Transmission: A Supernatural Thriller

by Ambrose Ibsen

  It was about nine in the evening when they arrived at their destination. The GPS gave a pleasant chirp as they rolled up to the spot. The road was a very narrow one, made of dirt and gravel, and as they reached its terminus, Kenji stared out the windshield with bated breath. The snowfall had ceased, and a terrible stillness enveloped them. “Are you sure this is the place?” asked Kenji, gulping down a hint of bile.

  Dylan nodded slowly, dividing his gaze between the bright GPS display and the sight directly ahead of them. “Yeah... this is definitely it.”

  They had made it to their destination. The coordinates, first gleaned from a recording in an obscure song, had led them to a small shack in the middle of rural Minnesota. It was a single story, looked to be of fairly-recent construction, and featured only a single window, as best they could tell from this angle.

  And the window was lit.

  The shack sat in the center of an open field. The grass was overgrown in places, and the sky overhead was laced in knotted power lines that were seemingly long out of use. There was nothing else to be seen for miles; this was the first and only habitation they'd run across in the last half hour of their drive.

  Dylan cleared his throat and leaned on the wheel a bit, killing the headlights but leaving the car running. Suddenly his care-free visage seemed infected with the very same nervousness that'd plagued Kenji's for the duration of the drive. He gave a weak laugh. “I don't really know what we're supposed to do here. I mean, do we just go knock on the door and tell whoever is in there that we heard their address in a song, or...?”

  Kenji tried to calm his breathing. The voice in the back of his head, the one that had tried to warn him off from making this trip in the first place, had changed its tune and seemed to be saying something else.

  I tried to warn you. Now it's too late.

  Carefully, so as to keep quiet, Dylan killed the ignition and opened the door. Stepping out into the chill night, he shot Kenji a glance and tugged on the collar of his jacket. “Let's see who's home, I guess.”

  Kenji exited the car and fell into step behind Dylan. Approaching the door of the shack, they peered at one another nervously before Dylan finally found the courage to issue a firm knock.

  The two waited in total silence, scarcely breathing, for an answer.

  SEVEN

  Reggie Cash sat in his recliner, the olive-colored cushions sinking beneath his bony frame. He'd cranked up the thermostat before sitting down, and a pleasant warmth belched out of the vent just above his seat. Fumbling with the television remote, he turned on his VCR and started up a program he'd recorded the day before, a documentary he'd been meaning to catch for some time.

  Sipping at a glass of milk, Reggie crossed his heels and waited for the tape to finish tracking. Then, when it was ready, he hit play and watched as the tail-end of a car dealership commercial flickered away. The opening of the documentary followed. It was a World War Two documentary that dealt chiefly with the black soldiers who fought in segregated units-- of which his father was one. He was hoping there would be some coverage of his father's unit, the 92nd Infantry Division. The credits started up, showing footage of the war. Reggie fast-forwarded through them, taking another sip of milk.

  Nearly missing the start of the documentary, he hit play and set aside his glass, watching intently. The scene was one of modern day Normandy, and the narrator, a British man, was discussing D-Day. The scenery was beautiful at present, but footage of the battle, and of its aftermath, was quite another matter. The narrator went on to discuss the regiments of black soldiers who'd fought in that historic battle, and soon thereafter a newly-erected monument was brought into focus.

  The monument was made of marble, and was flanked by a large, ornately-fashioned fountain that ran with crystal-clear water. A small crowd ambled about the fountain, which was stationed in a public park in Manhattan. Dogs were walked, passersby sat down and held conversations on benches nearby, while the narrator went on about the enormous number of names that were listed on the monument and the generous donations that'd made its construction possible.

  Something else caught Reggie's attention, however. While he should have been looking at the monument and appreciating its sleek design, the emergence of something in the background proved more arresting to him. It was a person standing in the crowd, a woman.

  Reggie leaned forward, squinting.

  The woman, very pale and dressed in a long, black dress that ended near the tops of her ankles, seemed to be speaking. Her voice melded in with the din of the crowd, but seemed to hover just above it, in a slightly higher register than the ambient noise. The narrator had finished his spiel and the monument was being shown from different angles. In each of these shots could be seen the pale, raven-haired woman. And in every instance her lips could be seen to move.

  What struck Reggie as most strange was the way this woman's gaze cut into him from the screen. Unless he was mistaken it seemed as though this woman was speaking directly to him. Of course, he knew that to be impossible. This documentary was old; it'd come out about ten years ago and he'd only recently caught it on television after years of meaning to watch it. But what was she saying? What drove her to stare so intently through the lens of the camera from her spot behind the monument? The makers of this documentary hadn't purposefully zoomed in on her or anything; like so many of the other spectators she'd simply been caught in frame, captured standing in a shady spot beneath a pair of Poplar trees behind the hulking monument.

  And then she was gone. She literally blinked out of view just before the next scene started up, and her sudden disappearance proved not a little jarring.

  The scene changed, and old footage of US bombers began to play. But Reggie wasn't paying attention to that anymore. A chill worked its way down his spine and he immediately began to rewind the tape. He had to see that woman again, make sure that he hadn't just imagined the whole thing. Zipping through the memorial scene, Reggie paused and found exactly what he was looking for.

  There she was, standing in the shade, twenty or thirty feet from the monument and just barely out of focus.

  The woman.

  Reggie let the tape play once more, and followed her with his eyes as the camera panned this way and that. No matter what angle the documentarians captured the memorial in, the woman managed to figure into the scene in some way. All the while, her lips were moving and a breathy voice sailed into the air which competed with the background chatter of the crowd and the deep tones of the narrator.

  And then she fizzled out of sight in an instant. One minute she was there, the next she vanished. Reggie told himself that this was likely due to some film effect, but the more he re-watched the footage, the less sure of that he became. The woman had been there one moment, and was gone the next, fading from view like she'd been suddenly erased.

  Rewinding yet again, Reggie played the sequence for a third time. This go around, he cranked up the volume and tried to make out what was being said by this strange, pale woman. He couldn't say just why he was so interested in this oddity; she had probably been some loony, some kook that always talked to herself and whose voice hadn't been fully edited from the finished footage. Still, he felt compelled to listen. The longer he stared at the screen, at the figure's pale countenance and unwavering stare, the more he wanted to know what she was saying. The way she was looking out at him from every shot gave the impression that her eyes were studying the inside of his living room.

  No matter how loud the television got, he couldn't make out what was being said. The woman's disappearance coincided with a strange crackling sound, followed by the deep roar of bombers flying over the ocean in the next scene.

  It'd been about forty years since he'd left Vietnam, but Reggie could still remember what it was like to have Charlie watch him from deep within the jungle. Sitting in his living room, clutching at the plush arm rests of the recliner, he felt himself transported back in time to the war, felt the very same hostilit
y directed at him from some undetermined point deep in the television screen. The pull of foreign eyes was unmistakable. His pulse began to race, his eyes scanned the shadowed corners of the cluttered living room.

  Calm down, he told himself. Ain't no one here. You're alone.

  Trouble was, he felt anything but alone.

  Though the scene had changed to grainy black and white footage of the era, if he looked to the screen he still saw flickers of the pale woman in his mind's eye. With great hesitance, he began to rewind once more, pausing the tape just a few moments before the mysterious woman vanished from the screen. Lowering the footrest, he stood up from his chair and sauntered across the room, stooping in front of the screen to get a better look.

  The tape was paused, so the figure of this woman should have been completely frozen. And though she didn't move or react in any appreciable way, Reggie got the impression that her form on this tape was unnaturally cognizant. He felt that, despite being a mere recording, she existed somewhere within the tape, and was capable of appraising him in some way. She wasn't flesh and blood, maybe, but she existed. The woman's glare was cutting, savage, and even in freeze-frame she had a life of her own.

  “Nonsense... you're talking nonsense,” he muttered, reaching behind him for the remote.

  He shut off the TV and tossed the remote onto his coffee table.

  In the moment before he'd turned it off, Reggie fancied he saw the figure move in some subtle way. Her gaze had narrowed, or else she'd turned her head very slightly. He told himself it was nothing and hurriedly set off for bed.

  EIGHT

  Reggie had taken longer than normal in getting up that morning. An unrestful sleep was only partially ameliorated by a hot bath and a close shave. When he was through with that, he prepared himself some toast and hot tea while scanning the day's paper in his recliner.

  Now and then, his gaze darted off of the page and to the VCR that sat beneath his television, the little red power light glowing.

  Reggie, some years retired, lived a rather care-free life. Between his pension, social security and the money he brought in from some old investments, he could do most anything he pleased within reason. With nowhere to be, nothing to do, he should have done as he usually did and called up some friends for lunch, or prepare to spend a day on the town.

  His freedom sometimes led to indecision however, and on a morning like this one, indecision was a very dangerous thing. He felt himself on the precipice of choosing a different path for his day, of embarking on a new kind of quest that might lead him to uncharted territory. Without any solid plans in mind, his thoughts were free to wander.

  And without fail, they wandered repeatedly to the videotape in his VCR. More specifically, he couldn't stop thinking about the strange woman and the scarcely audible speech she'd uttered in that scene near the war memorial.

  Though he knew it would be better to simply banish his curiosity surrounding the thing and forget all about it, he felt a strong urge to investigate, and had even begun to consider avenues by which he might make sense of the woman's words.

  A friend of his, Steven, worked in video. He did wedding shoots, mostly, but had a rather large audio-visual set up at his disposal and could easily clean up the tape so that the woman's speech could be heard. Steven probably wouldn't even charge him for it; what did he have to lose?

  Pacing in front of the television, he bent down and ejected the tape. The VCR clicked, the edge of the tape sticking out. He plucked it out and quickly stuffed it into his bag. Then, locking up his home, he decided to pay Steven a visit.

  What have you got to lose? he kept asking himself, as if to color the errand as a harmless one. It probably wouldn't cost him anything but a bit of time. When the speech proved to be nothing but gibberish, he could lay this fascination of his with the footage to rest and have a good laugh.

  But somehow, in the back of his mind, he'd already decided that he did have something to lose by digging deeper. His curiosity might be sated by investigating further, but there was no telling what might come tied up in that knowledge. Just carrying the tape in his bag and tossing the thing into his passenger seat made him feel unclean.

  ***

  Reggie's 1970 Buick LeSabre was a full restoration. Sleek and clean as the day it rolled off of the production line, driving it was one of his life's greatest pleasures.

  Today, though, it was all he could do to keep it going in a straight line.

  The weather was fair and traffic was light, but the scenery was thoroughly spoiled by the thing he'd brought with him. His foul passenger, the videotape, sat within his leather bag, transmitting a harsh aura all the while. Perhaps it was just his imagination that made him think the tape permeated an evil air, and yet, as he navigated the city streets and pulled into the parking lot outside of Steven's place, he'd counted no less than three pale, black-haired passersby who'd reminded him of the woman in that very tape. He'd felt sharp, hostile gazes locked onto him as he'd driven through the streets, had sensed the exact, nebulous danger that'd struck him the night before in his living room.

  Parking the car, Reggie stepped out. He smoothed out his dress shirt and pulled the leather bag out of the passenger seat, slinging it over his shoulder. Then, locking up, he took one brief glance around before setting off for the door to Steven's studio.

  Steven ran his small operation next to an old insurance outfit and kept irregular hours. Reggie wondered if he should have called ahead, but lucked out and found the front door lit up with the neon OPEN sign he remembered. Entering, he slipped into the quiet little storefront and past the rows of framed wedding pictures. Inside, he found Steven lounging in his seat, heels up on his desk and a breakfast sandwich in his hand.

  At hearing the door open, Steven sat upright and glanced Reggie's way. “How can I help--”

  Reggie sported a grin. “Hey there, Steve.”

  Ripping a hunk of his breakfast sandwich away, Steve chuckled to himself. “You scared me, Reg. For a minute there I thought I was going to have to get up and do some work,” he managed while chewing. “What brings you out here this fine morning?”

  Reggie walked over to the desk and fished around in his bag for the tape. “I wouldn't relax just yet. I got something here I want you to take a peek at. Now, it ain't a big job, but I was wondering if you could help me do something with this tape here.” Reggie held out the tape for Steven's appraisal.

  Straightening his glasses and brushing a few crumbs from the breast of his sweater, Steven sat up and took the tape. Flipping it around in his hands, he shrugged. “Yeah, sure, what do you need?”

  At the prospect of answering this question, Reggie's mouth grew suddenly dry. How best could he phrase his request without it sounding strange? There was a particular scene he wanted cleaned up. Specifically, he wanted Steven to play with the audio so that he'd be able to hear what the woman in that monument scene was uttering. “You got a VCR in here? I'll show ya.”

  Steven led the way to the back room, where all of the audio-visual equipment was held. There were stacks and stacks of dense machines whose names and uses Reggie couldn't be sure of. At the end of the room, stationed beneath a large screen, was something that Reggie recognized however. A tape deck.

  Steve switched on the TV and VCR, then inserted the tape. Crossing his arms, he turned the volume up a few clicks and handed the remote off to Reggie.

  Reggie had left the tape more or less in the correct spot, and had to rewind only a few seconds to show Steven what he wanted. “This scene here. You see that woman?” Reggie reached out towards the screen, pointing at the pale woman in the background. She was standing in the shade, her lips moving and her breathy voice serving as an undercurrent to the narrator's elegant British annunciation. “She's talking, but I can't hardly hear what she's saying, you know? Think you can clean this up for me? Just this scene. I want to know what she's saying.”

  Steve nodded, his gaze narrowing as he watched the
footage unfold. Then, he grinned. “Sure, that wouldn't be too much trouble. But what for? She an old friend of yours?”

  Reggie laughed. Steven couldn't have been more off the mark if he'd tried. “Something like that,” he replied.

  “Tell you what. I haven't got much going on today. Unless I get a bunch of folks knocking down my door I should be able to fix this up for you by this afternoon. Come by around one and I'll have it done.”

  With profuse thanks, Reggie left the shop and returned to the LeSabre.

  The wait had begun.

  Cruising to a little spot downtown he often went for brunch, Reggie decided he'd treat himself to a small meal and to the company of other people while waiting for Steven to finish working on the tape. The thought of returning home, of wandering the streets in search of entertainment, was repellant to him. Some eggs and coffee, perhaps a mimosa, would set him straight and soothe his nerves. Leaning back in the seat as he rolled up to a stoplight, he allowed himself a chuckle. What business did he have being so worked up on a lovely day like this one?

  Reggie Cash was, more often than not, a carefree guy. His friends all knew him as such, and he was famously difficult to rile up. Life's slings and arrows rolled off of him ordinarily, but here he'd gone and allowed some old bit in a documentary to unseat his mind. Thinking back on it, he felt almost ashamed for his frightful fascination with the tape. Why had he insisted on going to Steven's? Why was he so damn interested in what was almost certainly foolishness?

  Reggie began weighing the possibility of contacting Steven and asking him to just throw the tape away when something caught his eye on the road. He was stopped, the first in a long line of cars, and had looked towards the left side of the crosswalk when he involuntarily gripped the wheel till his arms shook.