 
"E-Normal: Ten Paranormal Ebooks—COMPILED!" by scifiguy3553. Smashwords. Copyright @ 2016.

### Now, to-date, all ten Paranormal ebooks by scifiguy3553, whom is Joseth Moore.

"19th & Emily," "The Literary Virus," "Custodial Science," "The Starets's Hunt," "The Caregiver," "Normal-PARA," "There's No Place Like Zone," "Vengeance In 3D," "Dead Silent," and "Cousin Josh."

### EBOOK ONE:

"19th & Emily," by scifiguy3553 / Smashwords. Copyright @ 2013.

### April, Edan, & Dan Epp are an up and coming family in St. Louis, Missouri. Taking advantage of low house-prices after the Great Recession, the Epps purchase an historic house.

### Little did April and Edan know, their son sneaks out a ouija board from their new home that belonged to the original owner! Paranormal phenomena begin to happen and an investigator helps out.

........................................................

### St. Louis, Missouri; USA. Present Day...

### The Epp's dark-blue minivan pulled up on the curb closest to the only house they could find in the College Hill neighborhood at the price range for their working-class status—sturdy Craftsman, three stories with a wraparound porch; wooden floors predominating, and a decent-sized yard. April took a long look at the surrounding barrio; sparsely-developed, red-bricked houses, and little action that she could see. It was a far cry from the bustle of the family's current location at Boulevard Heights; nearly eight times the population as College Hill. But with the housing market still recovering from the Great Recession, the house was going at a fraction of what it should during normal market realities. After seeing it in the Post-Dispatch the other day, April had suggested to Edan to swing by with their son, Dan, and take a look at the house.

### Christine Lotner, a latter middle-ager with spiky hair and trendy spectacles, warmly greeted them in the vestibule as two sets of families bid her their goodbyes. The wooden floors creaked with each step the Epps took, but that was expected with a hundred-year-old house. Otherwise, the floors had been recently re-waxed and the rest of the vintage setup in the house spoke to the Epp's love for the vintage genre.

### "So, what do you guys do for a living," Christine asked as she held back in the living room while April examined the kitchen. Their voices echoed, the house was so clean and sparse!

### "Well, Edan's a maintenance supervisor at the airport—"

### "Oh, good!"

"—and I'm a beautician." April finished looking at the kitchen and joined the real estate agent in the living room; both standing in the middle while Edan and Dan passed by and went up the stair to the second floor. April noticed that Christine's demeanor showed a hint of hesitation, but could tell that she was trying to hide it. April knew that it was not simple chit-chat. The agent was trying to size up the couple and see if they were able to afford the historic house.

### "Heard of April's Hair," April asked conversationally.

### Christine got where April was going and began to laugh. But there was no mistaking it; the agent seemed hopeful again. "The one downtown? Of course! So how does it feel to be your own boss?"

### "Wish I had done it after graduating from Gateway High instead of going to university in Chicago. Just to get a useless liberal arts degree and then turn around and go to a community college as a middle-ager. I don't know...seems like I wasted time!"

"Well, you and Edan are here, now. You have your own business. Edan has a secured job. You're looking at this house as a family, so you've done something right, April." Christine gently touched April on a shoulder and directed her to one of the living room chairs at the large coffee table. When they were both seated, Christine's face morphed into business-mode. "So, what's your guy's max you're looking to pay?"

### "Dad, take a look at this," Dan said excitedly from one of the two rooms on the second floor of the house.

### Edan was in the mid-sized bathroom, admiring the claw-foot tub. "Alright, buddy. I'll be right there."

### "Whoever's trying to sell the house must like games...which is kind of weird, because I don't see a room here decorated for kids!"

### Edan frowned at himself in the bathroom's mirror. "Dan...are you messing with the owner's things?"

### Edan hurried to the master bedroom, where the theme was an old-world, nautical genre. There were a couple of ancient-styled globes, antique telescopes, and model boats from the Columbus era seasoning the bedroom...and in Dan's hands was a ouija board! An old one, Edan could tell. For the grain in the wood was darkened and scratched and there were no cute, stylized astrological icons on it, like one sees in modern reproductions!

### "Dad...dad, what's wrong?"

### Edan snapped out of his paralysis and quickly grabbed the board from his son's hands. He then frantically looked around the room, saw the large cabinet that was by the doorway; opened one of the middle drawers, and aggressively stuffed the ouija board under some t-shirts, socks, and underwear! Just as Edan shut the drawer, they could her April and the agent stomping up the stairs; their voices echoing. Dan tried to ask his father something, but Edan threw up a shushing gesture with one of his hands.

### "What do you think so far, hon," April asked as she peeped her head in. They were on the way to the third floor.

### "I think it's great...what about you, Danny?"

### Dan, as most tweenagers would likely do, simply followed along with his father's instruction that he silently gave with his eyes and the slightest of a nod of his head. "Yeah...i think it's pretty sweet."

### April gave a bit of a frown. "Everything ok, in here?"

### "Yeah...just trying to make sure Mr. Epp, here, learns the etiquette of open houses!" Edan feigned a smile.

### April's eyes cut to Dan, but Dan had already manufactured his smile as well by then. The two women continued up the stairs. When it was clear they were walking around on the third floor, Dan tried, once again, to ask his father of the matter.

### "Let's go take a look at the yard again," Edan said before Dan could ask anything.

### Edan turned and headed for the stairs. Dan, for his part, looked back at the cabinet.

### "Danny..?"

### Dan sprinted over to the flight of stairs and followed his father down to go outside.

It took about two more months, but the Epps had received a call from Christine that they would get the house at Nineteenth and Emily. Fortunately for April she was her own boss. She was able to take a few days off from the salon to pack up their old house and begin the move. Edan had to go in, of course, being a supervisor at St. Louis International Airport. Some problems came up with a couple of planes, so he had to do a lot of over-time that particular week. But he still made it a point to help with the move after he got home.

### Since it was late Summer and middle school had not yet started for Missouri public students, Dan was able to help April with the packing and then the unpacking at the new house. On this particular night, it was the mother-son team hard at work with the new house.

### "We're going to need more cat food, mom," Dan said as he tip-toed to reach the curled bag that was atop the refrigerator. The young, gray cat rushed up to him and encircled Dan as he reached down and poured some food into the cat's dish.

### "Ok, sweetheart...I'll text your father so he can grab some on the way home." April was just finishing breaking down several boxes after the two of them had unloaded the van from their last trip for the day. She picked up a small box that contained her and her husband's things for their new master bedroom. "I'll be upstairs for just a few minutes."

### "Ok," Dan said, somewhat absently as he stroked the cat.

### Being a tweenie, Dan was just old enough to have his own smart phone. It was past his phone-curfew of nine o'clock by several minutes. Usually, Dan would have turned off his cell, but with all the action and excitement of moving he had left it on. He felt his phone vibrate in his back pocket.

### "Oops," he said to himself as he frantically reached to get it. Even a cell phone's vibration could be heard in another room and he did not want to risk losing the privilege of having one if his mother thought he was receiving a call from one of his friends this time at night!

### Dan was going to skip the call until he noticed that there was no number in the caller identifier.

### The cell kept vibrating.

### April placed the items from the small box in different areas of the room. Since she and Edan had purchased furnishings to match their old house, parts of their new home would look a bit mix-matched until they got new things. April moved their tall Tiffany lamp, literally, to all four walls to see where it would go best in relation to their bed—still at the old house, and small nightstand. Then, where should the small flat-screen go? One would reason, opposite of the bed's headboard. But when she tried it, even the sleek flat-screen stand got in the way of the traffic flow that lead to their bathroom...she would have to wait until they bought new furnishings for the house.

### She went back down the stairs and from the top-third of the stairs she saw that Dan had his cell phone to his ear while he stood stiffly in the middle of the living room. She had opened her mouth to scold him for violating hers and Edan's phone-curfew for Dan when she barely heard him speak.

"...please...please, just leave him al—" He stopped when he heard one of the stairs squeak under April's footing. But April could tell by Dan's cell phone's light that whoever he was talking to had just hung up on him!

Nothing to lose at that point, April quickly made her way down the stairs and snatched Dan's cell phone from his hand. Surprisingly to April, he did not protest. She gestured the commands on the monitor for the phone to pull up the most recent call that was received on the smart phone...it showed that it was one of Dan's friends from their old neighborhood, and the call was made at 10:13 AM. Nearly twelve hours ago!

April's mind was temporarily stuck in the mud. She saw with her own eyes that Dan did not hang up on that call; nor did he touch any of the icons on the smart phone. But she knew that there was a call on the other end. She recognized the interface on Dan's phone since she had borrowed it a couple of times herself. In a word, he could not had faked the call.

### April had gotten lost while trying to figure this out. She noticed that Dan was looking at her in an almost knowing way. As if he did not expect her to understand what was going on.

### "Dan...who were you talking to?"

### After a bit of a lingering time, he finally responded. "I don't know."

### "That's part of the reason why your father and I told you not to take calls this late at night!" She lowered her voice and gently rubbed one of Dan's shoulders, to let him know that she was more scared than mad at him. "Baby, you're old enough to understand that there are people out there who want to do some evil things to children."

### "It wasn't like that," he said tersely; his eyes unblinking.

This, in turn, caused April to pause and think. "So you did know who it was?"

### "No, I told you I didn't."

### A frown from April. "Ok, sweetheart. I honestly believe you. But, it sounded like you were kind of begging someone not to hurt someone else...?"

### Dan finally broke his stare from his mother and looked at his cell. "Can I have my phone back, mom?"

### She wanted to quickly shoot the idea down, but figured he was stressed enough for the night. Especially after spending all day helping her with moving to the new house. But before she handed it back to him, April checked the call history once more, and it was the same information she had read a few minutes ago.

Early the next day, Edan had to get ready for work. He was especially sleepy. He did not get home at the old house in Boulevard Heights until after ten because of the situation with the two planes parked at St. Louis International. One of the situation was resolved by his crew; the other plane had to stay over-night. Their bedroom in the old house seemed foreign to him, with the majority of the items already at Nineteenth and Emily street. Everywhere in the house it echoed a lot! Including the sounds of April getting ready in the bathroom down the hall. He could also hear Dan talking to Mouse, the family's cat, as he fed her near the kitchen.

### "Hey, good morning," April greeted her husband upon seeing him as she walked toward their bedroom from the bathroom. She was already dressed in her business-casual outfit for the salon; he was still in his jeans from last night.

### They gave each other a quick kiss. "I thought you were taking a couple of days off to get some of the smaller things over to the house before we got the movers," he asked as he walked to the bathroom and began to brush his teeth. Edan noticed that it took April a few seconds longer than it normally would for her to respond.

### "Oh, we had a bit of an odd situation last night. I thought I'd give Danny a rest from moving and let him come with me to the shop...you had such a long day yesterday, I didn't want to bother you with it last night."

### By this time, Dan over-heard the conversation and had gone up to his father; the door to the bathroom yet opened as Edan finished brushing his teeth. April could see from down the hall that Dan whispered something to his father. There was a small pause from Edan, but then he seemed to acknowledged the information and tussled Dan's hair and let him go watch tv in his room while he waited for April. She was confused by their behavior, lately. Ever since last month, when they were still looking at the house on Emily, when April noticed that the two of them seemed to be holding something back from her...she wanted to press it with Edan, but she knew that it would just lead to an argument. Besides, they all had to hurry out of the house.

### Officially named Lambert-St. Louis International Airport, it was always St. Louis International to many locals. Even more colloquial, the Airport. Edan parked his SUV in the employee-designated area and made his way to the maintenance section of the Airport. He barely got a chance to get his cup of coffee from one of the Airport's venders when he saw Duncan Holt, top manager of the maintenance division, briskly walk his way to him from across one of the concourse. Rotund, in his sixties, and clad in that ubiquitous khakis and polo shirt, Duncan looked pretty intense.

### "Heard about one of the planes last night," Duncan said right away. It was nothing personal. Even when there was not an emergency that was just the way he was.

"Yeah, I was there," Edan quipped as they both started walking down the same concourse to get to the maintenance office.

### "I'm telling you, Edan, buddy, these airline companies are trying to push out these bigger planes too fast! All that competition with the Europeans to see who can have the biggest boat in the air!"

### The airport was not at its peak business cycle at the time, so it was easy for the two men to strut their way through in good time.

"Yeah, well, you know how I feel about the industry," Edan said. "I still say they should nationalize those airliners and let Washington run them!"

### "Not this Commie-crap again, Edan! Come on, man; you've been in management for what, over three years now?"

"I'm a supervisor...technically, I'm not management. Hey, once a union worker, always a union worker! Besides, it worked for Detroit; why not the airline industry? After things got better, the Feds got out of the car industry and let Detroit run its course."

### Edan's boss actually nodded at his point. They were diametrically opposite in politics, but they were good friends, even outside of work.

### "So, how much longer on the other plane before we can get it out of Six, Twenty-Four," Duncan asked as they briefly stopped. They were about to go their separate ways at another concourse.

### Edan thought for a few seconds, knowing the importance of getting a marooned airline jet off one of the airport's runway! Even if it was parked by the facilities. "With those couple of extra guys you got me yesterday; we already did a trouble-shoot last night...I'd say by the end of first shift."

### Duncan gave a knowing nod to his subordinate and friend, then gave him a parting pat on one of Edan's shoulders and he went down the other concourse.

### It was not even five minutes after Edan had talked with Duncan when he heard a page over the intercom system for him. He was asked to go to the circulation desk.

### "Are you kidding me," he said aloud, but not quite so loud that others walking the airport could hear him.

### By the time Edan made it to the circulation desk, the activity at Lambert-St. Louis had picked up a bit. This time Edan had to dodge a few passengers and their luggage. "So, what's up, Marie," he asked the young woman behind the computer.

### But before she could respond, a tall, elderly man, dressed formally in a suit and tie with a vest, walked up to Edan with an intense face. His medium-length, white beard gave him a Hemingway look.

"Mr. Epp, I'm Dr. Turnov..." The older man gave Edan a look as if he should know who he was. But Edan merely stared at him. "Paul Turnov. You and your wife had recently bought my former house on Emily Street."

### "Oh, of course," Edan said, feeling more relaxed. "I'm sorry I didn't recognize you, Dr. Turnov. Our real estate agent said that you were in Slovakia while we were making the transaction, so we never got a chance to meet..." Edan noted that his countenance did not lighten. His impression of Turnov was one of those highly educated and well-traveled Americans that could pass as European. "Is, is there a problem? We've already signed the paperwork and did our first payments."

Dr. Turnov studied him for a few seconds. "I'm sorry to come to your employment, Mr. Epp, but I believe you and I both know that you have something that belongs to me."

### Now Dr. Turnov was really starting to worry Edan. "Well, like I said, my wife and I already completed the transaction—"

### "Not the house, Mr. Epp; the board!"

Edan froze. First, because he still did not understand what he was referring to. But then it hit him!

### "Yes, Mr. Epp," Dr. Turnov said in an almost whisper. "Don't even try to deny it. You shoved it into one of my drawers."

### Now Edan's eyes widen. He looked around the airport and stepped up closer to the older man. "You had a hidden camera?"

### "I've been a victim of theft a few times, Mr. Epp. You learn not to trust people after so long...the board, please!"

### "Well, I hope you have a receipt for that camera of yours, Doctor, because it's not working right! Ok; I tucked your stupid mojo-board in with some socks. But I never took it with us out of the house! Your camera should—"

### "I have your son on record taking it."

### Edan's eyes were all over the place. Dr. Turnov was watching him with steely eyes. "Well...that makes sense...that explains everything."

"Explains what, Mr. Epp?"

Edan's eyes cut to Turnov, wondering within himself. "I have a plane that I'm in charge of getting off the ground, Doctor. If I have time for a five-minute lunch break I'll call my wife and ask her to get it from my son and she could deliver it to you...it's the best I can do under the circumstances." Edan was about to turn to head back to the maintenance section.

Now it was Dr. Turnov's turn to give a stare. "I suggest you take your cell phone and call her right now, Mr. Epp."

### Edan turned on his heel and nearly rushed up to the old man and met his stare. "Is that a threat, old man?" Some of the workers behind the circulation desk were now watching the two men.

### "No, Mr. Epp...I'm trying to save you and your family's lives!"

Sometimes it pays to have a friend as a boss. Duncan let Edan take the day off after Edan convinced him that it was a family emergency. With a stoic Dr. Turnov standing behind the scenes, no doubt it helped Edan's case. Besides, it was an international airport. Duncan was able to call in another shift supervisor to take Edan's spot, because the second plane had to be repaired and make room for other craft on the runway!

Edan and Doctor Turnov both agreed that Turnov should follow Edan from Lambert-St. Louis to the Epps' new home at Nineteenth and Emily. Edan had called April and explained his encounter at his job with the professor from Washington University. April was incensed! She had two clients at her beauty salon under hair-drying machines and one more waiting, but Edan explained to her it was important that the whole family meet at the new house after April took Dan to the old home and retrieve the ouija board.

### April gave all three women at the salon a coupon for a free permanent for their next visit.

When April pulled up into the driveway at the Emily Street house, she saw Edan and the older gentleman standing apart from each other on the front lawn. Not even on the wraparound porch that had plenty of space! Indeed, why were they not in the house at all, April wondered.

### Dan had the ouija board in his hands and a guilty face to go with it as he and his mother exited the mini-van. April stopped a few yards away from Dr. Turnov while she let Dan take responsibility of handing back the board to the professor. Whom took it without so much as a thank you—understandably. In one of his hands, he had a smart-notepad, she noticed.

### "Ok," April said with vinegar to the elder man, "you got your ouija board back. Now get out of our lives!"

### "April," Edan said to her; but it was not a scolding tone, she noticed. "While we were waiting for you two, we got a chance to talk..."

### April was getting impatient. "And?"

### Edan and Dr. Turnov both looked at Dan, which caused April's eyes to fall on him as well.

### "I...I wanted to know why dad was so freaked out when he saw the board. So I took it from the drawer the first day we were here when you and dad weren't looking."

### "Ok..." April was still impatient.

### "I've heard of a ouija board before, but I never knew what it was about. So I went online to research it, and..." He looked upon his father with teary eyes, then back at his mother. "I did a séance with Jeff and Phillip, at our old house when you and dad were at work!"

### April actually started laughing, and without irony. Edan and Dr. Turnov were unmoving while Dan kept wiping tears from his face as he tried composing himself. "Oh, sweetheart...I thought you were going to tell me that you sacrificed animals or something! Danny, it's ok to be curious about some things, and what we call the Paranormal is one of those things in life we all have to learn about on our own. So long as you don't hurt anyone!" Again, she laughed with relief.

### As April looked up from talking to Dan, she noticed how quiet the two men were. She blew out a sarcastic sigh.

"Edan, obviously you and I have had this conversation for years, so I know what to expect from you, hon...but, Doctor Turnov; a professor of Humanities at a university? You actually believe all that stuff about ghosts, hauntings...ouija boards?"

### "May I show you something," the professor simply asked.

### April's eyes snapped over to Edan for consultation. Edan solemnly nodded and said nothing. "Ok," she said with a shrug.

Now Dr. Turnov was using his high-tech tablet. He was swiping and punching icons briskly as he walked over to April and Dan. "I've already showed your husband, Mrs. Epp, but I really think you and Dan should see this...on my summers off from teaching, I do investigations of the paranormal. That's why I was in Slovakia a month ago. As part of my tools, I use a special application that was developed by a friend of mine out at MIT."

### He held one of his hands up for April and Dan to see. With his other hand, he took his tablet and placed it in front of his free hand. And on the screen was something like an X-ray image of his hand, but with far more details of his veins, bones, and flesh in live action! The mother and son both flinched with amazement and surprise. For the first time since he met the Epps, Dr. Turnov actually smiled.

### "Don't worry; with this technology, there aren't any radiation you have to worry about. I use it to detect...hidden things in life."

### Again, April looked to Edan, but he kept his eyes on the professor as Turnov continued, keeping his hand moving in front of the tablet. "As an academic, I appreciate your skepticism, Mrs. Epp. But let me challenge you, that just as we all know that our bodies have internal organs underneath our skin, what about the organs in the world that are underneath the tangible order of the everyday?"

And with that statement, Dr. Turnov lowered his hand and did a slow, arcing sweep with the high-tech tablet of the Epps' new home...there were beings! Not alien, but not of this level of Earth, either. They looked human, mostly. Perhaps a trace of once being human? There were scores of them, and some flew around the house as if they were bats, while others glided—as if on skates. Some were idle, and, indeed, were watching the four of them standing a bit further away from the lawn of the Epps' new house.

### The cell phones of the Epps and Dr. Turnov began to ring or vibrate as one, or more, of those creatures tried taunting them. Only, these beings had no need for technology, per se, to call the human's cell phones. April had now understood the call that Dan got the night before, and it disturbed her that one of these beings had not only communicated with her son, but they all had been among her family while they were moving in!

### Dr. Turnov looked at each of them, while he disengaged the ringer to his cell phone, as did the Epps to their own cells. He lowered the tablet, then turned it off and faced the young family with a deeply sympathetic face.

### "This is not all your fault, Dan," he said to them, as they now bunched together as a family. "Some of them got here because of me! A few years ago, I was trying to prove a point to a friend of mine in a dare, and I brought that ouija board over from one of my trips in South America...like you, young man, I conducted a séance with some friends; here, at this house. It wasn't manifested right away, but..."

### Turnov sighed heavily as he looked back at the house. With normal vision, it was completely normal. But they all knew differently, now.

"Now you see why I was moving! I thought that, may be, if I destroyed the board as I left the house, before another family moved in it would send them back!"

### "But you couldn't because Danny took it before you could," Edan said, non-accusatory.

Dr. Turnov silently nodded, but gave a subtle smile in his direction so that Dan would not take it hard. "Apparently, each time a séance is held, several of these beings slip into our world with some kind of period of time. I have to admit I'm still learning that portion of the paranormal myself. Even after all these years!"

"So what now," April asked as she looked at the house. "Are they restricted to this particular house?"

"Given that I brought the ouija board over from South America and did the first séance here, I believe that to be the case. Note that when you and Dan were at your old house last night your son received a call on his phone, as opposed to an outright poltergeist at the old home."

### "Hold on a minute," Edan said, his eyes wider with some alarm. "What if by destroying the board all you do is trap them here, on Emily Street? Instead of sending them back!"

### Dr. Turnov was already nodding his head. "Yes, Mr. Epp, trust me I've thought of that. I've thought of demolishing the board by fire or crushing it somehow. But what if all that did was blow a hole so big that the portal would extend far beyond your house on Emily?"

### None of them could answer that poignant question.

After a long period of thought on the matter, Dr. Turnov finally spoke up. "Mr. and Mrs Epp, whatever you have in that house, consider it lost. I am not going to risk destroying the ouija board and possibly populating society's level of existence with many more those beings!"

### All three of the Epps nodded.

### "In the meantime," Dr. Turnov said as he walked over to his vehicle and placed his paranormal gear in on the passenger side, "I'm sure there are legal ways of bogging down a property so badly that it would never sell on the market...or, razing the house."

### "But others could always build on the land again," April pointed out.

"Exactly," Turnov replied. "Which is why I'll figure something out to make this property and the house undesirable."

### The professor and the Epps started for their respective vehicles when Dan spoke up to all of them. "Make it a ghost story!"

### All of the adults stopped where they were. "What's that," Dr. Turnov asked.

"Well, it's kind of like, there's always that one house in every neighborhood that has a ghost story, and no one ever lives in it, ever..." Danny shrugged. "Just tell people that ghosts live there."

### ~~the end~~

### EBOOK TWO:

### "The Literary Virus" by scifiguy3553. "The Literary Virus" was originally published by The Lincoln Underground, but has always been copyrighted to Joseth Moore; whom is scifiguy3553.

@ 2012 copyright Joseth Moore; published with Smashwords as scifiguy3553, 2013.

### Factory worker Jeff Littleton shares a couple of artifacts with his co-workers. The aged paper & enigmatic script, which came from a US soldier from WWII, is far more than what it appears...

### After one co-worker nearly dies after reading the artifact & a warning from another co-worker with experience, Jeff is left with the next logical step.

### Jeff Littleton had been on his job with Cintron, Corp for only a few months in Cleveland, Ohio, but he had already made several "lunch buddies" at the car-parts manufacturing plant. Rashad Muhammad al-Salem, from Morocco, was one of them. Cintron was known throughout the world for its forward policies for hiring many foreigners; even after the Nine-Eleven attacks of 2001. This, of course, was a good business move, as a kind of show to the world that Cintron would stay committed to being a global corporation. But it was also part of the company's philosophy that, just as the world is populated by different kinds of people, so, too, should their plants reflect that.

### It was the first coffee break of the day, and Rashad, a middle-aged man of average height and with a small beard that was common for men in the Middle East, was already at a table in the small cafeteria. It was entirely too small for such a good-sized manufacturing plant, but the workers took breaks on shifts, so that helped lighten the load. Even so, Jeff flowed into the break room with the sudden gush of human flood spilling in from the plant. Every table was full and the room was loud with chatting people and a TV set, perched near the ceiling. It was usually turned to the news.

### "Hey, Rashad, I got those writings for you to look at," Jeff told him as he plopped his coffee cup and a sack of munchies down onto the table.

### "Oh, you mean the ones with the Arabic writing you told me about yesterday," he said with a thick air of Moroccan-flavored accent. "Didn't you say that your grandfather had gotten them during World War II?"

### Just then another lunch-buddy, Anna Ozdan, from Cyprus, had joined them at the table, her hands full with her lunch for the day and other miscellaneous things. She was a very affable, pleasant-looking woman of middle age. Jeff, in his thirties, was the youngest and the only American-born of this little club at the table. Both men greeted her with a simple nod.

### "No, actually it was the guy that I used to work with who had a grandfather that fought in World War II. Sy said his grandfather had somehow gotten these from Northern Africa, during one of the Allies' operations against the Nazis there."

### Anna looked on with interest as Jeff pulled out a hand-sized, shallow container from his duffel bag. The container was transparent. It encased two folded pieces of paper, apparently quite worn with time. Already Rashad and Anna could see the inscriptions on either paper.

### As Jeff unfurled both pieces of papers carefully on the lunchroom table, away from their food and drinks, Rashad was studying them. Immediately, Rashad was shaking his head at the writings.

"This does not appear to be Arabic, my friend. In Arabic writing, you read right to left." That part Jeff already knew but he let the older man continue. Rashad carefully pointed to the larger sheet of yellowed paper, with its apparent faded, reddish text. "Notice the heaviness on the text here...you can tell it was written in the Western-style, from left to right. More to the point, it simply isn't Arabic! At least, not that I can tell."

### "Could it be an older form of Arabic? Or maybe even Aramaic?"

Rashad both shrugged and shook his head. "I'm no linguist, Jeff, but this doesn't even look like a sister language, much less an older form of one. You know we have other people around the plant that also speak Arabic, maybe you could ask them, just for a second opinion?"

### Anna looked on as she chewed on her food, nodding at Rashad's suggestion. Jeff began to replace the fragile paper back into that clear container while she spoke.

### "You know it almost looks like the text is written in blood!"

### Rashad's eyes widened. Jeff did not look so shocked.

### "I kind of thought that when I got this years ago from Sy, but he never said much about the circumstances of his grandfather getting these sixty years ago." Jeff became pensive after placing the container with the papers back into his duffel bag. "I have a friend who's an anthropology professor. His specialty is in ethnic studies...he used to teach here until he moved to Nevada. I think I'll email him about it."

### Since their coffee breaks were only fifteen minutes, it was already time for Jeff to go. He needed a couple of extra minutes just to put his belongings away into his locker and to use the restroom. He bid his friends 'later' until the next break and went about his business.

### Right after work, Jeff rushed to his apartment and went online and looked up the faculty list of the University of Nevada and found Professor Ned Conwell's email address. He requested of his old professor to take a look at the two pieces of artifacts he had and if he had any connection at the University's forensics lab to see if the text was written with blood or not. And, in the fine tradition of the barter system, Jeff would agree to a full month of unpaid work for the professor, via online research for him. Dr. Conwell graciously accepted Jeff's offer a couple of days later in a response email. That very day after work, Jeff went out at night and mailed off the artifacts to the University of Nevada, with the attention line addressed to Dr. Conwell.

### It was another workday at Cintron, Corp and the cycle of life was once again turning. Workers for the first shift piled into the building while some of the third shifters gathered their things to go home, except for those who occasionally stuck around for overtime. This time, Anna was in the bustling lunchroom before Jeff. She was at a different table this time, apparently someone else had gotten to their usual table before she did. She was working on her Turkish coffee with some Euro-styled biscuits splayed out on a napkin when Jeff got to the table and placed his things down.

### "Oh, no Rashad today, or am I that early?"

### Anna, who had been watching the news on the cafeteria TV set, had paused and turned toward Jeff and shook her head with a shrug. That's when Bridget, a middle-ager with reddish-blonde hair, came into the conversation.

### "Hey, Hon...sorry, I didn't mean to pry or anything, but I heard you ask about Rashad."

### "No, you're fine, Bridget," Jeff said while he turned his chair to face her. "I mean, it's not my business where he is or anything...just being neighborly nosey."

### "Actually, it's appropriate to be a lot more than just nosey," Bridget said ominously. Her apprehensive tone made both Jeff and Anna scoot their chairs closer to Bridget after sharing a glance. "I saw him for just a few seconds yesterday," she went on to explain, "but man did he look terrible! He had all these welts on his face and he looked swollen...I told him he really needed to be in an emergency ward instead of work. Said he'd stick around here for a couple of hours and if he didn't improve he would go. Haven't seen him since."

### "So you don't know if he's gone to hospital or a doctor or not," Anna asked.

### Bridget simply and slowly shook her head. It was quiet between the trio for a little while. The ruckus in the cafeteria continued, showing no respect for the worries of anyone's personal life.

### "During lunch time I'll go over to personnel and see if they have anything on him," Jeff volunteered. And with that, he gathered his belongings and left to start his shift early. He just wasn't in a chatty mood. Not when he knew that Rashad was in poor health.

### Later, Jeff's assembly production line was having some technical difficulties later that same day, so he and his co-workers had to do some extra cleaning while Cintron mechanics worked on the machines. Jeff took advantage of the down time and went to the restroom. On his way there he ran into another of the Middle Eastern co-workers who also spoke Arabic.

### "Hey, Nasir...! Nasir," Jeff called out to the tall man as he walked away from the men's restroom. Nasir was from Egypt and his English, like most of the foreigners at Cintron, was fluent.

### "Hey, Jeff. How are you, my friend?"

"Well, I'm fine..."

### Nasir, who was walking down a large corridor filled with shipments and moving, car-sized pallet-jacks driven by people, looked at Jeff. "Why do you say it that way?"

### "Oh, I've heard that Rashad got sick and a couple of us don't know whether or not he's gone to see a doctor or not."

### Jeff noticed that Nasir was nodding his head as he spoke. Apparently Nasir had already known about Rashad's condition.

"Yes...I was the one who actually convinced him to finally go."

"Oh, so he did go to see a doctor, or to an emergency ward?"

### "Like a cat being dragged in for a bath!" They both laughed. "I bothered him about it so much so until he finally went to personnel and told them that he was leaving. That's all I know," he finished with a shrug and turned to walk off.

### "Uh, Nasir...can I get a quick favor from you?"

### "Sure."

### Subconsciously, the two men walked over closer to a towering rack so they could be out of the way of moving people and indoor vehicles. Jeff reached into one of his back pockets and took out a couple of pieces of paper that had some odd-looking writings and markings on them. They were photocopies of something, Nasir could see. As Jeff handed them to Nasir, he began to ask the Egyptian if he could read any of the copied script—but quite unexpectedly, Nasir quickly shoved the papers back to Jeff!

### Needless to say, Jeff was taken aback by his action. Jeff thought that may be Nasir heard his boss calling him and he did not want to be seen doing something that could be considered non-work related. But then Jeff looked at Nasir. It was a combination of anger and fear on the thirty-something's face.

### "Where did you get that," Nasir demanded.

### Jeff's face contorted for the now surreal situation he found himself in. His mouth worked as he had to remember how he, indeed, got the original pieces of papers. "Uh...the originals are with a professor friend of mine out in Las Vegas. I copied—"

### "You mean you and your friend have touched the originals?"

### More confused looks by the American. "Generally speaking, for me to make a photocopy of something, I'd have to actually touch—"

### "Please, Jeff, I'm very serious about this!"

### "Uh, yeah! I'd say you are!"

### Nasir looked around the plant and pulled Jeff into the restroom with him. Nasir gestured to Jeff to remain by the sink area then he went throughout the whole restroom and made sure there was no one else there.

"Look, before you ask me, this is not Arabic writing," Nasir simply stated. "I'm assuming that's what you were going to ask me."

### "Yeah, but Rashad already told me that. I wanted a second opinion."

"Well my second opinion is that your friend in Las Vegas needs to destroy the originals...right now!" Jeff's eyes strained at the man but he did not interrupt him. "I can't fully explain it myself, Jeff, but it's like one of those viruses that gets passed along via email. Only this virus is spread by old-school method."

### "The original script," Jeff ventured.

### "Yes! The first time I heard about it was late last year when I went back home for holiday. My family was telling me about all these mysterious deaths that had been happening in my village. My relatives aren't exactly sure, but from what they've gathered apparently this strange literary death was spread by pieces of paper with some indecipherable text that look like whatever the local culture is."

Jeff frowned at Nasir's words. "What did you mean by literary death and that local culture thing," Jeff asked.

"Those are just my words. It seems to make sense. What else could you call it when people end up dead after reading a piece of text? And probably from touching the paper it's inscribed on? As for the local culture...that's another curious thing about this literary virus. The next time I heard about it was just a few months ago. Well, I should say, read about it. I read the same situation in other parts of the world that happened in my village back in Egypt! Romania, Chile, Canada, Thailand, and now here in the U.S.! Apparently, this strange script takes on some characteristics of any indigenous language, for each respective culture."

Jeff thought for a long while. "Question for you, my friend. How come I'm still alive? I've certainly handled the text quite a bit. In fact, for years! I got it from a friend of mine who had a grandfather that fought in World War II and who had gotten it from the northern parts of Africa."

"Ah, well that probably would explain why you turned out fine. Remember the local culture aspect of this virus. You and your friend in Nevada, I assume, are American, and this other friend of yours had a grandfather that was in my part of the world and somehow acquired the text. And since it's from North Africa, that would explain why this animal would configure itself to look Arabic!"

### "It also would explain why Rashad had taken ill. He's from Morocco."

### "Exactly," Nasir curtly affirmed.

### "As much as I don't like to think this, it sounds like this literary virus attacks people base on their ethnic roots!"

### Nasir sighed as he looked at the door to the restroom. They both knew, pretty soon, they would have to get back to work. "You know, the logical side of me says that it's some terrorist organization that found a way to genetically target groups of people and somehow they put toxic materials into these pieces of paper. But I'm not quite so sure.

### "I remember reading about the situation in Thailand, how an illiterate farmer had discovered some strange text there, but he thought it was in the Thai language. Even though he could not read, he still could recognize the alphabet..."

### "I take it the poor guy died. You're speaking in the past tense."

"Fortunately, not in this case, Jeff. The old farmer was treated in time. That's why I have hope for Rashad."

"Okay, Nasir, before we get back to work, you told me about the logical side of you looking at this. What about the illogical side of you?"

Again, Nasir sighed, this time he leaned against one of the sinks. "The terrorist angle would make sense if all these other countries and cultures had something in common! Egypt, Canada, Thailand, Romania, Chile, the United State... Do any of these nations seem to share an overall philosophical view that would link them together, and make them prime targets for some kind of terrorist group?"

Of course the question was rhetorical. "More to the point," Nasir went on, "your friend with the grandfather who's a veteran...assuming that what he told you is true, then your text artifacts are the oldest of the literary virus that I've heard about so far! I'm no genetic scientist, Jeff, but the field of Genetics, as we know it today, was not in existence back in the 1940s during World War II. So how could a modern, terroristic tactic like genetic targeting be around sixty years ago, before the technology even existed?"

### "Hmm!"

### Both silently thought within themselves for a few seconds. Nasir got off the sink he was leaning against, in preparation for getting back to work.

### "Before, you almost sound like you wanted to call this literary virus a living creature," Jeff observed.

Nasir stopped. He contemplated on Jeff's statement. "In the field of biology, is not the virus a living entity? Some even argue that computer and Internet viruses are just as living as the biological ones! And if those viruses can be considered living things, why not this one?"

### Two weeks had passed and Rashad had already been back at work for nearly a week. Officially, his doctor said he had some kind of allergic reaction to the spores in the air by some local plant life. When Jeff had the chance to ask him if he had ever had such reaction previously since being in America, Rashad directly answered, "Never in my life."

### Both Nasir and Jeff agreed to delay telling Rashad about the literary virus story until later on. Later, they would tell Rashad when his sickness was further behind him and, perhaps, when more news about the so-called virus had more time to get out into the media.

### Two additional weeks passed and Jeff had nearly forgotten all about his mysterious text on those two old pieces of papers. He was reminded about them as he watched a documentary on public television about a group of archeologists recovering some ancient writings in Europe. The next day, during lunchtime, Jeff had gotten out his scratch note that he made for himself that contained the email and phone number of Dr. Conwell's office in Las Vegas. He found himself a secluded area in the plant and made a call on his cell phone.

### "University of Nevada at Las Vegas Anthropology Department, can I help you?"

### "Yes, my name is Jeff. I'm trying to reach Professor Ned Conwell."

### There was a long pause.

### "Is this one of those student pranks?"

### "No, ma'am," Jeff assured her, his voice tense with confusion. "Why would anyone pull a prank by trying to talk with Dr. Conwell?"

### "Because the Professor has been deceased for about two weeks now."

### Jeff's stomach dropped on him and he could feel goose bumps ravaging his skin. "How?"

### "Bit of a mystery here on campus. One day he showed up to one of his lectures pretty sweaty and broken out with some kind of hives or something. He tried to soldier through it, but..." The secretary could not finish her sentence.

### There was an uncomfortable silence over the line.

### "Do you or anyone else there know whether or not Dr. Conwell received a shipment I mailed to him some weeks ago?"

### "Oh," the secretary exclaimed. Her voice was oddly more perky. "So you're the one who mailed that to him."

### "Yes! A clear container with two aged pieces of paper in it?"

### "Okay, I'll take your word for it."

### Jeff kept running into that wall of confusion. "What do you mean?"

### "Well, the Professor never got around to opening it! I remember him playfully telling us at the circulation desk to guard it with our lives, since it was from a good friend of his...and, yes, I do see your name on the return address now."

### Jeff had forgotten everything around him. Forgotten that he was at the Cintron plant, forgotten that he had five minutes to get back on the production line, and frankly did not care! "So, the package had never been opened?"

### "No, sir. Would you like for me to—"

### "Uh, no, that's all right, ma'am." Jeff was relieved. Besides, the package containing the literary virus was from Africa and Dr. Conwell was not African...so why in the world did he die? "I tell you what, is there some way the University could send the shipment back to me?"

### "Of course, Jeff. It's the least we could do."

### "And, ma'am, it's very important that no one opens that package. Could you make a notation of that on the package somewhere?"

### He could hear her chuckle just a tiny bit. "Of course...mind if I ask, Jeff?"

### "You mean what's the big deal about the pieces of paper that I mailed? It's okay to ask. They were just some old scrap paper with script on them someone had found in Africa years ago. I was just asking the Professor to validate it for me. That's really all there is to it. Anyway, thanks for your time."

"Huh, now that's funny," the secretary's voice came in softly, just before Jeff ended the call on his cell. "Professor Conwell had gotten another package before yours came in. It was from a fellow professor he had worked with in Arizona years before. Now that I think about it, this other professor wanted the same thing done for his shipment as you do for yours! How about that?"

### There was nothing from Jeff.

### "Jeff, are you still there?"

### "Yes, ma'am...ma'am, what's your name?"

### "Marcie," she said with some apprehension.

### "Marcie, you didn't happen to get a look at that other shipment, did you?"

"As a matter of fact, we all did in the Anthropology Department. Hey, anytime any of the professors bring something back from their expeditions or receive a cool shipment, the professors are nice enough to share the experience with us in the office."

### Jeff winced. "Did that shipment from Conwell's friend have some odd inscription on it?"

### Marcie gasped over the phone. "Well, how did you know that? It looked pre-Native American to the rest of us, but Professor Conwell said it wasn't and that there was no such thing in the Americas...huh, go figure that!"

### Again, Jeff's end of the line was blank. This time the secretary's patience was pretty much gone.

### "Okay, Jeff, it was nice to talk with you. I'm truly sorry for your loss...I have to go now. We're pretty swamped. We've got three people who called in sick today that we have to cover for."

### And the line was cut.

### ~fin~

### EBOOK THREE:

### "Custodial Science", by scifiguy3553 / Smashwords.

Copyright @ 2014.

### David, Michael, and Darren are three janitors at a wildlife research facility in California. Lately, the complex has been dealing with a mysterious, unnatural odor that quickly vanishes just as it appears. At first, it seems like a job for the maintenance crew, when, in reality, it's a job suited for a scientist!

### Okay, this is what I remember...It was a Friday night that I'm sure of, because I was, actually, in a good mood before going in to work. I'm a janitor. You know; I clean toilets and dump trash for the headquarters of the California Research Center for Wildlife. After I parked my piece of crap car that's when I smelled that weird smell again! Kind of a sweet aroma—like antifreeze in a car's engine that's too hot. Only even more intense of a smell.

### While I was walking to the complex, Lisa Punnel was just leaving. She's one of the Center's researchers. Me and the two other janitors responsible for cleaning the joint like her attitude. You know, she doesn't act stuck up even though she's a fancy scientist and all. Anyway, it was around 5:00 in the afternoon and her shift was done for the week. It was then when I found out that it wasn't just me and the other custodians that have been smelling whatever it was that produced that, smell...

### "Happy Friday," I said to Lisa with my hands straight in the air.

### "Like-wise, David!"

### "So, you have any big plans for the weekend?"

### "Just relax for a change...What about you, Dave?"

### I noticed that she didn't keep walking towards her car as she chatted with me. I learned over the years that when people did this at the Research Center it meant that they had a little time to talk.

### "Mmm, I was thinking about going to San Francisco with my sister. We want to see that modern art museum."

### She crossed her arms and nodded her head at this point.

### "Wonderful! My boyfriend and I had gone there a couple of years ago. You'll like it, Dave. Maybe it'll help you to decide whether or not you want to go to school for art."

### "Yeah, I'm still not sure about that..." I looked around to see if any of the other workers at the Center were passing by. There were just a few plowing their way to their cars from a distance. "Hey, um, Lisa; can I ask you a question?"

### I could tell she misunderstood my motive by the way she seemed to blush and roll her eyes at the same time.

### "No, no, no! It's not like that! Besides, I'm pretty sure Harris would pounce on me and make a modern sculpture out of me! Uh..." I was never good at segueing into discussions. So I discreetly stepped up to Lisa and continued with a whispered tone. "I'm not trying to be funny or anything, but have you noticed a strange smell around here lately?"

### It took her about five seconds, but she finally responded.

### "Yeah...yeah, now that you've mentioned it. Kind of like—"

### "Burning antifreeze?" I jumped in.

### "Yeah! It's odd. Faith and I were talking about that a few days ago. I'm surprised no one's asked you guys in maintenance to check it out."

### "Well, no one said anything to me or the other guys, but one time I did try to find out where the smell was coming from." I shrugged my shoulders and looked around for some subconscious reason. "Nada. I looked up and down the facility! In the garage, in the laboratory, all of the bathrooms...even all of the researchers' rooms in the entire building."

### "Hmm?" Lisa shook her head as she stood there with her lunch container and a couple of other miscellaneous things draped over one her shoulders. For a few more seconds neither one of us said anything. "I tell you what, David, I'll talk with Faith and everyone else in our division and ask them to tell maintenance whenever they smell something like that again."

### "You know, that would be great, Lisa. If something's burning and we don't know about it, we don't want to wait until it's too late!"

### "Great point, Dave...okay, I'm out of here," Lisa said to me as she finally turned and went to her nice, shiny car.

### I watched for a few more seconds as she drove by and then I threw a wave to her. But when I started to go inside the Center, the smell was totally gone this time...

### Well, it was our half-way mark for our part-time shift. Most nights many of the researchers hung around the Center, still working. But on this Friday night I didn't see any of the scientists or the office staff diddling around there. Probably because it was a nice summer night. Plus, the fact that it was the weekend and everyone had just gotten paid on Thursday. This left us free to blast our music from the radio and do a little fooling around at the Center. Especially since our immediate supervisor had taken off early that afternoon.

### "Attention shoppers," Mike announced over the facility's intercom system. It was his turn to play disc jockey that night. "We invite you to our annual cook-out festival! On the menu is David Turner, served very dry; just like his humor!"

### Of course I chuckled at Mike's silliness. I was on my way to the break room to get my typical dinner: coffee with a lot of cream and sugar, accompanied by a Snicker candy bar. The fine dining would not have been complete without the Sacramento paper to fill the void as I chewed away at my candy. Only on that particular break I would not have time to read the paper since Mike and Darren joined me in the breakroom. After they got their own junk food from the vending machines, they snatched the two chairs that were next to mine, parked in them, and stuffed their faces.

### "Hey, Dave," Mike poked at me. "I saw you talking to that Lisa, again."

### Darren smirked. He helped himself to my paper and started rummaging through it. Rude. But instead of making an issue of it, I got out my non-Smart phone and linked to the BBC's site. I was trying to save my phone's battery-level since I had done a lot of internet-searches that day.

### "Alright, knock it off, you yutz," I told Mike. That was the kind of relationship we had. "I told you, she already has a boyfriend. And even if she didn't, do you think she'd go out with a janitor?"

### Both sobered up after they saw how serious I was.

### "Besides," I went on to explain as I scrolled through the BBC's news page, "we were talking about that weird smell that's been going on around here."

### "Mmm," Darren mumbled out of his mouth as he devoured his chips. "The mysterious smell...! What did she say about it?"

### "Well, she noticed it. And so did that other scientist that works with her."

### "Faith," Mike interjected.

### "Yeah...I told her about that one time when I looked all over the Center to see what was smelling so bad."

### I distinctly remember looking at Mike at this point, because he had a very blank stare in his eyes.

"What's wrong with you," I questioned him. I was so used to seeing Mike in a more humorous way; he was always joking so much.

### "Nothing...you just reminded me of something when you said how you looked around the building." Darren and I just sat there waiting for Mike to say more to us. "Well, I can remember the first time I smelled whatever it is...I didn't look all over the whole building like you did, Dave, but I went over to the lab. It was—Hmm?" Mike just shook his head as he crinkled up his empty bag of chips and tossed it into a nearby garbage can.

### "What?" I said irritated.

### "You know how the lab has that one small window to the main part of the lab?" Darren and I nodded our heads without saying anything so Mike could talk. "Well, I figured that smell must have been something burning in the lab. So, I was going to knock on the door and ask one of those researchers about it. But before I could even get to the door, I thought I saw something."

### Darren and I just looked at each other and laughed at Mike.

### "No, I'm telling you guys! I saw...I don't know what it was! But—"

"Mike," Darren interrupted, "take a clue, buddy. That's why they call it the California Research Center for Wildlife!"

"No, you don't get it, Darren! The issue is not the animal I saw. Maybe a bobcat or a deer, or something...the point is I don't know what happened to it!"

### Well, now I was starting to get a little worried. It didn't help to see Mike so dead serious while he was talking.

### "I'm lost," I admitted. "So, you saw some animal in the lab, and you don't know what happened to it? Happened. You lost me—"

"—It's like it just disappeared, man! You know...like in those Sci-Fi flicks!"

### It was after this statement that I decided I had heard enough. It didn't help that it was rumored among the maintenance division that Mike believed in UFOs and aliens. And Mike already knew how people felt about him; including me.

### I got up from my chair, cutting the link to the BBC and Darren just kept flipping through the newspaper—quietly.

### "Well," I said with a long stretch, "I've got to get going on that hallway by the lobby. Boss wants three coatings on—"

"—Can I show you guys something?" Mike asked with his head down. That made Darren lift his head up from the paper. "I wasn't really sure about it myself. But I think after our little talk tonight, someone else should see it..."

### Now I was really apprehensive!

### Mike led our small pack of three down the hallways in the Center. There were plenty of lights on in the facility since we were still on our shift. But every now and then we would pass darkened hallways...this, too, did not help my nerves! We all looked around as we walked at a fast pace, knowing that we should have been working on some floors or bathrooms at the time.

### "Did you guys notice something else about that smell," Mike asked us as we came near to an isolated closet.

### "Yeah," Darren answered after a slight pause, "sometimes you can smell it, sometimes it's totally gone."

### Mike took out his collection of janitorial keys and used one of them to open the closet door. He smacked the light switch to the on position as we all just kept trekking our way to the back area. Mike finally stopped by a couple of vacuums, a trash barrel, and some other tools of the trade that's normally associated with custodial work.

### "I found this after I dumped one of the trash cans from the laboratory," Mike stated.

### Darren and I just stood next to Mike, waiting for him to turn around. We both automatically started to look around the closet space. Then it happened again: that smell! It wasn't as strong as I was used to smelling it, but it was there. I turned to face Mike again, and when I did, I saw Darren peering down at something small that Mike held in his hands, wrapped in a clear plastic bag.

### I walked up to see what it was. I sighed out of disappointment and looked at Darren.

### "So what! It's one of those animal skulls that biologists collect for categorizing different species! Michael, if I were you I would throw that away so no one will think you—"

"—Wait a minute," Darren said. I was actually mad at him for doing that until I saw what he was talking about after he took the skull from Mike. "Is this a real skull," Darren asked Mike.

### "Now you're catching on," Mike said with some degree of vindication.

### I couldn't see the skull that well, so I grabbed it out of Darren's hands and examined it for myself. The skull must have belonged to a mammal of some sort, maybe a rabbit or another animal comparable in size. The right side of the skull seemed pretty normal to me. Except for some pitting that appeared to evenly cover the area.

Now I will say what was not so normal to any of us was how there was a drastic change or difference on the left side of the skull...I don't mean a gradual shifting in texture, but a clear, clean-cut difference; as different as if you were to take an egg shell and placed it next to the surface of a porcupine! Only, imagine the porcupine needles being much shorter and on the same surface as the egg shell and you'll understand what we saw that night!

### "Good grief," I nearly shouted. I handled the skull a few more seconds and gave it back to Mike. "There's no question about it; that's bone! At first I thought it was plastic or something."

### "So, what are you saying about this, Mike?" Darren inquired.

"Well, like I said before, I'm not exactly sure. But what in the world is a wildlife research facility doing throwing away anomalies of nature like this?"

### It was a very good question. Darren and I glanced at each other and thought for a bit. Mike decided to use that quiet time and tell us more.

### "I became suspicious after a while...I started to see a pattern about the lab. Every time I smelled that disgusting smell, on that same day I would find bits of animal bone in the lab's industrial trash bin. Sometimes even little pieces of flesh!" We all winced at that line. "So far this is the largest piece that I found."

### "You've got more?" I said excitedly.

### Mike turned around and took out a small bag from the tool cabinet. He was right. The bone fragments were minute, but there probably was about twenty pieces in the bag.

### "Hey, it looks like there's scorching on these bones," I observed after sifting through them.

### "It's on all of the pieces," Mike affirmed. "Even on the skull. It's like they got burned by something!"

### Darren rolled his eyes up for a split second as he thought about something and leaned against the closest wall to him.

### "Mike, are you saying there's some kind of a connection between the smell and these bones?"

### "Well, think about it, guys! Now, Dave, I know you've been here for just over a year, but, Darren, can you tell me any other time when you smelled that odor around here? You've been here longer than me."

### "No, actually I can't!"

### "So, it's like the scientists around the Center are using animals for some kind of experiment," I asked. "Where they're, what, blasting the poor critters with some kind of heat that makes all that disgusting smell?"

"And if that's the case," Mike said, "it makes you wonder if it's legal. There are a lot of new laws in California and at the federal level that protect animals against certain experiments."

"So," Darren asked, looking a bit confused, "if these scientists here are throwing away these weird animal bones, maybe they're trying to cover their tracks; thinking that some low-life janitors wouldn't know the difference?"

### It was another one of those thinking times. Mike placed the skull back into the bag with the rest of the bones and, in turn, replaced the bag to its original hiding place inside the cabinet. He then turned to face us.

"Listen...I know I have a reputation around the Center for being a little on the weird side, with all my UFO-beliefs and stuff. So, maybe I shouldn't say all these things. I think it would be better if other people hear it from you guys!"

### "Now wait a minute, here," Darren said as he looked at me with surprise—as I'm sure I was looking at him! "Michael, we're not some zombie hunters, or something! We're just a few janitor-joes nosing around a research facility!"

I can tell Mike was getting upset; he tsked so loud it sounded like a sneeze! "Then what's the point in us snooping around? If we're wrong, we'll explain that we were doing far less than what Edward Snowden did with the NSA spy info!"

"Woah, dude, now you're really taking this much farther than I want to go," Darren told Mike.

My turn. "Let me ask you this, Mike...okay, let's say there is some kind of illegal scientific study going on here; what would it be? Because I think we all agree that what you have there is a real skull! Look, I may not be a scientist, but I've taken a couple of biology courses from the university. And I know enough to say that whatever it was that happened to that skull was not a natural phenomenon!"

### Even Darren had to agree with my point. I knew I could get some kind of an educated guess from Mike. He was a computer science college dropout and had gravitated to the more paranormal side of life. As much as Mike may have been stigmatized in society for that, it was a lot more than I could say for Darren: a man approaching middle age and merely finished high school. Not that it made him any less of a human being for not having a college education. I just didn't think that Darren had any room to dismiss scientific possibilities, given his limited education.

### Mike thought on my question to him for a little while.

### "At first I thought it could have been cloning."

"But it's not illegal to clone animals in the US," I volleyed to him.

### "Yeah, I know. And besides, I've seen the effects of botched cloning studies. Trust me, they don't look anything like that skull! But then I thought about another possibility..."

### Mike peeped at the time on his Smart phone and flinched because of the time. Darren and I indicated to him that we weren't concerned about the time. Besides, it was a Friday night.

### Once again, Mike got something out of that same tool cabinet. This time it was a large photo album. I knew what it was since we've talked about his collection of scientific articles and essays. Instead of sentimental photographs of family members, the album had articles dating back several years and others more recent. In fact, the majority of the contemporary clippings weren't newspaper clippings at all. They were articles copied off the Internet.

### Mike cleared off the top of another, but shorter, cabinet and set the album there. Straightway he flipped the pages to a particular article from a scientific magazine.

### "Teleportation, Mike?" I said in an almost rebuking tone after seeing the headline. I thought, 'Oh, great, he's going Trekkie on us now!'

### "Yeah, it's when—"

"—I think we all know what that is, Michael," Darren said while he kept his eyes on the story. "Kind of like when the characters in Star Trek are beamed around the galaxy by each atom of their bodies."

### "But what does that have to do with the Center's lab, Mike," I questioned as I sat up from skimming a portion of the article.

Before he would answer, Mike insisted that Darren and I read a paragraph from the article. To put it very short and simple, the passage dealt with a Teleportation study done by some scientists in Switzerland. From what I gathered from the one paragraph that Mike had us read, this scientific team had spliced a few photons with some kind of specialized crystal. (For those who care, later on I had written it down: potassium-niobate.) It's weird. I guess what happens is the two separate pieces of photon—from the original whole photon—always move at the same time! From the study in Switzerland, the photons could be a few feet from each other or literally miles and miles apart; it doesn't matter! Those pieces of light particles from the original photon were somehow tightly bonded together!

### As expected, Darren didn't show much interest in the article. Oh, he understood what the experiment was about; it's just that there was no tangible quality to the article, so to him it might as well have been Science Fiction.

### Michael and I, on the other hand, looked at each other with wide grins.

### "I can't believe it," I told Mike. "I mean, I've heard about studies like this, but I didn't know there had been such advancements in the study of Teleportation!"

### "That's nothing. This article is about a couple of years old. Since then there have been other researchers throughout the world to take the Switzerland model a step further."

### Now, even Darren started to develop an interest at this point. Darren and I stared at Mike for divine revelation.

### "There have been scientific teams that have actually practiced—or, I probably should say, attempted—Teleporting more complex things at the molecular level...relatively large molecules, viruses; even very small insects like gnats and ticks."

### Just then, I got where Mike was going with this. I couldn't tell for sure, but it looked like Darren had understood it as well.

"I can't believe it," I said. Michael's face had that look of victory again. "And you told us earlier that you believe you saw some animal just disappear that one night?"

### Mike's head nodded; he was so proud that he could finally convince someone else of his paranormal belief! But then, all of the sudden his eyes were locked into one position. And that was toward the door of the janitor closet...

### All three of us looked at each other. Then, with quantum speed, took off toward the door! We had split up as we looked for whoever it was that Mike thought he saw had cast a shadow in that small closet. I looked diligently all over the hallway that I choose to run down—nothing! Apparently it was the same for Darren and Mike, as I saw them meet up with me on that floor's main hallway. In panic, we all clumsily rehearsed the last few seconds of our conversation in the closet, trying to see if any of us remembered hearing the door to the closet open or not. Obviously, that was our clue to disperse and get back to work! I do remember this, too. On that night, all three of us left the Center earlier than we should have...

### Well, the weekend had passed. My sister and I got a chance to go to San Francisco's modern art museum. I must say, the trip was an epiphany for me. For now, I had decided to go to some university or a school of Fine Arts after our trip! I was so enamored with the contemporary artwork and even the museum itself until I had totally forgotten all about what happened last Friday night!

### I saw Lisa again. This time I had deliberately gone to work early so I could show her and other people at the Center some of my pictures that I had taken while at San Francisco with my new, high-tech, razor-thin camera I bought just for the trip. I had gotten carried away; I took about three-hundred pics! And you better believe I had posted them to my social media sites!

### After I mingled with the scientists and the office workers of the Center, I saw that it was time for me to return to my social strata and start my shift. First, with collecting the trash, then I started my first restroom. I had barely squeezed my rubber, cleaning gloves on when Michael came rushing up to me.

### "David, I can't believe they did it," Mike harshly said as he tried to restrain himself.

### "Mike, you're scaring me! What are you talking about?"

"The bones, man," he said with a whisper, "they're gone!"

### "What?!" I quickly looked around, since our supervisor was back on his regular schedule at the Center. I took off my cleaning gloves and pulled Mike into the ladies' restroom, since I was about to clean it anyway. I continued in a whispered tone. Bathrooms are notorious when it comes to echoes. "Now, just think, Mike! Maybe you just misplaced the bag...you know, we got pretty excited Friday night after you thought you saw—"

"—'you thought?' Dave, come on, man! You still don't believe me? I'm telling you, I saw someone's shadow in that closet! And whoever it was must have access to Maintenance keys, because that closet door locks automatically whenever it's shut."

### That was one detail I had forgotten about. My mind must have been spinning in circles after that point.

### "What about your album, Mike? Did they take—"

"—No, no. It's still there." Mike said this while he vigorously shook his head. "And in case you're wondering, so is my Teleportation article."

### "Good; that was going to be my next question...say, where's Darren?"

### "Not here, yet." Mike slumped against the wall and covered his face with both of his hands.

### Just then we heard our boss call for us. Composing ourselves, we calmly walked out of the bathroom to greet him.

### "Hey, there you guys are," Rick sung out to us in a jovial mood. "How was your weekend?"

### "Mmm, pretty good," I said with sincerity.

### "Yeah, one of the office workers told me that you had gone to San Fran.' Three-hundred pics, David?" Rick asked me in a quipping manner. Mike and I just chuckled. All three of us janitors like him. He was a very easy-going fellow, especially as a supervisor.

### "Hey, listen," Rick continued, "I've got a brief meeting with all three of you after Darren gets here. It's actually good news!"

### Mike and I looked at each other with puzzled faces.

### "I had a talk this morning with a few of the researchers about some foul smell around the facility lately. It looks like we won't have to worry about it. They said they found out what it was. Apparently some birds had been nesting in one of the complex's main conduit pipes."

### Mike just froze; I nearly choked on my saliva.

### "Birds, Rick," I said half sarcastically; half disbelieving.

"Well, yeah. I guess a couple of the biologists climbed into the conduit pipe and found a nest with three dead chicks still inside it. He never showed me what they did with them, though. Be glad, fellas, because, otherwise, we would have been the ones to clean up after the birds. If you ask me, it's about time those high-paid scientists did a little dirty work of their own!"

### I'm not sure, but I think I saw a tiny smile on the corner of Michael's mouth as he slowly shook his head. "They sure did, Rick," he finally said. "They sure did..."

### ~~fin~~

### EBOOK FOUR:

"The Starets's Hunt", by scifiguy3553.

Copyright @ 2014.

### Wayne is a geek who turned to the small crime scene; selling stolen goods online and to pawn shops. He and his accomplices stumble into the wrong place to plunder at a Russian Orthodox Church when they run into a mystic figure from the days of Tzar Nicholas II. And now Wayne is also Rasputin's prey!

### Lincoln, Nebraska; Present Day...

"...the firefighting authorities were explicit in warning the public to refrain from crowding around the house since they aren't sure just yet how the church fire was started. The fire chief said the possible causes of the fire range from a simple candle that was lit during one of the religious ceremonies to arson. Authorities think a very toxic chemical could have been released during the fire.

"When asked about the unusual cautious tone in his warning to the public, Chief Durbank had this to say..."

The 10 o'clock TV report then switched to a burly, middle-aged man in a dark uniform and hat. The local TV stations' camera lights made his image look somewhat ghostly bright. "It's been brought to our attention by some of the neighbors that they believe they saw a glowing effect coming from the church that did not look consistent with the fire that was engulfing the building."

"Sir, what do you mean by, glowing effect," the female reporter pressed him, her voice being the only manifest of her existence on the television report. "And how can a glow during a fire be separate from the fire itself?"

Before answering, the Lincoln Fire Department head paused, his eyes never so much as blinked. "Uh, as was told by the neighbors to the firefighters that arrived here first, there, apparently was...something seen that was unexplainable and we just want the public to take caution."

### The news report went on for another minute or so, but by that time Edward Schwartz and Julius Renolds, eighteen and seventeen, respectively, were already scheming their next stunt in the basement of the house that belonged to Julius' mother.

### "Hey, Jules, we should head over there," Edward blurted out, the idea suddenly popping in his head.

### Edward was on a cheap couch that was off to the corner of the basement while his host and cohort was virtually melded into his recliner.

### "You know, I was just thinking the same thing," Julius said.

### "Tonight would be a good time to go since the fire chief told everyone to stay away from the church."

### Julius thought for a moment as the local news now went to commercial. "I'm just wondering what was glowing over there."

### Edward guffawed from the gaudy couch. "Come on, man, it's not like it's a nuke plant! Probably just some cleaning chemicals from the church's bathroom caught on fire, or something..." He leaned over a bit on the couch toward Julius' direction and his voice turned slightly conspiratorial. "Or, maybe it was some souls that were trapped underneath the church since they didn't have enough money for their tickets to hell!"

### Now the cluttered basement was a hall of laughter.

### "Jules," Julius' mother, tall and slender and around fifty, called out as she made it down the last steps to the basement. "Your father and I are going over to play cards at the Favians. We still have some pizza left in the fridge if you want anymore." She looked over to Edward with that universal mom-smile that neighborhood kids have seen for many generations. "You're more than welcomed to have some too, Eddie."

### Even mischievous Edward Schwartz knew when to pull the innocent kid act when he needed to. "Thanks, Mrs. Renolds. I'll do just that!"

### "Say, Eddie," Julius' mother continued onto another subject her countenance shifting to somber, "did you ever get any of those jobs you applied for a couple of weeks ago? I talked with your mom and she said you didn't get so much as a rejection letter yet!"

### Edward was already shaking his head. "No, Mrs. Renolds. And my mom's right. I don't get it! It's not like I don't have experience in the

### telemarketing field."

### "Right. You did it for that one company downtown for almost two months..." She went pensive for a second. "What was the reason you said that they fired you?"

Edward shrugged as he answered while Julius picked up the TV remote and started flipping through channels. "They accused me of stealing client information from their caller-list—but I swear to you, Mrs. Renolds, I didn't do it!" Of course he was lying. In fact, it was because of that telemarketing firm's list that Edward and Julius began their criminal career in the first place!

"I know, Eddie," Amy said with a maternal sweetness. Then she looked at her own son and her face stiffened up. "And what happened to that fast food joint you were working for, young man? Why did you quit it?"

### Now Julius shrugged, but kept his eyes on the TV. "It sucked, mom. I told you...all those hours for such small amount of money. Plus it was cutting into my homework time."

She looked at him for a few more seconds. "You realize that your parents aren't rich, Jules. We're able to give you some allowances, but you're a young man now! At some point you're going to have to get another job to help with the bills around here...okay?"

### "Alright, mom," he said without looking away from the TV.

### In over a year's time, the duo had generated something in the order of thirty-five thousand dollars in their illegal operation. It was more than what some adults made in the labor and service industries! And given that the two teenagers yet lived with their respective parents, and with no dependents or serious bills to pay, Edward and Julius were able to afford their bling, their extravagant cell phones, and fairly decent cars and clothes. But for a cover story, both boys had taken on odd jobs and quit them in a few weeks.

### The two husky teens expected Mrs. Renolds to finally vacate the basement, but instead she looked upon them one more time, but this time with inquisitive eyes. "You boys aren't selling drugs, are you?"

### Both of them burst into laughter, Edward clapping his hands for effect and out of habit when he was on a laughing spell.

"Mom," Julius said to her, his attention now fully on his mother, "have you ever smelled any drugs on me? Or seen any roaches or bags or any other traces that would let you think that?"

### With relieved concession, Amy Renolds slowly shook her head and turned around to head back upstairs.

### "Your father and I will be leaving in about fifteen minutes," she called out to them when she was nearly at the top of the stairs.

### Mrs. Renolds had finally shut the door to the basement, leaving the two young men to their own thoughts. Julius arched an eyebrow and shifted his head as if to say, That was close!

### "Hey, I just thought about something while your mom was here," Edward said, his demeanor a lot more serious as he sat up on the couch. "We need a Geiger counter."

### Julius thought on his point, his face slightly soured for curiosity. "Why do we need one of those? The other times we were able to find things without one...besides, don't you think with all that beeping Geiger counters do it will draw attention to us?"

Apparently it was something that Edward hadn't thought on. But he was coming from another thought. "Good point. But I was thinking more about whatever's in that burnt up church that's causing that glow. If it survived the fire, it's got to be worth a lot of money! And if it is glowing a lot like the news reporter said, we should be a little more careful. I know I joked about it not being a nuclear plant a few minutes ago, but there are other ways to get exposed to radiation, and I could do without that!"

### Now Edward was the one with a good point. Julius expressed this by, somewhat dramatically, nodding his head and making a puckered look with his lips. "We'd have to save enough money for it for a future treasure hunt, but we should be okay tonight. Unless you want to wait to buy a small Geiger..."

Edward thought for a moment then began shaking his head. "No, I don't want to wait to go over. You know what'll happen tomorrow...probably some insurance guy'll show up and take pictures and stuff. And then the church members'll probably start to clean up right after that. But we can't go too early tonight because the firefighters will hang around for a bit and the cops will fence-off the area with that yellow tape!"

### "So, what do you want to do?"

### This time they both fell silent as they pondered an alternative for their pirating endeavor. A commercial about cleaning products was blaring away at them from the TV. Then Julius snapped his chubby fingers. Without saying a word, Edward looked at him for explanation.

"What about including Wayne on this one?"

### Edward blew out sarcastically. "That geek?"

### "Edward, that was part of the deal we made with him!"

"I know, and I wish we didn't make it with him. Look, bro, I know he's your friend in that science class and all, but he should have nothing to do with us! Not when it comes to what we do at nights."

### "I know, Eddie, but just hear me out...I told you that his father is a geologist at UNL, right?"

### "Yeah," Edward droned with a roll of his eyes.

### "What is it that a lot of geologist have because of their profession?"

### Now the idea finally hit Edward as well. He blankly stared at Julius while Julius smiled victoriously. "Geiger counters," Edward softly said.

### Later...

### Julius' parents had gathered some things for their night out with their friends and finally left about ten minutes later. Edward and Julius were up next. Since it was a Friday night, Julius and Edward knew that Julius' parents would be out well past 12 in the morning. That didn't leave them much time—something like two hours.

Julius had already called his friend, Wayne, and asked if they could use his father's Geiger counter. Wayne agreed that he'd asked his father to borrow it. Only thing was he didn't tell his father that he was borrowing it for that night.

### "He better be ready when we get to that corner," Edward bit out as he drove his 1980s foreign car from a neighborhood called Near South, in the southern portion of central-west Lincoln. "This is simple blackmail by a Bill Gates wannabe! We risk getting caught with guys like him, dude. Bookish people only go so far."

### Julius silently nodded in agreement. He didn't want to agitate Edward any further, so he said nothing else.

They had to drive all the way out to a much further neighborhood called The Highlands, a mostly upper-middle income sector by Lincoln's airport. That was where Professor Irwin Paul and his family lived. And Edward wasn't happy to spend some of their limited time driving out there to pick up Julius' friend, and then having to turn around and drive all the way back to the neighborhood where the gutted church was. Which was not far from Lincoln's downtown area. That better be a damned good Geiger counter, Edward thought to himself.

### And, indeed, it was. The lanky teen with glasses and a baseball cap was waiting for them at an anonymous street corner, not far from his immaculate neighborhood, holding the high-tech gadget that was nearly as tall as he was. With it being late night and with him standing under a street lamp, Wayne was making an effort not to be so conspicuous with the Geiger contraption. As soon as Edward pulled up with his car, Wayne hopped in and they were off toward the city lights in the distance.

### As Edward had predicted, there was the yellow tape festooning the perimeter of the church grounds, placed by the Lincoln Police Department. To the trio of teens' surprise, there were no officials to be seen. Obviously the firefighters had done a good job in killing off the fire and the coverage they had all seen on the ten o'clock news was a recording. So it had been several hours since the fire.

Another situation working to their favor was the fact that the church grounds were so large that they took up an entire block! With that said, the nearest houses and apartment complex were a mere several yards away...so the trio had to be creative with how they would get to the church, and be quick about it. They decided to take an alley at an adjacent block and creep against any nearby fences or structures that lined the alley. From there it was a lot easier to crawl to the church's backyard, with its relatively high grass. And especially since the firefighters had strewn out a lot of the demolished structure on the church grounds, there was plenty of hiding places for the trespassers.

Julius and Edward, the chunky ones, were out of breath when they all finally arrived at the back entryway of the shell of the church edifice. Wayne had a little hard time trying to crawl around with the Geiger device, but he managed quite well and was barely panting when they got there. Julius and Edward both had large, empty laundry bags so they could stuff them with booty. And, yet, they had more trouble carrying their load than he did.

" 'The Russian Orthodox Church of Lincoln,' " Wayne read aloud upon seeing the text that was engraved on the stone above the back doors. It was in English and Russian. By this time, all three were donning their rubber gloves. They all had previously fitted their ski masks and black clothing well before getting to the church.

### Now that the boys were safely tucked away in the shadows of the church, cast by the moonlight and a few street lamps, they finally had just a couple of minutes to really pay attention to some of the details of the church's architecture. It was an echo from another era in European history! With all its piercing spires, grotesque gargoyles, and surrealistic Christian mythology depicted on the remaining stained-glass windows...

"I don't understand religious people," Wayne said with a wincing face under his dark ski mask as he looked around the crust of what once was a church. His thick-rimmed glasses awkwardly jutted out from the mask. "Seems like to me the churches are more concerned about scaring you into believing rather than whether or not something is true!"

### Edward glanced at Julius through his own ski mask, then looked at Wayne with strained eyes. "You're an Atheist?"

### "Proud to be...born and raised that way! Why, afraid I'll cramp up your little prayer meeting once we get inside?"

First there was silence. Then all three snickered among themselves. It would have been a ridiculous spectacle: a religious man objecting to someone's nontheistic attitude, while all three of them were just about to rob a church!

### Sheer poetry.

### The building had so many openings because of the destructive fire. All the teens had to do to get inside was step through one of the gaping wounds of the church. They remained quiet as they slithered throughout the charred placescape of pews, fallen statues, and the remnant of soiled water from when the firefighters had battled the fire. The smell from the fire was so strong that they all held up their shirts or sleeves to their noses until they got used to it. Dry, crunching sounds crackled periodically as they stepped quickly, trying to use their time economically. But every now and then they'd also plopped into a small puddle of water...again, an echo of the lost fight the Lincoln Fire Department fought against the monstrous element, Fire.

### Wayne had taken the point position with his father's Geiger counter. He had used duct tape earlier to tape over the speaker so the noise indicator wasn't so loud. And since it was of the latest generation of Geiger counters, it had a medium-sized computer monitor displaying telemetry. That was just as good as any auditory warning signals. Of course, there is always naturally occurring radiation, so the Geiger had picked up mere traces of it from time to time. But none worth worrying about.

Edward and Julius were now veterans within the pirating business after a year's worth of practice. The husky lads were using their keen eyes to spot anything that might be considered valuable in the illegal markets. Here and there, both of them, in quite professional execution, would craftily lift a crystal here, a silver chalice there, quickly checked the offering bowls for any stray cash...Wayne had to smile out of admiration for the two young chaps. He had known both of them since early-middle school, and here they were, acting and being professional thieves, as any of them one would read about or see in the news.

It was only within the last three weeks did Wayne stumble across Edward and Julius' secret lives. Wayne, who had befriended Julius before finding out, happened to know one of the families that the duo had victimized and he was able to put two and two together and confronted Julius about it one day in one of the classes they shared. But instead of turning them in to the cops, Wayne demanded to be a part of the operation. He blackmailed the two-man team, threatening to expose them to authorities if they did not take him on. Finally, Edward had agreed to let little Wayne play supporting role in the team. Julius was the buffer in the new trio group. And Edward was the alpha-male.

### "Okay, are we getting any closer to anything interesting," Julius asked Wayne with a whisper. It was getting darker all around them as they walked further into the building, even with the collapsed roof. They were finally in the center of all the jumbled, blackened mess that the fire caused.

"I thought I brought this along to make sure you guys weren't exposed to radiation; not look for it!"

"Whatever was glowing during the fire is likely to have some radiation," Edward offered in hushed confidence. "I'm not one of your nerdy science friends, Wayne, but even I know that if something glows as much as the news said it did, there's got to be something going—"

### And there were muffled pings over the duct tape that encased the Geiger's speaker. The counter's interfacer was going wild with colorful graphs of warnings but only lasted for a split second. For a while, Wayne thought he saw the telemetry wink out on him, but the monitor never did go blank on him.

### The three young men all stood in complete silence, first looking at the Geiger's monitor, then looking out around the trashed out church. There was a breeze making its presence known in the autumn night. It rustled abandoned papers and made creaking noises with some of the church's very old and very charred wood.

### "Looks like we'll have to go to the basement," Julius finally said, breaking the eerie silence. For it was in the direction of a set of stairs where the Geiger had registered some radiation.

### With no further conversations, the trio cautiously made their way to the flight of stairs. The stairwell was a patch of pitch black against the darkened church in the night. They all turned on their flashlights and didn't have to worry about being seen by any of the neighbors at this point.

### Upon reaching the bottom of the stairs, Edward and Julius moved to the side and let Wayne proceed with his Geiger counter.

### "I don't see any glow around, do you guys," Wayne asked while glancing at the monitor once again.

### Neither Julius nor Edward said anything, though their heads shook in response. Again, silence. Wayne narrowed his detection field toward the darkest corner of the church's basement. Each time he pointed the Geiger in that direction the radiation levels increased, though not to dangerous levels that would fatal harm the boys, but definitely high enough to register caution.

### "We'll be okay," Wayne informed them curtly.

### Edward, still not totally trusting the bookworm, looked at him through his own ski mask with incredulity.

"Look, it's like you said yourself a few minutes ago, there's going to be some radiation. And, trust me, if it were that dangerous I wouldn't be here!"

### That last comment was more assuring than anything else Wayne said to Edward or even his friend Julius. The two stout ones glanced at each other and nodded at Wayne's point. Quickly, all three made their way to the blackened corner, stepping over debris and dodging wooden stalactites that hung in the basement from the first floor. The hanging wood from the gaping ceiling above the basement was a testament to just how extensive the fire-damage was within the church. They slowed down once they got within ten meters the corner.

### There was no more need to have the Geiger counter on at this point. So Wayne was about to turn off the device until he noticed a very odd reading on the monitor.

### "Well, son of a bitch," said Wayne so softly Edward and Julius barely heard him. The two stopped their advancement toward the corner and whipped their heads around to see what was Wayne's consternation.

Wayne was shaking his head while tapping gently on the side of the counter's monitor. "The Geiger's reading negative!"

Edward looked to Julius for understanding. All that he did was shrug his shoulders and nimbly shook his masked head for lack of comprehension.

### "And the Sun is in the center of the solar system...so what, Wayne!"

"Edward, Geiger counters read existing radiation. For this to read in the negative would be like a weather forecaster predicting how much rain would not fall during a storm...an interesting concept, but it doesn't make sense!"

### Edward was stoically nodding his head as he looked off to no particular place, thinking of the metaphor that Wayne described. "For once, C3-PO, you and I agree on something!"

### "Well, I'm going in," Julius said with impatience.

Edward snapped out of his pensive mode and followed Julius, while Wayne remained at his spot, letting the two pros do their thing. He kept his eyes on the monitor of the Geiger, noting how that each time he pointed it away from the dark corner the telemetry went back to either zero or mere traces of radiation from the burnt-up church.

He also noted how, this time, the audio portion of the counter did not ping when it read negative. Rather, slurred and elongated waves of noises he had never heard before generated from the taped-up speakers.

"This is getting too freakin' weird, guys," he said, now with apprehension in his voice, if not, outright fear. "Maybe we should—you know, get out of here?"

### Edward and Julius ignored him. They were too busy thinking of the moneymaking potential of whatever item was in that corner. When they finally got to the corner, there was a disappointed sigh from Edward.

### "There's nothing here, except more debris!" Edward's voice was still at a whisper, but its decimal was undoubtedly up.

Without saying a word, Julius went directly into the corner, took his miniature flashlight and shined his light in the area.

### Julius' inspection came across a corner of the basement's carpet. At least what was left of it. He grabbed hold of it and pulled the carpet back with some effort. And there, he and Edward saw the outline of a sealed doorway, built right into the concrete floor. In the center of that small door—approximately four square feet—was a medallion stylistically depicting a biblical mythological scene with Jesus Christ holding some fish and bread, surrounded by a score of men. They all recognized the symbol from when various parts throughout the church. It was the Russian Orthodox Church of Lincoln's official emblem. Encircling the medallion were several Russian words and what appeared to be a date: 1891.

### By the time Julius had moved the corner of the singed carpet out of the way completely, Wayne had moved in with his Geiger counter still on. There was no mistaking it, the Geiger's monitor was registering negative readings and the audio indicator was doing a creepy rendering of a melancholy piece. This time, Edward and Julius were there to see and hear it for themselves.

### "Turn it off for now, will you," Julius asked his friend. Wayne merely shrugged and obliged Julius.

### Edward examined the rectangular outline. He ran his gloved hands around its perimeter and over the medallion, pushing it and turning at the slightly raised artwork. He hoped, somehow, the relief would be a secret key to opening the door. The door was kept safe from the fire due to the carpet that had been covering it. "Don't see any handles or knobs...makes me wonder if they have any treasures down there!"

### "Whatever's down there, they felt it was important enough for them to lock and chain it underground," Julius said, also getting excited about the potential loot of wealth.

### "How do we know the church members didn't get whatever's inside, while the church was burning," Wayne pointed out, almost more of a suggestion than a question.

### "Remember, Jules had to pull up the carpet to get to the door," Edward reminded Wayne. Wayne nodded in affirmation to himself. "I can tell the carpet hasn't been moved for years by the staples and glue that was stuck to the carpet...Jules and I have done this for a while now, Wayne. We have a good idea what to look for. Besides, we might as well try it while we're here, right? For all we know they were too preoccupied with the fire and forgot about whatever's down there."

Even Julius had to shake his head at that one. "Uh, I don't know, Eddie. These churchgoers sure went through a lot of trouble to have this built and covered, just to forget about it during a fire...think about it. If you had something extremely valuable in a vault at home and your house caught on fire, wouldn't it be one of the things you'd grab with you as you got out of the house?"

### Edward and Wayne both nodded their heads at Julius' point.

"Like you said," Wayne commented, shifting around to get a better look at the door and its medallion, "you kind of had to go through a lot of work to rip off the carpet covering the door, Julius. And that was after the fire destroyed the carpet. Think how hard it must have been to get to the door before the fire!"

Edward and Julius remained silent, thinking about what was said by their obtuse partner. Wayne continued, his head shaking out of conviction. "No, guys, I think we got it all wrong. The sealed door with no knobs or handles to open it; it was covered by a thick carpet that looks like no one even tried to pull up to get at the door; the Geiger counter always reads negative whenever I point it directly toward the door...if you ask me, I think the church members left whatever's down there on purpose!"

### That speculation left a chill in Edward and Julius. Being in a burned out, dark basement of a very old church in the middle of the night didn't exactly help, either!

### "Come on, Eddie, Jules," Wayne practically begged. "You guys got several things from here already. Let's go while we still can!"

### "I wonder what the text says," Julius said as he ignored Wayne, half to himself, half to his two partners in crime.

### "It says to never open it," a Russian-accented male's voice came from another corner of the basement.

### The three young men screamed like tweeny girls! Wayne had hefted the Geiger counter and was actually ready to use it for a weapon.

### The man, though yet cloaked in the darkened corner, laughed a dry, hardy guffaw. "Well, it is rough translation, but you get point."

He finally stepped out of the corner and slowly walked in the boys' general direction, but made a point at stopping several meters away from them. Because of a large hole on the first floor above them caused by the fire there was some moonlight that filtered down to the basement. Before shining their lights on him, Edward, Julius, and Wayne were able to see some details of him. He was a tall, somewhat slender man, probably around early-forties. His hair, dark brown and slicked back with a part in the middle, medium-length with a few strands of gray blooming on his crown and his beard was extremely long and full, having more grays in it. He wore a black robe that accentuated his height.

### Oddly, the man held his left hand just above his abdomen, lightly pressed against his body and his fingers were closed tightly together, but extended across his torso. Perhaps an old war wound, congenital may be even?

"Hey, wait a minute," Edward said, upon all three of them shining their flashlight on him. His voice had a sense of relief to it. "By the way you're dressed and that unshaven look about you, I'm guessing you're the priest of this church."

The man chuckled. "Not bad, young man...but I am actually the bishop here. We are Russian Orthodox, not Catholic."

### "So, I take it you've been here the whole time," Wayne asked, fidgeting from the guilt and the embarrassment of getting caught.

### The bishop, his gaunt eyes slowly moving sideways, nodded. "Oh, you could certainly say that...please, take off your masks."

### Julius and Edward glanced at each other.

### "Please," the Russian man repeated. "I could have called police on you when you first got here, but I did not."

### Well, that was certainly reasonable enough. The three pulled their ski masks off their heads. Edward sighed, still not fully trusting this bishop about his word of not calling the cops.

### For his part, the middle-aged man slightly nodded upon seeing their identities. For a short time, Julius wondered if he was a pedophile, given the length of time he looked at them. But then he sensed the man was simply eccentric. Perhaps being tucked away in a church with not much human interaction was catching up with him, Julius reasoned.

"Thank you for not calling the police," Wayne stated. Edward, having never liked Wayne to begin with, looked at him with loathing. He felt the geek was placating the strange man too much. Never mind the fact that they were pilfering from the church.

### "What are your names," the cleric asked, taking a couple of steps closer to them.

### "I'm Julius," he then pointed to his companions. "This is Edward and this is Wayne."

The man nodded. "I am Bishop Vilkin. My lay members are quite upset about what happened to our church." He looked upon them, his eyes narrowing. "Do you think it wise to trespass into a church that has just burnt down? Have you ever considered possibility that police might catch you and accuse you of arson?"

### Edward and Julius were frozen, apparently still intimidated by this enigmatic man. That, and they had never thought of the scenario Bishop Vilkin had just laid out to them.

### But Wayne, being the good geek that he was, was pondering his words. His face was frowning with concentration and it was not lost on the bishop.

"What is it, young man?" Edward, Julius, and Wayne all noticed that his left hand had not lowered once since talking with this guy.

"What you just said...you speak as though you know we didn't do it. It's almost like you're warning us. I noticed that you did not accuse us of anything since we met you, not even the stealing that we have done...it's like you already knew all this."

### Edward and Julius looked at Wayne thoughtfully and Bishop Vilkin's eyes narrowed even more, but this time there was a microscopic smile to go with it. "I give you a break, as they say here in America. You may leave with items you have stolen. Trust me, those little trinkets you took are one of the last things my church is worried about."

### "Bishop Vilkin," Wayne hastened to say as Edward and Julius began to turn to vacate the basement. They stopped and turned to face Wayne while the cleric patiently waited for Wayne's question. "I'm sorry but I have this bad habit of being curious about things...what's in the small door?"

### "Wayne," Edward rebuked from the stairs leading to the first floor.

### For a while, Bishop Vilkin didn't say a word. In fact, he didn't even move at all. And when he did, it was only his mouth, much of it covered by his beard. "A secret...."

### Wayne stood there, expecting to hear more. Even Edward and Julius were askance at the man's reply.

With that, Wayne got the hint and followed his buddies out of the basement. They slipped their ski masks back on and, with their loot in hand, quietly made their way out of the gutted church and were back outside. They retraced their steps from the backyard of the church and through the same alley, and to Edward's old car. For a couple of blocks, he drove his car with the lights out until they were safely away from the Russian Orthodox Church of Lincoln.

### It had been three weeks since Edward, Julius, and Wayne pirated the Russian Orthodox Church and the trio had cashed out quite well off the few items taken. Even though Wayne did not actually rob anything from the church, he still got his share for helping out with his father's Geiger reader. Despite the fact the team did not get any treasures from that small door in the church's basement floor. He was at least able to be on the lookout for any passersby. That had to count for something.

Wayne was known for his book smarts, but Edward and Julius definitely had him on the street smarts. The two knew enough not to put the church items up for sale on Ebay or to go to any of the local museums between Lincoln and Omaha. For there were plenty of people that read the papers and heard the news and would have put two and two together and figured out where the antiques suddenly came from. Especially since some of the looted antiques had some fire damage and Cyrillic written on many of the pieces.

### Instead, Julius and Edward manually trolled the Internet for churches, museums, and other institutions on the East and West coasts and auctioned off the items. Unlike some potential Ebay's customers, most of those academic and religious institutions on the coasts weren't in the market actively seeking antique, Eastern European artifacts resold from the Midwest...hence, anonymity was safe assured.

### Julius was in the middle of his Algebra class, at Lincoln High School in central Lincoln, while Edward was in Spanish when they both had received a very ominous text message from Wayne. It said to meet him in the boys' locker room, since it was between the next gym class and the last one. Of course, this made it difficult for Edward and Julius to come up with an excuse for them to leave their current courses, but the two managed. They were young, career criminals already; getting out of a math and language class was nothing for them.

### When the two had converged at the boys' locker room, they found their geek friend, pacing among a couple of rows of lockers in the midst of the stench and dirty towels hanging off of various ledges. He had several sheets of paper with him, some of them having pictures, Edward and Julius noticed from the distance.

### "Wayne, what's up with you, dude," Edward asked with a coating of concern as they walked up to him. He glanced at Julius, who also had a worried look on his face.

### "Oh, crap," Julius said as he swacked the side of his own head, something occurring to him suddenly, "did someone find out what we did at that church a few weeks ago?"

### Now Edward's face had gone blank, but Wayne was already waving that off by now.

"No, but it does have to do with that church..." He took a quick look at the papers in his hand, and shoved it toward Edward. "Take a good look at this guy in these archival photos."

### For about a space of half a minute Edward and Julius studied the photocopies and the literature accompanying them. Then it suddenly dawned on Edward. Wayne nodded with quiet satisfaction while Julius was looking back and forth at Edward and the photos, still trying to figure out who was the tall, dark, middle age man in the printout. And then it hit him as well.

### "This is impossible," Julius finally said. Edward's face hadn't change while Julius continued. "This can't be! Wayne, this is—"

"Rasputin, I know. To be more specific, Grigori Yefimovich Rasputin. Appropriately enough, his surname was Vilkin. As in our bishop friend, Vilkin, from that Russian Orthodox church...I was in my social studies class, doing some research on the former Soviet Union when I ran across this info at the library online." Wayne's face was a bit on the pale side. He finally sat down on one of the locker room's benches before he continued.

"We've all heard of the saying that we all have a twin, but this is too close! I was three feet from the guy. I know what I saw."

### "Oh, come on, guys," Edward finally spoke up, handing the papers to Julius. "It was about twelve at night when we saw him. There are—"

"Eddie, I know what I saw," Wayne repeated, uncharacteristically aggressive. "You were there, too! Take a look at him in those photos...he even holds his left hand up all the time like Bishop Vilkin. Dude, look at his eyes, his beard, and the fact that Rasputin was Russian—and who did we happen to see in a Russian church...?"

### There was an uncomfortable space of silence as Wayne left his rhetorical question to itself.

### Julius, now having second thoughts, was shifting uncomfortably next to Edward. "I don't know, Wayne...this guy lived a hundred years ago! And what would Lincoln, Nebraska have anything to do with a Russian mystic? And all those things you mentioned—for all we know, he could be some Rasputin-wanabe or admirer. Kind of like those Elvis impersonators."

### "But what about the Geiger readings," Wayne protested, one of his hands arbitrarily pointing out.

### "What about them," Edward shot back after glancing at Julius. "You took those readings from that small door, not him."

"Yeah, but that door has to have something to do with, with Bishop Vilkin, or whoever he is! It can't be a coincidence that I got those negative readings and there was a guy standing there, in the dark, just hanging out, who just happened to look exactly like Grigori Rasputin!"

### "Hey, what are you doing believing in something like this anyway," Julius said. "Aren't you Atheistic?"

Wayne blew out a sigh from the bench, vexed at having to explain himself to someone else—again! "Julius, we've had this conversation before...being an Atheist is not a belief or even a philosophy. It's the simple state of not believing in any supernatural beings or an afterlife of any sort. This—" He pointed at the copies in Julius' hands. "—this crazy situation is more in the realm of the paranormal. And with the paranormal, there tends to be more logical explanations to how and why things happen...they're just often mysterious or unexplained. I know enough about life to say that the universe is so big that there are things that happen in life we simply can't explain or understand. No more than an ant cannot explain to me how a car works. But that doesn't make humans gods just because we create and understand cars. Humans are the same way in the universe as that ant. We cannot explain many things, but does that mean any gods exist...?"

### It was a tangential point in their conversation, but a very good one nevertheless. Neither Edward nor Julius responded to Wayne's monologue. In fact, it remained quiet in the locker room for a while as they all thought on what was next.

"Look," Edward said, "we all got to get going before the principal sends in the SWAT units after us. I suggest we forget all about this Rasputin bullshit and just be glad we got our pay from the church." Edward deliberately focused his eyes on Wayne, yet seated on the bench. "We all drop it! Right here; right now. Talk to anyone else about this and they'll start asking questions about this Bishop Vilkin and they'll trace what we did at the church to us! Personally speaking, even if he is Rasputin resurrected, I don't care. What does that have to do with me?"

### Julius and Wayne traded looks.

### "By the way," Edward said, ignoring his partners' apprehensive glances, "looks like we have another treasure opportunity...I'll talk to you guys about it later."

### Edward flashed a look of warning toward Wayne, and, as far as Julius could tell one at him as well! Then he left the locker room.

### Wayne had gotten off the bus at a fairly busy corner on East Lincoln. It was in an area of town where fancy churches peppered large swaths of land and where upper-income Lincolnites attended their institutions of beliefs. It was here that Wayne found where The Russian Orthodox Church of Lincoln held their services temporarily. The temporary church site was very modern and quite minimalistic, in comparison to the original church's ancient Gothic, Baroque style. It was also quite small—a mere meeting hall, virtually. But that was all that the Russian Orthodox members needed until they had a new church edifice rebuilt, thanks to the money coming from their insurance company's fire compensation policy. And with a relatively sizable Russian population in Lincoln, Wayne guessed it would not be too much longer for a new Orthodox church to be built to replace the old one.

### Wayne opened the door to the hall and found a middle-aged secretary at the circulation desk. She had a bit of a hard look about her, but she clearly made an effort not to show it in her demeanor as she smiled at him.

### "Welcome to the Russian Orthodox Church," she said with a heavy flavor of Russian. "Can I help you, young man?"

### Wayne gathered his thoughts before answering. He had decided to do a little investigation on his own into the whole Rasputin episode...if, in fact, that was whom they were dealing with. It was clear that Julius and, especially, Edward were not going to help him on this.

### "Hi, my name is Wayne Paul. I'm a student at Lincoln High. I'm doing a report for my social studies class. I ran across something that relates to your church and I was wondering if there was someone I can talk to about it?"

### "Oh...okay." Her English was a lot better than Bishop Vilkin's. "Are you talking about the religious aspect of our church? Historical in nature...?"

### "Mmm, a bit of both."

### "Well, you came at a good time, Wayne. Bishop Nicolas Gurnov is here today and he has a light load this morning. I believe he may have some time for you!"

### The secretary had picked up the phone and was about to dial for the bishop when she noticed Wayne's countenance.

### "Is everything all right, young man?"

"Yeah..." Bishop Gurnov. Now that was interesting.

### About two minutes later, a man around sixty, clean-shaven, came from behind the circulation desk and walked over to Wayne and shook his hand. He was amiable, rather plump and short, and quite nimble...the complete opposite of the man who claimed to be the Bishop of the Russian Orthodox Church of Lincoln, Nebraska he and Edward and Julius met a few weeks ago!

### Gurnov walked Wayne over to his temporary office, located just a few yards from the circulation desk. The bishop closed the door and gestured for Wayne to take a seat on a chair that was in front of his desk. Wayne noted how instead of seating himself behind his desk, Bishop Gurnov sat on the chair next to his. Usually a good sign that someone wanted a more informal conversation and was more likely to listen.

### "So, Wayne," the bishop said, his Russian accent a bit softer than the secretary's, "you're doing some research for social studies on the Orthodoxy in Russia?"

### "No, not quite. It was on the Soviet Union. But, you know how it goes when you're doing research on the Web...your eyes run across other links that look interesting to you and the next thing you know you're at another web site totally outside of what you're supposed to be reading!"

### The bishop laughed easily. "Yes, that happens to me nearly every day! So, what was the link that grabbed your attention? Ours?"

Here we go!, Wayne thought. "Uh, no..." Wayne produced the hard-copies from the web site he had printed on Rasputin and shared with Edward and Julius. Julius had given them back to Wayne a couple of days ago, after the trio's meeting in the boys' locker room. Instead of embarrassing himself any further, Wayne simply handed the pages over to Bishop Gurnov without saying a word.

### Wayne expected the man to scold him about bringing up such a foolish subject since he's such a busy man. But, to Wayne's totally surprise, Bishop Gurnov's face turned to stone! That, in turn, caused Wayne to freeze, wondering if he offended him instead of angering him.

"And, how did you say this had to do with our church," Gurnov inquired softly, the bright eyes on his countenance long gone by now.

### Wayne paused. It almost felt like an interrogation now. He remembered Edward's warning about telling other people about this Bishop Vilkin, since it would implicate them with the larceny they committed at the church. But Wayne knew that what they were dealing with was far larger than a few stolen items.

"I—a couple of friends and I—saw someone that looked exactly like Rasputin!"

The bishop looked upon Wayne with questioning eyes. "Where did you see this individual?"

### "At your church, Bishop."

### Another moment of uncomfortable silence.

"Was this before or after the fire burnt our church down?"

### "It was after."

### Gurnov leaned back in his chair and breathed out the slightest of a sigh. He leafed through the printouts silently. He then, suddenly, got up from his chair and went to his office phone. He, presumably, called the secretary, said something in Russian to her, and hung up the phone.

Oh, no; he called the cops!, was all that Wayne could think. Worse yet, may be the organization that replaced the KGB...may be Julius, Edward, and I all created an international rift!

### "Wayne," said Bishop Gurnov, his voice nearly back to its previous jovial level, but his eyes a bit more subdued, "are you finished with school today?"

### Wayne considered the man very carefully before responding. "Yeah...I only had five periods today. Why?"

### "Because, my young friend, you are about to take a little history lesson."

### Bishop Gurnov gave an outline on the life of Grigori Rasputin. That he was born around 1864 in Pokrovskoe, near the Ural Mountains and near the Siberia vicinity. Later, as a young man, Rasputin had been a student at a monastery in the town of Verkhoture, though he did not follow through with becoming a monk.

### To Wayne's surprise, Rasputin had married and had three children. Indeed, later, after entering the circle of the upper class in Russia of the early 1900s, it was purported that Rasputin had mistresses and was accused by some of using his high-class connection for those trysts. He also eventually had a following, a kind of discipleship. He claimed, and was believed by others, that he could heal those with infirmities and was able to foresee the future.

### His move to St. Petersburg was his apex of fame, power, and, ultimately, his downfall. By the time the last of the Russian tzars, Nicholas Romanov, was desperate to stop his son's bout of hemophilia, Rasputin had become famous throughout Russia. Other medical measures the Romanovs took apparently didn't work. So, by 1907, Rasputin was invited to try his magic on the Russian monarch's son. For some unknown reason, little Aleksei's hemophiliac attack stopped and, predictably, it was credited toward the healing powers of Rasputin.

Bishop Gurnov said that, depending on whom you talk to, it's believed that Rasputin took advantage of this apparent miracle with Aleksei Romanov. Rasputin warned Tzar Nicholas that if he wanted his son to stay alive and for his monarchy to reign successfully, Rasputin would have to have a seat in the Romanovs' house of power!

### Well, that was a little too much for some in the Romanov regime. Indeed, Tzar Nicholas and his wife, Alexandra, found out about Rasputin's mistresses and they began to share the Russian officials' concerns about his impact on the Russian government.

### In December of 1916 there was a plot to kill Rasputin. Interestingly enough, two of the three men who ended up murdering Rasputin were relatives of the tzar. Prince Feliks Yusupov was married to Tzar Nicholas' niece and Grand Duke Dimitry Pavlovich was cousin to the tzar. The third man was a member of the Russian parliament, the Duma...

"...yet Rasputin lived, even after eating the poisoned food," Bishop Nicolas Gurnov was saying to young Wayne Paul, who had remained seated at the same chair through the Russian's brief historical account of Rasputin. "So one of the three men shot Rasputin, and even that did not work!"

### "Yeah," Wayne confirmed, "I remember reading that at one of the other websites I went to! Poor guy probably would have lived to be an old man if it weren't for the fact that they ended ganging up on Rasputin and dumping him in that river."

"Yes, the Neva." The bishop had been standing the whole time as he told the legend, gesticulating with his chubby hands. But now his body language had settled, and he reclaimed his seat next to Wayne's. The bishop's old eyes were unblinking as he addressed the young criminal. "Wayne, I don't know what you and your friends were doing at our church when you saw this man. Honestly, I do not care...under normal circumstances, yes, right now you would be talking to police for trespassing on our property. But if it is true that you saw a man, who very much looked and seemed to carry himself like that of Rasputin, then not only does our church have bigger problems to worry about, but so do you and your friends!"

### That statement made Wayne's heart skip a beat! Wayne said nothing. He didn't even move. It wasn't bravado. It was his way of waiting for the next shoe to drop.

### "Rasputin's body was never found. Did you ever read that in any of the websites you went to?"

### Wayne silently and slowly shook his head.

"Yes...we are told that he was tied up by Yusupov, Pavlovich, and Purishkevich and then thrown into the Neva River, but we are never told if anyone had ever found his body! Now, I cannot say you will ever read this in any of the history books, but as is told among some, Rasputin had survived the assassination attempt. Some Christians in a small village down the river from St. Petersburg had stumbled across a tall, dark-haired man in a black robe...he had wounds about him and was taking off some ropes that were around him. Now, the village was so isolated and small that they had never heard of Rasputin, so they had no idea whom he was. Otherwise, they would have never accepted him into their village, where, as it is told, he took advantage of the villagers' hospitality and slaughtered all of them for their food, one of their horse-drawn carriages, and some of their small treasures..."

### Privately, Wayne wondered if the bishop was making some point about he and Edward and Julius being thieves and stealing from a church when he said 'small treasures' and that bit about a Christian village. But he, wisely, kept his tongue.

"One of the treasures that Rasputin had pilfered," Bishop Gurnov went on, "was a key. Rasputin, as he was riding away from the tiny village that he destroyed, stopped to rest and decided to look at his newly acquired small fortune. That was when he discovered this key...it had a floral design on the handle with foreign words written on both sides. Rasputin had limited formal education so he did not realize that it was in English—and this is where our Church, in Lincoln, comes into this story," Bishop Gurnov said with gusto as he pointed at Wayne.

### "The key had belonged to a relative of one of the families he killed in that tiny town outside of St. Petersburg...."

"Let me guess," Wayne said, finally getting the nerves to speak, especially after seeing that the Bishop was not going to turn him over to the cops, "this relative of that Russian town was of your family; the Gurnovs."

Bishop Gurnov laughed hardily. It was the most informal Wayne had seen him up to that point. "You are very smart, Wayne! How do young people call it? You are geek?" Wayne half-way laughed, half-way sighed for slight annoyance, but he let the Bishop continue; more somber now. "The key, as Rasputin had thought, belonged to something very important. Otherwise, why would a simple key be found among treasures, no? So, as is told in my family for years, Rasputin went back to that same village months later after he recovered from his wounds, so he could find whatever treasure box the key went to.

"Only, the village outside of St. Petersburg was then occupied by soldiers of a new power that had replaced his old friend, Tzar Nicholas..."

### "The Soviet Union," Wayne helped out.

### "The Soviet Union," Bishop Gurnov said approvingly with a nod. "We are not sure of details at this point, but my family speculated that Rasputin must have figured out the change in power of Russia and remained in hiding, because the atheist, anti-bourgeois Soviets would not tolerate the once-friend and close adviser to the Romanovs!"

"So, is that part of the reason why we don't read about his body being found, or anything else about him...he was in hiding for years after his reported death? From the Soviets and some of the Romanovs who didn't like his influence over Nicholas II?" Wayne was incredulous at the point.

### "Remember, my American friend, his body was never found!"

Wayne winced at that point. "No offense, but not finding something is not the same thing as proving that something is in existence...so, what about this key, if I may, Bishop Gurnov? Does it go to that little door on the basement's floor?"

"Not quite...the key is for what is inside the door."

Wayne waited patiently, but the elderly man merely sat quietly. "Bishop, may I ask, what is inside that door that this Rasputin wants so badly?"

### Bishop Gurnov assessed Wayne. "So, Wayne, you said you have seen the door in the basement floor. And I'm assuming you and your friends left the door exposed where Rasputin could see it?"

### Wayne shifted in his chair; guilt shooting through him. "Yes, Bishop...I was going to tell you about that—"

### Surprisingly, the Bishop stopped Wayne with a gentle touch on the young man's shoulder. "It's ok, Wayne. I probably should not tell you this much, but it was a—how do you Anglophones say it...reddish herring."

"Red herring."

### "Red herring," he corrected himself; smiling as he leaned back in his chair. Wayne noticed how he looked at his wrist watch.

### "Bishop, I don't understand..." Wayne had a sudden thought. "Did your church set the fire yourselves?"

### He gave the slightest of shrugs. "Fires happen all the time, my young friend; especially in buildings that are over a hundred years old."

### Wayne was not amused. "Bishop, if you're saying what I think you are saying, at best that's considered fraud! Look, I understand that you wanted to throw that Rasputin-creep off, but firefighters and other people put their lives on the line to rescue your church!"

### "Says one of the thieves who broke into my family's church."

### Checkmate. Wayne and the Bishop both understood this. Wayne leaned back in his chair; humbled.

### "You realize that Rasputin has probably already figured out you tricked him," Wayne finally said to Bishop Gurnov.

### He was already nodding his head, pensively. "Again!" Wayne did a double take. Apparently, there was some kind of cat and mouse game that's been going on for decades between Bishop Gurnov's church and this Rasputin! "That's why I said that we all have bigger problems than to worry about anything that you and your friends have stolen from the church."

### "So, if the fire and the small door in the basement was just to throw Rasputin off, what was causing the radiation that my Geiger counter was reading?"

### "Bits of nuclear waste," the Bishop stated very matter of fact. "What else would make a Geiger read such levels?"

### Wayne looked at the elder man; utterly shocked! "Bishop Gurnov, you can't just go around sticking nuclear waste in a church just so you keep people away! Where did you get it from, if I may ask?"

### "When I went on a trip to Chernobyl years ago," he said with a shrug. "One of our church members is a scientist and he helped me smuggle it into the US...we knew it would be one of the few things to keep other people away. It was this scientist's idea to insert a machine within the nuclear cask that made Geiger counters and other readers to read weird registrations when they got too close." He smiled at Wayne, figuring he would have tried something like that.

### Just then, two muscular young men—Russian, from what Wayne gathered—opened the door to the Bishop's room and stood by the door. They were in casual clothes, but their size was intimidating! They must have been the call that the Bishop did some time ago and why he glanced at his watch.

"Don't worry," the Bishop said with a slight laughter upon seeing Wayne's reaction, "they're for you."

"Me?"

### Bishop Gurnov nodded as his eyes stayed on some corner of the room. "You and your friends have stumbled upon a strange war that's been going on for about a hundred years now...even though you all did it during a crime against my family church, you still don't deserve to have Rasputin in your lives because of it." He then turned his eyes squarely on Wayne. "Especially you, Wayne...we knew about you and your friends already! Without giving away too much details of our operation, we had gotten word that Rasputin was on to us and was closing in. So, we needed something to keep him at bay."

### "The fire and the dirty nuke in the media," Wayne said with a nod of being impressed. "That way you could ensure tv cameras and the public hanging around church grounds, making it uncomfortable for Rasputin to show up at your church!"

### The Bishop looked at the two guards, beaming. "As I said earlier; you are geek!"

### Once again, the diplomatic laugh from Wayne. But the Bishop got serious before speaking a bit more.

"Wayne, I'm afraid you are going to have to make a choice that you and your friends have now found yourselves in. Rasputin has been chasing my family since he massacred my relatives back in that small village outside of St. Petersburg in 1916. He's never stopped searching for us since then," the Bishop warned Wayne with the most serious disposition he could. "I'm afraid that when he saw inside that safe was nothing but discarded nuclear waste, he will have counted you and your friends as accomplices to my family. You can join me as an ally, where I can offer you protection, but I would also expect some help from you."

### "Of course," Wayne simply said as he nodded.

"Or you could simply move your family from Lincoln; may be even the Midwest in general...it is us he is really after."

"And whatever it is that your family has had in possession for over a hundred years that he wants so badly, and you are still not willing to tell me what it is..."

### The Bishop merely smiled while the two guards stoically looked on; waiting to see which way Wayne would choose to go. Indeed, Wayne thought hard on it while the three Russians kept their eyes on him.

### "How do I know he won't come after me if I decide to move my family?"

### "Honestly, you won't ever know that for certain. I was hoping that the nuclear waste would eventually kill him from the radiation after he would open up the box in the safe, but I have gotten word today that he was seen around Lincoln." Another shrug from the Bishop.

### But that also meant that Wayne knew he could never live his life as carefree anymore. And, ultimately, he knew he could not do it himself...not against Rasputin!

### Wayne stood up from his chair and reached across the table and shook Bishop Gurnov's hand. "So, how do I put my talents to work for the Orthodox Church of Lincoln?"

### ~~fin~~

### EBOOK FIVE:

### "The Caregiver"

by scifiguy3553; Smashwords. Copyrighted @ 2014.

### Tate Morgan is a professional caregiver in the health care field. She gets a new client, who moves in with her financially well-off daughter and son-in-law after her husband died.

### During a date-night for the Barnetts, Tate is left at the house, alone, to protect her new client, Cynthia, from what appears to be a Shadow person in the house!

### Denver, Colorado; USA. Present Day...

"There she is," Tracy called out to her husband as he was putting the finishing-touch to his business attire. Both were in their early-thirties and were already financially successful. Tracy was dressed for her job as a financial analyst, and she was just now wrapping-up laying out the drinking glasses and supplements that her mother was going to take for the day. She wanted the new caregiver's first day with her mother, Cynthia, to go as smooth as possible.

### The gray SUV circled the cul de sac and came to a slow stop near the curb, by a small tree in the suburban-like residential neighborhood. Tracy and Phillip watched as the middle-aged woman climbed out of the vehicle, shut the door with her remote-key, and then quickly walked her way to the extensive grounds of the Barnett's property.

### "Prompt...I like her already," Phillip said with a contrived proper demeanor; straightening his tie as he did so.

### Tracy was nodding in agreement. "Frankly, I like the fact that she's a little on the older side." The doorbell rang and Tracy went over to open the door for her; Tracy yet speaking. "The last two I think were a little too young for..."

### "Yeah, that's what I was thinking."

### The Barnetts shared an apprehensive look, then put on a smile as Tracy opened the door.

### Behind the door was a pleasant-looking woman in her late-forties, though she clearly toned down her appearance for business purposes, the Barnetts reasoned. Her hair was medium in length, but pulled back in a lose-bun, while her clothes were sensibly an open-collar shirt and a pair of woman's khakis and tennis shoes.

### "Well, come on in, Tate," Tracy warmly invited her. Tate strode into the cavernous vestibule, just as Phillip was on his way out the front door. But he made sure to introduce himself before he left for his job at The Piers Group real estate agency at downtown Denver.

### Tracy began the brief tour of their house before she, too, had to go to work.

"Wow," Tate said after finally reaching the expansive basement. It was the last place in the house that Tracy had taken her. It was finished and had a myriad of vintage furniture, rugs, and other miscellaneous furnishings. "This basement is bigger than my last two apartments—combined!"

### Tracy shared a proper laugh as they kept walking in the partially-lit basement. Some corners were swathed in darkness and gave the basement a more dungeon feel to it!

### "Tracy," Tate was now saying, "you and Phillip certainly have done well for yourselves."

"Yeah, well, all of this," she indicated the furnishings all around them with one of her hands, "is pretty much my dad's. We're just lucky to have the space to store all of this down here after he died and mom moved in with us."

Tate's face turned almost apologetic, and, innately, the two women slowed down their pace. "I'm sorry for your loss, Tracy...I'm a few years older than both of you. So I've already lost both of my parents. I can certainly relate to your sorrows and adjusting during this very hard time in both of your lives. Especially you, since it was your father."

Tracy's head cocked inquisitively. "Thanks, Tate. But you're not so old yourself. You've already lost both of your parents?"

### "Yeah...they were both killed while on vacation in Mexico...the chartered bus from their church they were riding in slammed into an on-coming semi, just outside of Mexico City."

### "Oh, my god!"

### "Yeah...that was about, hmm, five years ago,now?" Tate was lost in memory for a few seconds.

### Tracy had a hand on one of Tate's shoulders, her eyes almost tearing up.

"Hey," Tate said, her voice more animated now, "enough about me. You are the one who lost a father recently and who needs her mother looked after!"

### They shared a social laugh.

### "Yeah, I suppose I should take you to see her..." There was a bit of hesitation in Tracy, Tate noted. She waited until her new employer felt comfortable to say more. Indeed, Tracy lowered her voice, even though her sleeping mother was on the third floor and they were in the basement.

### "Look, Tate...if you happen to notice my mom—converse with herself while she's sleeping, please don't let it bother you. And we ask that you don't try to wake her up, when you see her do this. Phillip and I took her to a psychologist and the center did a scan on my mom's brain. You know; just to make sure that all her talking wasn't some form of dementia setting in."

### "Oh, I understand...better safe than sorry," Tate interjected.

### "Exactly! But it turns out, according to Dr. Davis and from his office's scan, mom's brain is totally fine! Dr. Davis thinks when she does her talking-spell that it's just her way of dealing with my dad's death."

### Tate was nodding. "Well, that would make sense, and I can't say I blame her."

### "Thanks for that open-mindedness, Tate! You'd be surprised how very few people are about it."

Hmm?, Tate wondered to herself...

### "Ok, let's go peep in on mom and see if she's asleep!"

### Later...

### Cynthia was sleeping when Tracy and Tate got to the mid-sized bedroom on the third floor. She was tucked under layers of a blanket and covers. Only her small, lean head poked out from the bedding; her eyes tranquilly closed as no sound came from her.

### Tracy had already showed Tate the medicine regiment and the list of food and drinks for her mother. So Tracy silently mouthed to Tate that she would head off to work. In similar fashion, Tate mouthed back the acknowledgment and waved the mistress of the house goodbye as she stayed at Cynthia's doorway.

Tate waited until she heard the front door to the house shut before she started to leisurely, and quietly, stroll around Cynthia's room, looking at all the old photographs. Most of them where in black and white, and most of the photos were of family members. Some were standard-sized while others were mere inches in dimension. A few of the photos showed Cynthia when she was young; decades before her stroke that would rob the use of her legs. Young-Cynthia, standing on her own two youthful legs with a car; or another of young-Cynthia with a young, handsome man—undoubtedly, the same man that one day would become Tracy's father, Tate guessed by the facial features of the young man, when she compared it to pictures of an elderly man with very similar features—just ripened by several decades! It seemed so alien to Tate that the young woman in those pictures was the same personage before her now; swaddled and quietly sleeping while the rest of the world outside those walls churned out changes.

### Three weeks later; Friday night. Date night for the Barnetts...

### The mood at the Barnetts' upper-middle class house was up-beat. One of Phillip's colleagues was throwing a Fall party for the company and everyone was allowed to bring family and friends. Tracy and Phillip were on their way to that party.

By now, after nearly a month, Tate was comfortable with the Barnetts, but she was still not at the same level with Cynthia. Given that Tracy's mother mostly slept, and when she was awake, she said very little to Tate. It was to be expected by Tate.

### The young Barnetts were decked out in their party formals. Phillip opened the door for Tate as she showed up for the unusual night shift. Tracy was not far behind.

### "Wow, look at you two," Tate exclaimed; some of the festive atmosphere rubbing onto her.

### The young couple had just taken a selfie with both of their respective smart-phones. Laughter now filled the vestibule.

"I'm tweeting this," Phillip said while he was posting the picture onto his social media site and waving 'bye' to Tate.

### "Anything I should know about your mom tonight," Tate asked Tracy, with a bit more of a business-tone.

### Tracy stopped and thought for a couple of seconds. "Not really...we made dinner for her, took her to the bathroom, showered..."

### Both women shrugged with a playful face.

### "I guess you don't have a chance but to go have fun," Tate said in a kind of 'girlfriend' mode as the two clasped hands and chuckled.

### Tate watched the Barnetts drive off, then closed the front door behind her after locking it.

### Since Tracy had done a good job of caring for her mother, that Friday night was pretty much laid back. So Tate found herself some micro-wave popcorn and popped it in the microwave and sat in front of the living room's big, flat screen tv.

### After an hour or so, and after checking on Cynthia a couple of times, Tate went down into the basement to gather toiletries for all three bathrooms of the house. As she was gathering the sundries from the stock area of the basement, Tate heard the slightest of a squeak...

### She automatically froze on the spot. Tate was making an awful lot of rustling noises with the plastic packaging that those toiletries were wrapped in, so she shrugged to herself and finished filling up the basket with supplies. She then headed for the stairs to the basement. When she reached about two-thirds of the top of the basement's stairs, Tate's eyes caught what looked to be a still shadow on the floor; right in front of the door that led to the basement! Tate knew that the Barnetts did not own any pets, so...

### Tate felt a flush of fear tsunami over her! Paralysis took over her body for a second, until she forced herself to drop the basket of supplies and rushed up the rest of the stairs and throw the basement door wide open...

### Nothing!

### Tate then silently sprinted up the stairs that led to the second and third floors. She went straight to Cynthia's room and swung her door open—only to find the elderly woman virtually unmoved since Tate last checked on her.

### It then occurred to her to do a security sweep of the entire house. Given that it was Denver and the Frontier culture ran deep there, Tate went to her purse and pulled out her handgun and checked each and every room in the house, including the garage and the basement.

After about ten minutes or so of looking around the interior of the house, she made sure all the doors were locked, then, finally, went outside; making sure the front door was also locked. Tate always kept an extra copy of the house key in one of her pants-pockets, so she was secured there. But after a few more minutes of inspecting the three acre-property of the Barnetts, Tate found nothing out of the ordinary. She had to make sure to carry her gun with her so the neighbors would not see it. And since she was not a hundred percent sure she had seen or heard someone in the house, Tate wanted to keep her security sweep to herself...in the meantime.

### Tate quickly went back into the house and secured the front door. As she leaned against the door to catch her breath and to calm herself down, she debated whether or not to text either of the Barnetts. She decided against it, as she walked over to her purse and replaced her handgun. Again, she wanted to make sure her mind was not playing tricks on her, so no need to alert the bosses, yet. Hopefully, never.

She looked around the first floor of the large house from where she stood as the comedy show she was watching on tv continued its broadcast. Tate paid close attention to the shadows being cast all about the living room, the dining room, the sun room, and the kitchen...and there, she saw it! Ever since she was a child, growing up in the countryside of Colorado, she had heard of the Shadow People. How, supposedly, that strange feeling that one gets when one thought you saw something—or someone—move at the corner of your eye. Or right when you look away from one part of a room and focus your eyes on another part of the room, there seemed to be some kind of dark patch that flashes in one's field of vision...

Only, this vision was not flashing away!

### If she did not move her head, Tate could actually see the eyes! Blue, hazel...? But she played it off, for it seemed this Shadow being was holding still; trying to camouflage into the shadows of the kitchen, which was the very opposite location where Tate was in the house currently.

### "I think I'm seeing things," she said aloud, just enough for Shadow to hear her over the tv set. Her voice had a bit quiver to it, but Tate knew she had to be strong for Cynthia! "I think I better lay off those energy drinks!"

### Then she remembered her gun! She had just put it back in her purse, but had walked away several feet from it. If she went for it now, it would alert Shadow! And she had no idea if this intruder was armed or not! To play for time, she act as if she were watching the tv for a minute.

Just rush him!, she thought to herself. But, again, was Shadow armed? Were there more than one of Shadow? She also thought about rushing upstairs to the third floor and get Cynthia out of harms way! But as small and frail as she was, what would she do with a seventy-something year old woman over her shoulder as this Shadow rushes upstairs, unimpeded like she would be with Cynthia?

### She was beginning to panic, because she knew that if she sat for too long while she tried to figure things out, Shadow would either try to take advantage of the silence and get to her, or it would try for Cynthia!

### Paralysis!

### Then her smart phone rang! Her smart phone... Before Tate answered it, she looked at the caller id. It was a Colorado number, but it was not assigned in her phone, so she did not know who it was. But if she could use it to her advantage over the Shadow...?

### "Hello?"

"Ms. Morgan, this is the FBI. Do not respond! I'm agent Turner. I called from a local phone because I figured you would answer a call with a local area code. Now, my team have been monitoring Phillip and Tracy Barnett every since we've gotten some complaints about them from some former caregivers that used to work for them, before you came on the scene...act like you remember me from a party!"

### Without missing a beat, Tate caught on to what the agent was doing. "Oh! Yeah...I remember you from that house party..."

"Good job...alright, now listen to me very carefully, but say something every few seconds, ok? We have snipers that have you and the intruder in our gun-scopes...truth was, Ms. Morgan, we didn't know if you were the one that Cynthia was talking to. Something about trying to find out where Tracy's father had hid some money that he did not leave in the will! Apparently, it was this guy in the kitchen playing poor ol' Cynthia like he were some kind of ghost, or something!"

### "No, I don't like those kinds of movies," Tate blurted out. Her nerves were still a wreck!

### "Now, what I'm going to need you to do," the agent continued, "is drop your cell phone and crouch way down for it...ok? But on my mark!"

### Tate was about to improvise something else, when she saw a streak of blackness shoot from the kitchen! Something must have tipped the Shadow off to what she was doing, and now he was on his way to kill her! With her gun in her purse, yet, being too far away, Tate was left out of ideas to defend herself and the FBI agents might shoot her along with the Intruder as he rushed her!

### But one shot took him down to the floor; writhing in pain! It was surreal...the comedy show on the tv had been playing all this time, with a laugh track and applause. All while the FBI sting was just about to go horribly wrong! But it wasn't the FBI's snipers that brought this Shadow down...

### With her entire body shaking, Tate looked up from her crouching position. It was Cynthia, slowly walking down the flight of stairs with a shot gun in her hand! And now the whole house was being flooded by Federal agents and local police officers; all with their guns drawn. Some had them trained right on Cynthia! But she continued her slow stepping down the stairs.

### "Alright, easy boys and girls," a burly Federal agent, clothed in a dark business suit that was accented with a bullet-proof vest, directed everyone. "Cynthia's working with us on this!" That must be Agent Turner, Tate figured.

### Cynthia quietly handed her shot gun to the closest Federal agent as she kept her slow walking pace to Tate. She could see the amazement in the younger woman's eyes, and began to laugh.

### "Oh, Tate, honey, I'm so sorry you had to go through that..." Cynthia sighed and took a seat on one of the couches in the living room while the Feds and local cops escorted the criminal out of the house. Finally, one of the officers turned off the tv. Tate joined her on the couch, but said nothing and let Cynthia explain.

"Originally, my daughter and her crooked husband had hired some young CNAs to care for me. Somehow, they got wind of Tracy and Phillip's plan to find out where my late-husband had put some money he deliberately kept out of the will...huh! That explained why we couldn't keep good help around here! Anyway, before you were hired, I found out about it myself and played up the old-woman-can't-get-around-theme." She shook her head. "Well, it worked...that idiot was hired by my daughter and my son-in-law! They thought that I would get so spooked by him that I would spill my husband's secret about his money...ha! Look around you, Tate. Did you really think some kids, barely into their thirties, could actually afford all this? They've been stealing from my family for years, darling. And I'm sorry we got you caught in the middle of all this."

### "So," Tate finally came in, looking at the circus all around her, "you were wired, all that time?"

### "Yep," Cynthia nodded, a resilient smile gracing her lined face.

This time, Tate shook her head; partially out of being impressed with the operation, partially because she could not believe she was in the middle of it all!

### "So," Cynthia called out to Tate, as the younger woman gathered her personal belongings, trying to get out of the way of the agents and officers, "now that you don't have me as a client, Tate, what do you plan to do?"

### She blew out a cynical tsk. "I'm just a caregiver, Cynthia...have been for years."

### Cynthia was watching the action all around them as she spoke. "Ever thought about being an agent? You held up pretty well in here with your life at risk!"

### "Sorry, Cynthia, I don't do well in the shadows..."

### And with that, Tate took her things, was given permission to leave by Agent Turner, and she was gone.

### ~~fin~~

### EBOOK SIX:

"Normal-PARA", by scifiguy3553. Smashwords. Copyright @ 2015.

Sammuel and Trisha are new to the paranormal investigative field in Portland, Oregon. Upon their hunt for Bigfoot in a forest, they make new friends...and find themselves in their own paranormal situation. One that is not typical of a search for Bigfoot!

### PORTLAND, OREGON; PRESENT DAY...

"Two-thrity-eight..."

"Go ahead..."

"Got a female, about twenty; patrons complained about subject disrupting a private party at Janet's Booth Bar and Grill. Why don't you send over a twenty in case subject's still around."

"Copy that..."

### Silence...

"One-one..."

"Go ahead..."

"Any update on that sighting?"

Silence...Some static popped over the speaker to Sammuel Harpel's laptop speaker as he listened in to the Portland Police Department's live radio scanner feed from his small apartment near downtown Portland.

"One-one," repeated the other officer over the radio; the slightest touch of impatience heard in her voice.

"Yeah, one-one, here...I've got two civilians here who said they spotted something following them while they were hiking through Forest Park...I'm over at Northwest Industrial with them now. Civilians are in vehicle with me out of precaution."

"Copy that...sending over a twenty to St. Helen's Road."

"One hundred, on that."

The static, droning of Portland police officers over the online radio broadcast went on while Sammuel responded to a phone call from his girlfriend. Being so engrossed in the radio scan, Sammuel was actually startled by his smartphone's vibrations. Sammuel fumbled for his phone out of his front pants pocket to answer.

"You heard that," Trisha Mohr asked him excitedly; her high voice shot through the smartphone's speaker. "That's three, now, Sammy...three calls about something spotted by people in Forest Park in the past five months!"

"And so far the cops have said absolutely nothing about it whenever we or the media ask them about it," Sammuel responded with as much force as Trisha. "I don't know about you, Trish, but that sounds like a cover-up in my books!"

For a time, neither said anything while they both listened to the Portland police scanner. "I say we go over," she said suddenly.

### By that time, Sammuel's eyes had gone over to his laptop, which had a map on the monitor of the city of Portland. But he snapped them to attention after Trisha's last comment. "You mean tonight?"

"Hella yeah! Sammy, we've been tracking this for basically half a year now. Summer will be over if we keep waiting! And this time we have a third sighting! And you know what they say about three's..."

### "Yeah, when you have a situation at least three times, you have a pattern!"

### Trisha was still living with her parents, so Sammuel had to take that into consideration of any plans about the two of them going out; before twelve in the morning! But Trisha had already thought that out.

### "Hey, I'll just tell my folks I got a call from work and they needed someone to close for them after one of their grill people walked out. They'll believe that! I suppose I better make sure to put our gear out in my car before I tell them."

Sammuel was now back at his seat, in front of the laptop; scrolling around the map with a partial view of downtown Portland and a swath of Forest Park. "You realize it'll be tricky staying connected to the net out there...none of this will matter if we can't post it online for the world to see!"

### "Even if we get to a point where we can't stay connected to the net," she said as she gathered some hiking gear, "so long as we record it all, it'll be on our devices. We can always upload to the net later, when we get back in town."

### Even though Trisha could not see Sammuel over her smartphone, he was nodding at her point. "Ok, I'm about to head out...where did you want to meet?"

### She took a few seconds to think. "Let's just park by the La Quinta hotel out there. Just in case things go south, at least a large group of people won't be that far from the woods."

### ...............

### FOREST PARK; TUALATIN MOUNTAINS. SEVERAL MILES WEST OF DOWNTOWN PORTLAND. 1:42 AM...

### It had been days since Sammuel and Trisha had seen each other. They gave each other a long kiss and hug at the edge of the forest upon seeing each one another. They had been in a relationship for about a year and developed a strong bond, just after meeting during an outdoors party put on by one of Trisha's friends over a year ago. Since then, they had hiked the Tualatin Mountains a few times--their idea of a night out!

### On a couple of those occasions, they ran across several splintered trees, remains of animals so mutilated that one would have thought them aliens, and--most interesting of all--vignettes made out of a few pebbles; nothing else! The tiny stones were either piled into a tiny pyramid or some crude geometric. Usually, they were found atop a fallen tree or a slab of rock...it was those collection of pebbles, in light of the other findings, that convinced Trisha and Sammuel that there was something out in those mountains that was not typical of animal forest species.

### At first, they tried telling a few of their family and friends, but often the comeback--and valid, the couple would admit--would be, 'How do you know the pebbles weren't just some other hikers leaving "bread crumbs" for themselves in the forest?' Or, 'You guys are just being brainwashed by all those paranormal shows and movies.' Even with the video footage that Sammuel and Trisha provided via their smartphones, none within their circle believed them...

So that was when the couple got deeper into their new-found mission in life. Over the past few months, they both had invested money in some high-tech wildlife monitoring cameras and sensors! When asked by a local radio show out of Portland during an interview about their search, they both made sure not to use the names Sasquatch, Yeti, or Momo...it was the interviewer that brought up the name, Bigfoot.

Trisha and Sammuel were just one team out of a several that existed in the Portland area that were on the hunt for Bigfoot. They were still new to the practice, and they were young, so no one among the older organizations really took them seriously. But the Bigfoot community did listen to the Protect Against the Real Anomalies--Search organization: PARA-Search.

"What the hell are you doing here," Trisha exclaimed after she and Sammuel ran across the media-slick, world-renowned paranormal hunting group. Their temporary camp-site was awash in lights from the television production equipment and two of their team members were recording just as the young couple walked into their videoing.

### There were seven in their crew, their ages running from about that of Sammuel and Trisha to the oldest at a mere thirty-five years old. They wore mostly black uniforms--dark slacks with polos; although some in the group wore jackets. All, of course, with the organization's logo printed on their uniforms. And just like any other world-wide paranormal organization, their hunting equipment was top of the line!

### "Alright, cut, Ben..." The tallest of the group, and leader, Richard Hessl impatiently blew out a sigh and turned to see Trisha and Sammuel standing about fifteen yards away from them in the forest; their equipment looking more like they were about to take music lessons!

### Richard started, but then caught himself. Others in the group looked at him, also noticing the same thing. "Hey, aren't you that couple that was on that community radio station a few weeks ago?"

### Admittedly, it was hard for Sammuel and Trisha to be entirely angry at them after that.

### "Yeah," Sammuel spoke up. "But, like you said, that was a few weeks ago. I'm surprised you even know about that!"

### Richard, easily seen with all the lights among the crew, smiled. "We like to take time to do a lot of research before we start filming at a locale..." He placed a hand to his chest; pointed to the respective person he began to name off. "I'm Richard Hessl...my crew, Beatrice Crowe, Pam Alter, Tom Zeimmer, Al Port...and behind the cameras are Chris Hapshaw and Ben Arrow!"

All of them, as Richard ticked off the names, either nodded toward the young couple, or gave some quick wave and a smile. Sammuel, the friendlier of the couple, introduced himself and Trisha, and her behalf. She still did not like the fact that one of those know-it-all, Hollywood-types paranormal group was in the woods, now, and she and Sammuel would have to compete against them to find whatever it was they all believed was out there! The PARA-Search crew had a pretty good idea of this, given Trisha's less-than hospitable demeanor.

### "So...any good vibes tonight," Richard asked after an awkward silence.

### Sammuel shrugged. "Just decided to check it out tonight." He glanced at Trisha. He knew she did not want him to carry on too long with them.

### Richard gave a quick face. "Oh...truth be told, we were just listening in on the cops' radio scanner and got a lead!" The whole crew softly laughed.

The private irony was not lossed on the couple. Even Trisha shared some teeth! But Sammuel gave a knowing look at her, and even his hospitality had a limit...they had to get moving before PARA-Search did!

### "Hey, listen," Sammuel finally said, "we better let you guys get back to work."

### Sammuel gave a friendly wave while they both started to go off to another direction before Pam, one of the main co-hosts on the team, called out to them. Trisha and Sammuel were surprised to see such a concerned look on her face.

### "We probably shouldn't tell you this," she gave a somewhat rebuking look toward Richard as she said this; then looked back at the couple, "but I couldn't live with myself if we didn't give you a heads up...there's word from some of the locals that one of Portland's top Bigfoot hunters got killed tonight!"

### "What," both Sammuel and Trisha called out. Their attention was now fully on the team.

### "What was his name," Sammuel asked. "The Hunters are pretty much a tight group around here."

### Ben, one of the tech helpers in the PARA team, spoke up. "I believe it was a Ted Bishop."

### Both Sammuel and Trisha gasped; she up against Sammuel's chest. They both looked away for a few seconds. The PARA team gave glancing, saddened looks at each other.

### "What happened to Ted," Sammuel finally said.

### Nearly everyone shrugged from the production crew. Richard looked among his subordinates. "One of the locals told me he has a nephew that's a cop and he was one of the officers called to the scene..." At that point, the radiant countenance of Richard had darkened. "Something about a trail of blood that stretched for several meters and they couldn't even find his body. But for the fact that his equipment and backpack were left on site, there would've been no way to even know who the blood belonged to..."

### Now, literally, everyone at the campsite was silent and gave worried looks between one another.

### "You won't read about it, though," Tom, another of the co-hosts on the televison show, warned. "The best we could guess between all of us is, the cops are still investigating--"

### "Or they don't want to scare everyone in the Portland area," Chris, the other technical hand, put in from behind his camera. He had been recording their encounter all that time!

### "Chris," Richard admonished, "really? It's one thing when it's our crew, but we don't know how this couple feels about being recorded!"

### "No, it's ok," came a softened Trisha. All heads slowly swiveled to her. Given her previous attitude, no one expected such understanding from her. Perhaps it was the news of a local friend's death? "In fact..." She gave a questioning look at Sammuel, then glanced at the PARA crew. "Would you all mind if Sammy and I kind of tagged along...just for tonight?"

### Sammuel thought on the news of the long-time Bigfoot hunter, and gave a consenting nod. "If it's alright with you and your crew, Richard?"

### Without a second's delay, the crew had already voiced their agreement and waved the couple over to their camping ground. Sammuel and Trisha finally got to shake all of their hands. Chris had never stopped recording, while Ben had hefted his camera and resumed.

### ...............

### 3:29 AM...

### After nearly two hours into the combined camps of Trisha and Sammuel with that of the PARA-Search crew, neither group found anything related to a Bigfoot event or a trace. Of course, those of the skeptical persuasion would say, 'What did you expect?' Of course, given that all nine people within the combined Bigfoot party where out in a forest searching for said-creature showed they were not letting such doubters dissuade them.

### They decided to rest at a relatively wide-opened area that was much deeper into Forest Park. Richard teamed up with the two tech helps to look at some of the footage they had so far. Sammuel and Trisha were doing the same with their own equipment that they brought with them.

### "Hey, everybody," Richard called out after several minutes of quiet observations of their video, "you might want to come and take a look at this!"

### Those that were a few yards away met up with the whole group as they all formed a semi-circle around the tech hand crew Ben and his laptop. Again, Chris was recording the whole interaction every step of the way. Including the recording on Ben's laptop.

### "Why don't you show them what you got from camera eight, Ben," Richard requested as he stepped back to let others see.

### Ben keyed on his laptop's keyboard and brought up an image of fallen tree. It was a close up, Trisha and Sammuel could tell. And within the center of the shot was one of those pebble configurations--this one, the tiny stones were laid out in a perpendicular pattern, with a lot of spaces in between each of the pebbles.

### "Alright," Ben said as he glanced around at the whole crew behind him and the laptop, "you may remember that when we first started tonight's hunt, after Trisha and Sammuel joined us, that I kind of disappeared for a bit? Well, I was going around the Forest looking for some of those little rock formations. As you all know, PARA-Search has those tiny cameras that can be stashed anywhere without being seen--Chris and I have equipment that tracks each cameras' location so we can retrieve them later...

"Now, Trisha and Sammuel, you guys are the locals, here. So in that, you two are more the professionals on this point: Do you have an idea on how many of these rock-forms there are in these woods?"

### Sammuel and Trisha looked at each other with blank faces; almost surprised that the famed-PARA-Search crew would need their assistance at all! Indeed, all eyes were now on the young couple.

### "I've personally counted fourteen," Sammuel spoke up. "I've logged each formation in my electronic notebook."

"But we've also heard from other local Bigfoot hunters that they've seen more at different areas of the Forest we haven't even gone through, yet," Trisha explained. "So...there could be up to more than a hundred of these formations for all we know!"

### The PARA crew glanced at one another with a combination of concern and overwhelmed looks.

### "Just a suggestion," Richard said from behind the group, "may be the locals could start marking the formations; kind of mapping their location. Not trying to come into your town and tell you what to do--"

### "No, it's ok," Sammuel said with a nod. "That's actually a great idea."

Ben waited until Richard was done. "As a matter of fact, I ran into so many of these formations that I had to limit how many of our tiny-cams I could use." He playfully looked at Sammuel and Trisha. "Even rock stars have their limits!" The couple chuckled at the comment. "Ok...I am currently recording a total of ten of these formations. I just randomly chose this location."

### "I remember seeing that bread crumb," Al, another of the co-hosts, shared as he pointed toward the monitor.

### "Yeah, me, too," Ben said. "Only, I don't think these rock formations are bread crumbs, everyone..." Ben typed on the keypad that made the picture go to a split-screen. The new image was that of another pebble vignette. This formation was a simple pyramidal pile that was atop a small rock outcrop.

"Ok, I'm letting both of these shots play in real time and at the same time. That's important. Now, note the time-stamp on both of these images--"

### "Two twenty-eight," Beatrice, another co-host, said with a bit impatience.

### "Right. Also, keep in mind, the location of these rocks were about a mile from one another..."

### Ben went quiet and let the recording play. The recording captured not just the images but the sounds of the woods as well. Occasionally, birds were heard, but other than that; silence...until some within the group either gasped or shouted to the point that Richard had to tell them to keep their voices down!

### "What, what, what...?"

### "Dude, I didn't see shit"

### "I don't get it!"

### Those were some of the comments from those within the group that, obviously, had not seen what the others had. Again, Richard had to quell the others as Ben replayed the scenes.

### This time, Ben aided with the pointing of a finger on the laptop's screen. "Now, just keep an eye on this spot..."

### Epiphany...

### The entire group was now silent--without being told by Richard.

### "Dude, those twigs just showed up out of nowhere," Tom said; being more excited than alarmed.

### "And the time-stamps are accurate," Beatrice added. "I used the clock on my phone to match the time...bloody hell!"

### "Are you sure about the time not skipping," Sammuel put to Ben. "I mean, it could've been a two-minute gap and that would've given someone time to just place those branches there."

"At the exact same time, Sammuel," Al contested. "There would have to be two different people standing by with a radio or their cell phones to coordinate when to do that!"

"We've ran across countless time-gaps in our investigations all over the world," Pam now came in; a bit more calm, but her eyes spoke otherwise. "None of the time-gaps match exactly...besides, look at the recording. There are no jerks or motion on them!"

Without saying a word, Ben keyed into the laptop and brought up all ten of the pebble formations he was recording. He did more keying until he got to the time he wanted for every locale. "Again...two twenty-eight AM; this time all ten cameras!"

### Again, the recordings played, their time-stamps syncronized, and in each shot--reduced to smaller squares to fit within the monitor's range--there were some type of twig or branch that simply appeared right next to their respective pebble formation! Once again, the team began to get rowdy and Richard struggled to remind them that they were out in the woods. With strange happenings, on top of that!

"Sammy," Trisha said aloud to him, over the others' voices. "Remember...patterns!"

### Sammuel's face went blank. Noticing this, Richard got the couple's attention, after finally calming down his crew.

"The twigs..." Sammuel excused himself to Ben as he reached over and pointed on the laptop's screen. "Of all the times Trish and I hiked Forest Park and ran across these rock formations, they've always been nothing but rocks!"

"So, why are branches showing up now ," Pam, catching onto Sammuel's point, questioned. "Could it be something like some kind of countdown, or signal to someone else out in these woods?"

### "Yeah, and out of thin air, to boot," Tom reminded.

### "Guys," Chris' voice now came in from behind his camera; he spoke even as he recorded, "is it me, or does anyone else think that this doesn't seem like something a creature like Bigfoot would do?"

### "Yeah," Al said; now looking around with fear, "I'd say it would be a bit on the sophisticated side for a Bigfoot!"

"Look," Trisha stated, "I'm no scientist, but to Al's point; aren't we talking about physics at this point! I mean, how the hell could anyone do that, at the same time, at ten different places?"

"And based on what you and Sammuel said," Richard came in, "you two have not seen all the rock formations...if these ten formations altered with the addition of these branches, what about the other formations we don't see?"

"What get's me," now Ben said; his eyes beginning to survey the immediate surroundings, "is, if whomever it is doing all this has that kind of power we just saw in the recordings, wouldn't they have the ability to be here and we not know it?"

### Once again, silence from the group. With the exception of the various recordings that Ben let loop over and over from his laptop.

### "Folks," Richard finally spoke up, "I don't know what we're dealing with in these woods, but it sure as hell ain't Bigfoot!"

"Richie," Beatrice implored as she pulled at his jacket's sleeve, fear finally manifesting in her voice, "let's just go...I've got a very bad feeling about this one!"

### Before Richard could even respond, the majority within the group--including the young couple--voiced their consent with Beatrice!

"You don't have to tell me twice," he said as he nodded in Ben's direction. That was all Ben needed to see to start packing up his equipment. "Oh, Ben; Christopher...just leave the cameras. We go--now!"

### ...............

### MOHRS' RESIDENCE; HAPPY VALLEY, OREGON--SOUTH OF PORTLAND...

### Several months had passed since Trisha and her boyfriend, Sammuel, had experienced an extraordinary investsigation with PARA-Search. All that recording that Chris Hapshaw had done throughout that night came in handy for the paranormal crew's televison show. When it aired, it was received by critics with high marks and viewers used social media to plaster the Internet with their fandom and love for the show.

### Of course, it made Trisha and Sammuel instant stars! Indeed, the reason why Sammuel was not around lately was due to the fact that Richard Hessl had offered both of them a job with PARA-Search! How the couple handled themselves out in the Forest Park woods made an impression with the whole crew. That, and the fact that PARA-Search's marketing division told them that the viewers liked the young couple and they wanted to see more of them...based on viewership's social media postings.

Trisha was at home with her parents this particular day because she needed to move more of her things from her parents' house. With the great job Sammuel and Trisha now had with PARA, they were able to afford to buy their own house. It was not that far from the Mohrs; the town of Beaverton--just South and West of Portland.

### "So when is Sammy and the rest of the team coming back from South Africa," Faden Mohr, Trisha's mother, asked as Trisha came back in for another load of boxes to get from her parents' basement. Faden was just finishing up cooking lunch for the two of them. Bruce, Trisha's father was at work, with his computer engineering firm he started years ago. Faden took off from her job as a CPA to help her daughter with packing.

### "They're not sure," Trisha said; grabbing a cookie from a glass jar. She leaned back against the kitchen counter. "Rich said they ran into some legal problems with the hosts-family."  
"Uh, oh," Faden expressed as she, too, leaned against the counter.

### "Not sure what it is...something about Chris placing one of those micro-cameras in a sensitive area of the house!"

### They both broke out laughing.

### "That Christopher," Faden said as she got off the counter and began to clean up the kitchen.

"Hey, Mom, if it weren't for that Christopher your future son-in-law and I wouldn't be able to move out to Beaverton...he was a genius to ignore Richard and kept on recording that investigation!" Trisha started for the basement.

### "Oh, that reminds me, Dear..." Her mother walked out of the kitchen and went into the living room, then came back with a medium-sized parcel. "This came for you."

### Trisha took the box from her mother and examined it. "It's a little on the heavy side...a bit of a rattle to it. Hope it's not broken, whatever it is!"

### "I looked on the return address--"

"Yeah, I was noticing that...'Forest Park?' That's it? No name or or address?"

### Trisha went ahead and opened the box as her mother looked on...Trisha froze on the spot.

### "Well, what's wrong, Dear?" She walked over to Trisha and looked inside the box. "Ohh, well, that's beautiful! That would make a nice centerpiece for your new house, Dear! All you need to do is find something that would match with pebble stone, twigs, and...Trisha, Dear? Why is one of your team's tiny cameras in here?"

### ~~Fin~~

### EBOOK SEVEN:

"There's No Place Like Zone", by scifiguy3553. Smashwords. Copyright @ 2015.

### Chris and Kevin have no choice but to drive to Chicago from New York City for an important meeting. Their car runs out of gas at a very inopportune time. Especially when they are not alone out in the middle of nowhere...

### "I told you, Chris; we needed more gas!"

"Look, if you don't like it you can always get out and walk the rest of the way to Chicago!" As much as Chris was upset with Kevin for rubbing salt on the wound, he knew he should have listened to Kevin about an hour ago about stopping for gas. It was his fault!

Kevin looked at his co-worker over his black-rimmed glasses with a sardonic grin from the passenger seat. "Well, it looks like neither of us has a choice but to do that, now!"

The two twenty-somethings were agents for an advertising firm in Manhattan, New York called N-Grove. N-Grove was courting a major clothing company in Chicago and needed a couple of their employees to go there to close the contract. Kevin Lotsworth and Chris Maddison were the chosen victims. N-Grove was one of those youthful companies ran by youthful people and only had so much money; even after a couple of trials with crowd-funding. Therefore, old school traveling by car was a necessity.

### The only problem, now, was that Chris and Kevin had to take some unexpected detours on the interstate due to construction zones and just plain old getting lost! Which, of course, meant that more of their gas was expended than they budgeted for. They had just a few more hours before they had to be in Chicago on time for their meeting, and they were just now entering right in the middle of nowhere Indiana...

### "How long has it been since we passed the last convenient store," Kevin asked nervously. He was now surveying the bleak landscape that enveloped them and their silver, two-door car. Behind them, Kevin could see the signs of dawn splashing reddish light on the few trees that were in those parts of Indiana. They were somewhere between Toledo, Ohio and South Bend, Indiana.

### "Probably about an hour ago," Chris answered absent-mindedly.

### For a long while, neither said a word. Truth was, they were both scared out of their wits! Both had lived in New York all their lives, and when they did go on trips it was usually to other big cities...this was something that neither realized still existed in America in the early 21st century: nature! The section of Interstate 80 that the two Hipsters were on was far enough away from even the smallest of towns in Indiana that they could actually see the details of stars in the sky and even slices of the the Milky Way system!

### Chris, after pushing the trunk button, finally got out of the driver seat and walked over to the trunk and pulled out a flashlight. Kevin retrieved his online map on his smartphone and joined Chris outside.

### "What's the closest town from here," Chris wondered out loud.

### "Hmmm..." Kevin was scrolling around on his phone with the map of continental United States with the region of Indiana, Ohio, and Illinois at the center. "Angola is the closest bet, but that'll still take a while to walk out there."

"Still better than sitting around here waiting for another car to show up," Chris said as he looked around; frowning as a thought occurred to him. "Interstate 80 should be a little busier than this, shouldn't it? I mean, there are several fairly big towns around these parts."

### "Yeah, but remember all those construction zones you had to drive through...truth is, Chris, I'm not even sure if we're even still on I-80!"

Chris, alarmed by now, shot his head up and glanced around the area. "It would explain why we don't see any other cars around. I don't care how early it is in the morning, any parts of the Interstate should have some kind of traffic!"

### Now it was Kevin who became pensive as he continued to scroll through his online map. "Yeah...detours or not; wouldn't there be other cars on the same detour routes as us?"

### Chris had opened his mouth to respond but nothing came out as another sound showed up in the indigo-dark! To Chris and Kevin, it sounded as though someone was dragging their feet as the individual slowly walked toward them! The sound of the soles of some pair of shoes scratching against the textured surface of the road slowly got louder. What was worse, when they both looked around there was no one to be seen--even when Chris pointed the flashlight all around the area of the car!

### The two New Yorkers jerked out of their casual posture and were in the silver car within a matter of nano-seconds! Chris, apparently used to being in the driver seat after so many hours of driving, locked all the doors with the master pannel on the driver side. He was criss-crossing the flashlight around the immediate area of the car--yet finding no one! Kevin had already started to dial Emergency!

### "Get anybody yet," Chris had asked Kevin. Both were shaking and panting at this point!

### Kevin still had his smartphone to his ear. After a few more seconds, his face soured with confusion. "It just keeps ringing! Since when does 911 keep ringing?"

Chris handed Kevin the flashlight then stretched himself in the driver seat so he could reach his own smartphone from one of his pants pockets. The icon of of an old-fashioned land-line phone was all that Chris needed to push to reach Emergency...nothing but the sound of digitized ringing met his ear. Sheer panic was beginning to fill both young men--the car was out of gas, and for whatever reason they could not reach 911, eventhough they were able to access their online maps on their smartphones! The closest town was several miles away, and now they heard disembodied footsteps!

### Before Chris could even curse, Kevin had a hand on Chris' right shoulder, which prompted Chris to freeze. Both remained silent...

### "The footsteps stopped," Kevin observed. He slowly surveyed the area with the flashlight and saw nothing. Even when he directed the light down the stretch of road it was bare.

### Chris tried 911 again and got the same results.

### "Well, it can't be the lack of satellite connection," Chris was saying with a shaky voice, "we still have access to the Net!"

### "Then why the hell can't we get Emergency," Kevin questioned tersely; the stress of it all breaking the surface. All Chris could do was shake his head.

### Apparently they both had the same idea at the same time: Chris and Kevin began to search the car for any kind of weapon!

### "Crowbar," Kevin spat out; looking at Chris with some askance, since Chris had opened the trunk to the car.

### Chris winced. "All I got out was the flashlight!"

### "Shit! Did you close the trunk?"

Chris froze out of terror. He looked in the rear-view mirror while Kevin twisted his whole upper body and looked back toward the trunk of the car...the hatch wide open and blocking the view of the road. Anyone could have access to the car's crowbar at that point, and whatever else was in the trunk!

### Neither moved nor said a word. Both were now officially on survival-mode! All they had in the car's main interior were most of their luggage. Given that they were cultured big city boys, they did not have a gun available.

"There's got to be something in our bags that we can use," Kevin whispered urgently.

### Just then, from a distance down the road from the front of the car, they could see headlights to another vehicle! Both jerked an excited motion that was a mixture of victory and surprise. Chris started honking the horn of their car and manually flashing its lights! And just to make sure, Kevin decided to dial 911 once again...More electronic rings. By that time, the other vehicle began to approach their car.

### It was a camper; one of the newer ones that could pass as a tiny house on wheels. At the dashboard was an elderly couple, dressed as if they could pass for being tourists in Florida--though their license plate was from California.

### "You boys look like you need some help," the man at the steering wheel greeted them straightway after the driver-side window rolled down.

### "Sir, please be careful," Chris shot out toward the man after his own window rolled down. "We think there's someone out there, but we don't see him!"

### The older man gave a quick nod. He and his wife looked around the area and whispered something to each other. "I'm assuming you're having car trouble."

### "Yes, sir...ran out of gas! Would it be ok if we hopped along for a ride to the next town that you pass?"

### "We'll pay you for the ride," Kevin threw out from the passenger-side. Even though the couple was going the opposite direction, the New Yorkers did not care. They just wanted to get away from the scene and whoever could have been out there!

### N-Grove meeting in Chicago be damned!

### The man waved them over. Kevin and Chris quickly grabbed their wallets and other, small essentials from their luggage and did not even bother to look back at the car as they sprinted to the camper. The older man quickly drove away from the area after the two young men practically leapt into the camper.

### It took approximately an hour for the camper to reach Angola, Indiana. Morning was now starting to make its presence known with some orange and blue strokes on the lightening sky canvas. The first convenient store that the small crew of four in the camper saw, they made sure to stop there.

### The couple had introduced themselves on the way to Angola as Greg and Janet Vilnack. They were an older couple that were vacationing the Lower 48 and just happened to run across the road that Kevin and Chris were on...

### "So, you boys want to buy some gas here and take it with you to fill your car up," Janet asked, her voice maternal and sounding concerned. All four were still in the camper. Greg had parked it off to an isolated area of the store.

### The two Hipsters glanced at one another.

### "To be honest with you, Mr. and Mrs. Vilnack," Kevin admitted, "we haven't even thought about what to do next! We just wanted to get away from whoever was out there!"

### The couple gave a glance toward each other. Noticing this, Chris spoke up; careful not to offend the people that just rescued them.

"Look, I know it sounds crazy in retrospect, but, believe me, someone was out there!"

### The couple smiled, as if they were the boys' grandparents!

"Well, being stranded out in the countryside at night can play with your mind," Greg said with an air of understanding.

### "Greg, Sweetheart," Mrs. Vilnack said to him, "we should get them something!"

### Chris and Kevin shot uncomfortable looks at one another.

### "Oh, that's not necessary," Chris insisted. But Janet was even more insisting!

### "Don't be ridiculous! Listen, all of our kids are grown and live all over the world--it would be nice to be able to take care of somebody again!" She gave a grandmotherly smile to them.

### Kevin and Chris both forced a smile and relaxed in their seats. Greg nodded with a satisfied face and slowly exited the camper...the sound of the soles of some pair of shoes scratching against the textured surface of the road slowly ebbing...

### ~~fin~~

### EBOOK EIGHT:

"Vengeance In 3D," by scifiguy3553. Smashwords. Copyright @ 2015.

Dr. Ellen Chase is a scientist and owner of the small Three-D printing company called Triple D Select in Los Angeles. It is a very competitive, new industry with a lot of money to be made. Perhaps a little too much money.

### For Dr. Chase finds her company at the center of a conspiracy, and one that strays into the Paranormal; with a sighting that would throw off Dr. Chase and her employees.

*Dedicated to my father, Joe James Moore; from Birmingham, Alabama.

### LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA. PRESENT DAY...

### "Hey...perfect timing," Ralph Tucker said as his boss flung open the suite's door.

### Lab assistant Heather Portman heard the domicile chime from the Customizer Two--Pennult, three-dimensional printer in the lab's main area, where Ralph was as he worked on some paperwork. She had just made it back from a meeting for her working lunch break in the Anaheim area and was excited to see the results for the small firm's most recent client. "Triple D Select" was still very nascent at five months, and the owner, Dr. Ellen Chase, was already starting to get nervous about Triple D's finances.

### And with good reason. Dr. Chase was one of those young, former Silicon Valley employees of one of its major international businesses whom decided to strike out on her own and find her own gold in California. But to do that, she had to acquire some serious funding from investors. Most of Triple D's stakeholders were also from Dr. Chase's demographics--twenty to thirty-somethings, all from various parts of the world whom met in the Valley and were all ambitious, smart, and out to become the next Steve Jobs or Mark Zuckerberg. Only, in the new Three-D industry.

As what happened often with the inevitable office politics, Heather had learned from Ralph that Ms. Chase's investors were already grumbling about Triple D's slower start than what they had anticipated. After only five months. Even though Ralph was her subordinate, he always seemed to have the ear on what was going on in the tiny company well before she did! It made Ralph all the more valuable in Triple D, as far as Heather was concerned.

Since the investors were also Dr. Chase's friends from the past, the pressure was not high. But the temperature was definitely heating up to produce higher profits. Despite the Los Angeles Time's glowing article on Triple D in its Tech section within two months of Dr. Chase opening up for business. Despite the several customers to-date the small company had, with each of them posting positive reviews on social media. In the end, Triple D simply needed more clients than what it was generating each week.

So, the anxiousness that lab assistant Heather Portman was feeling was not just the cool-factor of seeing a new Three-D printed project. The company had to make sure every project was perfect, and the three-person outfit had to figure out how to get more clients...while the three of them worked the lab to produce even more projects!

### "Hey, slow down there, kiddo," Ralph advised Heather as she threw her jacket and purse onto a nearby chair. "This is not a fast food joint!"

### "Might as well be," she responded sardonically as she walked over to the main computer that ran all the Three-D printing.

### Ralph was just finishing up some marketing to-do's list and was gathering up his papers. It was nice and quiet until--

### "What is this?"

### Heather and Ralph both jumped in their respective chairs and looked toward the suite's front area from the laboratory. Dr. Chase's retort came so quickly, neither of her employees had heard the door open. She then closed the door with some gusto and made her way to the lab. Heather and Ralph glanced at each other.

### Immediately, Dr. Chase held out a couple of distorted-looking pieces; both about the size of a grapefruit. They looked akin to a child's clay-type toy that one shaped with. Only these pieces had a rather darker feel about them...

### Heather and Ralph stopped what they were doing and walked over to the thirty-something boss. She hadn't even bothered to take off her lab coat before she did her errand. Which, apparently, had to do with this situation. Both Heather and Ralph recoiled upon seeing the two pieces in Ms. Chase's hands, as if they were some dead animals she found somewhere!

### "Are those from us," Heather asked as she braved walking up to Dr. Chase and took one of the pieces.

### "Yep," was all that Dr. Chase said; her eyes burning with fury but her face maintaining composure--ever the professional, Ellen Chase was.

Upon further examination, Heather could see that the distorted piece in her hands did look familiar...but something was very off about the pieces. They weren't "broken" or even mangled.

### "Wait a minute," Ralph said as he looked on while Heather turned her piece around and around for inspection, "that's from the Outer Watch account, isn't it?"

### Ralph catching on quickly seemed to soften Dr. Chase's demeanor. "Very good, Ralph." She then tossed the other grotesque piece to him.

"Ellen," Heather said defensively, "this is not our fault. Remember, Outer Watch purchased one of those other Three-D printers from Michelangelo's Air! Their programming probably couldn't read our code...I told them they should have bought one of our printers."

### "Then how do you explain the one that Ralph's holding," Dr. Chase challenged; her voice frosty, and one of her fingers pointing right at Ralph's piece.

### Heather and Ralph glanced at each other, then back at their respective object in their hands.

"That ugly piece of modern art was supposed to be a reproduction of that beautiful swan we made for the West Side Dish account...you know; that fancy restaurant on Rodeo Drive? Where they were catering for one of Hollywood's movie studios! They ran out of time and had to skip the presentation for their client all together because our swan was the centerpiece of their project for their client!"

Now things were looking worse! Dr. Chase's employees had nothing to say. But there was more. "Oh, and the Three-D printer West Side Dish used was one they bought from us and they want their money back now!"

### All fell silent. That chime from the newly-minted Three-D piece in the lab's main printer was periodically sounding. The Triple D crew was ignoring it for now, but it gave Ralph an idea.

"We...we probably should have printed both jobs from our lab instead," he said as he gestured toward the printer. Heather was silently nodding; dejection all over her.

### Ralph's bringing up the printer reminded Dr. Chase to go over to it and check upon the printed project. Heather was just about to do that before Dr. Chase's explosion.

### "That's actually a good idea, Ralph," Ms. Chase said as she was still walking it to the printer. "Even when it's our printers we still...have...to...."

Heather and Ralph glanced at each other again. Now something was wrong with their business's main Three-D printer. And if that went out of commission, Triple D Select would be out of business!

### With the two morphed plastic yet in their hands, Heather and Ralph ran over to the large printer where Dr. Chase was. The printer, approximately the size of an upright piano, had an open chamber where the printed object could be easily seen. Indeed, Dr. Chase was standing right in front of the chamber--and looking right at a three-dimensional printing of a man's face. It was monochromatic dark-green, near-life sized, and was of a depiction of a middle-aged man with a receding hairline, and with a very serious expression as its countenance.

Instead of anger from Dr. Chase, she was shocked into silence, just as Heather was. Ralph had more of a confused expression. He looked at Heather, and she at him. Without saying anything outloud, they questioned each other whether or not they had mistakenly printed the bust. As Dr. Chase continued standing in front of the Three-D printer, both Heather and Ralph shook their heads at each other. For they knew with certainty that they had done the printing procedures for their day's work correctly!

### "Wasn't this supposed to be a printing of some endangered fish," Dr. Chase asked either one of her employees without looking back at them.

### "For the US Fish and Wildlife Service--yes!" Ralph had said this while his eyes went back and forth between the bust and watching his boss, seeing if she would verbally lash out at the incorrect printed project. He walked up next to her, seeing that she was in too much shock. "They wanted to have a model of that species as a reference for one of their projects."

### "Aside from the obvious, Boss," Heather inquired, after picking up on her shock, "what's wrong?"

### Neither employee said anything; waiting for her response.

### "That's my father!"

### Heather glanced at Ralph. His brows furrowed in response.

### "Your father," Heather said with a mixture of incredulity and surprise. "Ellen, didn't you say--"

### "Yeah, he died a couple of years ago!"

### "Murdered, if I remember correctly," Heather said with apprehension; wondering if she should have even brought it up.

### "Yeah..."

### More silence from the crew.

"In--in order for us to print, we have to scan something--anything! So how the hell did we end up with a printing of your dead father's face, Dr. Chase," Ralph said; tension building in his voice as he began to think more on the implications of the event.

### "No, no, no..." Heather now began to pace while shaking her head; one of her hands up to her mouth as she thought out loud. "This is not as simple as a Three-D printing gone bad--in fact, look at it! It's like one of the Renaissance sculptors could have done that!"

### "So how is it that our clients' pieces turn out looking like a convoluted mess while this portrait of my father is perfect," Ms. Chase put to her small team.

### Neither had an answer.

### "I think you should call the cops, Boss," Heather suggested.

### "Why would she need to do that," Ralph put to Heather. "I mean, the case is basically cold by now."

### "But that's just it, Ralph," Heather persisted, "they never caught that guy who killed her dad! How do we know that he didn't hack into our system and uplinked a scan of Ellen's father's head before..."

### She didn't want to finish the details.

"And why now, if that were true," Dr. Chase asked as her shock began to wear off. "We've been in business for almost half a year; my father died a year and a half before we opened..." She shrugged as she looked at her employees. "I mean, I admit, I don't have a better explanation. But I just don't see why my father's killer would mess with my head now."

### Ralph was nodding at this point.

"Well," Heather said, again, sensitive about Dr. Chase's family situation, "he left you a good-sized amount of money that helped you secure a down-payment for your business, Ellen. I've heard of some criminals patient enough to wait for several years before they strike! And your father was a public figure...a big-time real estate guy making a lot of money buying up all those foreclosed homes and businesses isn't exactly a Robin Hood icon for some in the public."

### Now, Heather's words could have been taken as an offense to Dr. Chase. But Ms. Chase knew Heather well enough to know that she meant no disrespect to her father. Indeed, Dr. Chase actually nodded at her point.

### Dr. Chase let out a big sigh while her two employees watched her; waiting to see what she wanted to do next.

"Well, all this speculation doesn't change the business at hand, does it?" Heather and Ralph silently agreed with her. "Ok, Ralph, I'm going to need you to contact the US Fish and Wildlife people and tell them there's a brief delay in getting their piece. This time I will personally sit in the lab until the entire printing process is done and I'll deliver it to their branch office!"

### "Got it," Ralph said as he rushed to a phone in the front area of Triple D's suite.

### "Heather," Dr. Chase now said to her assistant, "all I need you to do right now is to keep making calls and hitting social media about Triple D...we can't get side tracked from getting more clients! I'll call Outer Watch back and try to smooth them over and see if we can give them a discount or something."

### Dr. Chase had turned and started to leave until Heather called out to her.

"Ellen...you can't act like none of this just happened! That was a printing of your father, Ellen! Someone is sending you a message!"

### They both looked upon the bust with troubled faces.

### "What did you want me to do with it," Heather volunteered.

### "Just put it into our reject-pile. But go ahead and put it through the smasher, Heather. I'll see you guys later tonight."

### ......................

### SANTA MONICA, CALIFORNIA. DR. MAUREEN CHASE'S RESIDENCE...

### "Why didn't you take a picture of it with your smartphone," the heart surgeon asked her daughter.

### "I didn't want it to remind me of dad," Dr. Ellen Chase threw back at her mother. They were on her mother's backyard deck. It was elevated and they could see parts of the beach with all its palm trees and some of the brilliantly white edifices peaking above the horizon-vantage, relative to Maureen Chase's neighborhood.

### "I think you should have listened to your assistant...the police could use it as evidence. Why don't you call Heather back and see if it's too late?"

### "I'm sure she's recycled it by now."

### The two women were almost twins. Ellen had inherited all her looks from her mother--tall, slender. They were both relaxing on a couple of comfortable deck chairs.

### "What do you think, mom?"

Maureen took a while before responding. "Again, I think Heather was right...someone is sending you a message. But I don't think it was Richard's killer."

### Ellen, surprised at her mother's words, lifted her head up from the head-rest of her deck chair and looked at her mother through her big sunglasses.

### "I think it's Rich," her mother said softly; her eyes never leaving the beach from the distance.

Ellen had just about enough with such Paranormal talk, between her employees at the lab and now her mother!

### "Mom, that's ridiculous! How could you say that, being a scientist? Someone, most likely dad's killer, had hacked into my Three-D scanning network and uploaded a scan he had done of dad before he killed him...besides, if you and Heather want to get all Supernatural on me, why would "ghost-dad" waste his time in the tangible world by trying to send me a message via a Three-D printing when all he could do was talk to me! Or write me some kind of note...why do people who believe all this crap always insist that the dead must use some kind of electronic device to talk to the rest of us?"

### Maureen simply shrugged. Her daughter scoffed and continued.

"So, based on that belief, my question would be, What did our ancestors do when the dead wanted to communicate with them, but they did not have electricity back then?"

### "Some people still do it...it's called the Ouija Board, darling. But you know this."

This time, Ellen laughed and nodded. "Ok, that's a good point. But it also goes to my point...all this BS about ghost hunters--and I'll even throw in aliens, too!--when they use all those pseudo-equipment and pseudo-science is nothing but a twenty-first century version of our ancestors using those Ouija Boards, mom! In principle, it's the same thing. The only difference is we borrow a lot from real science to justify our belief in those Paranormal or Supernatural things."

### Maureen was a quiet woman. But her not saying much was not the same thing as agreeing with her daughter.

### "Well, I suppose you're right," the elder Dr. Chase finally said after sipping from her drink that had been by her side. "I wouldn't even be surprised if I'm subconsciously saying this because it's hard for me to let go of your father."

"Now, mom, I wasn't bring this up for that kind of conversation. Never let go of dad in your memories, mom. You know me; ever the rationalist."

### Ellen got up from her deck-chair and grabbed her things.

### "Where are you going, darling?"

### "Oh, I'm not done for the day yet, mom." She went over and gave her mom a kiss on the forehead and started to walk off before her mother called out to her.

### "Say Hi for me to Heather and that freeloader!"

### That last part made Ellen stop in her tracks as if she ran into an invisible wall! "Mom! Why would you say that about Ralph?" Ellen walked back over to where her mother sat.

"Because the only reason he even got that job with you is because his uncle was a close friend of your father! And his uncle is one of your investors."

### By this time, Ellen was cocking her head out of surprise. "How come I never knew about this? I'm the owner of the business, for crying out loud!"

### "How many people did you interview for Triple D, darling?"

### Ellen thought for a bit, but was still lost where all this fit into her mother's revelation. "Ten, may be...I don't know, mom. It's been--"

"I mean, for Ralph's position."

### Now Ellen reclaimed the deck-chair she was sitting in a couple of minutes earlier. "Well, now that you've mentioned it, mom...I was so focused on hiring someone for my assistant since that was a bigger job in the company...I guess I pretty much just hired him a week after opening Triple D!"

### "Yeah, right after that Jeremy Smithguard joined the Board...some of the other investors didn't like him shutting that position before others even got a chance to apply for it!"

### Ellen thought for a minute. "Mom, how close of friends were dad and this Jeremy..."

### "Smithguard," her mother finished for her. "Oh, I'd see him from time to time with your father. They'd go golfing a couple of times, or so. But, you know how your father was. He wasn't the most sociable person. But I'll say one thing, that Smithguard was pretty good at giving your father some good advice about all that internet stuff that you and your generation are so fond of!"

### Now it was Ellen who was looking down toward the beach.

### "What are you thinking about, darling?"

### "I don't remember ever seeing any of dad's friends before. He usually kept work separate from his personal life."

### Maureen gave a face. "True...Now, remember, by the time Jeremy and Rich were friends, you had long moved out of the house and were off to the university to study your computer sciences. So that probably explains why you've never seen him."

### Ellen's turn to give a look. "I guess..."

### "Besides, darling, we all need someone to confide in. No matter how independent we may seem."

### Confide in, indeed.

### ..................

### LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA. TRIPLE D SELECT LAB...

Heather had gotten a text from Dr. Chase. It was a little on the odd side. Dr. Chase wanted her to dig up some old information from the company's financial and corporate files--both electronic and physical files! And she asked that Heather take them home with her and read through them and wait for her to call...so much for prioritizing the problems with the Three D printing for that day! What Dr. Chase requested would take a couple of days, at least.

What concerned Heather the most was Dr. Chase directed her not to tell Ralph what she was doing. And that she had to tell him she was going out of town to secure a new client to make up for the West Side Dish account that the company had lost that day.

### Indeed, Ellen called Ralph and told him that she had some things that she had to tie up in Long Beach and she would be back in the lab tomorrow.

### .................

### It was just after 9:00 that same evening when Arthur Blake got a call from Dr. Ellen Chase. He knew her very well and had a good working relationship with her. Of the many businesses that leased space in the mid-rise edifice where Triple D Select was located, she was one of his favorite tenants. But he was not expecting the odd call he got from her that night...

### "...who was it you said came in with Ralph," Dr. Chase asked over her smartphone. She was still in her high-end car; parked in another parking structure she did not normally use.

### "Uh...he signed in as Jeremy Smithguard. I've seen him several times before, Dr. Chase. I assumed he was legit since he was either with Ralph or he had one of those card-keys."

### Checkmate!

### "Is everything ok, Dr. Chase," the guard asked after a while.

### "Arthur, how would you like to earn some extra cash tonight? I need a little security with me...you up for it?"

### Again, odd. But there was no good reason to doubt her. "Sure, Doc. I'm off in another--"

### "How about I pay you double for that hour? Don't worry; I'll talk with the landlord about it tomorrow."

### Apprehension. "Yeah, sure, Dr. Chase...where should I meet you?"

### ....................

Even though Dr. Chase was paying Arthur good money for helping her, she still felt obligated to tell him some of the situation as they carefully made their way to the Triple D suite. He was, after all, potentially putting his life at risk. If, in fact, the situation with Jeremy and Ralph was what she suspected. Yet, she could not call the police, given most departments would not send a couple of officers to investigate based on her mere hunch!

### Besides, like Ralph said earlier that day; the official police investigation into her father's murder was pretty much a cold case by that point anyway. It just made sense to use an armed security guard under such circumstances...

### ...until she saw that he was not needed!

### "Oh, no!" they both called out upon seeing the two bodies!

### Ralph Tucker, yet in his lab coat, and Jeremy Smithguard, the tall middle-ager in his business suit, were both splayed out on the laboratory's floor of Triple D Select. Arthur wasted no time in calling 911 Emergency, while Dr. Chase was working to keep herself together for all the blood and flesh-bits she was looking at! Her hunch about getting Heather out of the lab under the subterfuge of researching those old files turned out to be the right decision after all.

### Dr. Chase noticed that the Three-D printout bust of her father was still in the printer's chamber. Upon on Dr. Chase's call to Heather to inform her of what had happened, she asked why Heather hadn't taken the Three-D bust to the reject-pile and put it through the recycle smasher like she asked her to do?

"Ellen...I not only took it to the recycling smasher and had it crushed; i watched the recycle truck take it away!"

### With all the commotion with the Emergency responders and LAPD beginning their investigation, Dr. Chase was just outside the doorway to her business. She had used her smartphone to log onto Triple D's main printing terminal station to check the work-history for that day. She thought on Heather's words.

### "I think I know what happened, Ellen," Heather said after more thought; her voice sounding down from all the bad news. "There probably was another command sent to print the statue, and while you and I left the office--"

"Our printer printed a second copy. Yeah, that's what I thought, too, Heather. Here's the thing about that: One, even if that were true, we'd have to figure out who's sending those printing commands."

### "Well, like we speculated before," Heather said with a bit more confidence in her voice, "probably someone hacking into our system!"

"But that takes me to my second point, Heather. That's not the case."

### "What? Well, how else could our Customizer print off another bust of your father?"

### "That's a good question, kiddo. Because I've logged onto the system with my phone to check the action-history..."

### Heather waited. "And?"

"The work-history shows everything else we've printed this morning...Heather, there's no history of my father's bust even being printed!"

### ~fin~

### . Two years since leaving us.

### EBOOK NINE:

"Dead Silent", by scifiguy3553. Smashwords. Copyrighted @ 2016.

Eric Donland cleans offices for Swifty Shift in Raleigh, North Carolina. He's a working man with not many friends. He finds out he had unwittingly walked into a bit of a slice of life of the underworld...a slice that opened the door to another underworld.

### Raleigh, North Carolina. Present Day...

"...hello?...hello?...hello?!"

### Eric listened over the cordless phone for several more seconds. Same results.

### Silence...

Eric shot one of his index fingers to his mouth as he shushed his older co-worker, Barb. Both froze on spot in the downtown high-rise office they were cleaning. An executive office they had just finished cleaning. And that's all they were supposed to do.

Barb playfully smacked the early-twenty-something on one of his shoulders with one of her cleaning towels after he disconnected the cordless with the push of a button. "Eric, you're going to get us both killed!"

### "Why? I didn't say anything that gave us away!"

### Barb, rotund and in her fifties, shook her head as she pushed their shared garbage cart out of the posh suite and rolled it out into the hallway; Eric close behind, as he turned out the lights and shut the locked door.

### "The Beneficial techies could look in their phone records and see their calls. It doesn't take a genius to see the time matching up with third shift...they'll figure it out and you're screwed, young man!"

### Eric waved her off as he grabbed his master card-key from one of his pockets and opened the next office for the team to clean. They, each, began their respective routine for cleaning a business facility—Eric started on dumping the trash containers into one of the large barrels they were pushing around in their cart; Barb began her dusting.

### "It was a little different this time..."

### Barb never broke from her stride with her dusting. "You mean that phone call you shouldn't have answered?"

### Given that Eric was Swifty Shift's cleaning crew's resident trickster, she expected him to laugh, send a sarcastic remark her way...something. But he was actually serious that time.

### "There was nothing over the phone line...not the electronic clicks that we usually hear when it's an automated telemarketing computer. I mean you could tell someone was just listening to me, and then hung up!"

### She glanced at him as they both worked. "Kind of taking this a bit serious, aren't you? It just could've been a wrong number."

"With someone over the line saying nothing for literally a minute? Most people apologize and hung up...at the very least, they'd just hang up!"

### Barb shrugged. She was working her way to the back of the suite, while Eric was already at the last office at the back area. "Could've been Mr. Turner, himself...may be he called to see if someone would answer the phone to his own office?"

### Now Eric froze with fear! Barb smirked. Eric then visibly relaxed as a thought occurred to him. "I don't think so. You said it yourself: businesses have the ability to monitor calls. Why bother staying up late at night to call in and see if the janitors are fooling around with his phone in his office? Wouldn't an executive of a multibillion dollar insurance company have a lot of better things to do?"

Eric actually had a good point. Barb shrugged again and continued with her work. "I told you weeks ago not to answer all those phone calls in all those offices. Remember? Now you're having to look over your shoulders..."

### This time, Eric had no wisecrack for Barb. She was right, after all.

### Later...

### The small cleaning crew had just gone on their second break for the evening. There were about ten employees in total, not including the night supervisor. Barb had gone off with a couple of other female workers in a cafeteria elsewhere in the edifice. Like most of the others, Eric just broke into a small package of junk food and ate it in the main lobby of the high-rise since their breaks weren't all that long. He was taking a gulp of his lukewarm coffee in one of those ubiquitous, cheap Styrofoam cups when his smartphone vibrated. He didn't recognize the number in the caller id section.

### "Hello...?"

### Nothing.

### His phone was in working order, and there was no interference in the lobby. The connection was open and the clock on his smartphone's call-timer was counting when Eric looked at it—to make sure the caller didn't hang up. It was just that no one was talking.

### "Barb," Eric said over his phone; laughing, "are you trying to teach me a lesson? Look, I got it, OK? I won't..."

Eric broke off from his sentence because he looked up and saw Barb walking back to the lobby area, with her two co-worker friends...and she was not on her phone!

"OK," Eric said over his phone; at a whisper and tense, "I've had it with your shit, whoever this is...first it was in Turner's office tonight, but, now, my own phone? I'll trace this call and go to the cops, you got that?"

### Eric's phone was still lit up and the call-counter was still going. He put the phone back to his ear to see if he could get any clues—background noises; breathing...the caller finally disconnected the call.

### When Eric finally looked up from his phone, he saw that Barb had noticed that something was wrong. She broke with her friends and went over to see what was going on with Eric. When she got to him, all she did was look at him with an inquisitive face.

### "That call again," was all he said to Barb; his eyes staying on his phone.

### "You mean you got a similar call on your cell, like the one from Turner's office?" Her eyes were wide with surprise and concern.

"Yup...Barb, this was not a wrong call."

### "Trace it," she shot out; starting to get tense, herself. "Get a copy of the records from your provider and—"

### "Yeah, I already threatened him with that..." Eric thought for a second. "Or her." He shrugged.

### The other cleaners were starting to break up and head back to work.

"Wait a minute," Barb said; calling out to Eric before he started for the elevators. "Even if you're right about this being the same person, how would this individual get your smartphone number?" She looked around and began to whisper. "Turner's company number, I can see someone Googling that. But your cell...?"

### They both thought for a bit. Eric then gave Barb an askance look.

### "Hey, I didn't give out your number to anyone else! And we know it wasn't me. So— "

### Just then, their young boss was making the round in Beneficial Security's lobby, to make sure his team was going back to work...Eric and Barb quickly made their way to the nearest elevators.

### 4:oo AM...

Third shift for Swifty was finally done. There actually were some over-achieving office workers showing up for work! Sometimes whenever Eric seen such determined, career-minded people at the high-rise he would feel a shot of regret that he hadn't pushed himself to finish his business degree at the local community college. He was still very young, so he had not given up on the idea. But, like so many Millennials of the early 21st century, Eric was stuck in the cycle of finding a full-time job to pay the bills and he did not want to risk being burdened with tens of thousands of dollars of tuition the second he graduated!

### So, like he'd done so often in his young life, he settled on his current situation—

### "Hey, Donland," Andrew, Swifty Shift's night supervisor, called out to Eric from the maintenance area, "someone's here to see you! Said she'd meet you in the loading area!"

Eric frowned to himself. He was not the most social creature, and the few people he did know were mere acquaintances from work or back home in Utah; where his parents and his siblings still lived. So...?

### "Who is it," Eric lobbed back to Andrew as the last of his co-workers zipped by; excited their shift was finished.

### "How the hell should I know?"

### "OK...thanks."

### Eric looked around, hoping to see Barb still around. She was like his out-of-state aunt to him and had often relied on her for support over the four years he'd been working for Swifty. She was nowhere around as he walked toward the truck-docking area...

### Before Eric got to the door that lead to the loading section, he could already see the middle-aged woman standing by the mostly-glass door. She was formally dressed and had a very business attitude about her.

### Cop.

### "Hi," Eric said cautiously as he kept the dock door half-opened, "is there something I can do for you?"

### "Hi, Eric, I'm Detective Thyla Grimes with the Raleigh Police Department..."

Oh, shit...all those calls I've been answering in the offices, he thought with terror as the detective continued talking.

### "I was told that your shift stops around four o'clock?"

### "Yes, that's correct."

### "Do you have some time to talk?"

### Eric looked at her perplexed. "Uhh, sure..."

### He followed the young detective to a more open part of the loading dock area. Given that it was Summer one was able to see indigo creeping into the early sky of the morning.

### They stopped at a spot and Detective Grimes just looked at him for several seconds; making Eric very uncomfortable.

### "Mr. Donland, I see you like to do a little extracurricular activities during work."

### His stomach dropped! "Detective Grimes...I, I won't even try to pretend I didn't do it. Barb, my co-worker and friend, tried to tell—"

"Yeah, we know that's who two of her work buddies got their drugs from...we already have them all in custody while you were finishing up your shift."

### Now Eric was numb and, no doubt, looking quite dumfounded!

### "Mr. Donland," she continued; but with a more curious tone, "I don't know if you realized just how lucky you are?"

### "What? How's that?"

Again, the detective gave a rather apprising look at him. Perhaps Grimes thought Eric was playing dumb? "Mr. Donland, for future reference to whatever jobs you might have later in life, you might want to be careful how you horseplay. In this post-Nine-Eleven era, everyone is video recorded in some form or fashion! Even if you don't see a camera, there's bound to be one somewhere!

"At the office while we looked at Beneficial's security cameras, we noticed a very curious thing with you during those sessions...every time Barb came at you, a phone in the office would ring!"

### "What?" Eric's mind began to replay how just within the past few weeks, the phone calls began to happen during his shift. He looked up at Detective Grimes, whom was stoically nodding her head in affirmation. "But that's crazy! OK, the RPD picked her up on drug charges, but what does that have to do with her trying to hurt me?"

"Kill you, Mr. Donland...sometimes it was a pair of scissors from a desk; other times a letter opener from another office...remember, we have it all on Beneficial's cam records."

"But..." Eric was almost in denial. Almost. "Why would she want to kill me?"

### "You were a risk of exposing her and you didn't even know it..."

### It was at that point the detective pulled out her RPD-issued smartphone and brought up a picture of a selfie he had taken with Barb and the two women he had seen her go to lunch break with earlier that night! It was during a party at one of the other lady's house...where Eric had, indeed, stumbled across a hidden factory for some of North America's hardest drugs on the streets! Eric remembered he had acted as if he had never seen it whenever he was around Barb.

### And that party had taken place a few weeks earlier...

By that time, Eric was shaking his head for the disbelief that a so-called friend would have, literally, stabbed him in the back. After four years of working so well together!

### "Anyway," Detective Grimes said; placing the phone back in her pocket, "I just wanted to touch bases with you about all this. Like I said, Mr. Donland, I'd cool off on clowning around any worksites from now on. Thanks for—"

### "Wait a minute," Eric said; stopping Detective Grimes as she turned to walk off. "So, Raleigh Police didn't do those calls, then?"

### "Of course not," she said with the biggest smile Eric had seen her with since meeting her. "We're the ones who noticed the timing, remember? Besides, when we monitored the videos, they weren't real time."

"So how did someone know when to call me?"

### Both squinted their eyes as they thought on the question. Detective Grimes walked back to where Eric was with a hand held out.

### "May I see your phone?"

### "Yeah..." He simply handed his smartphone to her.

### Eric could see that the detective was quite adept at maneuvering through his phone's call history list...then she flinched.

### "That call in Mr. Turner's office tonight...was it around quarter after ten?"

Eric thought for a few seconds. "Yes, as a matter of fact. About that time. But I had gotten a call on my cell around two-fifteen...why? Were they the same number?"

For a while, Detective Grimes said nothing as she kept her head lowered; reading Eric's phone history. "Yeah, according to RPD's records they're the same phone number that called you at Turner's office and your phone. Thing is, it's been disconnected for years. It used to belong to Barb's dead husband."

### ~~fin~~

### EBOOK TEN:

"Cousin Josh," by scifiguy3553. Smashwords. Copyright @ 2016.

### Avery Snider is a high school jock, and his family had just lost a close cousin. His other set of cousins ask Avery to watch over their son, Josh, while the families go out of state to attend the funeral.

### Avery and a friend both learn that autistic traits could, actually, serve as a doorway to the Paranormal...

### *Dedicated to Meme Heiselman & her daughter, Peggy Briggs.

### Atlanta, Georgia, USA. Present Day...

"...yeah, Mom?"

### "Hey, Baby! Listen...your father and I are about to head off to Marge's funeral, ok?"

### The Millennial shifted uncomfortably at the mere sound of 'funeral.' It was Avery Snider's first family loss since he had been born. The family was still young enough that the family unit of three was spared the experience...until his mother's first cousin's death.

### "How long do you think you and Dad will be in Albany," he asked over his phone as he glanced toward his classmates as they ran around his high school's main track at Booker T. Washington. He had been paged over the school's PA system informing him of an emergency call, though cousin Marge had died days ago.

### "Well...we'll be landing there by this afternoon...you know we can't just leave right after the viewing, Av! So, it'll probably be in a couple of days –"

### "I know, Mom! I just..."

His mother waited patiently for him. "I know, Av. Now it's our family's turn to experience death in the family. As you get older, Av, you'll slowly experience it more and more."

### Avery waved toward his coach, indicating that he was almost done on his phone. "That, too..."

Tamara paused. Her husband and Avery's father, Michael, had just closed the car door and started driving to Atlanta's Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport. "What do you mean, that, too, Av?"

### Avery's turn to pause. "Look, Mom, I don't mind watching cousin Josh while all of you are out in New York state, but the guy has been acting weird lately!"

"Avery," she said admonishingly. "I thought I raised you better than to call people with disabilities that!" Avery's father silently nodded his head in agreement as he drove their car.

"It's called autistic, Mom. And that's not what I mean...lately, he keeps saying shit that doesn't make sense!"

### "Avery!"

"Stuff—alright? He says stuff that even a non-autistic, twelve-year-old usually wouldn't know about!"

### "Like what?"

Avery had to think for a few seconds. " 'It's all under sub-header, section three'... Or, 'Easement.' " Even though his mother could not see him on the phone call, Avery shrugged for effect.

Tamara sighed. "You know that's all part of the autism, Av. He's just repeating what he hears on TV and from other people—which is why I want you to be careful with your language around him, young man! Besides, with his parents going to the funeral, this will give you a chance to prove that you truly are a gown-up...just you and your cousin at the Bishops for two days. Remember, you've been saying that people don't take you seriously enough? Well these next two days is your chance to change that, Av!"

### He knew he was supposed to be encouraged by his mother's words, but it was not working. "I guess...still don't see why Daren and Shawna couldn't just take him with them to Albany."

### "You've gone to a movie with Josh. Think he'll sit quietly on a plane ride; much less a few hours during a funeral and everything else that goes on?"

### They both lightly chuckled.

### "I better get going," Avery said as he saw his coach peer at him from the distance on the field. "You and Dad have a safe trip!"

### "Ok, Av...remember, if shit goes down, call the cops."

### "Mom!" he said with a laugh.

### Avery replaced his smartphone back in his pocket of his sweats and trotted off several yards to catch up with his classmates that were warming up before his school's football team practices.

### Later That Evening...

### Chastain Park was one of America's richest neighborhoods. The arboreal area was a swath of upper-middle class residency and open public park amenities. Avery always had a mixture of the feeling of jealousy and feeling safe whenever he and his parents would drop by to visit the cousins on his mother's side of the family. Out of courtesy, Avery always parked his SUV on the side streets. The Bishops had always insisted that he park in their driveway or their garage, whenever there was a free-spot. But Avery felt embarrassed about his vehicle always having some kind of leakage from some organ within his SUV.

### Young Josh Bishop's parents, Daren and Shawna, had already left for their flight to Albany, so Avery was met by the Bishops' part-time nanny, Emilina Durante; a middle-aged woman from Ecuador.

### "Hola, mi otro hijo," Emilina called out to Avery as he closed the front door upon arriving. She was cleaning up the last of the dishes from the dinner that she made for Josh and herself. She stopped in the middle of what she was doing and looked Avery straight in the eyes when he reached the kitchen. "How are you and your parents holding up, Av?"

### Avery shrugged as he plopped his backpack down onto the kitchen floor. "You know...holding up. I think Shawna and Daren are taking cousin Marge's death a bit harder than mom is, to be honest with you."

### Emilina gestured toward the small gathering of Tupperware on the kitchen's counter to see if he wanted any of the food she had just put away. Avery simply held up a hand with a quick shake of his head. "Well, the Bishops had always been closer to Marge. I saw that the few times I met her when she would come by for the holidays...I'm sure going to miss her!"

### "Yeah, me to... So, how'd it go with little man," Avery asked this as he smiled and craned his neck, looking for him.

### Emilina was a bit slow in responding, Avery noticed. She had a bit of a blank look on her face—usually not a good sign, he learned over the years! "He...he's been a bit challenging lately. Shawna thinks it has something to do with Marge's death—"

### "But you don't think so."

### "No, I don't." She put away the last of the clean dishes and leaned against the kitchen counter with a sigh. "His latest thing has been going on for about two weeks now! He keeps doing his echolalia, which, of course, is normal. But with a new twist."

" 'Section three,' or something, rather?"

"Yeah! But, Av, this time he's writing it all down..."

### Avery paused. "I can hardly get him to draw a stick figure for our activities! So, now, he's writing stuff down?"

### Emilina walked over to the dining table and grabbed a tiny note pad. Avery figured it was Emilina's, since he didn't recognize it. She handed it to him and nodded her head once, indicating she wanted Avery to go through the pad...

### The pages were mostly blank. All except for a series of numbers at the very bottom of most of the pages in the tiny note pad. No points, no dashes, no commas... merely numbers that looked unrelated numerically—in terms of sequence or in how long or short they were. After Avery flipped through the pad a second time, he looked up at Emilina. She only shrugged; her face having a resignation to it.

### "He hasn't been violent toward you has he," Avery asked as he handed the note pad back to Emilina.

By that time, Josh could be heard talking to himself from across the living room, past the dining room, and in the kitchen; where Avery and Emilina could hear him. "Oh, no. But he keeps on talking and just starts writing all those numbers down instead of interacting with me sometimes. Tonight I finally decided to let him write in one of my pads just so I could show you."

### Avery frowned to himself. "Why not just take the other pieces of paper he writes on and show his parents?"

### "Because I can never find them."

### Another frown from the athlete. "You mean he throws them away in the recycling bin?"

She was already shaking her head. "No...after I show them to Daren and Shawna, the papers he writes on just seem to disappear!"

### "You check the regular trash can?"

### "Yep...never found the papers there either."

### Both look off to a corner of the kitchen as they thought on their conversation. All the while, young Josh could be heard, repeating himself from time to time.

### "I better get going," Emilina stated suddenly; startling Avery!

### "Yeah, it was great seeing you again."

### The two embraced. It made the Gen-Xer miss her own children back in Ecuador! She gathered her belongings and Avery walked her to the front door.

### "Ok, chico, it's you and little man the next two days! You are the hombre of the house, ok?"

### Avery laughed. "I don't know about that, but thanks, Emilina!"

### After Avery watched Emilina close her car door and drive off, he quietly shut the front door and gently latched the locks so that the metallic locking sound was a whisper. He noticed that he did not hear Josh's echolalia anymore.

### Avery looked around the house from the vestibule, where he stood after locking the front door, and softly walked in the direction of the den, where Josh had been playing.

### Still no sound from Josh.

### Avery had made it all the way to the family room...no one!

### "Avy, Avy, Avy!" Josh had been hiding and jumped out from behind, calling Avery!

### After Avery had jumped with a yelp, they both began to laugh.

### "You little stinker," Avery bantered with Josh as he began to tickle him. It was a game one would do with a child about eight years younger than what Josh was.

### "Hey," Avery said; stopping in the middle of their play. "Serious-time, now..."

### Josh knew what that meant and promptly sat on the floor. It was a practice that the Bishops had learned to do with Josh so that he could understand that it was time for him to focus. Avery took on the approach as well.

### "Are you ok since cousin Marge's death, Josh?"

### "Yeah...Ok."

### "Mom and Dad talked to you about what happened to cousin Marge?"

### "Cancer..."

### Avery had not expected him to actually say the disease. He merely nodded. "You want to talk about missing her?"

### "I'm ok...I can talk to her whenever I want to."

### A pause from Avery.

Avery rubbed his hands together, psyching himself up to play big cousin. He sat on the floor next to Josh. "Josh...look, I'm sure your parents explained to you about dying...I'm sorry, buddy, but you can't talk with cousin Marge anymore. Not unless you pretend. And for some people, they need to pretend they can still talk to people they love after they died."

### Avery looked at him; gauging how his little cousin was doing. He simply sat there.

### "Ok...enough serious-time. Want to watch a movie?"

### "Yeah!"

### Josh jumped up from the floor and ran to the back area of the house, where the family room was. Avery joined him there. He found an old Science Fiction movie on a subscription channel, popped some popcorn, and the two fell asleep by the time the movie ended.

### The Next Day...

### Avery found it odd taking Josh over to Atlanta's major dinosaur exhibition in the middle of the school week. Of course, it was due to the schedule-change because of cousin Marge's funeral. Avery had never seen so many older people before! He was used to going to high school, his football practices and the actual game matches themselves, and his part-time job at a local casual dining restaurant...it was like a parallel world to see so many people over sixty out doing errands, exercises, and even working at places he and Josh stopped to eat!

They were at the last floor of the dinosaur museum. It had been years since Avery had been there. As young as he was, Josh represented, yet, an even younger crop of Millennials that had taken the spot his age-group used to occupy—dinosaur museums, pizza activity spots with games, fairs... Josh was having a good time, and that was all that mattered.

### They were about to leave the museum when Josh had stopped Avery by the circulation desk.

### "Pen, please! Pen, please! Pen, please..." He kept that up, even as the lady behind the counter looked for a pen to placate Josh!

### She found one and quickly handed it to Josh. Avery started to ask the clerk for a piece of paper so Josh could write onto it with the pen, but Josh had already started scribbling words on the top portion of the circulation desk!

### "Sir, I'm going to have to ask your brother to stop writing on the counter! This is considered vandalism—"

### "Yes, Ma'am, I understand," Avery said, trying to control the situation. A security guard from down a hall was slowly making his way there! "I'm asking for your patience, Ma'am...my cousin is autistic and—"

### "What the hell!" The woman at the circulation desk was now looking at the words Josh had just scratched onto the counter! Her exclamation, of course, just encouraged the security guard to pick up the pace!

### Avery craned to look at whatever it was that Josh had written that jolted the worker at the desk. By that time, there was a small crowd gathered and the guard finally made it to the circulation desk...no one understood what Josh's words meant.

### Except the lady at the desk.

### "How the hell did you know my family," the lady threw at Josh, after reading the rather small list of names.

"Carol, what's wrong? I don't get it," the guard said as the small crowd looked on. He had now become more concerned with her than any security threat!

### "Doug, that's my family I lost during that tornado in Texas a few years ago!"

### There were loud gasps in that knot of people gathered around Avery and Josh by that point! The guard began to wave off everyone to either leave the museum or move on to another area of it. But most of them stayed after Carol quickly walked from behind the circulation desk and walked up to Josh. She was so filled with horror, and perhaps shock, that Avery thought he would have to defend his younger cousin from her!

### Doug, the guard, must have been thinking the same thing. For he began to place himself between Carol and Josh, but she held up one of her hands; indicating that she only wanted to talk.

### "Young man...why did you just remind me of my family that died four years ago in that tornado?"

### Everyone was silent. There was even a new group of people that showed up, wondering what the commotion was!

### "I...I...I don't know...I just looked at you..."

### Josh, then, looked up at Avery. Avery only kept his eyes on Carol and Doug; wondering what would happen next. For Josh was his charge, during the two days that Avery's parents and Josh's parents were all attending cousin Marge's funeral in New York state!

### "Officer," came the voice of a middle-aged man; dressed in business-casual and thick-rimmed glasses. "I think it'll be ok to let this one go..."

### "Dr. Walters...I'm sorry this got out of hand!"

### "Don't worry about it, Doug. Carol, why don't you take the rest of the day off. We'll get Gary to cover the rest of your shift."

### Dr. Walters then looked around at the crowd that had started growing. He, then, fished for his lanyard that had his pictured id and flashed it before the whole crowd. "Ok, ladies and gentlemen...I'm Dr. Frank Walters. I'm the executive director of the museum. I appreciate your concerns, but I'm going to have to ask that you either proceed with your tour of the museum, or continue through the exit...this is all under control...thank you!"

### He was quite effective at crowd control. Everyone had dispersed except for Doug—whom was on his radio, getting the replacement for Carol—the director, and Avery and Josh.

"Ok, Josh," Avery said, feeling horribly upset for what happened under his watch, "you lucked out on this one! We're—"

### "Joshua, is it," Director Walters asked; his demeanor calm and not the slightest bossy!

### Avery looked at him with suspicion. "It's actually just Josh..."

"Ok...Josh..." He looked at them both, then looked at that list of names from Carol's family, then back at the boys. He held out his hand for Avery to shake in a greeting this time. "Well, you know who I am..."

### "Avery," he said as he shook Dr. Walters' hand.

### "Josh," Dr. Walters asked softly, "may I shake your hand in greeting?"

### Avery smiled at him with a slight nod. Josh then stiffly held out one of his hands and awkwardly shook the director's hand!

### "Say, Avery; Josh...why don't we go into my office." He then gestured toward that list of names scribbled on the circulation desk. "I've got a feeling the three of us have something to talk about!"

### Dr. Frank Walters' Office; Executive Director...

### The director took a while to make himself some coffee after he had offered some to Avery and Josh. Neither taking the offer. After he did some calls to tidy up some of the museum's businesses, Dr. Walters finally sat down at his desk with his coffee, opposite from the boys.

### The office was actually relatively small for an executive of such an Atlanta institution. But it was a public museum, so it was actually an appropriate sized-office.

Dr. Walters sat quietly, drinking his coffee before he finally asked, "You see them...don't you?"

### Avery's head snapped back and forth between his cousin and Dr. Walters!

"Not see them," Josh corrected; his head violently shaking. "Numbers...names...other things..."

### An arched brow from Dr. Walters as he glanced at Avery, whom had an inquisitive look for the director.

"Although I'm an administrator for this museum, gentlemen, by education I'm a psychologist..." A playful shrug from the director. "For what it's worth. In this society, unfortunately, psychologists have gotten a bad reputation years ago."

### "So," Avery finally spoke up, "what's the bottom line of what you suspect, Dr. Walters? That, because of Josh's autism, he has some special powers to see...people's souls after they died?"

Dr. Walters made a face. "Bah! I don't buy into all that 'soul' and 'spirit' stuff, Avery! But there are actual studies that seem to suggest there could be some logical connections to the perception of the ability of those with autism to see paranormal events...I can think of one study I've read years ago from Cambridge University that dealt with what we in the psychology and brain sciences call the autistic-spectrum. Basically, it seems to suggest there's a bit of a sliding scale between autistic people and, I'm sorry here, those of the psychotic-spectrum that believe they're seeing things!"

### "My cousin is not crazy," Avery said defensively.

"And notice I did not use that word, Avery...it's more of a manifestation of how a person perceives events or things. The more psychotic-spectrum studies were really more of the schizophrenia and bipolar situations...which Josh is not!"

### "Easement, Av, easement!" Dr. Walters and Avery's conversation was working Josh up a bit. And it reminded Avery of Josh's situation at the Bishops' house.

### "So, how does all this explain how my cousin thinks he can still talk to a cousin of ours that just died, and how he just starts writing all these weird numbers down?"

Dr. Walters was already nodding his head after a sip from his coffee. "Well, that's where you slide more into behavioral reasons than something dealing with hardware, like the physical brain..." He shrugged, knowingly. "Our buddy, here, misses your cousin and his brain constructed a meme for him to interact with your departed cousin!"

"Ok," Avery pressed, "I actually get that! But that still doesn't explain these numbers he's been writing down these past two weeks, according to Josh's family nanny...more to the point, how could Josh had known to write down all those family members' names of that lady at the circulation desk? We never talked to her before!"

### Dr. Walters leaned back in his chair; a finger tapping at his chin. "But you've been to this museum several times before?"

### Avery froze for a second; all the while, Josh looking on. "Well, yeah. But we never talked to that lady before, much less about her family!"

Even the scientist had to nod at that point! "Yeah, in science you often deal with things we aren't able to explain...at that time! Look, Science does not need to fill in the blanks to make events in life gift-wrapped nice and neatly for humans! Just because humans didn't know how to fly for thousands of years did not mean we could never figure it out...I'm guessing someday—much later—humans may also figure out what we call today the Paranormal!"

### It was an unsatisfactory response from the scientist for Avery. But he knew that Dr. Walters knew a lot more than he did, so Avery did not press the subject any further. Dr. Walters got out some free coupons for the boys to use for several days at the museum, and sent them on their way.

### The Next Day; The Bishops' Residence. Chastain Park...

### It would be one more day before everyone got back from the funeral out in Albany, New York. Things had quieted down a bit for Avery and Josh since the situation at the museum the day before. Avery figured it was better for Josh to relax at the house. Perhaps with all the activities at any given museum there were simply too many stimuli?

### They were playing one of the latest modern day video games when the doorbell rang.

### "Ding, ding, ding, ding, di—"

### "Ok, Josh, we get it, buddy...just keep on playing, will you? I don't want to have to start over. Took us too long to get to this level!"

### "Alright, Av..."

### When Avery reached the front door, he peered through the eyepiece of the door and saw that it was Emilina! But she wasn't scheduled to be back for another couple of days...

### "Hola, Emilina..." She did not smile back. In fact, her eyes darted around inside the house as Avery spoke. "Everything ok?"

### "Where's Josh?"

### Avery paused. "In the family room...come on in—"

### "Not this time, mi hijo...can you step out here and shut the door?"

### Another pause by Avery. "Sure..."

### Before Avery could say anything else, Emilina pulled out her little note pad she had with her the other day. "Avery...remember all those numbers I told you that Josh was writing in this pad and those other pieces of papers?"

### "Of course."

### The nanny seemed to think more on whatever was on her mind before she went on. "Av, what do you know about estates?"

### Now he was frowning. "You mean property stuff?"

### "Yeah..."

### "Well, we all know that's how both of the Bishops made their money to afford all this...Emilina, why are you asking me all this?"

"Account numbers, Av! All those numbers were hidden bank account numbers to all of your cousin Marge's wealth, man!"

### "What?!"

### "Si..." She had several other pieces of paper with her and brought them up to show Avery. "I hope you don't mind, but I had a friend of mine look at Josh's writings on my note pad...he's an analyst, so I figured he might have a little insight, you know? He pointed out to me that if you pay close attention to how Josh wrote all those numbers, they correspond to how most banking systems work!"

"What a minute," Avery finally said; things starting to click for him. "So...you have copies of my cousin Marge's accounts?"

"Not me, mi hijo...those original papers that Josh wrote on and what his parents did with them that I could not find? Well, guess what I found in some old trash that I left in the back of my car I was about to throw out that came from this house?"

### "All of cousin Marge's bank accounts— photo copied," Avery said slowly.

### It was at that point that she held up a couple of pieces of crumpled-up papers with Josh's writings of those series of numbers, and then she held up her tiny note pad—letting them face Avery, several series of numbers had matched exactly!

### "Oh, my god," Avery said under his breath. He thought for a moment as Emilina looked on. "Josh was writing down what he somehow saw in this house! So, then...all that stuff about 'easement' and 'sub-header—"

### "Section three of your cousin Marge's will was about how she wanted her money used in a land-dispute she had with a certain someones..."

### "The Bishops," Avery said. "They shared some land with cousin Marge but wanted to use it very differently than she did. Sounds like Daren and Shawna were trying to take advantage of cousin Marge's sickness!"

### She quietly looked at Avery, worried about what life would, now, throw at him and his cousin, Josh.

"So, what now, Emilina? No doubt, all this seems to be true! But we're not lawyers—"

She feigned an apologetic face. "Again, mi hijo, I hope you don't mind, but I took the initiative to contact your parents yesterday! Don't worry, I waited until after the funeral service."

### Avery nodded his approval.

Emilina felt it was appropriate that Avery should keep all the copies and other papers she had accumulated in her research. She and Avery gave each other a warm embrace. It was a different hug this time. For given what they both knew about Josh's parents now, Avery and Emilina were not sure they would see each other again, since she was the Bishop family's part-time nanny. Indeed, what would happen to Josh, in the likelihood that both of his parents would face long jail-terms for white collar criminal offenses! In Avery's and Emilina's minds, Avery's family taking him in seemed the logical contingency.

### Emilina began to walk off the Bishops' porch before Avery called out to her. "What do you think about Josh saying he's able to talk to cousin Marge?"

She thought on the question, yet a few steps away from the front door. "Did Josh write those numbers down because he saw them, or heard them around the house? Or did he get them from somewhere else...?"

### They both looked at each other before Emilina finally walked off to her car, nothing else said between them...

### ~fin~

