Morningstar/Alignment by Keith Trimm (people reading books txt) 📕

Stepping lightly in the dark, he crossed the creaking floor and knelt down. He grasped the lid, and looked into the darkness of the hole through the floor.

"Dad?" Robby asked from the doorway.

Startled, the father turned his head to the boy and yelled, "Go back and sit with your brother!"

"I want to leave!" the boy cried.

"Did you hear me boy!" the father barked back. "We’ll go when I say it’s time to go. Now go back and sit with your brother!"

The boy hung his head low and sulked off back to the concrete slab. With the matches still in his hand, he struck up another flame, illuminating the hole, showing a set of steps heading down to a lower level. He sat on the floor and hung his feet down reaching the second step, putting on weight to see if it was in condition to support him. Standing erect, he felt it was safe and took a step down, then another until his head was even with the floor. He placed his hands on the edge of the hole and continued down four more steps till he felt his foot step onto a dirt floor.

Again, a match was lit with a dim yellow dancing flame. Down under the floorboards, the burning match was like the sun. He was able to see clearly with the small flame, the stonework foundation surrounding him, and he was taken aback by its condition. The basement was in much better shape than the building led him to believe. It was also much larger than he suspected from above.

The room was six sided, stone wall construction with a single door centered on each wall. All of the doors were closed with the exception of one to his far-left swung wide open. The doors seemed oddly out of place, as if they were new additions to the structure. The cellar did not show the wear of the years, like the building above had. The match went out. Another took its place, and he walked to the open door noticing right away that there was a padlock dangling from the door left in the open position. The lock looked brand new.

He stepped through the doorway into pure darkness. By now the odor was second nature to him, and he no longer felt nauseous. Another match was lit, illuminating the interior space revealing a long hallway receding far enough back that the match light was unable to penetrate. It reminded him of a mausoleum. He noticed along the sides of the hall, rows and rows of hinged doors, five high, spaced evenly down the length of the underground passage.

The doors were all closed and locked shut with a padlock hanging next to the door pull. The hinges were galvanized steel, gate style, and looked the same age as the other new hardware. The doors were unpainted cedar of simple construction, with a symbol carved in the center, which was unrecognizable to the man holding the match.

He leaned in close to examine the writing and burned his finger. He dropped the match to the floor leaving him standing in the dark digging in his pocket for his matchbook. He was down to his last three and struck up another match, then walked further into the chamber, examining more of the doors as he went. The deeper he moved the cooler the air became, unusually dry for a cellar he thought, and he moved slowly further into the dark passageway.

The hall seemed to go on and on as he walked deeper and deeper. He looked to the ceiling surprised to see the wood beam supports free of spider webs and rot that he would expect in such a place. He finally stopped in his tracks. Thirty feet into the long hallway, he came across one of the doors on the bottom row, seemingly torn open and hanging from its hinges. Teeth marks were visible in the wood and splinters were strewn all around the door. Mixed into the debris was the rest of the body from the little girl in the woods.

Shivers ran down his spine now that he realized he was standing in some sort of graveyard. "How many bodies were stored down here?" he thought, while lighting one more match. "How come I have never heard of this place?" It was time to go. He had only been a resident in this town for four years and was not totally familiar with the local customs and traditions. He knew of the city cemetery, but it was entirely possible that this was a private one. Anyway he now felt he was trespassing on the dead and needed to get out.

From the main room, he heard the creaking of footsteps on the staircase. He turned to see a light bouncing about the entrance getting brighter and then dimmer. The light brightened again then dimmed through the doorway in the larger main room.

"Damn kids!" he said aloud and walked back up the hallway to the main room where he was greeted with a bright flashlight beam in the eyes. Squinting in the glare, he raised his hand to block the light and yelled, "Get that damn thing out of my face!"

The beam lowered down enough for him to see there were more than two people standing before him, and he put down his hand. The beam of light moved to the right illuminating his two sons standing together at gunpoint.

"What the hell is going on here?" he exclaimed.

They boys were silent. His eyes began to adjust back to the dark and he could now see a man standing before him wearing camouflage coveralls and a cap. In his hands he was holding a deer rifle. He scrambled for something to say.

"Hey I’m sorry mister, that’s my gun outside but I wasn’t hunting on your land. I don’t hunt out-of-season. That’s not my style."

The man was silent. Only the breathing of the boys penetrated the air.

"What’s your name?" the man asked.

"Johnson. Dennis Johnson," he replied.

"Does anyone else know you are here?"

"No. My wife is at work and my daughter is at home." For a second he hesitated. He knew he should have lied. .

"You live in the trailer park. Don’t you?"

"Yeah, Do I know you?" he asked.

"I don’t know. Do you?" the stranger chuckled, and his companion joined in.

For a moment the Dennis felt better, thinking the situation was more relaxed, more in control.

"Get back in there," the stranger said. He was soft-spoken in his tone, but pointing the rifle back down the hallway letting him know who was in control.

"What?" Dennis replied, curling his brow.

"Turn around and march your behind back in there."

He looked to his sons for a second, then backed into the hall. He kept his face pointing at the man with the gun.

"You too!" the stranger barked at the boys, and the other man gave them a shove. The two boys followed their father into the hallway and the two-armed men stood in the doorway blocking their escape.

"What do you want with us?" the father asked.

"Nothing," he replied. "What are you doing in here?" the stranger asked bringing his rifle to eye level. The captives flushed with heat and fear.

Dennis swallowed hard and tried to think of something to say. "I just saw the shed…and…"

"And what?"

Dennis scratched the back of his neck and looked around at the ground. "Hey, we didn’t mean anything."

"You just like to trespass?" the stranger said

"No."

With a squeeze of the trigger, the rifle muzzle lit the room, flashing with a loud bang. The father fell to the ground clutching his neck. Before the boys could move the second man fired four shots from his twelve gauge shotgun, spraying the boys with lead shot, tearing into them, ending their short lives. The man with the rifle handed his weapon to the other man and stepped forward pulling a pistol from his belt. Chambering a round he aimed it at the man on the ground and fired a single shot into his head. A flash and a bang ended his life. "Someone is going to pay for this," the first man said. "Who ever left this place open is gonna get it bad. Real bad."

"Seth isn’t going to like this," the second man said.

"Seth will never know."

***

Anne Johnson was on the phone when she heard a loud knock at the door. She excused herself from the call and answered the front door of the doublewide trailer. Standing on the landing, draped in plastic rainwear, was the sheriff and a deputy. They stood back lit from the street lamp in the driveway.

By this time the thunderstorm was in full force, the rain sizzling on the ground like bacon in a frying pan and lightning flashing across the sky. Seeing the two officers at this time of night surprised the girl. She was home alone, her mother not back from searching for her father and brothers, missing since before suppertime. Her worries now turned to anxiety as she tried to make out the features of the men in shadow.

"Hi, I’m Sheriff Lester Spade and this is my deputy Leroy Barnes," the taller man stated to the girl. Rain pelted him from above. "Is your mother home?" he asked silhouetted in the darkness.

"No," she replied, "My mom and grandma are out looking for my dad and two brothers."

The sheriff turned to his deputy for a moment and then back to the girl saying, "We need to get a hold of her as soon as possible."

"Is this about my dad and brothers? Are they ok?" she asked.

"Yes it is, it is important we get a hold of her. There has been an accident."

She opened her eyes wide and swallowed hard. "Are they alright?" she asked.

The sheriff hesitated, then said; "Your brother was hurt this afternoon in a two car collision. He has been taken to Topeka. Your father and other brother are at the hospital here in town. I have come to offer your mother a ride to Topeka."

Her body relaxed and the tension released its grip on her allowing her to sigh in relief.

"Thank God no one died!" she said smiling back.

"Maybe we can find her at your grandmothers," the officer said, "Can you tell us where she lives?"

"I can call her if you wait a second," she replied, heading back into the living room.

"No, it would save time if we just drove over there. I can take all of you to Topeka at the same time. You’d like that, wouldn’t you?" he asked the girl.

The question struck her odd. She hesitated then answered, "Yeah, sure."

"You grab a coat and we will wait for you in the car," the officer said and the two men turned and walked back into the rain, down the steps to the car idling in the driveway. The men opened the doors and got inside watching all a while through the swishing wiper blades. Minutes later the front door opened and the girl came out turning to lock the door. She ducked her head trying to dodge the rain quickly jumping inside the patrol car in the back seat.

"Ever been in a patrol car before?" the sheriff asked her, looking through the rear view mirror, backing out of the driveway.

"No," she answered nervously. She shivered in the cold looking out the window as they traversed the narrow streets of the trailer park.

The interior of the car was dark. Voices cracked and sputtered from the car radio, and red dots of light zipped back and forth on the scanner mounted under the dash.

"What’s the address?" he asked her, picking up the radio microphone.

"825 west 25th street," she replied.

The officer depressed his microphone button and stated to the dispatcher " Denton, twenty-six in escort, white female, Anne Johnson to 825 west 25th street." The phrase ended with a