1988


Sherriff Russells was just getting ready to head up to the mountain with Search and Rescue when his office phone rang.


"This is Russells," he answered.


"Hey, Son. It's Dad," came the familiar voice.


"Oh, hey Pops! I'm just getting ready to head out for the search, can I call you back?"


"That's what I want to talk to you about. It's urgent."


Sherriff Russells' dad was usually not the urgent type.


"Uh, yeah sure. What is it?" He sat back down.


"Well, first, what I'm about to tell you stays between us, okay? This is a secure line, isn't it?"


Russells laughed. "Dad, I think you've been watching too many James Bond movies,"


"No one else is listening are they?" His father pressed.


"No, of course not. This isn't the FBI." Russells was starting to get concerned. What on earth could his father need so much privacy for?


"As you know, Granddad was the Sheriff here once upon a time," he began.


"Yes, Dad. So were you. It's in our family," Russells was now starting to wonder about his father's mental health.


"He told me something once, Sean. I didn't know what to make of it, but I got the damnedest feeling that I need to tell you before you head up there today." His voice was more serious than it ever had been.


"Okay," Russells said slowly. "Go ahead, Dad."


"Those camp-fire stories about those dead hobos are true, son."


"What?" Russells was shocked. As far as he knew, they had only been harmless ghost fables.


"Listen to what I'm about to tell you and listen closely. And whatever you do, do not go onto the old Stanislav land, not that you could probably get up there today..." He said before giving his son all the grizzly details.


--


1924


"We gotta take them back up there - bury them up in the woods," the Sheriff said, breaking the silence in the room full of dead men.


"What? Bob? Why?" Father Hendricks asked, shocked. "We have to give them a proper burial! They may be hobos, but they are still children of God!"


"That's why we need your help, Father. We need you to give them their Last Rites..." the Sheriff replied, pacing in the room.


"It's a little late for Last Rites, isn't it?" The undertaker chimed in flatly.


"Technically yes," Bob answered. "But we can't bury them here in the town cemetery. Too many people will see and this kind of thing ain't gonna sit well with all the families that have decided to settle here. Hell, I'm a copper, and it's nearly too much for me. Imagine old Mary Lou at the school, or your own Mama, Jones! They couldn't deal with all of this!"


"But, it still ain't right, Bob!" Jones exclaimed. "These are humans! We can't just bury them in the middle of nowhere because we are afraid it's going to scare everyone away!"


"He's right," Father Hendricks chimed in.


Jones and Edwards looked at the priest, shocked.


"Nothing good will come of this. This is an act of the purest kind of evil," the priest made the gesture of the cross over the bodies. "We must get them as far away from this town as we can if we want a nice, safe little settlement for generations to come."


"I will go with you to help put them at rest," the priest continued. "I will pray on their behalf that God will admit them into the Kingdom of Heaven, away from whomever - or - whatever did this."


"You heard it from God's own man, Fellas," Sheriff Bob spoke up. "Let's get these guys out of here and back up there. It's dark now and no one will notice. And besides - I mean this with all due respect - these guys were wanderers. Drifters. They're not tied to anyone here. It's not going to disrupt the safe haven we have going here."


Jones sighed heavily. "But we just brought them down!"


"And we're gonna take them right back up." Edwards covered up the bloody neck back up. "I agree with Father Hendricks and the Sheriff. Let's get this done."


--


"Holy shit, Pops. Why didn't you ever tell me?" Sean couldn't believe what his father was telling him.


"This was a deathbed confession, son. And your granddad swore me to secrecy. I didn't even know if I believed him at first, but one night we had to pick up ol' Cletus Jameson from the bar.


He was drunk and disorderly over at Mel's Tavern. His Step-Daddy used to be the undertaker here way back.


Ol' Cletus was carrying on something fierce about them 'poor hobos' up there - how one of them had his head taken clean off. He was crying and hollering about nightmares and all that. Well, the hairs on the back of my neck stood on end because your granddad had just told me about that only a week before. Bringing Cletus in was my first job back after the funeral. Cletus told us to go ask old Mick Reed what he knew about that patch of woods, so I did..."


"Mick Reed? The old football coach?" Sean knew Mr. Reed well.


"One and the same, son. He also used to be a banker, but quickly he learned he'd rather work with the kids instead. Started out in Hunter's Safety before he went to coaching. He lived up there awhile as a kid before old man Stanislav bought the whole side of the mountain."


Sean vaguely remembered hearing that Coach Reed used to live at one of the Depression-era logging camps. "Well, what did he have to say about it?" Sean asked, now fully invested.


"He said that if someone wanted to hide something up there, or go up and never be found again, it wouldn't be tough to do. He said that there was something strange up there, something bigger than all of us, and if whatever or whoever it was that was wanted a person gone, by God you'd better get gone."


"Pops, you know we need to try and look at the whole mountain. That includes the Stanislav land," Sean was getting exasperated by his own, law-abiding father insinuating that he shouldn't do a thorough job.


"You won't be able to get all the way up there anyway, son. Not until Spring, at least. And what I'm about to say may be hard to hear but, if that girl's been taken up there, she's long gone, Sean. I know it's hard and I hate saying it, but that's just part of the job. Just let it go. Trust me on this."


--


Sarah opened her eyes to the bright light filtering in through the cracks in the cabin walls.


Her mind was fuzzy and her body hurt.


Where am I again? She thought.


Just then, she remembered. It wasn't an awful dream.


Priestess Tzarinah and Priest Jarrel from that horrible TV show had taken her from the old bus lot yesterday, as she was walking home from school.


Hot tears started welling up in her eyes. It was Christmas! Why was this happening?


The tears were fast turning into full-on sobs, and she did not want to call any attention to herself. After all, if they thought that she was still asleep, they'd be more likely to leave her alone, right?


Sarah gently rolled onto her side, her face mere inches from the rough log wall, when the sobs stopped.


"What is that?" She whispered to herself quietly. She blinked the tears away to get a better look at what appeared to be a carving in the wall.


"Take care of Rascal and always love your mama?" She mouthed quietly. What on earth could that mean? Who is Rascal?


It was the thought of her own mother, though, that caused the tears to start flowing again.


"I do love you, Mama. Please come find me!" She thought to herself, with tightly closed, hot stinging eyes.


Please find me!!!