Herb and Matt had resurveyed the site with GPR and got no additional anomalous signatures. “Clean,” they both said at the same time.
Herb came over to where Ben and Adrian were standing. “Should we fill the hole?” he asked.
“You’re sure we’ve got all the pieces?” asked White.
“There’s nothing left down there,” Herb replied. “We even scanned a wider perimeter and found nothing unusual.”
White looked at Ben who nodded. “Fill it.”
Again, the Bobcat roared to life, and in less than 20 minutes the hole was filled. The 21 pieces they had uncovered continued to be the focus of that afternoon. White was inclined to consider the substance a composite of mineral and metal, but Liz was not so quick to accept this assessment.
The longest piece measured six feet, and the shortest, that piece with the seven symbols, was about two feet long and 12 inches in width. The edges of each piece, originally thought to show deliberate breaks, were now being referred to as stress or compression fractures. Liz Raymond, however, held on to the thought that there had been some deliberate attempt to alter the integrity of the pieces, that they had been intentionally compromised, though, at this time, it remained a notion unsupported by anything more than conjecture.
Ben rubbed his hand across the iconography. Suddenly, he pulled it away abruptly, shouting, “This thing is pulsing—vibrating!”
The more pieces they fit together, the stronger the vibration, which not one of them could comprehend. Dr. White suggested the pieces had become a kind of conduit for electric charges, possibly a long obsolete trunk line housing for cables buried in the ground. Because of the mysterious iconography, and the fact that there were no cables present, this idea was quickly dismissed as not a very plausible presumption.
For the time being, they went on with their efforts to fit the remaining pieces together. Seven pieces, and none more than ten inches in depth, were already assembled on the lawn. Adrian, kneeling beside Liz, passed the Geiger counter across the surface of each piece, and told her the readings were still consistently low.
Finally, all 21 pieces had been connected into a two-dimensional shape that lay on the grass. What they had put together in less than three hours, none of them could identify. One thing was sure, except for a few rough edges, each piece fit together perfectly—like the interlocking pieces of a jigsaw puzzle.
“I don’t think this was meant to be a two-dimensional structure,” White concluded, looking at what resembled a tower with three spindly legs that converged into a triangular enclosure. Measuring over 12 feet as it stretched flat on the grass, it resembled in some respects a surveyor’s transom.
“I don’t think we can stand it up, if that’s what you’re thinking,” Liz replied.
“It’s not going to stand on its own,” Herb agreed, “but supports might hold it up.”
With several scans of the pieces already downloaded, Matt ran a Microsoft Windows image manipulator called GIMP on his laptop. This platform allowed him to produce and edit several possible images, and eventually he rendered a structure that resembled a three-dimensional triangle. “What about this?” he called out from the shade of the canopy. “We could use the three long pieces as the verticals,” he proposed, as the group gathered around the monitor. “Some of these shorter pieces could be used as capstones, others to provide horizontal support.”
An hour later, after nailing together a wooden support structure to the same measurements as the pieces, they stood back and looked at it with interest. Seeing the three-dimensional image made of lumber gave each a feeling that they were getting closer to learning what the image might have looked like originally. What if they did figure out the shape? It did not come with a set of instructions. It wasn’t one of those do-it-yourself kits accompanied by directions. It was something dug out of the ground and that was just about all it was. Even with the three-dimensional framework in front of them, no one seemed any closer to solving what had become a conundrum of sorts.
“It’s a tower. Maybe it transmits a signal,” said Manning at length.
“Needs batteries,” laughed Jenna, regarding Ben with a huge smile.
“What?” asked White seriously enough to attract their attention.
“Batteries,” repeated Ben. “She said the thing needs batteries.”
White looked at Dr. Raymond with the same serious expression. “She might be onto something.”
“I was only joking,” Jenna told them.
Dismissing Jenna’s remark, White said, “What if we put a deliberate electrical charge on this thing?”
Matt rubbed his fingers through two days of whiskers. “Are you serious?”
“I don’t know,” answered Adrian. “It’s like nothing I’ve ever seen. At some point it had a purpose, and that purpose might be one we can’t even begin to imagine, so we begin with possibilities.”
“If it is a communication tower, something must activate it,” Ben surmised.
It was Matt who offered another possibility. “Maybe it’s nothing more than yard art—a kind of abstract architectural structure. We’ve seen some weird stuff come out of the ground. Some people got peculiar ideas about decorating lawns.”
“Perhaps,” smiled Liz. “But I have a hunch there’s something more to it than yard art.”
None of them was confident about the purpose of what had been constructed from the 21 pieces, unless it was Dr. White, who continued to suggest that they hook an electrical charge to at least one of the three vertical pieces. They’d apply a voltage charge, then stand back and wait for something to happen. After backing the truck closer, Matt taped generator cables to opposing sides of the largest pillar. Gradually increasing the voltage to 4500 watts of power that surged through the anomaly . . . nothing.
Shaking his head, he shut down the generator and removed the terminals from the structure. “That’s all we got,” he told them. “Maybe it needs higher voltage, or a sustained charge.”
“It was just a hunch,” admitted White. Then after a pause, he added, “There has to be some way to wake this thing up.”
“Maybe it’s been dead too long and isn’t going to wake up.” Ben’s remark was intended to break the solemnity that had taken hold of the dig. It was just something to say—words to fill the spaces between too much serious dialogue.
Before anyone could answer, “I hear something,” Jenna whispered. “Listen carefully, and you can hear a kind of buzzing or snapping sound.”
“That’s just residual power off the generator poles,” Matt assured her.
“Oh, well, how would I know that?” she laughed.
“You probably wouldn’t,” returned Matt with a smile.
Soon, everyone was laughing slightly—except Liz, who stood on the bridge looking down into a winding stream of clear water that trailed off into woods in both directions. With her head bent over the railing, she seemed intent on something in the water. Whatever it was, held her attention for almost a minute, until Adrian came up beside her. The others watched them from a few yards away.
“What is it, Liz?” White asked. “Is there something there?”
“A face,” she replied slowly. “There on the surface of the water,” and she pointed to the stream ten feet below.
“Your reflection?” he asked cautiously.
“No, it’s not my face.”
No matter how hard he tried, Dr. White could not find a face reflected in the water, not even his own. Instead, white puffy clouds and the low branches of a large oak tree spread out across the surface in a mosaic of fall colors. Liz insisted there had indeed been a face looking back at her, a face from “another time,” as she later told them. “I’m not a person inclined to invent or exaggerate. It was there as clearly as my own face was not there.”
Dark clouds gathered low on the horizon and the temperature dropped severa
l degrees once the late afternoon sun had set. Matt and his father had packed it in about six o’clock, telling the others they would be out of town for a few days and wishing them all the best with the investigation. Liz went back to Bloomington, and Adrian White spent much of his time working on a new book. Ben decided it was time to reconsider what White had referred to as “strategies.” There had been many documented observations. Time was needed for analyses and syntheses of field notes. And maybe they all needed time away from the paranormal.
Chapter 13
Manning was sitting in front of a small fire, reading, when the phone rang.
Jenna said, “I’m on my way with a bottle of wine.”
“Great, another Friday night, and all I’m doing is sitting alone in this big empty house waiting for some company.”
“You probably have more company than you realize,” laughed Jenna. “I’ll be there in a few.”
“Are you walking?”
“There’s a beautiful moon, or haven’t you noticed?”
“I’ll wait for you at the bridge.”
“You better get started. I’m almost there.”
The moon had risen high above the horizon and washing across the lawn was a soft silver brightness that gave at least form, if not substance, to surrounding trees and shrubbery. Lower in the northern sky, where a long heavy bank of black clouds had formed, sharp flashes of lightning advertised a storm, soon to be above Atwood House.
For Manning, there was something comforting about the sound of rain. It was particularly enchanting when it struck the windows in the library and splashed into puddles on the grass. Thunder, though it could certainly be unsettling, carried the message of any rainstorm, and that message always spoke of power—the incarnate power of nature. It was lightning he didn’t like. It had always frightened him tremendously. He remembered a story his father had told him when he was ten, about a man sleeping near a window during a raging storm. Only seconds after the man got up for a glass of water, a bolt of lightning struck the bed in which he had been asleep. Every Sunday after that day, the man could be found in church praying to a merciful God.
The thing they had dug out of the ground cast a heavy shadow, stretched wider and taller by moonlight. He glanced at it, curious about what they had uncovered—wondering if it had any significance at all. Its glossy surface glistened, as if each piece had recently been polished. The closer he came to it, the more ominous it became. Propped up by a wooden frame, the thing had a kind of malevolent appearance. For a moment, it seemed to move, as though it had legs, twisting and turning as it grew out of the ground like something alive.
“Ben.” Jenna’s voice was muffled and sounded strangely far away. He saw her shadow on the bridge, a long thin shade, unmoving against the sky, almost as if it was a piece of the night waiting for moonlight to breathe life into it. Again, she called his name, and again he stood transfixed to the spot not more than 20 yards away from her. Something moved closer to him. Then, before he realized it was happening, the entire night with all its darkness began to close around him, causing him to breathe deeply as though he expected to be suffocated by a night that grew blacker and stranger with each second that passed.
“Ben,” Jenna called again.
Suddenly, a thin veil of mist fell across the grass. Jenna was little more than a shape against the far sky, a silhouette with blurred edges. Claps of thunder shook the ground. A blast of cold air sent shivers through him. He felt extreme shaking as though the ground beneath him was about to open. Lifting one foot, then the other, he was conscious of the ragged sounds of stiff awkward breathing as he tried to walk. Ben Manning was afraid and did not know why. The threatening dark kept closing in, until Jenna’s voice was eclipsed by a spikey wind that blew the mist nearer to where he stood.
“What’s wrong with you, Ben? I’m here, on the bridge. Can’t you see me?”
Her voice was incredibly faint, the words increasingly indistinct—ephemeral whispers pushing anxiously through the night, only to die in the grass at his feet. Manning stood immovable, his eyes focusing on the thing in front of him, his brain trying to comprehend it. He felt an offending numbness take hold of him, even felt this bitter apprehending cold in his shoes and socks, which were soaking wet. The same dampness seemed to be creeping up his legs and when he looked down at his feet, he didn’t see them. Had they sunk into the ground? Was he sinking into the earth? How could such a thing be happening right there in his own front yard?
“Look at me, Ben. Turn your head away. Turn away from the cold. The stars are in the sky above you—starlight encloses you. Lift your collar to keep away the cold.”
But there was a force that kept him from moving. His eyes closed. He attempted to move his head. His entire body was rigid—stiff as statues he had seen in museums and city parks. And as he sank deeper into the ground, mist filled in the spaces of the night, until the only thing he saw was the strange image in front of him. From far away, a voice called faintly, “Look at me, Ben. See the moonlight shining on the water.”
With the ground continuing to shake, and his heart about to beat right out of his chest, he was conscious of movement. A dark slender shape appeared near him in the mist. He’d heard stories of people disappearing, never to be heard from again, and now it was happening to him. Still visible in the sky was a pale moon. He could still distinguish its white edges, but the closer he looked, the more doubtful he was that it was the moon at all. And where had all the stars gone? The entire night had transformed into an alien landscape.
“Moonlight is all around me, Ben,” whispered a familiar voice he knew was Jenna’s. “Though a storm is on the horizon, the clouds are far away and the moon is brighter than I’ve ever seen it, so large above the trees, such a pristine moon, climbing higher in the sky. The coming rain has only dampened the air. Can you see the moonlight, Ben? It’s in my eyes, and my hair is on fire with moonlight. Please look at me, Ben.”
Taking another deep breath, he tried to pull himself together, attempted to understand the unfamiliar sky. At length, the ground back under his feet, and the mist beginning to dissipate, he managed to turn his head to see Jenna running toward him. She was moving much too slowly and seemed suspended in the air. With her arms stretched in front of her, and her fiery hair fanned out on the sharp wind, she took on an ethereal presence that startled him even more. Everything began to spin wildly—until someone grabbed his arm.
Beside him, a long thin silhouette rising out of the shadows caused him to draw back. Then he saw her, her mouth wide open, her lips moving slowly. Where were the words? He knew she was talking but heard only crickets and cicadas roaring in his ears. He felt her fingers gripping his arm, pulling him toward her. They were digging into his jacket, pinching his skin.
“Jenna!” he yelled, surprised how far away his voice sounded.
She tugged on his arm, pulling him nearer; but another equally strong force, this one invisible, pulled harder from the other side, both trying to take control of his body. Then before he realized what was happening, more nothingness, as the ground disappeared once again. He felt the distinct sensation of ascending. His body weightless, the perception of floating off into space was more euphoric than unpleasant. Except for the persistent tugging on his left arm, his body was entirely without feeling. The conscious numbness in his legs and hands, a tingling throughout his entire body, were disturbingly intense as he hovered motionless, buoyant, severely afraid under a sky filled with strange constellations. But the grip on his arm was deliberately strong. Whatever it was, a determined force, a chain that anchored him to something substantial, it was the security that kept him from floating into another time.
Squinting in the intense light, he tried to see what he suspected were fingers digging into his arm. Just for the slightest of moments, he saw a small blue sparkle near his elbow. The smell of flowers filled his nostrils. Something wet and cold struck his fac
e and hands. Rain. The blue sparkle dimmed. The smell of flowers faded. He no longer had the sensation of floating. Even the mist had disappeared into the woods, leaving behind a black sky with no moon present, and Jenna, who continued to grip his arm fiercely.
“Snap out of it, Ben!” she yelled, her breathing labored, hair disheveled.
“What happened just now?” He felt the grip on his arm relax. Still a little shaken, he looked at Jenna who stared past him with wide eyes. “What is it?”
She pointed to a dark figure standing on the bridge. “There.”
In the faint glow of a yard light near the bridge, a figure in black stood unmoving in the light rain, which had just started to fall. Lightning snapped across the sky. The storm had come in much quicker than either Ben or Jenna had expected. Only minutes before, they had been standing in moonlight. Taking her hand, Ben pulled Jenna toward the safety of Atwood House.
When they were seated in the library in front of a flaming fire, it was Jenna who spoke first. “I’m glad that’s over.” Her voice was flat as though what she was saying had no meaning at all to her. It was just a thought that needed to be disclosed. If there was another thought that it really wasn’t over, that thought was not expressed.
They sat next to each other, watching the fire. His arms were folded. Jenna’s hands were in her lap, and at times, she rubbed them together, possibly rubbing heat from the fireplace into her skin. The heavy furniture in the room left shadows on the rug. Rain beat noisily against the house as minutes passed in silence. It was possible that each was trying to decide what had happened out by the bridge. What was clear to both was the realization that they had seen a familiar figure standing in the rain.
Shaking his head, Ben managed to explain to Jenna that when his uncanny, inexplicable disassociation had happened, he was looking at the thing they had dug out of the ground. “I saw you standing on the bridge, but something powerful took hold of me. And the light was so bright, a huge explosion of white, vibrating in concentric circles that weakened before finally disappearing—compelled me to close my eyes.”
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