Hammond, but the professor was already practically on top of him. Hammond caught Matt around the body, pinning his arms to his sides so he couldn't use the ax, and forced him back against the altar.
The black stone's searing heat stabbed into Matt's back and made him yell in pain. He head butted Hammond. Rotten flesh split. Hammond reeled back. Matt butted him again. Maybe it was real, maybe it just looked that way to Matt's eyes, but the flesh was peeling away from Hammond's face now, revealing the skull beneath. Matt broke the man's grip and shoved him back against the side of the pit. Hammond had time to scream, 'No!' before the ax began to rise and fall, rise and fall.
Matt didn't stop until there was nothing left but quivering chunks of something that had once been human . . . but not anytime recently.
Breathing hard, Matt swung around toward the altar. He saw Jerry lying there, trying feebly to stuff his guts back inside his belly. Matt went to him, got an arm around his shoulders, and said, 'We'll get you out of here.'
'No . . .' Jerry's voice was a weak whisper. 'I can't.'
'You've got to. I have a stick of dynamite. I'm going to blow this damned pit to hell, and everything in it.'
'Can't . . .'
'Dr. Dupre and some of the others are still alive and all right,' Matt said. 'They can take care of you, Jerry.'
Jerry shook his head.
'There's no choice. I have to be here to set off the dynamite.'
Jerry looked up at him. 'You'll . . . blow yourself up.'
'That's the way it's got to be.'
One of Jerry's hands clutched at him. 'No! I'm . . . as good as dead . . . anyway. Let me . . . set it off.'
'I don't think you're strong enough. You'd have to hit it pretty hard with a pick or a shovel.'
Somehow, Jerry managed to smile. 'Gimme . . . a chance. If I can't . . . you can always . . . come back and do it.'
He had a point, Matt realized. By all rights, Jerry should have been dead already. He couldn't have more than a few moments of life left. But maybe that would be enough.
'Let me help you sit up,' Matt said.
Jerry groaned as Matt pulled him to the far end of the altar and helped him into a sitting position. Some of the loops of intestine still rested on Jerry's thighs.
As Matt started to get one of the picks lying in the excavation, Stephanie reached out and clutched weakly at his leg with one hand. Matt looked down at her and said, 'I'm sorry.' He meant it, too.
That didn't stop him from splitting her skull with the pick.
Then he handed the tool to Jerry. He reached into his shirt and pulled out the blanket-wrapped stick of dynamite as he went to the lower end of the altar, the end where the face of Mr. Dark was carved.
'You won't be laughing much longer, you son of a bitch,' Matt said as he unrolled the fabric from the greasy red cylinder.
He placed the dynamite on that end of the altar, where the blast would totally obliterate the carving when it went off. 'Can you reach that with the pick?' he asked Jerry.
'Yeah . . . I can do it . . . Mr. Cahill.' Jerry took a deep breath. The movement caused the guts that had spilled out of him to squirm a little. 'You better . . . get out of here.'
'Give me a minute or so to put some distance behind us,' Matt said. 'But only if you can. If you feel yourself slipping away . . . go ahead and hit that sucker as hard as you can.'
'I will,' Jerry promised. He summoned up a faint smile. 'Blood Mesa. Good name . . . for the place.'
Matt was in awe of the strength that filled the mild-looking young man. The strength not only to fight off the effect of the altar but also to cling to life for this long when he was so badly hurt.
'So long, Jerry.'
'So . . . long. Tell Dr. Dupre . . . I expect . . . a good grade.'
'Top marks, Jerry.'
Matt went up the ladder, taking the ax with him, and sprinted toward the place where he had left the others with the truck.
He had run several hundred yards when he slowed, stopped, and turned to look back. Nothing had happened. He drew in a deep breath. It seemed like he might have to go back and set off the dynamite himself after all. Maybe Jerry had died before he could strike the blow, or maybe Mr. Dark had finally taken complete control of him . . .
The blast was so powerful it jolted Matt off his feet and threw a ball of fire into the air above the pit. Matt rolled onto his belly and covered his head with his arms to protect it as chunks of rock began to rain from the night sky. Several of them thudded into him. They would leave bruises but no permanent injury.
Finally the last of the gravel that had been flung into the air by the blast stopped pattering down around him. He climbed to his feet. The explosion had destroyed the generator and the portable lights, too, so again only starlight washed down over the mesa.
Then the truck's headlights clicked on. Matt turned and walked toward them, gripped by a huge weariness that made him stumble and almost fall.
Then Ronnie was beside him, running to meet him and put an arm around him and help him. 'You did it, Matt!' she said. 'You did it! It's over.'
'This time,' Matt said, so quietly he didn't know if she heard him or not. He didn't say it again.
# # # # # #
Sheer terror was utterly exhausting. The other four survivors slept the rest of the night while Matt stood guard. When dawn had grayed the sky enough for him to see, he took the ax and went back to the excavation.
The blast had caused the pit to collapse on itself, burying not only the altar but also the bodies of Jerry, Hammond, Scott, April, and Stephanie. The toll was high, but it would have been higher if he hadn't been here, and if Jerry hadn't destroyed the altar. Maybe as high as the whole world.
He walked back to the trail that led down from the mesa. As he expected, he found that the broken remains of the Indian's Head blocked the path. It would take heavy equipment to clear the trail.
But a person could slide through some of the narrow gaps and climb over the other obstacles. The interstate was only three miles away. Ronnie and the other three survivors could walk it, especially if they got an early start before the day got too hot. They would be footsore when they got there, but they would be alive.
He went back to the truck and got his duffel bag. The others were still asleep. He changed out of his blood- drenched clothes, put the ax in the bag, and closed it, slung it over his shoulder. It would be better for all concerned if he was well away from here before they woke up.
His luck ran out as he was about to walk away. Ronnie pushed herself up on an elbow and whispered, 'Matt?'
He motioned for her to be quiet. She got to her feet, and they walked out of earshot of the others before she said, 'What do you think you're doing? You're going to abandon us here, after everything we've been through? You can't just walk away.'
'I have to. The sort of thing we've just been through . . . that's my life now, and it's better if I face it alone.'
'What are we supposed to do?'
'Walk back to the interstate and call for help. If I was you, though, I wouldn't tell the authorities exactly what happened up here. Just tell them it was, I don't know, a drunken brawl that got out of hand.'
'With eleven people dead, do you really think anybody will believe that?'
'They're more likely to believe that than the truth,' Matt said.
Ronnie wasn't able to argue with that. She just stared at him for a long moment and then said, 'Damn it, Matt, it's not fair. You save our lives, you stop God knows what sort of even worse thing from happening, and then you just walk away and don't tell anybody?'
'That's the way it needs to be. The way it has to be.'
'It's just not fair,' Ronnie said again.
Matt thought about everything that had happened to him in the past year and said, 'Not much in life is.'
# # # # # #
An hour later, an elderly rancher in a pickup stopped to give him a lift as he trudged along the two-lane blacktop.
