The Lost Time Probe

by V Bertolaccini

  “Yes! He knew, and gave his word not to ruin his plan … As I did, after he told me everything …”

  “You mean that you knew all along he was still around?”

  Eisenberg sat with his mouth open thinking of all the occurrences that had occurred.

  He started to recall all the strange occurrences and considered if he had been behind them, and asked Kurt, “Did he have anything to do with the birds at the lake – where we found the first clue – and the media coverage …”

  “He did! The birds were put there, and the clue … I gave him the information he needed … He wanted you to have the mansion to investigate it, as you’re a private eye, and with sources …”

  Eisenberg realized that the other clue, and grave with the oldest grave marked on it, was put there by him, and the postal worker with the parcel who had arrived.

  “So he must have had me watched …”

  “Correct! That was what I was also to do … We were basically to find the lost Transylvanian treasure … Dracula’s lost treasure … He originally found out about this place when he was younger … He had always wanted to solve the mysteries … What was really here! This castle had fascinated him, and he had studied its history, and everything he could find about out about it … He had later bought it and had intended to solve all the mysteries but had not been able to … He had come up with the basic plan of getting us to get it, and had put many of the people that were investigating it here, and he exceedingly wanted to find out what was haunting it … He had been working on the project and getting the solution as we explored it for him …”

  “Who put this castle here …?” Eisenberg asked, curiously.

  “There is far more history to it than you think … It was owned by rich and famous people … The rooms and place was once full of people, and activity, and the grounds regularly had parties, full of people … Yet most avoided the top floor at night …”

  Eisenberg did not know whether to be happy with the situation or not, and wondered what else he was missing.

  “So was Howard Eisenberg happy with the treasure discovery?”

  “Yes! It was him that we got the cash for the treasure from … He bought it off us!”

  “Were you searching here for it before I arrived here?”

  “I once checked … We watched you here, and were before I arrived here at night – when you were wandering around the corridors, and it was us who left the window open – you discovered the draft coming from …”

  Eisenberg realized he might be missing something, and that they wanted something else, and he went over everything and wondered what it was.

  “What does Howard Eisenberg want now?” he finally asked.

  Kurt smiled, and thought of what to say, and replied, “He wants you to investigate something else …”

  Eisenberg sat back and wondered what the hell else he could want, and why he was not content with what he had.

  “What else does he need?” he moaned.

  “There’s another map …”

  “Another map! Of what?”

  “I don’t know! I believe it’s another treasure! Howard Eisenberg believes it exists … He claims it belonged to an old Red Indian that located some form of treasure …”

  Eisenberg knew he knew more, and replied, “Tell me more or I’ll not bother …”

  “What I heard was ancient Red Indians passed on accounts and stuff in folklore of lot treasure and supernatural occurrences and many searched for the source, though little exists to prove anything, and what is behind it is vague and confused …”

  “Go on, tell me more.”

  “Old folklore has descriptions of lost treasures and strange accounts and explorers searching for what was behind it, and out of the ordinary accounts of supernatural findings and of an old Red Indian that was once believed to have encountered something, and treasure, and drew an old parchment treasure map.”

  “What is known of it?”

  “Many fundamental facts are missing that would allow anything to be located – and nothing is known to answer the queries of the treasure hunters, who have risked their lives in deadly attempts to discover it.”

  “So why do you believe we can find anything then?”

  “The region it is in is clearly thought to be a dangerous place, which accounts for why it was time and again told of, and people were believed to have been killed by something.”

  “Something!” the paranormal researcher moaned.

  “Accounts have little, especially later on, and might prove what was killing them no longer existed, and strange claims of supernatural phenomena are told, and some newspapers conclude it was ancient superstitions of the region and tribes, and ghost stories, even invented to scare travelers away by natives, and due to the desolation of the region.”

  “Sounds as though there’s something …” the paranormal researcher continued.

  “Early colonists and travelers exploring and traveling through or settling in the region mentioned old myths and accounts of deaths of people, and some mention hideous occurrences …”

  Eisenberg wondered where the hell the place was, and sat confused, and tried to recall anything like it.

  Eisenberg watched the paranormal investigator stop what he was doing, and put the book he had on the table again, as Kurt put his hand in his inner pocket and removed an old piece of crumpled parchment, which was ripped and worn all over, and barely held together, and he sensed it had some importance, and Kurt placed it in front of Eisenberg, and flattened it across the table, and Eisenberg looked at the condition of it with horror, realizing he would have to work out what it was, and could barely see anything on it other than vague lines, drawings of ancient and vague things, but he saw it was a map of some place with small hills and trees.

  Chapter 9

  The Treasure Investigation

  What confused Eisenberg the most was why Howard Eisenberg had given them the old Indian treasure map, which he got a photocopy of, and he now wondered what the hell he was up to.

  Kurt, and Howard Eisenberg, seemed to be insisting that there was something at the mansion that could solve the mystery, and his observations of Kurt confirmed it could be in the library.

  The only thing he could think of was getting accurate maps of the whole region, and perhaps old ones, where there might be trees marked on them, and the only reason there could be anything in the library was someone that built the mansion out of the old castle, or later, had put something there, and he was left confused, and wondering why they were so sure anything existed as there was nothing that indicated anything was there.

  Eisenberg recalled some of the recent findings the paranormal researcher had come up with, and of the kings Dracula had taken vast treasures from, and he was sure there was far more, and he was sure Howard Eisenberg might think so, and he sat considering where it would be, and wondered if it was in the mansion and if Howard Eisenberg had come up with a plan to get it, and wondered what the hell the new map was for, and realized there would be more to follow if it was.

  It was astounding what they had done but he was sure they were missing many things and about Dracula and the vampires, and he still had vivid memories of Dracula and his two vampire creatures flying away into the dark night, flying towards New York, and them wondering what the hell they had released on he world.

  He was sure it was their biggest mistake, and he and the others searched for an answer to the problem, and he was sure it was now the main motivation of the paranormal investigator, and finding a way to destroy it.

  Its first killings had been strange deaths marked in small news stories, and the investigations of it showed it could be some sort of creature, and they had tried to identify it.

  Yet the killings about New York became worse, and dark sightings of Dracula had been witnessed, and many thought it was the devil itself, or some monster out the depths of hell.

  There were now deaths from it occurring all over the city, and now almost ever
y night, and the deaths and occurrences were now clearly being covered up, and some police who witnessed it had been unable to describe what it was, and what could be behind it.

  What was incredible was it seemed to be carrying out an ancient plan and like it had done things like it in ancient times, and some accounts mentioned in the mansion library were similar, out of the ordinary accounts of events at the original castle, and they were now unable to fully grasp what the vampire wars had been like, and what had been occurring.

  He believed they could eventually return to the castle, and desolate estate, to get it back, and he had been considering different plans to handle the situation, and escaping.

  What was incredible was, when he spotted Kurt’s newspaper, and asked to see it, he knew there was something in it that he never wanted to see, but had to, and he studied the front page staggered at the coverage of the vampire attacks, and wondered if Kurt had deliberately bought the newspaper for it, and that the other newspapers might not have much, and he read through it staggered at their plans of capturing it, and that they gave detailed accounts of groups of people being attacked and others being killed by them, and he realized they were becoming far more powerful, and he knew they would return.

  Chapter 10

  The Tunnel

  Eisenberg was blinded by a black abyss rapidly surrounding him, when he was lowered down through the tunnel, and examined the sides of the tunnel above him, in the little light there, and saw where it had been drilled.

  He gripped the rope and harness on him hard as he spun round, and fixed his boot against the tunnel wall to stop it, and looked up to the top of the tunnel and through the hole there, and listened to two archeologists over him conferring and arguing on what way to lower him.

  He could not believe the events of the past days, and the way they had introduced the workmen and drillers, and proceeded wreck the region around the shaft, removing walls and drilling deep into the foundations of the castle.

  It still amazed him the way they still never fully knew or said what they thought was below, and why they were going to such an extent to do it, but he realized it had to be something, and what the scientist told them, and of alien origins.

  The actual depth surprised him and them, and why it took so long to get to what was there, and he wondered why they never thought it could be destroyed by the powerful drill blasting through the ground.

  They had found little there so far and it had taken a long time arranging the exploration of it, and he had been unchallenged with his insistence in going down, and the archeologists agreed to help him and to follow him down later.

  It was incredible that they never had any working lights, with after all their technology, and he was waiting to get one, and he wondered what else they could have missed.

  He heard someone appear above, and watched Kurt emerge, and his light beam down and illuminate him, and he wondered why they never just waited until the morning, as most of them were too sleepy, especially after a long day working there, and could make mistakes, and they would do things better.

  He grabbed the light off him when he lowered it down to him on a rope, and realized it had already turned dim, and gasped realizing it could go out at the wrong time, and he checked his communicator and spoke to one of the scientists in the room beside the shaft and checked it was safe to go down, and was surprised his attitude had altered and was reacting more, and considered why, and he just started lowering himself down, and followed the scientist’s instructions.

  It was an ultimate discovery and exploration and he wanted it to be done right, and to give the discovery everything it deserved. Yet he was utterly confused at what was actually being discovered and would happen, especially after finding so much there already.

  Chapter 11

  The Celestial Discovery

  A deep thud echoed down from overhead as the scientists at the top of the tunnel gathered there to look down and he wondered why he was carrying out such a task.

  He recalled how secretive the scientists were and knew they intended to cover up what was there and he wanted to see it and find out what he could from it, and he pointed his light directly down for the first time, and quickly landed at the bottom, and was surprised to see something artificial buried beneath solid and crumbled mud, and he bent down and started wiping away the dirt and dust at an area the object was the most visible.

  The low radiance of the light was no longer enough to allow him to see much, and he realized how tired they all had become and that they had not even bothered getting someone to get a proper light.

  Some dust entered his throat making him gasp, but he ignored it, and speeded up and shifted away large heaps of muck around the area, and felt the rope shift, from above, and he inhaled more air, and detected it was more stale.

  What was the outcome? Would they even find anything? What the hell could it be, and be doing there?

  Strange echoes from overhead came down entering the strange silence and he bent over and examined what he had revealed of the artifact and was surprised it had a strange surface and felt rubbery and he felt a strange current, and was surprised its surface altered, and changed color, and when he put pressure on it his hand sank into it, and examined it considering if it was some form substance.

  Yet its surface hardened and he felt it was an artifact again, and realized the scans of it showed it was.

  He realized he had no real explanation of what it was, and was sure it was unknown, and he was surprised it became so hard he thought they could not penetrate it.

  He wished he had forced the scientists into giving him the scans of it they were hiding, as they insisted it was, and he sat down and rested on an area of muck.

  He suddenly recalled the incredible magnetic field or powerful force detected from it and realized how powerful it was, but he was sure they explained why it was not dangerous, and he realized from what they told him earlier that they would not fully know, and he realized why they never went down the tunnel, and realized how highly advanced the scientists had become.

  Chapter 12

  The Artifact

  Eisenberg was amazed when one of the archeologists started declaring to having found something unusual, and Eisenberg went back down the tunnel to investigate it.

  The archeologist had started removing debris from the artifact, and pointed at the black surface it now had, and Eisenberg checked the cavity they had drilled and dug out, going around the entire artifact’s now circular shape, and going down around its sides, and he watched the other archeologists digging deeper around the sides to get below it, and examined one of the scientists staggered face as he studied the object with profound fear and confusion.

  He spotted an archeologist touching it for the first time and quickly pull his hand away from it, and look staggered and confused, feeling the extraordinary energy pulsations now going through it, which they sensed had far more magnitude than they had encountered, which confused them.

  Its identity left them staggered and trying to realize what it was, and he watched them occasionally considering it, and in the end ignore it, and continue to clear away the dirt from it.

  Eventually more scientists came down from above and started examining it, and some joined in and helped clear the dirt and clean it, and help hoist the rubble up in buckets, while trying to get a close look at it, and examine it up close, which mostly left them confused, and eventually Eisenberg realized the artifact was slowly being removed from beneath the ground, and would be soon hoisted up the now giant tunnel, they had dug wider, and the main problem was what weight it actual was, as its altering states also changed its density, and weight.

  What staggered him the most was the scientists and just about everyone with them did not believe it had any supernatural origins or powers, and was surely entirely of alien origins, and he could not believe that anything of such a nature at the haunted mansion could not be, and it staggered him.

  At the top of the tunnel the other scientists
were in the room monitoring it and what was occurring there, and any reactions from it, and he discovered they were receiving better views of it, and were seeing its perfectly symmetrical shape.

  Chapter 13

  The Alien Code

  Eisenberg looked down the tunnel at the empty chamber beneath the mansion, still glowing in bright light, beaming out from spotlights below, and he spotted some equipment the scientists had left behind in the excitement, and he shifted away from the top of the tunnel, and away from the shaft.

  He checked how much damage they had done to the historical building, as he moved away to the lounge, where they had taken the artifact, and gasped when he saw it resting in the middle of the large lounge room, and spotted one of the scientists through a door, along a corridor, and realized how late it was, and realized the amount of action there would be there in the morning, when they brought in their new equipment and began their proper investigations of it.

  For some reason its energy seemed to have died down and he walked around its giant shape wondering why, and why it had altered into a giant black solid object.

  He shifted back and watched it in the dim room light with amazement, astonished that the fifteen-foot perfect symmetrical black object even looked like a strange black flying saucer, and he wondered if it had taken the shape for a reason or there was another reason for it, and it was perhaps its real shape, and he wondered what the hell it was, and how it got the power it had.

  It could have powers that lasted centuries or it could get it from some other source.

  “So do you think they have the technology to communicate with it?” Kurt asked, swiftly entering the room from a corridor.