The dog chain dragging on my left foot was slowing me down, but it hadn't snagged on anything yet, so I was glad. As soon as I got to shelter I'd unhook the damn thing.
I had no idea how badly the car crash had hurt Alex. Hopefully a lot, because as soon as he could, he'd be gunning for us. With a real gun.
We made it to the trees and slid into the leaves beneath, trying to get as unexposed as possible. The leaves felt like wet laundry. I had the helmet with battery light I grabbed from the car, but didn't dare turn it on now.
As I hunkered down, Jed lifted his head and peered out of our cover. "The chain!" he hissed.
I took a look at the road. Barely visible by the moonlight, the long dog chain was stretched out across the road, running straight into our trees like a trail of bread crumbs. Oh no. I ripped the end I had tangled in my leg off, tearing my cuff a little, and pulled in the other end. The line pointing at us slowly reeled in, luckily not snagging on anything. I could see little pieces of gravel bouncing from its drag, but the sound of that was drowned out by the rain. Soon the chain was completely pulled in from the road, and got balled up in my hands. I crammed the ball in the bowl of the helmet, where it wouldn't rattle that much.
Alex burst onto the road. Jed and I froze. His face was red and soaked, his hair in his eyes. His waved his pistol around like he was looking for the next light flash at an eye exam. "Where'd the hell you go?"
We were silent. The rain dripped down from the trees, a small torrent of it hitting me right at the back of my neck. I didn't dare move out of its way. One snapped twig and we were history.
Alex wiped the hair from his face while he continued thrusting the gun. I saw a fresh trickle of blood on his forehead "Where'd you go? Huh? Come on, come out here!"
The rain came down a little harder. Alex stayed where he was, blocking the road. He began staring deep into the woods, all directions. Sometimes in ours.
Were we just going to wait it out? Sooner or later, the cop guarding Simpson Cave would come back. He had only left because Alex's leadfoot friend Leo blew by a speed trap in his Ferrari, and the cop guarding Simpson was the backup. Unless that chase turned into a Fox special, the cop car would be coming back soon, and we'd be safe.
My legs were beginning to cramp up. During a low rumbling thunder, I shifted them, not hearing any sounds from doing it. Good.
Alex was glancing at his watch. What did that mean?
I found out. A set of headlights appeared around a curve behind Alex, and quickly rushed at him. The cop car?
Alex turned around, gun casually at his side, as the headlights grew. He didn't get out of the road; he almost seemed happy to see the cop car come and bust him.
It wasn't the cop car. It was the Ferrari. It came to a jarring halt a scant foot or two in front of Alex. The wipers carved brief arcs of visibility in the windshield.
"Park it!" Alex yelled. "They're in the woods somewhere."
The Ferrari backed up to where the minivan had crashed. There was no way a low riding Ferrari could clear the steep hill the minivan had gone down, but it kept on backing up, another fifty feet. Then it pulled off the road, into what had to be a second secret parking spot. Alex ran back to rendezvous with Leo, out of sight.
Jed leaned into me, risking speaking. "We can't stay here," he whispered, right in my ear.
I turned into his ear. "I know. Which direction?" To the north was civilization: houses, phones, roads we could flag down a car. But Alex and now Leo were in the way of that. East and west were more forest. South was Simpson Cave.
"Simpson," he said confidently.
"It's a dead end!"
"We have light. We can trap them, or wait it out."
"No, it's a dead end. We go north, we can escape, get help."
"They're expecting us to go north. Simpson will buy us a lot of time, plus we've got experience in there. Alex has what, a year or two, tops? We know it better than him. We can trap them. I've got a plan." "If they don't go in there?"
"They will. We can't argue now, we have to move. They'll be coming back any second."
We both shut up, got up, and ran. We kept the gravel road on our right, since it was our only landmark and the only thing the moonlight was able to reach at ground level. Jed was carrying the helmet, with the chain balled up inside. He didn't turn it on.
Behind us, we heard nothing. Good. The road went a few hundred yards, and then turned into the gravel parking lot the cops set up shop in. The moonlight showed a pile of cigarette butts that must have been where the cop car was parked. We sped through the clearing as quickly as possible, got back in the relative safety of the darkened forest, and made our way up the hill to Simpson.
Jed went first, leaving the light off and going through the entrance blind. I followed suit; we both knew Simpson well enough to do it blindfolded, which we were now doing. I hit my head twice and banged a knee, but nothing major. I didn't hear anyone following us.
Jed turned on the light once he got into the Maggie room. I was glad it worked: I hadn't even checked it for batteries. I could see Jed's shirt and khakis striped with mud. Mine weren't looking so good either. Normally we wear coveralls underground. The rain was getting this place wetter than usual.
"Where are we going?" I asked, whispering.
"A good ceiling." Jed gave me the dog chain, then strapped the helmet to himself. He looked at the Maggie/Lisa/Bart ceiling, which, aside from stalactites, was smooth. "This won't do."
"What are you looking for?"
"Ever hear how they invented the yo-yo?"
I had no time to tell Jed how unnecessary this bit of trivia was right now. "What are you looking for?"
"Hunters, a couple thousand years ago, used to have rocks on strings. They dropped them on their prey from up in trees, then reeled them in so they could do it again. Plenty of high spots in Simpson."
"But we don't have string."
"We got the dog chain."
"We're hitting him twice?"
"Once for Alex, and once for Leo. They hit us with rocks, we hit back." He looked around at where we initially found the charred corpse. "Where would Alex go in here?"
I thought a second. "Homer's Misery."
"Why there?"
"I think that's where the body is."
"What?!" We were whispering up until this point, but Jed's exclamation got a small echo going.
"Henry had suspicions it was there."
"Why the hell didn't you tell me?"
"Why the hell didn't you tell me you knew Alex was the killer?"
"OK, point taken. Why'd Henry think that?"
"The map for that section of the cave was redone. The big map, on the table when we were doing the search. Homer's Misery was a new page, redrawn."
"So the body's in Homer's Misery."
"Possibly. I'm pretty sure it was checked -"
Jed waved his hand and shushed me. "Not important now. What's important is, they'll be going downstairs, lower level. They'll take Hans Moleman. You can hide in Principal Skinner, that's midway down Moleman, then bonk Alex on his way down."
"What about Leo?"
"You wait for Leo. Once both of them pass by you drop, reel, drop again."
"Why don't I just get two rocks to drop?"
"Because we've got a dog chain."
Couldn't argue with logic like that. "Where will you be?"
"On the bottom, with my own rock. You strike them first, I strike them last."
I picked up a ten pound rock from the ground, something flat. The chain went around it well, and I made it secure. I had fifteen feet of jingling chain left for slack.
Jed shined the light down Hans Moleman as I made the descent, rock in hand. It was odd to do this stuff with my sneakers and no gloves.
Principal Skinner was only two and a half feet high, so I had to crawl in head first, then u-turn at a wide spot. There was plenty of room to move my hands to drop the rock, but little place to store it and its noisy chain.
There was a jutting ledge at the right edge of Skinner, and I hid behind it. I couldn't be seen, so I thought. I put the yo-yo rock behind a smaller left jut, where the dog chain wouldn't have a chance to glint off any passing light. It was a bit out of reach, but I wouldn't have to deal with accidentally jingling it.
Jed climbed down once I was set up. "We're silent from now on. You knock them down, I knock them out."
I patted the rock. "Ready."
"Let's do it." Jed went down to stream level, then turned his light off. We were in total darkness, again.
The dominant noises of the cave quickly turned to the swelled stream below, and the screaming jet engine of my breathing. Breathing couldn't really be this loud, could it? I couldn't hear Jed's, and he was just a few feet away. Must just be in my mind.
Time went by. I couldn't see my watch to see how much, but it felt like ten minutes. Why couldn't Jed have left me with the helmet? I wouldn't be able to safely turn it on, but it'd still be a comfort to have.
I was getting cold. I was pressed against a wet rock, with wet cotton clothing, and wasn't moving. Hopefully I wouldn't be here too much longer. Drop, reel, repeat.
It wasn't as bad as last week, but this pitch black claustrophobia was coming back a bit. I did not want to be here. That was probably more common sense than anything else, but it was a good chunk of fear as well.
A light appeared above. A quick strobe, then nothing. Alex. Right then I realized we both assumed Alex had a light source to follow us in with. He did, apparently.
I heard movement. Then a small pebble bouncing down Moleman. Alex was climbing down. I held my breath.
After thirty seconds of no movement outside, I slowly exhaled, then slowly inhaled. I could barely hear myself breathe; it should be mute to Alex.
How soon after Alex passed me by should I drop the rock? This was a dilemma. Too soon and I could have Leo step on my head. Too late and Alex could shoot Jed before Leo even got a foot in Moleman. I was assuming Alex would go first.
Time ticked by. No lights, no sounds, nothing. What the hell was going on up there? Did Alex leave? Was he checking the small passages up top before he went down Moleman?
A peek out would be useless. I'd just see pitch black. Unless the light was far away. Conceivably, a light in a far corner of Maggie couldn't be seen from my vantage point, but could from Moleman.
After a minute of debate, I decided to risk it. I shifted my body weight to move.
Light exploded in my face. It burned my fully dilated pupils. I held up a hand to block it. What the hell was that?
"Hiya, Teddy!" I heard. I moved my hand, and saw Alex's face right in front of me. His gun was a foot from my head.