The Totem

Slaughter inhaled deeply. "Get moving."

"What about-?"

"I'll bring the rifles and equipment."

"Leave them."

"Can't. We'll need them. Get away."

Hammel almost argued. Abruptly he lifted Dunlap and stumbled through the boulders.

Slaughter strained to raise his head, and then he stood and stretched up to grab the knapsacks, which had fallen behind the seats. He threw them out. Then he grabbed the rifles. He was just about to leave when he saw the camera he had lent Dunlap. Gripping it, he lurched from the helicopter. He fell, gasped, wavered to his feet, hoisted the knapsacks and rifles, and he was ru

"Over here."

He saw Hammel on a slope above him, tugging Lucas and Dunlap, fir trees thrashing in the wind. Slaughter struggled up the slope, but they were moving higher, cresting, disappearing down the other side. He rushed to catch them, smelling fuel. He slipped and almost fell but kept surging higher. Then he reached the crest and lurched across it, saw them and tumbled toward them, falling. He fought to breathe, huddled among sheltering boulders.

"Those packs weren't worth the risk," Hammel said.

"The rifles are, and anyway we're stuck up here, we have to eat."

"I still say-"

"Are you hurt? Is anybody hurt?" Slaughter asked.

"Well, he is."

They frowned at Dunlap who was propped against a boulder, his eyes closed, blood across his forehead.

"Dunlap, can you hear me?" Slaughter asked.

"Let me rest a minute."

"Hold still while I check your head."

Dunlap's hair was bloody, matted. Slaughter saw the gash above his hairline.

"Is it deep?" Hammel asked.

"I don't know. There's too much blood."

"Oh, Jesus," Dunlap muttered.

"You're all right. The blood is clotting."

"Jesus, Jesus."

"Take it easy. Lucas?" Slaughter turned to him. He saw that Lucas was awake at least. The eyes were cloudy, narrowed, but nonetheless open.

"I hear you," Lucas said.

"This knapsack." Slaughter tossed it to him. "There's a first-aid kit. Some bandages and disinfectant. Help me." Slaughter could have done it by himself, or he could have asked Hammel, but he wanted Lucas to get moving, to regain control, and now he turned to Dunlap. 'Just hold on. Apart from your head, does the rest of you feel okay?"

"I'm sore, but nothing's broken. At least, I don't think so. Jesus." Dunlap winced, and Slaughter watched as Lucas found and opened the first-aid kit. Slaughter took a bandage. Then he fumbled in the second knapsack for a canteen, wet the bandage, and swabbed at Dunlap's face.

"You're looking better."

Dunlap shook his head and grimaced as Slaughter dabbed the gash above his hairline.

"There's no more dirt that I can see. I don't see any bone.

These head wounds can be awfully bloody, even when they're nothing."

"Slaughter, you don't need to lie to me." '

"I'm telling you it's deep but not too bad. We'll make sure you don't go to sleep. We'll watch for signs of a concussion. If you get afraid, though, you'll only make it worse. Now hold still while I do this."

Slaughter opened a tube and squeezed disinfectant onto the wound. He put a square of gauze on top, then wrapped a bandage around the head and tied it. "Don't touch the bandage. It might slip off."

Dunlap nodded, slumping lower against the boulder. "Jesus, Jesus."

Slaughter opened a canteen. "Here. These pills will help the pain."

He watched as Dunlap took the pills, drank, and swallowed. Then Slaughter turned to Lucas and Hammel. "Both of you are sure you're all right?"

Both men thought a moment, felt themselves, and nodded.

"What about you?" Hammel asked.

"A little dizzy."

"Let's hope that doesn't mean you're going into shock."

"At least the chopper didn't explode," Lucas said.

Slaughter leaned against a boulder, wincing. "Well, I guess things could be worse, although right now I'd hate to think exactly how. We'll rest a little. Then we'll look for Parsons."

"Better make it soon. The sun is heading down."

They all looked up then, and the sun was dipping toward the rockwall up there. The wind thrashed the forest.

"How soon?"

"I don't know. A couple of hours."

"And if we don't find Parsons by then," Slaughter said, "in the dark we might never Find him."

EIGHT

The gruesome discovery of the mutilated organs and the dismembered skeleton had not been anything that they'd expected. They'd anticipated the possibility of finding corpses, yes, but not organs that had been chewed and bones from which the flesh had been gnawed. No one had imagined that further degree of horror. For a time they were distracted by the need to calm the man who'd fallen onto the guts and the bones. Then they directed their troubled attention toward the rockwall and were forced to decide if they intended to go farther.

"Look, in nineteen seventy I helped kick out those hippies, but I'm telling you that this bunch isn't like those others."

"Sure, that first bunch, they were pacifists."

"What do you mean 'pacifists'? They fought us."

"But they didn't want to. They knew they were whipped before they started."

"Christ, what's wrong with you guys? We just found-"

"I know what we just found. Don't talk about it."

"But they-"

"I don't want to talk about it! Did you think we'd just hike up, kick their asses, and chase them down the mountain?"

"Hey, you were as eager to come up here as the rest of us."

"Yeah. And now I wish to God I hadn't."

They were silent as the wind howled.

"Well, we have to make a choice. We either go on or go back."

"They'll catch us in the forest."

"What?"

"We don't have a choice. You saw the barricade, the blood. Hell, you saw Altick, what was left of him. They'll trap us, and they'll kill us."

"We've got too many men for that."

"You think so? There were-what?-five hundred hippies in that commune."

"There could be less," a man said, hoping.

"Or a shitload more."

The hopeful man frowned.

"Why not say two hundred? That's still more than we have, and they know these hills, they live up here. We haven't got a chance."

"Then what-?"

"I say we go up and get them before they come down for us."

Again the group was silent. '

Parsons stood to one side. He listened, careful not to add his comments. Because he was frightened almost to the point of ' panic. They would hear his fright, and they would lose respect for him. If he had his way, they'd all be ru

The men continued talking.

"Pete makes some sense, you know that?"

"What? To finish them before they finish us?"

"It's better than just waiting for them."

"Sure. It's what we started out to do."

"But you're not listening."

"I heard you. Now shut up. I'm going on. At least this way we've got a chance of surprising them. Anybody coming with me?"

They stared.

"If we split our force, we don't have any chance at all."

"I'm going with you," someone said.

"Count me in as well,"