The Light in the Hole

by Chris Herzig

A swirl of silver smoke appeared under Vincent’s boot. The hiss of his cigarette extinguishing on the wet asphalt temporarily drowned out the cries coming from behind. As he turned toward his car, the door of the café opened revealing a tall lanky figure. A stale grin crossed Vincent’s lips accompanied by an almost maddening look in his eyes. As the figure approached at a pace reminiscent to a marathon runner on his last leg he dug his hand into his chest. Vincent’s grin grew to the proportion of a full exited smile as he drew his trusty 9mm out of his holster.

As the figure appeared more detailed, bursting from the fog on this unusually cold evening, Vincent could see blood, and fear etched upon this mans face. This man, known only as Big Tony even to his friends, was nothing more than a scared little boy to Vincent. With his left hand he pulled another smoke out and inserted it in the right corner of his mouth. The motion was smooth and steady with no trace of dismay. From the inside vest pocket of his hand tailored Italian suit came out a stunning silver lighter engraved with the saying “Some people grin and bear it … while others smile and change it…” The glee in his eyes grew more maddening. His smile now arched half way up his cheeks.

Vincent, now extending his gun with his right hand, set the wick ablaze with his left. At the moment the flame illuminated the rough features on his face, the 9mm expressed its displeasure in a loud ringing crack! Big Tony fell to one knee, as the world grew dark. A loud metallic sound followed the shot. Now Tony no longer held his gun, his respect, or his head up as he fell face first on the drenched terrain. Vincent took a drag from his smoke and pleasingly exhaled from both his nose and his mouth. Big Tony lay stagnant and slain by his own misfortune. Vincent hopped in his custom Mercedes blowing smoke from the tires as he shifted into first. “Boss man should be pleased.” He thought to himself as he headed to his cabin in the remote town of Redville.

Back at his cabin Vincent opened the front door exposing nothing more than a sleeper sofa fully extended and a TV standing on an end table. He reached over next to the sofa and grabbed the phone off of the floor. A tiny red light had been blinking for some time now acknowledging an unheard message. The machine started to play a scratchy recording “Vince you there? This is Mike; listen I don’t know what this is, but it’s big. Meet me at the vineyard tonight at 11pm. I’ll be at the bar.” He pressed the stop key and chuckled as if he just relived hearing a good joke. Then headed for his car.

Mike had known Vincent for a long time while growing up on the Las Vegas strip. They had done safe cracking, theft and bookie rings together for years. The problem was that Mike had good reason to worry. The word on the street was that he was bragging about his position in the Mafia. The rule is, if you brag, you go to sleep with a shovel. Like any respected member you do what has to be done. That means any remorse you have you don’t show it or you become considered weak. Weak men deserve no respect and respect was harder to come by than money.

Now the odd thing about this is that Vincent had no remorse to show. He was a cold-blooded killer with rock hard nerves and the self-confidence to match. He was the perfect hitman. His black shoulder length hair was as dark as his heart. He had a solid frame and an endurance to match. He wore dark suits that upon closer observation would make you believe he was a VP at a multi billion dollar company. The odd part about him was his eyes. They were so blue, that if you looked directly at them you would find yourself trusting in him as if he were an old friend. I think that’s how he would surprise you. Just like tonight at the café.

Vincent pulls into The Vineyard and puts the car into park. He lights another cigarette then puts his lighter away. He greets Mike at the bar and welcomes the fact that Mike seems perturbed. “They want to kill me Vince!” Mike exclaimed. “Your just paranoid kid.” He replies. Vincent looks at the bartender “Ill take a whiskey, and some change for your cigarette machine.” Mike takes a nervous slug from his draft beer. “I’m telling you they want me dead.” “Jesus Christ Mike you cant go around whining about every little thing. I mean come-on you can be such a bitch you just make me want to…”

A moment of silence passes and Mike’s eyes grow wide. Vincent puts his cigarette out and grasps his shot glass. Without expression he tilts the glass to his lips then returns the empty shot glass to the bar. He puts another smoke in his mouth and again lights the lighter with one stroke. As he puts the lighter to his filtered friend he removes the cigarette from his lips, and blows the whiskey hidden in his mouth through the flame.

Mikes hair goes up in flames. Vincent swallows the last bit of whiskey he kept hidden in his mouth. As quick as lightning and as loud as thunder Vincent smashes his forehead through the bridge of Mike’s nose breaking it instantly. “You had to run your fucking mouth, didn’t you? Didn’t you?” he yelled. Vincent leaned over and lit his cigarette off of Mike’s flaming hair, pulled his .45 out and put Mike to bed with a shovel.

As Vincent hoisted Mike’s body on his shoulders he could hear gurgling coming from Mike’s mouth. He thought it must have been the air being forced out from carrying him. Vincent could feel a shallow inhale along with a faint wheeze. Mike turns and coughs out “The shadows, they whisper, and now that I’m dead they’ll want you.” He coughs one more time then falls dead limp in Vincent’s arms. He tosses the dead body carelessly in the back of his car then speeds away to a secluded spot in the mountains to dispose of the body.

Snow started falling heavily as Vincent made his way up the winding mountain road. Visibility grew worse the farther up he went. Not at all tired he yawned to compensate the pressure that had built in his ears due to the elevation. Barley visible in his headlights he could see the small dirt road that led to Mike’s final resting-place. As he turned he could hardly tell which direction the road was travelling. Through the blinding storm he could finally see the opening that led to the trail he made a day earlier.

Hoisting Mike’s body again upon his shoulder he noticed the snow let up to an almost tranquil pace. The trees, void of any leafs had a good blanket of white draped across them. At the end of the trail, the woods parted exposing an almost perfect twenty-yard circle with no trees in it. Vincent laid the body down then back tracked the trail to his car and grabbed his shovel, a pickaxe, and two bags of quicklime to cover the smell and help decompose the body. As Vincent broke ground the pickaxe slid into the earth astonishingly easy. The snow on the ground was not melting yet the earth was not frozen.

He switched to the shovel to work faster when he noticed the soil was moving. Grabbing his flashlight he could see hundreds of June bug larvae squirming in the dirt. “The hell are you boys doing out this time of year.” He uttered to himself. Oddly he recalled reading of a strip of land in China 1,000 meters by 15 meters that at –30°C air temperature the land remained at 17°C. In fact in the summer it would freeze to a depth of thee feet.

Suddenly, out of the corner of his eye he noticed movement darting from one tree to the next. Pointing his flashlight in that direction revealed nothing at all but the seemingly endless darkness of the forest. As he turned back to the grave he saw the movement again. This time he could tell it was a human shadow. Then out of his other eye he could see another. After a moment it seemed to fade out. Then another appeared only feet from the last, then another.

Rushing behind a tree Vincent pulled his guns out waiting to see who the intruder was.

He flipped the thumb switch on his flashlight revealing nothing out of the ordinary. Chuckling at his paranoia he lit a cigarette and headed back to continue the morbid work of a gravedigger. As he rounded the tree his mouth dropped open with the look of shock.

A twig snapped some fifteen feet from where Vincent crouched. Hitting his cigarette he felt a cold breath from behind blow across his left ear. He quickly turned but nothing was there. A whisper came from behind. “Its you.” The soft raspy voice said. Vincent franticly turned and swung his elbow around to strike the perpetrator. Again no one was there. His hands began to tremble. Maybe he was over worked he thought. Maybe he was tired and just didn’t realize it.

He turned once again towards the body, at this point he just wanted to get the hell out of there. When the head of the shovel met the ground this time it made a terrible clank. The earth was frozen solid. At two feet six inches, the hole was nowhere deep enough to bury the dead body, so he grabbed the pickaxe. “Its you” the voice said once more, this time a little louder and a little clearer. Vincent put his cancer stick in his mouth and turned slowly. Upon exhaling, he witnessed the single most frightening experience in his entire life. He stood there shaking with the feeling of vomit now in his throat. What he had seen made his bladder want to let loose, followed by his bowels, if they hadn’t already.

The smoke blowing out his mouth parted a foot in front of him, revealing the silhouette of a human face. This face unfolding in the smoke was the face of Mike. Its eyes began to open. “Its you.” This invisible creature spoke. “Its you.” “What the hell do you want with me?” Vincent screamed. As the tobacco smoke raised up with the wind he could no longer see the figure. “What do you want?” he screamed again. Another cold breath raced across his ear from behind making his hair stand on end. A translucent figure appeared behind a tree and sprinted straight for Vincent. He pulled his 9mm out and fired off three rounds that passed through its body and struck the tree behind him.

The shadow was gaining speed and Vincent went to grapple the monster. The creature slammed into Vincent, knocking him hard into a tree behind him. “What the hell do you want?” he cried. Everything is pitch black and a moment of silence passes, and then a rumble starts. A deep rumble reminiscent of thunder. It begins to grow louder then focuses into a horrendous voice so loud it almost breaks Vincent’s eardrums “We want you dead!” His face cringes in pain as he drops to his knees.

This once vulgar hit man with nerves of rock has been reduced to a whimpering coward. He begins to crawl around searching for his flashlight when he hears a footstep in front of him. He lashes his arms out to grab it. Nothing comes into contact with his flying fists. He gains his feet and runs full speed for the car. Every unseen branch that hits Vincent makes him jump with shock. With his heart racing as fast as he was, he reached the car in extreme fatigue. He had never been so glad to be on his way home.

The next morning Vincent awoke thinking the whole thing to be nothing more than a very realistic nightmare. The thought of hallucinations due to stress crossed him mind. The important thing was he had to bury the body before any of the locals discovered it. He traced the road to the gravesite a little uneasy. As he turned onto Orchard he read a sign he had earlier not noticed. Now leaving Redville, population 284, nice people live here, the sign read. Vincent smirked at the irony. Off to the left he could see a lake with a couple fishermen on rowboats. It sounded like a good idea on this unseasonably warm day.

The car pulled up to the isolated trail he had walked the night before. The snow had melted off the tree branches and only a trace could be found on the ground. As he rounded the corner to the opening he saw that everything was still in place from last night. The pickaxe slammed into the ground breaking a small chunk of earth out. The morning sun has started to thaw the ground so the work would be a little faster to complete. So far so good he thought to himself, as he took another whack with the pickaxe.

Vincent had finished by early afternoon and the temperature was now in the upper 50’s. He loaded the equipment in the back of his car and headed back down the dirt road. This time however he turned left onto Orchard Street and headed into the center of Redville. He pulled into Louie’s gas, bait and lodging to fill the car up. Maybe twenty-five yards behind Louie’s he could see an old rundown dock with four rowboats tied to the posts. He turned to the gas pump and noticed that nothing on it was digital. That seemed to fit he thought as he scanned the scenery.

The town was a living model of a 1920’s mining settlement. The wind blowing off the lake gave the town the scent of fresh rain all year long. Kids could be seen riding old bikes that all seemed to have a distinct rust color. The population here had a sub average income witch was kind of amazing based on the fact that it was really a beautiful community. Most men here were working for Redville Logging until the EPA shut them down for chemical dumping. Now a couple run down factories support the majority of people here.

“How we doing today?” a voice rendered from behind the pump. “Pretty good Louie, how bout yourself?” Vincent replied looking at Louie’s weathered face. “Good to have the temperature up that’s for sure. Done almost sold out of bait today.” Vincent smiled and handed Louie a twenty-dollar bill. “Keep the change my friend.” “Thanks, say, have you seen the news crew up near Orchard St? They’ve been down here asking questions a couple of times today. Just wanting to know what they found.” Vincent looked at him bewilderedly. “No I haven’t seen them. Why are they here?”

“Well” Louie began “about forty years ago an oil crew showed up here to do some drilling. They drilled miles below the ground; in fact they broke some record for the deepest drilling ever to be accomplished. The reporters were all over that being nothing really ever happens around here. So anyway one day they left and abandoned their equipment. The only other thing found there were blood stains surrounding the work site.”

“What do you suppose happened?” Vincent asked. “Well, the rumors began flying around that they drilled into hell and it drove them insane. There were lots of reports of loud screaming and moaning that night. Most people here who were around then wont go near the old site out of fear for their lives.” Vincent chuckled. “You’re not superstitious now are you?” “Nope, not at all, but you still wouldn’t catch me there on a dare.” Louie said lightheartedly. “Well thanks for the gas Louie, ill catch you later.” “Any time!” Louie replied.

Vincent rolled up the winding driveway to his cabin admiring the warm day. After seeing there were no messages on his answering machine he decided to get some well-needed sleep. It was still light out so he closed the curtains and turned out the lights. A few silent moments passed then a knock sounded at the door. Vincent jumped up a little startled. He proceeded toward the door then opened it. Vincent’s face grew perturbed as he looked at his empty doorway. “Little bastards!” he shouted. He thought that was the only bad thing about living here were the occasional kids knocking on the door and running away.

As he lay back down on the sofa sleeper the door cracked with a thunderous knock that again startled him. He rose up and ran to the door in a full sprint sure to catch the kids this time. Again the doorway was empty and not a child could be found running for cover. As he grasped the knob to close the door a slight shuffle could be heard on the driveway. He walked a short distance toward his car hoping it had not been tampered with. A gust of wind picked up filling his nostrils with the smell of fresh rain.

“Its you.” A voice whispered from behind directly into his ear. The color in Vincent’s face drew pale. “Mike?” he stuttered. “Is, is that you?” His voice cracked like a teenage boy. After a moment passed without a response Vincent headed in to his cabin to find the number of a good therapist. As he crossed through the doorway the door slammed behind him causing a shooting pain in his ears. “We all play where its light all day. Soon you will to.” The voice said. This time the voice was much louder and deeper. “What do you want with me?” Vincent yelled. “We want you to come play, its light down here you know. Come play with us, we’re all waiting.” Vincent leapt towards the door and yanked the doorknob but to no avail. Turning, he ran to the window and threw the curtains open. What had been daylight moments ago was now night. The moon was out and reflected off what you could see of the lake.

“What the hell is going on? Its only four in the afternoon, how can it be dark?” He looked over at his alarm clock but the time display was blinking the word play. He then threw his fist forward at the window but the window didn’t break. He drew his gun and unloaded his cartridge and again the window showed no sign of damage. From about ten yards away Vincent could see what looked like flashlights moving in the distance. “Help me!” he yelled. “Dear god please help me.” One of the lights stopped and made its way towards the window. Vincent pressed his face on the glass yelling some more. “Help me please.” As the figure approached closer Vincent could now see it wasn’t a flashlight after all, it was a small light fixed to a hat, a miners hat. “What the hell?” he mumbled under his breath.

The miner looked up at Vincent. He had a blank stare and there appeared to be boils covering his face. The miner smiled exposing a mouth full of sores and only three visible teeth. “Come on and play goddamn you. You will you know, play here, you will.” Vincent flung the curtains closed and ran for the cellar where he kept a small weapons arsenal. He rounded the steps and busted through the cellar door. In the middle of the room a solitary chain hung from the ceiling. Vincent pulled it down turning an exposed light bulb on.

In the corner sat an enormous gun rack riddled with an arsenal of weapons. He ran his sleeve across his face dispersing the beads of sweat away from his eyes. “That won’t do you any good.” A voice said from behind. Vincent went to turn towards the voice but nothing was there. A loud creak echoed from behind the gun rack. It began to shake violently. The gun rack then fell blowing a cloud of dust into the air. When the dust settled a door was exposed where the rack once stood. Vincent rushed to the door looking for any means of salvation.

As he entered the room his skin grew flush and his eyes started to burn uncontrollably. The heat emanating from there was as hot as an oven. He turned to leave but the doorway no longer existed. He fell to the ground in a scorching pain from the heat. He opened his eyes one more time unveiling a large hole in the earth. A bright light rose from the depths at a blinding potency. His skin started to bubble while his breath was impossible to catch. A voice spoke up. “See, I knew you would play. We all play.” Vincent rang out in a loud laugh scraping charred flesh from his face. There was nothing he could do now. Nothing at all, but lay in his blazing tomb and play. Play a game with only one rule. If you play, you die.