Tell My Sorrows to the Stones by Christopher Golden

turns with the hammer before, at last, none of them were strong enough to lift it. McIlveen and Bob Landry had fallen unconscious. Bob had been in and out for a while, but nobody could wake McIlveen.
    They didn’t talk much, trying to conserve air. What little conversation took place down there in the heart of the mountain was in whispers, men sharing regrets and fears. Wisialowski talked about the way his drinking had driven his wife, Lorraine, away, and how he would have done it all so differently if he had it to do over. Some of the men were writing notes on scraps of paper from their wallets or on torn pieces of clothing, just wanting to leave something behind, some reassurance or a farewell or a last expression of love. They told each other it was just in case.
    Just in case.
    Tommy stared across the small enclosure at his father, and Al stared back, never looking down at Nilsson, who lay with his head on Tommy’s dad’s lap, unmoving.
    “Christ,” Wisialowski said at one point. “Is he . . . ?”
    Al froze him with a look and Wisialowski never completed the question. That grim expression was answer enough. None of the others had been foolish enough to ask. Or, Tommy thought, perhaps they just hadn’t wanted to acknowledge the death that had taken place in their midst.
    “Ostergaard,” Tommy said.
    The name echoed against the stone and the coal rib and the curtain. The men who were still alive and conscious all turned to stare at him.
    “What’s that?” Jerry said.
    “The Lost Miner,” Tommy said, pulling the mask of his rescuer down. “We’ve gotta call on him. Nobody else is coming, Jer. We’re gonna die down here, we don’t get some help.”
    “Are you fuckin’ thick?” Dan Raymo snapped. “We tellin’ ghost stories, now, or you got brain damage from the fuckin’ methane?”
    Tommy blinked. His eyes felt heavy. “Gotta call him.” He sat up straighter, looked around at the walls, settled his gaze on the coal. “Ostergaard! You gotta come, man. We need you, now. Ostergaard. We need your help or we’re gonna die down here.”
    “Tom,” his father snapped.
    Tommy looked at him.
    “Shut it, boy,” his old man rasped.
    It felt like a slap. He flinched, then hunched down a bit. Tommy pulled his rescuer back over his face. He closed his eyes and whispered the name into his mask, over and over.
Ostergaard
.
    He woke, suffocating. His chest clenched and the muscles in his throat began to seize up. Eyes wide, Tommy reached up and scrabbled at his face, tearing away his mask. The oxygen in his rescuer had run out. He clawed it off and dropped it to the ground. In his mind, he began to roll over and sit up, but his body was sluggish in its reply. He managed to loll his head to one side and then prop himself up enough to look around.
    Sometimes he drank a little, but this wasn’t like being drunk. It was more what he imagined it must feel like for people who took too many sleeping pills or Hollywood types into heavy narcotics. The small space between the curtain and the coal rib seemed to shift and blur. His eyelids felt heavy. Nearby, Wisialowski had curled up into a fetal ball, softly crying. Raymo had sprawled onto the stone floor of the tunnel on his face, breath coming in long, shallow hisses, body twitching. Jerry Tolland sat against the wall with his knees up under his chin, arms draped over his legs. Staring at him, Tommy frowned. It took him a moment to understand that Jerry was dead.
    “Dad?” he whispered. He gazed toward the far wall, where his father had been sitting with Nilsson. Someone shifted there. In the fading glow of their remaining lights, a hand rose up—his father, signalling that he had not yet breathed his last.
    But it wouldn’t be long for Al Betts. Whatever rescue might be in the offing, it needed to happen now. The sledgehammer lay on the floor, forgotten.
    Tommy ran out his tongue to wet his lips, opened his mouth in a last prayer. But instead of Jesus, the