Hedge Lake

by Brian Harmon

  Ned stood up. “I’ll give you a ride over there,” he decided. “And I’ll drop this one off at home while I’m at it.”

  “I’d appreciate that,” said Eric.

  Jordan, on the other hand, looked like she didn’t appreciate the gesture at all.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  They dropped Jordan off in her driveway despite protests. The last Eric saw of her before they drove away, she was standing on the porch and staring after them, her arms crossed, looking as if she had some choice words for them.

  “I seriously don’t get that girl’s mother,” said Ned once he and Eric were alone. “I understand being a little introverted, but you’d think she’d at least want to know who her daughter’s spending time with, eh? I mean, I’d never harm her, of course. But how does she know that? I wouldn’t be that trusting.”

  “I agree completely.” He and Karen had talked a few times about having children, but it never seemed to be the right time. There was a lot to worry about when it came to kids in this day and age. They just weren’t ready for it. And he wasn’t sure he ever would be. Especially now that he’d discovered how truly weird and terrifying the world really was.

  Jordan told him repeatedly that her mother was sick. He wondered if Mrs. Holstep was diagnosed with a serious condition, maybe even cancer. She might simply not have the energy to keep up with her spirited daughter. Or maybe what she really meant was that she was depressed, or otherwise emotionally distraught. Eric had heard of such cases before. The extrovert child became more independent as the introvert parent grew more dependent, to the point that they actually began to trade roles, the child becoming the caregiver. More often than not, however, it had more to do with a substance abuse problem on the part of the parent, rather than an emotional disorder.

  Whatever was going on there, he dearly hoped that Jordan remained safe. She was a very sweet little girl. He didn’t want to think about anything bad happening to her.

  Which of course was all the more reason to wrap up this lake madness before it was too late.

  Four miles went by quickly enough in the passenger’s seat of Ned’s Jeep, and he was thankful to not have to trudge all the way around the lake, dodging ghosts and lake monsters and alien abductors the whole way. Soon, he found himself sitting at the end of a long driveway, next to a mailbox with “FETTARSETTER” scrawled across the side in big, block letters.

  “You want me to wait for you?” asked Ned.

  Eric wanted to say yes. And to keep the engine running, too. But he declined. “I don’t know how long I might be. You might as well head back home. I’ll be fine.”

  “If you say so.”

  He stepped out of the car and closed the door. Through the open window, he said, “Thanks again.”

  “No problem. You be careful. I’m telling you, this guy’s kind of a creep.”

  Eric thought it was strange how people kept telling him to be careful around Fettarsetter. He understood not liking someone. There were plenty of people he didn’t like. But he never advised anyone to beware of those people. He didn’t tell his students to be careful when they said they were off to Algebra with Mrs. Cannings. Just because she was an insufferable bitch didn’t mean she was going to suck out their souls if they didn’t watch their backs.

  He recalled what Isabelle said about Fettarsetter giving off a bad energy of some kind and wondered if that was something that everyone could feel on some higher level. Maybe even Ned Bouven, who didn’t believe for a minute in psychic powers, could tell on some level that there was something dreadfully wrong about the man.

  Or maybe it was just a Yooper thing. What did he know?

  He didn’t say any of this aloud, of course. He merely thanked the man again and wished him farewell.

  Seconds later, he was standing there alone again.

  His cell phone chimed at him.

  BAD PLACE, said Isabelle.

  “Yes it is.”

  FEELS COLD

  Eric frowned at the screen. “Cold?”

  IT’S ODD, I KNOW, BUT IT ACTUALLY FEELS COLD THERE. IT MAKES ME SHIVER

  It was odd. But he was used to odd. Odd was kind of his thing now.

  He set off down the driveway.

  No shallows walkers or hellhounds blocked his path. He made the trip to the front door, about a hundred yards in all, without incident, to a little ranch house with white, vinyl siding, decorative shutters and a large front porch with a swing.

  Eric was almost disappointed. It didn’t look much like an evil lair. There weren’t even any skulls nailed to the walls. The least the guy could’ve done was post a sign warning him to turn back now.

  He found the front door open, with only a screen door to keep out the bugs.

  He knocked.

  Usually, this was the part where no one would answer and he’d find himself compelled against all rational sense to enter uninvited, which of course would lead to a terrifying discovery inside the building and him running for his life from some relentless monster.

  But Fettarsetter’s voice drifted immediately from deep within the house, inviting him in.

  The interior of the house looked nothing like the castles of Count Dracula or Victor Frankenstein. It was far smaller, more cluttered, and without a single stone wall or torch to be seen. And although it certainly lacked a woman’s touch, it was also a far cry from the sort of slovenly place where serial killers spent their spare time admiring themselves wearing their victims’ faces in the bathroom mirror. The place was pretty standard, really, except for the massive quantities of books lying everywhere.

  Ned had suspected this guy of being a rival scientist, but the books piled on the nearest end table weren’t scientific journals. They were classic literature. He saw Mark Twain, William Faulkner, George Orwell and Ray Bradbury.

  The bad guy was a fellow lover of literature?

  A big bookshelf stood against a nearby wall. He stepped toward it, scanning the titles. There were a few familiar favorites here, but mostly these books were in other languages. He had no idea what they might be.

  Next to the bookshelf, a darkened hallway led deeper into the house. It was from there that he heard Fettarsetter’s voice again. “Take this kiss upon the brow! And in parting from you now, thus much let me avow…”

  Eric peered down the hallway. One door stood open, spilling light from within. The voice was coming from that room. Cautiously, he moved toward it.

  “You are not wrong, who deem that my days have been a dream; yet if hope has flown away in a night or in a day, in a vision, or in none, is it therefore the less gone?”

  He approached the doorway and peered into a small office so littered with books he could barely see the furniture. Jonah Fettarsetter sat at a small desk, his chair turned to the side, as if deep in thought.

  “All that we see or seem is but a dream within a dream.”

  “Edgar Allan Poe,” said Eric.

  Fettarsetter turned and looked at Eric. He smiled. It was a creepy smile. Or maybe it was just a normal smile and it simply looked creepy because the man was creepy. “He was something of a weirdo in his time,” he remarked.

  “Well many of the things he did were all still pretty new in his day. I mean he invented the murder mystery.”

  That creepy smile widened a little. “True.”

  “Sorry to show up so late.”

  Fettarsetter shrugged. “It’s not late at all. Not for me. I’m always up well into the night.”

  That’s probably when he feeds on the blood of virgins, Eric thought. Aloud, he said, “That’s good. I lost track of time today.”

  “Did you learn anything interesting from Lorelai Fulrick or Dr. Bouven?”

  Eric’s brow furrowed. “Have you been spying on me?” He recalled the surveillance equipment he gave to Owen and Pete. He’d considered the possibility once before that the entire thing might’ve been a clever ruse to get Specter Ten to set up a surveillance system by which he could keep an eye out for s
noopers like himself. He didn’t see any monitoring equipment anywhere, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t in another room. Or maybe he didn’t need any equipment. For all he knew, he could have it all fed directly to his smart phone.

  There was probably an app for that.

  But Fettarsetter said, “No. I don’t need to spy. I simply predicted it.”

  “You predicted it?”

  “I’ve been studying the triangle for years. Not much happens here that I don’t foresee.”

  He considered this. The guy even talked like a monster movie villain. Any second now he’d probably sprout fangs and lunge across the room at him. He glanced at the books stacked on the desk. Most of these were about the supernatural. There were books about everything from hauntings to aliens to witchcraft to cryptids. It looked like an entire library dedicated to the occult.

  “Those two are very different people,” said Fettarsetter. “Lorelai can sense the lake’s energy. She feels the spirits. But she has no idea what makes any of it work. In contrast, Bouven is looking at the whole thing so scientifically that he’ll never be able to discover the truth. He lacks the imagination it requires.” He turned to the side again, resuming that deeply thoughtful pose. Eric thought it looked cool enough, but he was overdoing the drama a bit. “The irony,” he continued, “is that I think they could almost figure it out, if they put their heads together. But they’ll never do that. They’re both far too stubborn.”

  “So have you figured it out?”

  “Oh yes. Definitely.”

  Eric waited, but Fettarsetter didn’t offer to elaborate. Finally, he said, “Will Specter Ten figure it out?”

  He snorted laughter at this, but his smile disappeared. The result was a frighteningly unhappy expression on his already unpleasant face. “I’m amazed those boys can find their way out of bed in the mornings.”

  Eric didn’t argue with this. Instead, he asked, “Then why did you bring them into it? You obviously already know a lot more about what’s going on here than they’re going to find out. Do you really expect them to find proof of something paranormal?”

  “Of course they’re never going to find proof. You can’t prove anything with cameras and voice recorders. Even if you catch something, the nature of the thing is ambiguous. There will always be those who doubt because any evidence is always double-sided. People will perceive it in different ways. It’s like religion. There are always people who convert, but you’ll never prove to everyone that theirs is wrong because that’s the very definition of faith.”

  Eric had to pause to consider this. “But you gave them all that expensive equipment…”

  “I did,” he admitted. He leaned forward in his chair and steepled his hands. “And I told them to find me absolute proof in return. But unlike them, I knew what I was asking was impossible.”

  “Then what was the point?”

  “Simply to keep them busy. They serve their purpose perfectly just by remaining here in the triangle.”

  “Why?”

  “Energy. The energy of the living and the energy of the dead.”

  Eric tried to wrap his head around this. “Are you talking about the spiritual energy that’s drowning this area?”

  Fettarsetter didn’t seem remotely surprised that he knew about the energy. Whether he simply assumed that Mrs. Fulrick told him about it or thought he’d discovered it on his own, Eric didn’t know. “That’s the energy of the dead. Do you know how many people have died in this place?”

  “A lot,” said Eric. He’d seen dozens with his own eyes, and Mrs. Fulrick spoke of hundreds more.

  “A lot more than you know,” said Fettarsetter. “Even more than Lorelai knows. The natives who were here when the Europeans settled were only the last in a very long line. You won’t see any of them, of course. Only the modern ghosts show themselves as they lived. The older spirits almost never manifest themselves and never as anything more than whispers when they do.”

  That explained why he hadn’t seen any Native American ghosts. It had crossed his mind a time or two since Mrs. Fulrick mentioned them.

  “This is a place that feeds on tragedy,” said Fettarsetter.

  “That much I’ve gathered.”

  “The energy of the living is different from the energy of the dead,” he explained. “Without life, death is only a void. As you said, this area is thick with spiritual energy. There’s so much of it you can almost taste it. But it’s the energy of the living that gives it power. If you removed the living from the triangle, the energy of the dead would fade.”

  Eric thought about this. If this was true…

  “Of course,” continued Fettarsetter, anticipating his thoughts, “even if you could find a way to make everyone leave, the damage is already done. You’d only slow down the inevitable. And probably buy yourself only a few minutes for your trouble.”

  He was right, of course. That wasn’t going to be the answer. There were a lot of people living here. And anything major enough to evacuate that many people in a hurry would only draw more back in. He was going to have to go inside the triangle, like Mrs. Fulrick and Cordelia said, to face whatever was there.

  “Have you unraveled how things in the triangle work yet?”

  “There are layers,” replied Eric. This guy knew he’d been talking to Mrs. Fulrick and Ned, but he hadn’t mentioned Cordelia. Instinctively, he knew he should keep her to himself and pretend he’d deduced these things on his own. That might be the one advantage he had. “On the surface, things are normal. The deeper you go, the stranger it gets.”

  There was that creepy smile again. Eric wished he’d quit doing that. “Very good. I had a feeling you’d be the one to sort it all out.” He leaned back in his chair again. “So let me ask you this: What’s at the bottom?”

  Recalling what Mrs. Fulrick said to him, he guessed, “Something evil?”

  Now Fettarsetter frowned. He managed to look disappointed. “Good and evil have nothing to do with it. It rarely does.”

  Eric was fairly sure he was looking evil in the eyes right now, but he didn’t say so.

  “Something amazing exists at the bottom. A remnant of a time and place so ancient it defies comprehension.” Again he leaned forward. This time he placed both of his big hands on the top of the desk, spreading his long fingers. His eyes grew wide. He actually managed a look of childlike wonder that might’ve been perfectly endearing if he wasn’t still so damn creepy. “Something I’ve been waiting my whole life to see.”

  “Lost episodes of Dr. Who?”

  The corners of Fettarsetter’s mouth twitched a little. Eric found it hard to tell if it was a hint of amusement or a barely-concealed, murderous grimace. Either way it was borderline terrifying.

  He leaned back in his chair once more. “This is not the only universe man has inhabited.”

  Eric raised an eyebrow. “So this is all about the aliens?”

  “Not aliens,” said Fettarsetter, finally managing to sound impatient. “Merely nomads. Travelers across dimensions, not galaxies.”

  “Ah,” said Eric. He understood now: This guy was evil and crazy.

  “Our last home is still out there somewhere, probably dead and long rotten. And I believe the thing that writhes at the bottom of the triangle is a remnant of that world. Not evil. Not extraterrestrial. Only ancient beyond imagining.”

  So now he’d gone from extraterrestrial aliens to cross-dimensional beings from ages long forgotten… What happened to the aliens? Were there still aliens? Or were the aliens the beings from another dimension all along? What the hell was that crazy spaceship thing? He’d been keeping up pretty well before now, but this he was having a really hard time following.

  “The only variable I’m still missing is the map,” said Fettarsetter.

  “Map?”

  He turned in his seat, offering Eric his profile as he gazed up at the books on his shelf. “You can’t just walk to the source of the triangle. To get there you have to traverse more than our uni
verse’s four dimensions.”

  “We have four dimensions?” asked Eric, cocking his head to the side and considering.

  Fettarsetter seemed to pause for a moment, as if struggling to retain his patience. Eric didn’t feel bad about it. On the contrary, he didn’t care for this guy’s pompousness. If he was getting on the man’s nerves, then good. “Time,” he said. “Time is the fourth dimension.”

  “Time?” Eric’s first instinct was to scoff. What the hell did time have to do with anything? Except for the fact that he was already running short on it, of course. But then he recalled a curious thing about his time in the fissure two summers ago. There’d been places where he lost time. After spending an hour or two in that strange gray zone with no cell phone reception, he’d emerged to find that Karen had been trying to call him for three or four hours, which of course should’ve been impossible. Somehow, time ran differently deeper in the fissure.

  So maybe the creep had a point after all…

  Fettarsetter turned to face him again, tilting his head to one side as if tired. “I can get inside the triangle. That’s not a problem. It’s only a matter of finding where the world is thin and letting yourself inside.”

  Oh that’s how you do it, thought Eric. Piece of cake. And not at all crazy-sounding.

  “But once inside,” continued Fettarsetter, “there’s no way to navigate it. I just end up back at the beginning again. Every time. It’s an unfathomable labyrinth.”

  Mrs. Fulrick, Ned and Jordan had all spoken of him roaming around in the woods. He’d been seen taking measurements with peculiar tools and searching for something.

  “So how would a person even get to the bottom of the triangle?” asked Eric, trying to sound skeptical and not at all like he really needed to know this.

  “That’s the trick, isn’t it?” He tilted his head the other way now, as if trying to stretch out a crick in his neck. “I thought I could do it using the energy of the triangle. But it’s just too overpowering. I’d need much finer instruments than I have.” He picked up a small, black object that had been lying on top of one of the books on his desk. It reminded him of Specter Ten’s ghost-hunting gadgets, but looked sleeker and more expensive. “And I have the best equipment there is to buy.”