The Biggest Geode
by Nikki N.J.Lucero (rated R)
4/3/2004
(Note: Parts of this story are based on truth and some are purely fictional. Names have been changed and some characteristics have been exaggerated to make the story a STORY. The mind is a wonderful thing. Don’t you think?)

They were all digging for Geodes in the California desert, just before spring and it was already hot.
Deep in the desert, a place called Wiley Wells, near the boarder of Arizona, in an area known as Blyth. Yes, the heat was in the high 90’s already.
They were “EARTH-MOVERS”, a Rock hounding on line club formed to go out and meet people and dig for all sorts of rocks. Some people just went for the social aspect; others really were die hard rock hounds. All in all they had fun. Collected rocks. Most of the time the trips were uneventful. Not this time. “The Heat”, some would say or maybe “That Time of the month…” others might say. Whatever that is supposed to mean. Men had a way to blame a woman’s monthly visit from Aunt FLOW as something that only women get and only women can turn into feverish killing monsters.
Not so. Men are just as capable as getting “moody” and without loosing a drop of blood.Well the group was mostly men.
Some wives and girlfriends tagged along and some of those women were really into rock hounding as much or more than their husbands. There was one single gal, Martha. Martha was your cliché of a snooty librarian. Martha, the name it self sounded old maidish. She did not wear librarian clothes on these trips. No way, she dressed to get rocks. Why she wore those thigh high, fly fishing boots no one knew. Protection from rattlers some thought. There was no river close enough to go fly-fishing in the closest one was the Colorado about 45 miles and across the California/Arizona boarder. Well other things were quirky about Martha, She was found sitting at night in her parked car Outside the Wiley Wells prison. There were signs posted everywhere: NO PARKING, NO PICKING UP ANY ONE ON FOOT…etc. The normal warning signs found out near prisons. There, Martha sat at night no less. Some of the late comers of the Earth-Movers saw her sitting there on the last night. What she was thinking no one knew.The late comers were the Owner of the group, Mott Stanley, another single woman and Mott’s wife and two children a girl of 12 and a little baby. They HONKED at Martha and she blinked her headlights and they saw her start down the road again in their rear view mirrors. They told everyone back at camp what they had seen. It was a topic of the conversation for a brief minute, when out of the dark a man walked up. He was a stocky man about 5 foot 6, weighing about 250ish. He walked up as friendly as could be, as if he was at a cocktail party and just mingling with us other guests.
“Pardon me, but can I camp out here? Well way over there any way?”
The other campers looked at each other. Puzzled. Cooper, one of the main guys in the group stepped up with a beer in his hand, “You can camp ANY WHERE you like…out here.” Pointing out all the “any where’s” with his can of beer. “ Oh cool, I am here to look for and dig rocks…” Again everyone looked at each other. They all knew most of the rock hounds, maybe he was one that did not get on the list? Drew asked,” So, hey are you a Earth-Mover?”“A what, Or who?” A puzzled look over came his round bearded face. If he were shorter he would look like one of those Hobbits everyone was talking about. “We are Earth-Movers, rock hounds from the Internet, how did you hear about hunting rocks out here?” Cooper always spoke more on a few beers.“Oh a few friends told me about this place, I am not a member of your group, but can I be? That would be SWEET!”
“Sure, that's fine.” Someone said…
“ Yeah, that's cool, what are you looking for, in rocks I mean?” Cooper asked. “ GEODES, I am going to find the biggest one!” Every one’s eyes rolled.
A newbie rock hound to be sure!
“Oh by the way, I am Chris, Chris Mothersload, Pleased to meet you all.” He tipped his base ball cap, it was red and had white printing that said, “SAY CHEESE!”The topics flowed and dropped. Jokes where told laughter was enjoyed. Some campers went off to bed. Leaving Mott, Cooper, and Newbie Chris to drink a few more beers, and have fun pulling a prank on some campers that pulled in late. They also had a Bon Fire flaring up into the already warm night desert sky. They are men and men bond in unusual ways. But their fun did not harm anyone.
Cooper and Mott were great friends, and they learned a lot about Chris. But unfortunately not enough. They learned he wanted to find the biggest Geode to send home to his Pop, in Maine. They learned that he was great at participating in pranks. There was some very important information they did not find out. Chris had carved up his wife and her lover and they were waiting for him neatly wrapped up in newspaper and plastic, in his trailer he had parked about ¼ of a mile across from Cooper and Mott’s group. Yeah Chris, his wife and her lover were going to find the biggest Geode. This was one little tidbit of information that Mott and Cooper did not find out.
They and the rest of the campers would never know this important information as they warmly welcomed Chris into their camp site and into the Yahoo Group: Earth- Movers.
“Earth-Movers”, Chris chuckled over his secret and this name as he got back into his trailer that night and went to sleep on the pull out bed in the kitchen, in his murder box on wheels.
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The next morning came too early for some. But all the Earth-Movers were showing up bright eyed and bushy tailed…as they say. Ready to bust rock…move earth and do whatever it takes to find Geodes.
While late nighters woke up and stirred up coffee; others that slept in town, in comfortable beds in Motels and ate big breakfasts at Denny’s ®, made small talk and tried to plan where they would go dig today.
Chris unhitched his truck from the trailer, He had moved it in the night trying to leave it out of sight from the road and closer to the digging sites.
He joined the group as if he was the most eager of newbie rock hounds there ever was. “ So where we going today?” If he had been a dog his tail would be wagging all over the place with excited happiness.
People that had not met him the night before where looking at him with due curiosity. He sort of felt he had been accepted into the group and he just started to ask all sorts of questions. People looked at him with the blank, “Who the hell?” looks. Chris just kept asking questions. Finally Mott asked him a question, “ Hey Chris, where is your trailer?” Looking off into the desert Cooper also now noticed that the Trailer was gone. “Oh I just took it out closer to the Geode digs, I plan on staying out there closer to it tonight.” He was going to find the Biggest Geode, He was Mothersload going to find the “Mother load” of them all! Mott and Cooper nodded with approval.
Martha heard his newbiness questions, looked at him with a twinkle in her eyes she had not had since she was a teenager looking at Bobby Sherman. She was taken by his newbie dumbness and his enthusiasm to find the biggest Geode.
He was mistaken there; SHE was going to find it. She would tag-a-long with him to make sure she did! Her little two-wheel drive Honda was not going to make the rough drive to the Geode dig site. So she warmed up to him. Chris was all for it, “ Sure I will take you to the dig site, do you know what to look for?” “ Oh yes, I am a school teacher and a Geologist major!” He was surprised and happy like Charley finding the “GOLDEN TICKET” in Willie Wonka and the Chocolate Factory.
Everyone was talking about this and that. Finally it was all sorted out. First they would go to an Agate site and collect there. It was an easy find someone with knowledge had expressed. Then possible more Geode digging and then to a Fire Agate site which was going to be the hardest of digs. “Like getting a Coke® bottle out of a cement block.” Someone else said.
So off they all went.
Cooper and his girlfriend, Crystal Fire Eyes Woman, their 2 dogs, Mott and his daughter in one truck, His wife and baby and one lady in another truck, several other group members and last of all Chris and Martha each one thought they was going to get the biggest Geode! It was 11:00 and already getting hot. “Let’s ROCK AND LOAD!” Mott yelled out his 4X4.
His CD Blaring away: "Piling the bodies Burn them in the night Skin grows black and withered Decayed smell will rise"*

Crystal Fire Eyes Woman yelled out a throaty high pitched yodel, like Xena Warrior princess everyone said, but to her it was the call of her people when they where in approval or highly excited. Vehicles Va-ROOOOMED and roared…Dust flew! They were Earth- Movers on the go! After about ten minutes of bumpy road, all the vehicles made it to the dig site.
First site: Agate. People were very happy here buckets were filled people chatted. They loaded up. They drove on.
Second Site: Cinnamon Minds. Not many Geodes where found, but a lot of “Drusy” (tiny sparkly crystals) the color of cinnamon also blackish was found by Cooper and Crystal Fire Eyes Woman. Some people found some small Geodes. Chris kept going around in his Newbieness and asking, “ Is THIS a Geode?” or “Did you find something good yet?” It was getting on people's last over heated nerves. Some just rolled their eyes, Crystal Fire Eyes Woman told him, “ What is good for ME might be shit to everyone else, find what you like, find what calls to you.” She had a way to tell people off without hurting their feelings most of the time, she was getting hot also and needed to drink water. She walked away blankly looking for her water.
Chris stood there for a moment; his white face was turning redder by the minute. He was sweating from his head, maybe his head was melting… “Hey look what I found…Is this a Geode? Is it any good?” he wandered around in a crazy circle asking the same set of questions to the same people all of which looked at him and said basically the same thing in different ways that Crystal Fire Eyes Woman had said. His brain was sizzling he was nearing heat stroke. One by one people stopped digging and said good-byes and drove off in homeward bound directions. Mott and some friends that caught up with the group talked about driving to the Fire Agate Mine. Martha heard that most people where leaving. Mott was trying to convince Chris to come dig Fire Agates, but Chris was on the edge of sunstroke and did not care about Fire Agates. He just wanted to know if what he found was an Geode, he wanted to know if he went to the other Geode digging site with Martha how could he catch up to Mott? Mott simply told him that he could not do both. Like a little boy, Chris pouted. Crystal Fire Eyes Woman put her hand on his shoulder,“Hey man, it is gonna be OK! Just go to the Geodes, you said you wanted the biggest you could find, for your Pop, right? Well go with Martha she will show you what to look for and how to get there. Anyway digging the Fire Agates is for more advanced rock hounds, they say it is like trying to take a Coke® bottle out of cement!” He looked less wounded now, it was the calming in her voice like a cool breeze, refreshing his spirit. He nodded. “Drink water man, you’re over heating yourself…” He nodded again and walked away. Walked over to Martha. Martha was complaining about wanting to go to the geode site, The Hauser Beds. Someone was trying to ask her "What part of the Hauser Beds? These are ALL Hauser Beds". She was very annoyed looking. Also over heating herself, in those long boots. Finally Cooper told her how to get to the spot where he had gone with her the night before. Chris listened also. They where planning to go there together. Everyone got into their vehicles and drove again into different directions. Cooper and Crystal Fire Eyes drove to the camp again to take it down and start home, Mott and everyone else left started to head to the Fire Agate digs, Chris and Martha headed to the Geodes, finally!
Martha ordered Chris to “Turn HERE!” “GO THERE!” (She was only missing the Whip!) They made it to the same place she had gone to briefly with Cooper the night before; she had scouted around and found several good sized Geodes. She had the Geode fever as well as impending heat stroke fever.
Chris was pleased at the amount of holes, “Nice deep holes, will save us digging!” He bounced out of the car, grabbed a soda from the cooler in the truck bed. Martha was also out of the truck and into a deep hole with shovel and bucket. She was going to find the Biggest Geode if it killed her! She did not even mutter anything back to Chris!
She was on a mission.
It was getting near 5 o’clock now. The hole she had been digging in all these hours was very deep. Deep enough for what Chris needed. Martha was smoothing off dirt from something the size of a basketball. Chris had stopped looking in holes, he had collected enough of what he thought was Geodes. None of them bigger than tennis balls, most the sized of golf balls. He was sitting on the ledge of Martha’s “claim”.
He had been drinking beers now because he ran out of soda. He had no water with him and all.
Martha had a small canteen with some water in it. She had been sipping it from time to time.
Martha was trying to lift out this large Geode. Chris jumped in the pit and offered to help. Martha let him. She was tired but she was not going to leave with out this Geode. He put a crow bar behind the bumpy dome and pulled. It gave loud POP! and rolled onto Martha’s lap! She gave a squeal of delight! Chris picked it up off her and danced around with it! “WHOOO! Lookie here! WOW! My Pop sure is gonna like this!” Martha looked at him like he stole a large pile of gold! With a crazy gleam in her eyes she jumped up. Reached into her tall boots and brought out a blade about 13 inches long! With a swift silent motion she sliced though Chris’s wrist. He not only lost the Geode but his hand as well! Blood sprayed out into the hole and he grabbed onto the squirting stub as he sunk into the hole. He lifted his head to scream a protest, SLASH! The blade in the crazy Martha’s hand sliced his head off! “No claim jumping allowed!” Boomed a strange deep voice out of Martha’s parched throat. She quickly wiped his blood off her blade using his own shirt. Then replaced the blade into the same tall boot.
She then grabbed the Geode before it could get more blood on it. She placed it on the edge of the hole. She went to the truck. She scouted around for the keys. They where not in the ignition. So she knew they would have to be in his pocket. She walked over to him and took her shovel and pushed him from his stomach to his back. She found the keys in his pants pocket. She put them into her own pants pocket. And took up her shovel and started to fill in the hole now occupied with the man that had planned to use the hole for his cheating wife and her lover’s body parts.
Martha was weary and very hot. Dehydration was going to take a toll on her very soon. She sat a moment and drank some water. She remembered there was beer in his cooler. She needed one of those she thought. She drank one so fast and grabbed another and sat down to sip this one a little slower.
She looked at the Geode. She worshiped the perfect round shape like a gypsy looking for the future in a crystal ball. She wiped his blood off of it. She could always say she cut herself getting it out. Rock hounds are notorious for hand wounds. She bashed her hand against the Geode now to make her story work. She reached into her shirt pocket and took out a handkerchief to tie onto her now bleeding hand. She finished the beer. She had work to do and was now loosing light.
She suddenly became frozen. Awake but stuck in her place, the ledge of the hole with a handless, headless man lying in it. This happened to her sometimes. It had happened the night before, when Mott saw her sitting and spacing out in front of the prison. It was the medication she took for depression, it seemed to be placing her into these paralyzing fogs. She would sometimes sit for hours just staring, she did not think of anything usually her brain just seemed to shut off too. By the time she snapped out of this one she barely had time to cover the whole and get the hell out of there in just barely a crack of sun light. She covered the hole. Picked up her Geode and placed it into the passengers side of the truck. She looked around one last time. For anything she might have missed. Was his foot sticking out of the hole? Damn it, it was! So she hurried over and started to place large rocks all over his damn foot. When she was done doing that the sun had finally sunk!
She had some way to go to get to the campsite to her car. So she drove fast over bumps and dips. Racing this way and that. Panic hit her when she realized that she was lost! “Shit!” She thought to herself. Then she yelled it,"SHIT!" She just kept going turn after turn. She finally came to a big dip in the road. At least that was her last thought, “Damn that is a big dip!” But it was a cliff! A 50-foot drop! On the way down the Geode knocked her in the head she lost consciousness before the truck hit the ground and exploded into flames. The Geode escaped all injuries as it fell out the opened driver’s window as the driver took one final nap. Martha had wasted injuring her hand; the Geode was now covered with blood from her skull. The truck burns into the night. No winds to pick up and carry around the flames. A pilot in an over head plane thinks it is just another camper with a bon fire roaring.

In the morning two guys in there late teens drive into Wiley Wells camp and see Martha’s Car. They are on dirt bikes and have just both run out of gas. They had smoked some weed early this morning from another campsite further out east of where Martha’s car was. They walked up to her car and decided to hot-wire it and “barrow” it for a while to get into town for more gas. They came back about 40 minutes or more later. They had gotten the munchies and so stopped at a roadside café. No one had showed up to claim the car they drove. They found rope in the car and tied one three wheeler dirt bike to the car in case they needed it to get out of the desert. So they took it for a drive. The 2-wheel drive Honda did not like the road at all or towing a dirt bike. That was OK because Frank and Terry found a cool looking trailer out there in the middle of no where. The hiked over to it and as soon as they where at the door they smelled the dead flesh of Anna and Carlos, Chris’s dead wife and her lover. They both leaned in opposite directions and puked all of the eggs and ham breakfast they had eaten. “DUDE! What the fuck! Man something stinks to hell in there man!” “Fuckin’ no way are we going in that thing!” “ Dude, Man I just lost my whole fuckin breakfast!” “Fuck that shit man! Let’s burn this mother!” “Hells Yea!” So they went off to get one of the 5-gallon tanks of gas they filled up on. They soaked the trailer with the gas. Lighting it was just too easy and boring they decided. So they doused a few more drops of gas on Martha’s car. Frank was the bravest dude there was in his college. So he told Terry to hang back with the dirt bike and get ready to “Ride the Hell outta here!” Frank got in backed up away from the trailer, he had found in the back a pole thing that looked like a golf club, it was gonna fit just fine against the gas peddle and seat. He started off. Door open, pole on the gas, braced on the seat, and he rolled out of the car and onto the ground. Ran back to Terry and they both watched the Honda crash into the trailer and BAM! Anna and Carlos’s remains cut and wrapped, hidden in the cupboards in the trailer went up in smoke!
“DUDE!” “SWEET!” was all Terry and Frank managed saying. They watched a few minutes and headed back to the other dirt bike.
They lite up a victory joint, sat there smoking a few hits and drove off in another direction. No one stops them they keep driving.

Sometimes the desert is a wonderful place full of wondrous cactus, thorny ocotillo, snakes and sometimes the biggest geodes around…sometimes they are filled with the biggest secrets and most wonderful stories.

*Infernal Death
by DEATH Scream Bloody Gore (1987)