed his bare knees, making an irritating, rasping noise. 

            " . . . the big one.  Them's the age they need most," a man was saying.

            Then Pal's whiny snarl, "Nah, it's the young ones, like that li'l' squirt Papa Jo.  Y'know, we should do fuckin' babies, man.  You know how many babies are born with somepin' wrong?  Parent's'll do fuckin' anything to save the little fuckers, man."  The man who spoke didn't look like Pal.  He wore rimless glasses and a business suit.  I willed myself to grab his gun and shoot them; but all I could do was sit there, unable to speak or move, only listen as they jawed on with their sick brainstorming session.  "Maintenance, man.  Too much maintenance."

"Shit, I could do that,"  Linda said, her face morphing into No-Face's, amber light flickering.  I was aware of another me somewhere, restless, murmuring.

          "Yeah, you did a good job with Jody's kids."  The man who said this wavered into view as Chet, the scum who had harassed Billy-Bob, the one his buddy, Sandman, sitting beside him, had called Hairball.  These two looked like themselves.  I realized later I had matched up voices I had heard with the faces I knew and now saw in delirium.

          "Shut up, Chet, you fucker!  We weren't going to talk about it.  It's over.  Done!  Fuckin' finished!" Linda shouted.  Chet leaned across the table and leered through the flames, saying,

          "You ever think about, about the rest of it?"

          "What?  Rest of what?" she said.  This time her face didn't change.

          "The body.  What happens to the little body?"

           "Yeah, Hairball," Pal said.

           "Naw, man," Sandman interrupted, "That's crazy."

           "Cuts 'em up in little pieces," Chet droned on, "and spreads 'em around.  Fee fie fo fum," Chet sing-songed, leaning back, "I'll grind their bones to make my bread."

           The business man with Pal's voice snorted.  "Probably has a storage shed in the boonies," he said, "near Redding where he stacks the little skulls in pyramids--" 

          "Shut up!" Linda yelled, her face contorting.  At the table, I watched entranced at the spinning spirals of her pupils.  She scraped her chair on the floor and stood up.  Barefoot, she crossed the room backwards, turned the crystal knob on a paneled door, and banged it shut.

            "I still think we should get someone in here who knows about partin' em out, man."

            "Can it, asshole," Docker said, rubbing his knees, face still in shadow, "Why do you think I'm holding out, Pal.  Driving the price up on the whole unit.  We'd have to shell out a shitload of bread to part 'em out.  Plus, we'd have to demand a shitload, too.  I'm in constant contact with Hesh on the Net, man.  They're getting desperate."  That name resonated, quavering through my brain like a jelly-fish underwater.

            "We gotta agree on somethin' fast," the businessman said, "That Ay-rab'll go someplace else.  Gonna be snowin' hard in a couple of days.  They won't be able to set down.  He'll come after us!"

            "He's no Ay-rab.  And anyway, it's Arab, how many fucking  times do I have to explain it to you."

            "Yeah, but his name--"

            "No one knows what it is."  Docker cut him off,  leaning forward out of the shadow into the flickering candlelight.  Wearing a billed cap backwards and a well-groomed beard, he looked like one of my foster parents who used to buy me books.  "It stands for He Shall Not Be Named, you brainless dickhead.  I've told you a million times.  So pipe down.  They'll come around.  Can't go nowhere else, man."

            Sandman laughed.  "Man, what kid c'n resist going for a chopper ride!" he said, "I's their age? I'd fuckin' jump at it."

            "Yeah, Lyle, you ol' Sandman," Docker added, his face now back in shadow, "Last ones couldn't wait to hop in the truck for the ride to the pad, cheeks all rosy and shiny.  Like putting puppies to sleep."  This was spoken so softly, I barely heard it.

            I roused for a moment and suddenly grasped that I wasn't at the table, but in the loft, under blankets.  I sensed myself tuning out again and fought to stay conscious.  Mormo's warm, heavy hand on my shoulder startled me.  His face loomed into my fantasies.  I felt the covers being tucked under my chin, "Be still," he said, "In time the Mother will cast off the sickness.  Drink."  He pressed a cup of warm, sweet liquid to my lips and I drank it down.  The after-taste was so bitter, involuntarily, I spat into the cup.  The next instant, Tadpole, lying supine on the bar, rose up, his white face blank.  "You said you'd help us escape.  You lied."  His stomach had been sliced open; the red wound gaped.  A strange man, with a halo of flaming red hair, plunged a hand into the incision and pulled out a moist, bluish-red object and held it above his head.  Tadpole reached for it.

"Hey kid," the man said, "for this I will give you Seguro Muerte Numero Siete."

The boy's crimson mouth stretched like a clown's.  He laughed and laughed.

For a moment, I surfaced from my delirium in stillness, blankets damp and my body clammy with sweat.  The vision of Tadpole, lying eviscerated on the bar, swam before my eyes as I sank into unconsciousness. 

            Clutching the covers to my heart which beat like a jazz drum solo, I sat straight up on the mattress.  It felt like late morning.  Across the loft, the closet door bore an image of Tadpole's face melding with the grain of wood.  My head spun with the night's apparitions and voices overlaid with my own, demanding I get my shit together and split.  The dialogues droned on like the static of endless, intercutting, bad radio plays.  What I'd heard last night was enough, delirium or no.  I couldn't bear being here another moment.

         The buzzing in my ears increased when I tried to stand; but the pain was gone.  My forehead throbbed.  I touched it and felt rough skin.  I recalled that sometime during the night Docker had sponged me off.  He had lain beside me, stroking my hair.  "Baby," he'd murmured, caressing my face with soft, cool fingertips, "I told you, asking too many questions is detrimental to your health."  I found my clothes, freshly washed, folded, on the floor next to the mattress, put them on and pulled on my jacket and boots.  Shaking, I climbed down the ladder.  No one was about.

         In the bathroom, I looked in the mirror, shocked at what I saw.  Both eyes were swollen and purplish-black with greenish-yellow tingeing the edges.  On my forehead, an angry gash grinned back at me.  The door squeaked.  In the mirror, I saw Docker standing in the door frame.

           "Don't come near me.  Don't touch me."  I squeezed into the space between the toilet and the sink.  He stood in front of me and sang,

            " 'I never dreamed I'd love somebody like you'.  Sweetheart," he said, "I'm sorry.  Really, I am.  Please, just remember all those things I told you the other day.  We won't be here too much longer.  Just a little while longer.  Soon as, soon as . . .Well, soon."

            "I don't want to go anywhere with you.  I'm going home."  A palpable force separated us.  He turned and walked out, quietly closing the door after him.  I doubled over, lifted the toilet seat and retched until nothing came up but green bile.  If they try to stop me now, they'll have to kill me.

            The boys, sullen and quiet, were sitting at the table, kicking the rungs.  Their mouths formed little Os.  I told them I'd bumped into the bathroom door in the dark.  I couldn't entice them to go out and play so I asked Mormo to take them down to the creek.  The voices of Docker and the couple, yakking on the porch, filtered through the door.  I started throwing food into my backpack, along with my flashlight and pocket-knife, and was just about to reach up for a tin of jerky on a shelf behind the bar when Docker came in and leaned his elbows on the plank. 

            "I wish you knew how I felt, babe.  I wish yesterday'd never happened," he said, lowering his head, "I'm really sorry."

            "Wishing won't make it so," I said, turning to face him.  "You can't make me stay here.  What are you going to do now?  Slug me again?  Toss me across the room?  Kill me?"  I grabbed a kitchen knife lying on a shelf below the bar and pointed it at him. 

            "Whoah!  Sally!"  He raised his hands.  "Hey, what are you doing, man?  Are you crazy?  Put that down."

            "Leave me alone, all right?"

            "Hey,  I'm telling you.  I've changed.  I'm not going to hurt you.  That part of me is history.  You scared the shit out of me yesterday.  Thought you were dead."

            "Sure.  So you left me there.  Thanks."

            "Okay, okay, shit.  Mormo had it covered.  Now put the fucking knife down.  Don't act crazy.  You could hurt yourself.  You don't know who your dealing with here.  I could disarm you before you could blink."  I lay the knife on the bar.  We stared at each other.  "What are you doing?"  He came around the bar, retrieved the tin and handed it to me.

            "I'm packing."

            "Don't mess with me.  You're getting the kids' lunch."

            "Think what you want.  I know all about you.  I was right.  I found your old place, the shack.  I know what you guys do.  What I heard last night confirmed it."

            "What're you talking about?  You don't know shit."

            "This," I said, fumbling in my jacket pocket for the article, "I don't need a bolt of lightning to tell me something really sick is going on.  I knew it.  Last night you said something about Heshie and the Net.  He's in this."  I waved the yellowed clipping in his face.  "You  scumbag losers kidnap kids and sell them to organ brokers.  I'm taking them with me."

            "What the holy fuck are you talking about, baby?  That's a little harsh, man.  You're loonier than I thought.  Give me that."  Docker snatched the brittle yellow paper out of my hand.  It crumbled.  Bits floated to the floor.  "What's this?" 

"You know what it is."  He brought the ragged scrap close to his face, squinted at it, crumpled it into a ball and stuffed it into his front pocket.

"What's it say?  Tell me," he said, leaning on the bar, "I can't read it.  It's all messed up."  I knew it word for word.  Head bowed, he listened.  When I finished, he pushed away, threw his head back and laughed, pacing back and forth, running his fingers through his hair.  Black shocks stuck up crazily from his head. 

            "You think I'm that dude?"  He spoke softly, bending over the bar and reaching out to take my hands.   I held them behind my back.  He grasped the edge of the plank, knuckles white.  "You really think I'm that dude?  God, woman.  You're aching for some adventure, aren't you.  Listen now.  Just listen to me a second.  Trouble with your type, you look for excitement.  It comes along, you start imagining all kinds of shit.  No wonder you have nightmares, hallucinations.  Mormo told me--another one last night.  You must repress a lot of shit, kiddo."  He shook his head.  "Believe me, sweetheart.  I don't know a thing about that scene.  Your head's all messed up, man.  Thought we got everything all straightened out the other day.  You hurt me, you know.  Take it easy.  I've been through a lot.  Lost a bro, his girl split.  I just lost it.  Try to understand.  Man, I'm so sorry I hit you.  I didn't mean it.  Okay?  I'll take you home tomorrow, if that's what you really want."  Shoving his hands into his pockets, he rocked on his heels, started to walk out, and came back.  "I'll be outside," he said, "Ol' Lyle, the Sandman wants me to take a look at the truck."  After he left, it dawned on me he rarely clued me in on what he was up to.

            I resumed stowing food in my pack.  So No-Face made it out.  Bully for her.  Trembling, I fumbled a bottle of water and bent to pick it up; my eye caught something I hadn't noticed before.  Embedded in the floor at the base of the bar was a tiny, round, metal ring.  Holding my breath, I squatted down for a closer look, expecting Docker to sneak up on me any moment.  The ring  looked like a port.  His briefcase, then, had to be a laptop.  Though I had seen no evidence of electricity, except for the vehicles, I never questioned the low hum, far off in the distance, that sometimes woke me in the wee hours.  I ran a finger around the chill chrome circle.  Faint crescent-shaped scratches marred the floor.  Someone had moved the bar so slightly, disclosing the port, its new position went unnoticed.  Somehow, before I split, I had to get hold of his case.

            My hands shook as I continued to pack.  Then I stopped; an envelope of dried food dangled from my fingertips.  Christ.  I sat down and set my backpack on the floor between my legs.  Maybe that stuff Mormo made me drink was drugged, why I had delusions, playing up the paranoia I felt from the very beginning: that first night under the trees, No-Face saddling me with her own bullshit, the news clipping . . . I braced my forehead with the heels of my hands, elbows digging into my knees.  Docker's right.  I am messed up.  I'm going crazy.  I have to clear off this place.  I wedged the envelope next to the jerky and slung the pack over my shoulder, walked out the door smack into Docker just as he stepped on to the porch with Pal.  I pushed past, not looking at them.

            "Hey, Sally!  Where're you going with all that shit?  That's some lunch!"  Docker chided.  His side-kick laughed.

            "Maybe she's movin' in with the kids in the tree-house," Pal said, "Better watch her, Doc, she might be tryin' to split again."  I moved on, ignoring Pal's guffaws and razzing.  Docker called after me.  Pal said, "Let her go, man.  You gonna let her pussy-whip you?  We won't let her get away--"  I heard the cabin door bang shut.

            I climbed the oak and stashed the pack high in a fork to retrieve later.  I wanted to sound out Mormo; he was nowhere around.  I pushed from my mind the thought that he had drugged me, sensing he was fed up with not only watching Docker use me as his personal punching bag, but the whole scene.  He would help me get away.  I had to trust someone.  The kids were batting rocks across the creek with a tree limb.  I saw Linda on the bank, rinsing out some things.  Over their protests, I asked her to watch them for a few minutes.  She averted her eyes from my face as we talked.

            Mormo wasn't at his watering hole.  I hiked farther up the creek, looking for him.  It was frozen over along the edges, but in the middle, the creek coursed along swiftly like a river.  I went upstream, in the opposite direction I'd gone when I tried to escape, and found myself deeper into the woods.  I ended up in a copse of firs, scrub oaks, and hemlock.  Something shiny, partially hidden beneath a pile of dead leaves, caught my eye.  No-Face's mirror?  What was it doing up here?  I didn't think anyone ventured this far from the cabin.  I hadn't seen her since our talk.  Docker said she'd split.  I brushed away the leaves.  The shiny object turned out to be a bottle cap.

            The sound of rushing water grew louder.  I stooped beneath low hanging branches and went down the bank to the creek.  A voluminous mass cascaded into a deep hollow in the rocks, then surged out, roiling and frothing.  I peered into the turbulence.  What I saw there confirmed my suspicions.  Mormo hadn't slipped me something last night; though, because of my injuries and his healing herbs, I'd become delirious.  But Docker had, probably in a drink; I had not been hallucinating that night .  The drug had kicked in right after Pal slit that guy's throat.  Docker wanted me out for a couple of days so I wouldn't accidentally come upon him doing his dirty work.  Below the water's surface, staring up at me, was a distorted face I barely recognized as the coalition leader's, his body wedged between submerged boulders, current tugging at a loose flap of flesh below his chin.  This man in the roaring creek, I would soon discover, wasn't the only victim.  I reeled backwards, gagging, and collapsed on the pine needles.  I stood up and plunged on toward the cabin.  I had to take the kids with me. 

THE EARTHQUAKE.  NO FACE DISCOVERED

            I hadn't gone a half-mile when something made me stop.  The air seemed impregnated with a silence so profound, I felt I could hear the sun sliding across the sky.  No birds sang; no cicadas buzzed.  It was as though the earth had stopped turning, teetering instead on the edge of the universe, readying to spin itself backwards in time.  The feeling was so intense that for a split second I forgot where I was and what I was supposed to do.  A low rumble coming from deep in the mountains grew inside my head, expanding into a deafening roar.  The earth rose up, buckled beneath me, and threw me to the ground.  Trees swayed; their branches swishing every which way sounded like waterfalls thundering down over my head.  The shaking stopped.  I stood up and ran on legs I could no longer feel but ordered to move and reached a clearing within sight of the cabin.  I had to find the kids.  Where was Linda?  "Tadpole!  Billy-Bob!  Papa Jo!  Where are you!"

            From a distance, I passed three men, lurching and stumbling around.  Waving their arms, they pointed this way and that.  One held a bottle high over his head, shaking it.  Maybe they knew where the kids were.  In an instant, there was another roar, louder than a film soundtrack explosion.  The men fell, then clawed at each other to get to their feet.  They staggered off, wailing, appearing to move in slow motion over fallen trees, around boulders, then disappeared.  In plots in front of the porch a few of the gang hugged each other, mouths hanging open.  Suddenly, the mountain which housed the cabin gave off a thunderclap and chopped itself off halfway up.  A cavernous gash, the color of dried blood, appeared in its side.  I dove to the ground and lay flat, body hugging the shuddering earth, arms over my head.  I peeked over my forearm and witnessed tons of earth and stone cascading down, crushing the cabin's heavy beam portico, blocking its entrance and burying men, women, and children as they struggled to flee.

            Earth, rocks, and shrubbery continued raining down.  Hair-raising screeches surrounded me.  Then the ground undulated as though a giant had hold of one end, shaking it out like a carpet, tossing me into a deep crevice.  I kicked loose dirt from a tree root for a foot hold, straining to climb out before the earth closed above my head.  The root gave way.  It turned out to be an arm.  No-Face's shredded blue shirt and a piece of a trash bag clung to it.  Shock pumped me full of adrenaline, propelling me from her grave.  Docker's words: ". . . work to do before the ground freezes," echoed in my head.  I dropped to my hands and knees and panted like a dog.  Saliva streamed from my lips.  I couldn't think of her, only of the kids.  She was dead. 

Deafening booms split the air.  Again, trees swayed and cracked with the sound of lightning and skidded down, flattening everything in their paths.  Boulders hurled in all directions.  I felt as though a part of me were outside myself, watching.  I crouched down and covered my head, hearing myself scream.  The after-shock passed.  In the silence, a child cried out.  I saw Billy-Bob and Papa Jo stumbling up from the direction of the creek, their little faces screwed up with fear.  Mormo, his eyes wide as saucers, trudged behind them, carrying the red-head who had lost a shoe.  He lay the boy beside me.  The other two fell on me, sobbing.  I held them tight, brushing leaves and earth from their clothes.  The sound of tumbling rocks, coming from where the porch had been, made me look up.  I recognized Linda by her hair--stiff, sticking up wildly--her clothing ragged.  She had dug herself out and was dragging Pal from beneath the wreckage.  He was naked; abdomen torn open, guts hung out, his legs still buried.  I turned the boy's faces away and swallowed the acrid taste rising in my throat.  Linda clung to Pal, keening.

"Linda," I shouted, "turn him over.  Pull off your sweater.  Push his guts back in with it.  Hold your sweater over his stomach and press.  Where's Docker?"  She sat back on her heels, not listening.  Pal will die, I thought.  What chance was there of getting him out, going for help over miles of ruined landscape to the highway, if it still existed, and then what?  Writhing and groaning, he collapsed in the rubble.  Linda bent over him, smoothing his hair, "It's going to be all right, baby," she said, her voice riding the still air.  I left the kids with Mormo and knelt by her side. "Was Docker with you?" I said.  She pushed me away.  The crotch and back of her torn jeans were stained.  I thought it was blood till I moved closer; she'd shit her pants.

"Pal's going to die!" I said, "Is Docker inside?  Tell me!"   She yanked a gun from her waistband and aimed it at me.

"What are you doing?  Don't!"  Before I could stop her, she shot Pal in the back of the head, put the gun to her chest and pulled the trigger.  The blasts reverberated off the mountains in the silence.  She crumpled to the ground beside her man; her raveled, soiled sweater drank up the spreading red lake.  Mechanically, with clanging eardrums, I held her arm and felt for a pulse, then rested my fingertips on her throat.  She grew cold under my touch.  Her eyes stared unseeing at the purple snow-clouds piling up near the mountain peaks.  Her lips parted, white teeth sparkling, gums and tongue already turning grey.  Without looking at Pal's head, I touched his arm; it felt hard.  His torso lay twisted, now pressed to the earth as though striving to burrow beneath it.  Beyond the noise in my ears, I heard Mormo huffing and my own heart beating.  Billy-Bob and Papa Jo cringed in the giant's arms, hands held tightly over their ears. 

Tadpole remained unconscious under the big man's parka.  I listened to the red-head's heart and checked his breathing; his pulse was weak and fluttery.  Dark bruises marked his rib cage; blood matted the hair on the back of his head.  In his upper left arm, a shattered bone gouged through his pale skin.  Using a branch and a bandanna hanky, Mormo and I straightened and splinted his arm; the giant packed it in herbs.  The boy never woke.  I left the boy's side after I had cleaned the blood from his hair and commanded Mormo to help me as I tore at mounds of earth, boulders, and broken branches, hoping to find survivors.  I felt the weight of his great hands on my shoulders, drawing me away.

            "No use," he murmured, "save strength for the living--you and the boys." 

            Birds took up their songs and a stiff breeze moved through splintered boughs.  The kids and I jumped at sporadic sounds of loose rocks and chunks of dark, grey-brown earth falling around us, and at the crack and crash of yet another tree.  From the cabin, crushed beneath half the mountainside, came only silence.  In little more than a minute that had seemed an eternity, devastation reigned.  Docker had to be dead; he'd been in the cabin with Pal.  He had killed No-Face or had had someone else do it.  She'd been right all along.  Why had he buried her so close to the cabin?  I caught Mormo looking at me strangely.  His mouth hung open, eyes fixed in an uncomprehending stare.  I was thinking aloud.  An uncontrollable trembling took hold of me and I hugged myself to stop it.

            I tried rousing Tadpole, patting his cheeks and shaking him.  The other two, exhausted by fear, had fallen asleep.  Gazing at their peaceful faces, an irresistible urge to close my eyes came over me.  I scootched down beside the red-head under the parka and, before drifting off, asked Mormo to keep an eye on him in case he woke up.

THE AFTERMATH.  TADPOLE

The giant shook me awake and I yawned and stretched, feeling renewed.  The air was  pungent with odors of overturned earth; crisp and sharpened by the fragrance of crushed foliage. The angle of the sun told me not too much time had passed.  Billy-Bob and Papa Jo sat silently beside him.  A low growl rose from deep in his throat.

"Me and Billy-Bob try to bury," he said, "Earth too hard --  So boy and I lay Linda and Pal in place where the Mother broke apart.  Cover them with rocks."  He spoke with unusual gruffness and gestured towards No-Face's grave.  He had erected a pillar of stones in descending sizes for each burial.  I patted the parka covering me, then jerked it clean from the ground.  Leaves and twigs flew up.

"Where's Tadpole?" I said.  Tears streaked Billy-Bob's cheeks.  He hiccuped and sniffled.  Papa Jo, head bent, rotated a pine cone in his small fingers.  Mormo handed me Tadpole's shoe, hardly bigger than a doll's.  Shaking his head, he thrust out his chin, then pointed to a spot a few feet away.  The waning sunlight sparked tears clinging to his lashes.  The black oak, torn from the earth, rested on its side; pale, soil-encrusted roots grabbed air.  In an area all by itself, closest to where the tree-house had been was another stone totem. 

            "Cover boy with earth in place where big oak tree-house once hug the Mother, where he like to play."  I broke down.  Billy-Bob and Papa Jo crawled into my lap, sobbing, 

             "Docker's dead, too, Mormo.  I just know he is."  He nodded, looking into my eyes.  I prattled on.  "He couldn't have survived.  I don't care.  I wish I knew what you're thinking."  I told him how I'd found No-Face's body and how I thought she had ended up there.  His eyes were blank.

            He rose from a cross legged position on the ground, carrying Papa Jo.  "We must go."

            Mormo scrounged around where the plots had been and somehow unearthed a couple of damaged backpacks containing half-pints.  He also found jackets, rope, and packages of food, but no bodies, or so he had me believe.  I filled empty bottles from deep muddy pools which had once been the creek.  The quake had displaced its bed.  I closed my mind to the image of the coalition leader over whom this very water may have passed.  Then Docker's face loomed in my mind's eye; his laugh echoed in my head.  Unbidden tears flowed.  Why cry over a murderer?  No-Face's large, brown eyes haunted me as I moved about in a trance, talking to myself for reassurance as I helped the giant make ready for our trek.  The tree-house ended up a mess of dead branches scattered here and there.   I found my pack thrown half-way to where the cabin porch once stood.

We said good-bye to Tadpole beside his grave at the uprooted oak, which Mormo had marked off by encircling it with rocks.  Tears welled in my eyes, spilling down my frozen cheeks.  We'll make it out, I told him, I'll find your parents and give them your shoe.  My heart thudded like a bag of wet sand against my sternum when I thought about having to turn Papa Jo and Billy-Bob over to authorities.  I promised myself that soon as I could I'd call GGIO about the article I'd found in the shack, the kids, the murders, and my suspicions that Docker and his gang were who they were looking for.  Belief in the future helped me distance myself from the all too immediate present.  Fuck the Now.
THEY CARRY ON

Night was falling; a frosty chill permeated the air.  Papa Jo clung to the big man's neck, burying his face in Mormo's thick body-hair.  He tried putting the toddler down, but he wasn't going for it.  He kicked his tiny legs screaming, "No!  No!"

"Billy-Bob and I will hold your hands," I said rubbing his little back.  He shook his head and clung tighter.

            "He's scared the ground'll move and he'll fall down again."  The older boy explained, stomping on the earth and pulling the toddler's pant leg.  "Look, PJ," he said to his little friend, "it's solid.  Come on.  Let Mormo put you down."  The child resisted.  Mormo gave up and settled Papa Jo in the hollow of his neck and shoulder.  He draped a parka he'd found, on Billy-Bob.  It dragged on the ground when he walked, sleeves flapping, making him look like a war-torn refugee.  At the vehicle compound, we found the cars and trucks crushed under giant firs.  Fallen trees had ripped the nylon mesh which now covered everything like a massive, shredded spiderweb.  The landscape looked as though bored gods had whimsically destroyed it as easily as children stomp sand castles into oblivion.  Mormo studied the ravaged terrain, hunched his shoulders and let them drop.  We'd have to make it on foot.  He roped the extra jackets to my backpack, to layer on when it started snowing.  He knotted the sleeves of another, filling it with more bottled water and food, and tied it on himself.  He fashioned a secure sling in which to carry Papa Jo, on top of the packed jacket, which appeared child sized, rigged to his trestle-like shoulders.  I turned to look at the scarred mountain that had housed the cabin, most of which now buried Docker and his gang, their worries about the Members over.  They'd reaped their karma. 

            "Come!"  Mormo grunted.  It felt as though we were the only ones alive on the planet.

            Time was eaten up as we slowly picked our way through uprooted trees, whose sundered trunks revealed the pale, raw flesh of moist, healthy xylem; the fragrance, intoxicating.  We climbed over gouged earth, around displaced boulders as big as houses, and shards of granite twice as large.  Mormo, for his bulk, moved about these obstacles like a child on playground apparatuses.  The pinks and mauves of dusk stood out against dark, towering clouds.  Birds readying for sleep twittered and chirped, fluttering about in search of new roosts.  The giant's pace lulled Papa Jo to sleep; he never woke, not even when we scaled rocky outcroppings.  Billy-Bob would sob and cling to me one minute; the next, frisk about like a mountain goat.  Mormo tried to restrain him from dashing ahead, parka flapping clownishly, before the giant tested the ground first.  We walked along a rare, fairly level place high on a ridge; Lassen's cone, glowing whitely in the twilight, reassuringly visible from afar.

            "There's an old shack about a half day's walk--"  I said, holding my flashlight and the boy's hand.

"I know."  Mormo cut me off.

"If it's still standing," I said, "we can stay there tonight.  Maybe the quake didn't damage it or change things there as much as it did here.  We could have a fire if the stove is okay."

"I hope we find that ol' shack," Billy-Bob said, "I hope it isn't wrecked.  I'm cold."  He wrapped his arms, lost in huge sleeves, around himself, then stuck out a pink hand, picked up a branch and tossed it.

"You know, Billy-Bob, sometimes an earthquake'll demolish a building and the one right next to it will be okay."

            "Yeah, I seen pictures on TV about hurricanes that do that, too.  Look, Sally, look way over there.  There's some trees that didn't fall down.  I wish Tadpole'd been like one of those trees."  He buried his head in my side.  I knew how he felt.  In a strange way, I was beginning to wish the same for Docker and hating myself for it.  I patted the boy's wool capped head and hugged him.  Numb, I moved about without thinking, catching my breath when the spectre of my dead lover rose up before me.

"So you never know," I said.

"Nope.  Right, PJ?"  Billy-Bob leaped up to pat the little kid's butt, but his fingertips just missed the bottom of Mormo's pack.  "Yah never know."

"Please don't jump, honey.  I'm afraid you'll come down on something and twist your ankle."  He looked at me, startled.

"Jeez, you sound just like--" he said, cutting himself off.

"Your Mom?"

"F'rget it," he mumbled, turning away, pretending to be preoccupied with a rock he'd picked up, moving his head from side to side.  I decided not to pursue it; the right time would come.

"The way to the shack, I think, is over here," I told Mormo, veering off from his side, sure of my direction.

"No.  Come this way," Mormo insisted, "Come with me.  I know the land."  His footsteps imprinted the fresh earth.  He turned, waiting for me to catch up.  "Why look at me like that?"

"Is this where you lived as a child?"  He didn't answer, simply adjusted Papa Jo in his sling and trudged on.  I had to trust him.  The icy air pinched my nose and a needle-point of pain pricked the center of my forehead.  Instantly, a heavy snow began to fall.  Eyes closed, head raised, Billy-Bob twirled around, catching snowflakes on his tongue as they sifted down.  Winter was upon us.

MORMO LEADS

If it weren't for the big man, I would have been completely lost.  Now, added to the disorientation caused by the temblor and after-shock that redistributed the land and waterways, snow covered the landscape, draping trees in white lace and creating otherworldly arrays of distended white mounds of all shapes and sizes.  The full moon's reflection made it almost as light as day.  The scene brought back memories of the story-book Snow Queen's castle where, as a child, I yearned to live.  I would pray before falling asleep that I'd wake up there.  By morning, I would have forgotten.

Picking our way along a ledge, we found ourselves confronted by fifteen-foot slabs of granite that had broken free of the mountain and had slid down its side.  There was no way around -- mountain on one side, sheer drop on the other.  Before we could restrain him, Billy-Bob squeezed through a narrow gap between them.  He wriggled his way back, his face radiant.

"There's some old building!  I could tell by its shape, but it's covered with snow!"  He slipped back through to the other side.

"The shack," I whispered.  I tried pushing myself between the slabs, but tensed up with fear.  I didn't want to get stuck and freeze to death.  I backed out, shouting at the boy not to do anything till I made it through.  Unless Mormo was a genie, the only way for him was over the top.  Barefoot, with his boots tied to his belt, he started climbing, with Papa Jo in his sling. 

"Come," he called to me, tossing down a rope, voice muffled by drifting snow, "Tie it around your waist.  Start climbing, I will pull you up."

"I'm going to try to squeeze through again," I shouted up to him.  I knew I could make it.              "Take off your things, then.  Too bulky, get caught.  Push them through first.  Leave your shoes and gloves on.  You will not feel the cold."  I watched, stomping my feet, hugging myself to keep warm, as, at each step, he brushed snow from the granite surface before placing his broad hairy hands and feet on it.  Clouds covered the moon and once again snow fell heavily, making it difficult to see him.  I stripped to my undies and bundled my clothes, set them on the ground in front of the narrow space, and prodded them along with a branch I'd pulled from a drift, until I heard Billy-Bob shout, "I got 'em!"

Bathed in the sweat of fear, I breathed deeply, seeing my muscles lengthening, softening.  I imagined myself as a cat, gliding easily through the narrowest spaces.  My heart started racing.  A tingling sensation crept up my legs, along my arms, moving toward my heart.  I couldn't breathe.  I was stuck.  The granite slabs crushed me.  Frozen lichens tore at my skin, and my heart labored, suffocating me.  I fought the urge to scream.

            "Sally!  Sally!"  The boy's voice cracked through my creeping panic.  I took a deep breath and let it out slowly, closed my eyes and concentrated on warmth, seeing the connection between each bone in my body.  I ducked down, turned my hips a little more sideways, sucked in my belly, squeezed my buttocks, and thrust my head and the rest of me out into the open.  Billy-Bob threw his arms around me.  "I knew you could do it!  I knew it!"

            Mormo had already made it over.  He unbundled my clothes and handed them to me.  I gave myself a vigorous rubdown with my sweater, then dressed quickly, leaving buttons and zippers till my fingers thawed.  The snowfall had ceased and clouds parted on the full moon, giving off enough light to see by.  Holding Billy-Bob's hand, I followed Mormo into the abandoned structure.

DOCKER'S END

            "Hold it right there," a voice out of the darkness warned.   Mormo came up short and put out a hand to stop us.

            "Doc?"  Mormo growled, moving toward the voice.

            "Docker!  You're alive!"  I played my flashlight all over the place.  "Where are you?"

            We found him sitting on the floor, shoulders braced against the back wall, his briefcase on the plank floor beside him.  He'd covered himself with the old black coat.  Without thinking, I dropped to my knees and hugged him.  He uttered a cry of pain, then choked, straining for air.  Billy-Bob stood silently by.  Mormo lowered himself to the floor, balancing Papa Jo.  Eerie shadows, cast by our flashlight beams, danced erratically on the smoke-blackened walls.

            "You are hurt, Boss."

            "See you got the kids--  Where's the other one?"

            "Dead."  Mormo minced no words.

            "Fuck.  You got some water?"  Docker pointed his gun at me.  I saw an image of No-Face and caught my breath.

            "Put that away.  You do not need it,"  Mormo said.  Docker lowered his weapon, moaning.

            "What happened, Doc?" the big man said, "Something is wrong inside, you are bleeding from your mouth."

            "How did you manage to get past those granite slabs?"  I said, "Did you fall?  Is that how you got hurt?  Or was it the earthquake?"  He moved his head slowly toward me.

            "Shut the fuck up.  Shit!  Ol' Sally and her questions.  The death of her yet."  He tried to laugh.  I wiped away fresh blood streaming from his mouth with my scarf.  He looked at the giant.  "We're going to make it, Mormo.  We got two of  'em.  Let's get to the helipad.  I got it all here."  He jiggled the case.  I glanced at the big man.  He lowered his eyelids then snapped them open in some kind of signal I couldn't decipher, then growled,

            "When earth first move you flee like baby mountain goat chased by white leopard.  You did not stay to help your friends.  They are dead.  I went to find kids near creek.  Now, you are wolverine."  I realized then that Docker must have escaped just after I found the coalition leader's body.

            "No, no.  I was coming back for you."  Docker spoke slowly, moistening his lips with his tongue.  He coughed. 

            "You do not speak from your heart.  Your mouth speaks words out of wrong face.  You had contract.  No contract, no deal.  You find more kids--You do not have kids," Mormo said.  The room started to spin.  I closed my eyes for a second.

            "It is true," I said, "That article was about you, Docker or Rocker, James Petrie, or whoever the hell you are.  You killed No-Face.  And I found the coalition leader's body."

            "Yeah, so what?" 

            I felt as though I had fallen into a bottomless hole.  I moved away and covered my face.  Mormo was implicated just as deeply.  I had trusted him.  I forced myself to listen to them, blocking out remonstrative inner voices. 

            "Fuck, big man, "Docker whispered, "couldn't find the brats.  Linda had them.  Said she left them with you when she came back to the cabin to mess around with Pal."

            "No," Mormo said.

            "They're both dead," I said into my palms, "Linda shot Pal.  He was going to die anyway.  Then she shot herself in the heart."

            "Fuck."  He caught his breath; a bubbling sound issued from his chest.  "I sent ol' Hairball Chet and The Sandman out looking.  Heard that rumble, thought I was back in Koz, man.  Then I figured a quake was comin'.  Linda 'n' Pal were screwing around in the loft.  They probably didn't even feel it.  I split through the tunnel.  What good would I be dead?  Gimme some water."  He paused for another breath.  "Between us, we can make it.  Come on."

            "What tunnel?" I said, dropping my hands, "You mean there was another way out of the cabin?"  I looked at Mormo, who now stood in the darkness, then back at Docker, wondering how I could have ever loved him.

            " 'Bout time someone thawed you out of deep freeze, kiddo."  The expression on his face told me that every word cost him acute pain.  Each breath a struggle, he coughed often, spitting blood.  He tried to stand, but fell back against the wall.

            "Boss, it is night, freezing, more snow, blizzard coming.  Wait till sunrise."

            "Since when do you give orders, you hairy imbecile.  Help me up.  Get me a drink."  Suddenly, Billy-Bob rushed him,

            "We're not going with you, Dad!  I hate you.  I'm staying with Sally and so is Papa Jo."  I pulled the boy away.

            "Hey, kid.  Honest.  We're going home, buddy.  First you're going on that chopper ride, like I said.  You'll have shitloads of video games.  Your own computer, electric car.  We'll go to Space Disney, too."  He was dying.  I caught myself smoothing his gritty, black hair from his forehead and pulled away my hand as though I had accidentally touched flames.

            "What about the rest of your gang, the guys who ran off in the woods?"  I said, tucking my hands under my armpits.  He paid no attention to me.

            "I'm okay, Morm'," he insisted, "Just got to get on my feet.  Where's that drink?  We gotta get moving."  Sweat beaded up on his brow and upper lip.  He raised an arm and pushed my flashlight away.  "Move that fucking thing.  Help me."  His face contorted as pain shot through him. 

"You must be still.  We will build a fire," Mormo said, moving about the shack, steadying a whimpering Papa Jo, picking up anything that would burn, and brushing away clumps of snow that had fallen through the roof.  I supported Docker's head while washing away more blood from his lips and chin.  My eyes were dry.  Holding him was simply reflex.  No longer could he hurt me or the kids, nor kill, ever again.

Licking his lips, he whispered almost inaudibly, "We're rich, Darlene."

"It's Sally."  I put my ear to his mouth and felt the heat of his face on mine, smelled the iron-like odor of fresh blood.

"We made it to the New Hebrides, I told you.  Beautiful, isn't it?  I know I've been bad, hurt you, baby.  I'm sorry.  I love you more than my life.  I feel it in here."  He tried to move his hand to his heart, but it fell to his side; the other clung tightly to the case's handle.  He kept moistening his lips.  "Sweetheart, I'm thirsty, please get me some water from that fountain over there."

"Mormo, pass me a bottle, please?"  I allowed a small trickle to run on Docker's lips.  His tongue darted out and swept the drops from them; his eyes never left my face.

"Sally?" he whispered.

"Docker, you're dying.  Make peace with yourself.  Tell me.  Why did you kill No-Face?"  He muttered something; I leaned close.  He moved his head away.  I didn't want to cry;  he wasn't worth my tears; but I couldn't stop them from spilling down my cheeks.  I watched his life fade, eyes growing as dull as stones in a dry creek bed.  I listened for a heartbeat, felt for a pulse.

"He's dead," I said, closing his eyes like I'd seen done in films, noticing how they stayed closed even without placing coins on his lids.  Billy-Bob flung himself on him, crying.

MORMO REVEALED

"Mormo," I said, "is he really the boy's father?"

"Do not know, Miss.  Do not think so.  Found child in mall near Fresno when age of Papa Jo.  Docker got him.  Boy thinks he is father.  Only father he know."

"But why would he want to sell him, now?  Didn't he love him like a son?"  I felt my throat constrict.

Mormo lifted his huge shoulders.  "Boss hear deal not go through.  Need boy quick.  Need money."

I looked away.  Everything I'd been holding back rose up in me and I threw myself at the giant and pounded his chest with my fists.  "You're a part of it!" I shouted, "You're just as bad as he is!"  He enveloped me in his arms and let me cry.  He smelled musty, like dark, loose earth beneath trees where mushrooms grow.

"Never hurt no one.  Long ago, Boss not let my spirit rise up to the Father.  He offer food and water.  I hear others say 'let freak die.'  I see his white spirit like the center of the sun.  Not let no one cause him pain.  Then over many seasons, I see him cause pain.  I feel his darkness.  See his dark spirit cover white sun spirit when I see him hurt others, see him hurt you.  White sun spirit vanish like mist in heat of sun.  "I hear my spirit speak to the Mother.  The Mother say she will cast off sickness."  He relaxed his hold and I lay against him, sobbing. 

"The earthquake," I said, moving away, wiping my eyes with gloved hands.

"No."

"What then?  Tell me."

"I cannot tell you.  The way of the Mother is told through spirit in silent darkness."

"Dreams?"  At once I remembered something I'd been meaning to ask him.  The enormity not only of the quake, but discovering the truth about Docker, had erased it from my mind.     "Mormo, where were you right before the earthquake struck?  Off somewhere conjuring spells?  I was looking for you.  And the night I escaped?  I heard him say he'd fix you for letting me get away.  What did he do to you?"

"Boss right about one thing.  You ask many questions."

"What did he do?"

"Make me find you, bring you back.  No more questions.  I will bury him now."

"That's how I learn things."

"Let spirit teach you from within through silence.  I will bury him now," he repeated.

"You sound like some self-proclaimed guru, but you're real."  He gave me the look of a math teacher trying to explain counting by two's to a very dull student, and started gathering Docker in his arms.

"Mormo, the case," I said.

He struggled with it, but the handle wouldn't come free from the dead man's grasp.  He tried prying Docker's fingers from it.  "Can't, Miss."

"Please, Mormo, try!"  He gripped a finger and wrenched it upwards.  At the sound of the first crack, I looked away.

THE BRIEFCASE: A GRISLY FIND

A parka covered me.  Mormo handed me a bottle.  I leaned up on my elbow, drank some water and looked around.  Docker's body was gone.

"What happened?"

"You passed out, Miss."

"Where did you . . .?"  Mormo headed out the door.  I pulled on a parka.  Billy-Bob and I followed him into the falling snow, around the rear of the shack nearest the forest, to a mound of snow-covered rocks.

"Try your charms, now," I whispered, contemplating the stone marker Mormo had erected  at Docker's grave head, thinking of No-Face and kids he had kidnapped and sold.  His physical being was no more, but his black mystique would linger with me for the rest of my life.  "Waltz with Persephone, my sweet.  Let the gods of the underworld decide whether to send you to the Elysian Fields or to Tartarus.  Let it be Tartarus.  May you rot in Hell, you monster."

We sat on jackets on the floor, huddled around the stove, eating jerky and drinking tea prepared with water boiled in an old can.  Papa Jo was falling asleep in Mormo's lap.  The big man carried him to a corner and covered him with a fur-lined jacket.  (The toddler had allowed himself to be set down, at last, because the floor was of wood not earth.)  With the strange feeling that Docker had died twice, I dragged his briefcase in front of me and tried prying the lock with my pocket knife, hammering it with a stone.  Mormo grabbed the case and took it outside; Billy-Bob trailed after him.  The pop of gunfire, echoing in the mountains, sent shock waves through me.  Papa Jo cried out in his sleep.  Stone-faced, wordlessly, Mormo carried the briefcase back inside like it was a cake and handed it to me, its lock shattered.  It was heavy.  I set it on the floor.  In a moment, I'd be in the files.  The boy peered over my shoulder; the big man sat cross-legged, opposite me, training the flashlight on the case.  I raised the lid.  Nothing could have prepared me for what I found inside. 

  "What is this?  I don't believe it."  I held up a handful of odd scraps of paper, ribbon, costume jewelry, and photographs and let them fall.  Mormo grunted and glanced at me, his forehead furrowed.  "This isn't a lap-top," I said, "There's nothing in here but a bunch of junk like I used to keep in a box under my bed when I was in high school."  I pushed the stuff around.  I expected to find something incriminating, concrete, in print, tying Docker to the newspaper clipping.  Ever since I found that port in the floor and heard him talking about the Net, I had convinced myself that his briefcase had to be a lap-top, why he had so preciously guarded it.

I took the flashlight from Mormo and shined it on a eight-by-ten studio shot of a smiling woman with dark hair in a pixie-cut, wearing a Peter Pan collar and pearls, the long ago look of a half-century plus.  There were letters tied with pink ribbon, locks of hair; more photos, curled at the edges, of Docker and a blonde in front of a boat, a house; the woman herself -- a Mona Lisa in fur-lined clothes -- beside a low stone wall in front of distant mountains; the two of them on a Harley; playing in the surf, palm trees in the background.  There was one picture of them with a little tow-headed boy about two or three years old.  Billy-Bob snatched it out of my hand, studied it intently, then threw it back into the case.  He flopped down on his parka in a far corner next to PJ and watched me rummage.

"Mormo," I whispered, pointing to the woman, "is this Darlene?"  He shook his head, shrugged, and looked away.  I found a tattered, lacy slip, a pair of zebra-striped bikini pants, and a moth-eaten, pink cashmere sweater that smelled faintly of White Shoulders, a perfume one of my foster mothers used to wear.  Under the sweater were a couple of "Soldier of Fortune" magazines, paperbacks: On the Road; Che's Motorcycle Diaries, a battered, dog-eared Gray's Anatomy, and a hardcover, which, when I picked it up, I laughed out loud; I couldn't help it: Danielle Steel's Passion's Promise.  I couldn't imagine him reading it.  It must have been Darlene's.  I almost missed a thin, beat-up copy of Machiavelli's The Prince (no surprise), with pages falling out and passages heavily underlined: "Here a question arises: whether it is better to be loved than feared, or the reverse.  The answer is, of course, that it would be best to be both loved and feared.  But since the two rarely come together, anyone compelled to choose will find greater security in being feared than in being loved . . . "  Bastard!  The books gave the briefcase the heft of an old laptop.  I dug in a pouch along one side and retrieved a couple of silver and gold medals shaped like many-pointed stars engraved with Latin words, on multicolored ribbons, but no back-up documents bearing his name.  The article had mentioned Peace-Keeping operations, yet said nothing about awarding him medals.  Among them I found No-Face's mirror, and shoved it in my jeans' pocket.

Something was tucked away in a corner, wrapped tightly in clear plastic.  Cold, with the density of clay, the object fit snugly in the palm of my hand.  I peeled off the wrapping.  The thing plopped to the wooden planking.  Mormo swung his head from side to side like an elephant about to go on a rampage, lumbered to his feet, and ducked through the doorway.  From where I sat, I could see him standing in the snow.  I played the beam on the brownish-grey lump, picked it up and turned it over in my hand.  I was fondling a desiccated human heart.  I tossed it to the floor and rushed outside.

"Mormo, that's the most ghastly thing I've ever seen.  Who in their right mind --  Whose was it?  Where did it come from?"  Our breath formed white clouds in the darkness, mingling with the softly falling snow.  Mute, he stared off into the distance.  I went back into the shack and closed the case, lay my head on it and pounded it with my fist.  An unreasonable sadness swept over me at the image of Docker forever dragging along a briefcase filled with old photographs, time-worn souvenirs, and a macabre remembrance of, of what?  Tears pooled and I let them come.  Like a small warm mammal, the big man's hand rested on my back.  He patted me as though I were a baby.

            "Mormo," I said, "I can't.  Could you?  Do you know anything about it?"  Without answering, he retrieved the heart and wrapped it carefully in the plastic, nestling it in the case with the other things.  I knew I could get nothing from him.  I wasn't sure I wanted to know.   Sighing, I glanced at the sleeping Papa Jo, and Billy-Bob sitting silently beside him.  Mormo poked my arm with a thin black object the size of paperback.  Suddenly the room seemed filled with light.  He handed me the powerbook.
            "Where did you find it?"  I said.

            "Hidden compartment, look."  I watched as he carefully removed a section from along the side of the top edge of the case, then replace it.  I smoothed the powerbook's cover and brought it up to my nose.  It smelled of moldy leather.  I slipped it out of its case and pressed a key.  Nothing happened.  The solar batteries were dead.  We wouldn't have time tomorrow to set it in the sun if it wasn't snowing.

            "Any disks?"  He shook his head, lifting his shoulders.  No matter.  I'd be home soon.  I slipped the powerbook back into its case and slid it into the inside pocket of my jacket to give to GGIO.  Hopefully, the information it contained would lead them to Heshie whatever-his-name-was.  They'd put an end to him and his racket.  The thought of him made me shudder.  Mormo snapped the briefcase shut and set it on the floor behind him.  Billy-Bob came over and sat down.

"Mormo, how do you think Docker made it to the shack so fast?" I said.

"He must know the Mother angry when he first hear her roar.  Used secret exit beneath floor, slip through narrow tunnel, like he tell, quick, like otter, before mountain collapse.  Doc very fast.  Tunnel leads to compound.  All vehicles crushed.  Had to go on foot, like us."

"Then that chrome ring in the floor wasn't a port--"

"I do not know what you mean 'port'," Mormo cut in.

"It doesn't matter.  So that metal thing was a latch?"

"Docker always check passage in case Members come.  He check it the night after I carry you to the loft.  I move bar for him and when he finish, I saw a vision, cloud my mind."  He waved a huge hand in front of his face.  "Forget push bar back same place, so he escape while I go look for kids."

"Lucky for him.  Otherwise he would have been killed in the cabin with the others, but the tunnel could've caved in--"

"He is dead all the same," he said, with that look of impatience.  The fire crackled in the stove.

"What kind of vision?"

"Cannot reveal it to you."

"Well, how do you think he got so smashed up inside?"

"Try to climb granite slab, then fall."  He shrugged his massive shoulders.

"Maybe the rocks were like this," Billy-Bob interjected.  He lay the piece of jerky he'd been chewing on in his lap and held up his hands, parallel, about an inch apart, palms facing; "then they went like this."  His hands fell together into a narrow tent.

"So the earthquake broke the slabs loose from the mountain and they landed there.  Then when it stopped, they came together."

"That's what I just said."  Billy Bob stared at me.   His chilling gaze made my skin crawl.  He looked like Docker. 

            "You're right,"  I said, holding him tight.  He glanced up at me and grinned, blue eyes sparkling.  Blinking back tears, I rumpled his hair and got a hug in return.

            Mormo must have sensed my fear of sleep, of dreaming.  He shook some wild herbs from his bag and brewed a special tea.   I drank it down, then nibbled dried fruit to kills its bitterness.  Within minutes, my eyelids began to droop.  The giant stretched out on the floor and cuddled Papa Jo to his chest.  I curled up next to Billy-Bob and slept like a rock.

AN UNWELCOME INTRUDER

            The next morning, I went around to the side of the cabin, into the sunlit dawn, to pee.  Zipping up, I turned to go back.  A man grabbed me from behind.  The rough wool sleeve of his jacket scratched my throat as he tightened his hold; some hard object I guessed was a gun pressed against my spine.  I tried to warn Mormo before my wind was cut off.  The man shoved me about, our boots sank in a mushy, slippery hole.  I stomped on his foot, but the soft ground gave way and we stumbled around in a strange dance.  Choking, I tugged at his arm.  He relaxed his hold, but I still couldn't speak.

            "Don't try nothing, again.  Okay?"  he said, jamming the gun into me, his nicotine breath moist on my ear.  He released me, but twisted my arm behind my back and pushed.

            "Don't shoot me," I said, steadying my voice, "If you do, you won't have anything to bargain with."

            "Start walking."  He poked the gun harder into my back.

            "What?"

            "You heard me, bitch.  Start walking and shut up!"

            "Where?"  He jabbed again at my back and shoved me through the door smack into Mormo.

            "I heard voices," the giant growled.

             "Leave us alone!  You can't hurt us!" Billy-Bob cried out from behind the fortress of the big man's bulk.  The man drew me backwards a step.  I felt rapid bursts of his warm breath on my neck; his heart beat hard against my shoulder blades.  Time seemed to stand still.  No one moved.

            "Boy, am I glad to see you and the kids made it, too," he said, "Where's the red-head?  Thought the world was coming to an end.  Man!  You guys tried to pull something over on us.  Docker split with Pal and Linda at the first rumble to wait for the chopper at the helipad.  Right?"  Mormo glanced at me and nodded slightly which I read: keep my mouth shut.  "He trusts you, big man, to bring them out, huh?  All systems go, despite the quake?  We're all still alive, right?  The briefcase stays with the kids.  No kids, no contract.  You guys'd just slow them down.  Else he wouldn't let you out of his sight.  Right, big man?"

            "What do you want, Chet?  Let Sally go," Mormo said, big eyes staring.  So that's who's got me, I thought.  Mormo, seemingly unconcerned, which set my teeth on edge, simply stood at the table where we'd dumped our stuff, bracing a mewling Papa Jo on his shoulder, and began packing.  I wanted him to do something.      

            "Uh, well," Chet said in a loud, forced voice, "I'm taking her with me.  Yeah, taking her with me.  She's my hostage now, against Docker.  But I'll be back.  I gotta consult with my buddy."  His body jerked.  Putting his arm across my windpipe again, he turned his head this way and that, his neck rasping against wool, chest heaving.

            "Look," I said, strangling, "Move.  I'm freezing."  He took a deep breath and adjusted his hold.

            "Docker--" Billy-Bob blurted.  The giant pressed the boy's face to his pant leg.  Billy-Bob punched his tree trunk of a leg with his small fists.

            "What's going on?  Trying to throw me off?  Anyways, what's this broad to you, anyways.  Come on, Mormo.  Aren't we all in this together, buddy?"  Mormo not speaking, remained as placid as the surface of a lake on a windless day.

            "Sally!"  Billy-Bob cried, breaking free from the giant.  He caught the boy's sweater, dragged him back, and held him fast.  He patted him, making murmuring, comforting sounds deep in his chest, more animal than human.  Billy-Bob sobbed, hugging the giant's knee.  Papa Jo hiccupped from his perch.

            Chet turned me around.  Pushing me ahead of him, we floundered together into the woods.  I knew Mormo would hold a tight rein on the boy.  We hadn't gone far when my captor shoved me into a hollow between some fallen redwoods surrounded by mammoth, snow-covered boulders, protected by still standing trees and overhanging rocks.  A bearded, emaciated guy with a yellowish, sweaty face lay on his back on the ground, covered with a sheep-lined denim jacket.  He was shivering, breathing weakly.  I recognized him as Lyle The Sandman, the one who was going to whip Billy-Bob with Chet's belt.  Even in the cold, both smelled like some bars I'd frequented.  The man groaned.

            "Thought you were going to leave me here to die, Hairball," he whispered.

            "I got us a hostage, Lyle, old buddy, leverage for the briefcase and the kids."  He turned to me.  "Got any aspirin?"

            "You haven't a chance, you know."  If I kept talking, maybe he wouldn't search me and find the powerbook.  "Your friend is very sick, probably dying.  He needs more than aspirin.  Looks like pneumonia."  I started to go to him, but Chet held me, one arm crushing me against him.  He whipped off his belt and strapped my wrists together behind my back, pushed me down on the soft ground, padded with pine needles and leaves.

            "It's just a cold.  Leave him be, he's okay."  He gathered twigs and branches and started a fire as we talked.  Sandman dragged himself up to it, then fell back, gasping.

            "You'll never make it," I said, anxious for Mormo to show up.  If he doesn't come soon, I'll know where he stands; he'll do what Docker asked, I thought, my heart racing.  "Anyway, you don't have to worry about Docker.  You can let me go.  You can't use me against him."

            "Back up here, lady.  You're confusing me.  I don't like mysteries.  Talk to me straight."  I decided to tell him; though, for some reason, the giant didn't want him to know.  I thought it would take this loser's fuel out of his rocket.  The wood was wet; the fire smoked.

            "He's not waiting for the chopper at the helipad with Linda and Pal, for us."  I had no clue where this helipad was; I hoped I'd find out.

            "What do you mean?" he said.  He puffed out his cheeks and blew into the fire; flames flared, gilding his face.

            "He's dead.  He died in my arms.  He made it as far as the shack--  We buried him behind it."  Lyle turned his face away.  Chet stared, open-mouthed.

            "The Docker?"  He blinked.

            "Yes, and Linda and Pal.  Pal was dying.  At the cabin when the mountain crushed it, burying everyone else, too.  His stomach, somehow he ripped his stomach open.  She shot him, then herself."

            "You're lying--"

            "I'll show you Docker's grave.  We can dig it up.  Just covered with dirt and rocks and stuff, behind the shack.  It's too cold for him to decompose yet.  In spring, the vultures and wolverines'll eat him."

            "Shit.  Holy shit.  Man.  So that leaves only us."  He paused; I could almost hear the buzz of his hard drive.  "Well, that makes it real easy, now.  Interesting.  Poor Docker.  It'd take something humongous like an earthquake to whack that dude, I swear.  What was that old commercial, Sandman?  Yah can't fuck with Mother Nature?  Too fuckin' bad.  I still get the shakes -- never been so scared in my life.  Shoosh!"  He tossed more branches on the fire.

            "I know.  I saw you bullies, cowards, run off into the woods.  I recognized your jacket.  Surprised you didn't get killed.  Docker told us he sent you guys to look for the kids.  You could've had them and made it to the helipad by now, if you hadn't chickened out.  But you'd probably just abuse them anyway."

            "Aw, we're just teasin'.  Playin' with 'em.  Make 'em strong.  Had to let 'em know who's boss, so they wouldn't try to escape.  Anyways, the 'pad's probably wrecked.  Chopper's probably gonna take a chance on the highway at night when there's no traffic, instead, like they did before we built the pad, if they didn't call off the pickup," he mused, pacing.  My heart jumped.  I damped my elation so my face wouldn't betray me.

Next up: The conclusion: Mormo vanishes with Papa Jo. Sally's ordeal ends, leaving her fate uncertain.  She never liked kids.  Will she find Billy-Bob's parents?