by Mark Lukens
“At the subatomic level,” Warren continued, “particles blink in and out of existence all the time. Where do they go? Where do they come back from? Alternate universes? Different dimensions?”
Warren rushed over to his large wood desk and rapped his knuckles on the top of it like he was knocking on a door. “Everything we see, everything we touch, everything we know of is built on these unstable particles—these particles that are here one moment and gone the next.” Warren smiled as he stared at his class. “Even we are made of these particles.”
The class was stunned.
“So I ask you again,” Warren continued. “What is reality?”
Professor Heinz hurried over to Warren with a nervous smile plastered on his pale face. “Thank you, Dr. Savage. That was a very … uh … a very unique lecture.”
Warren ignored Professor Heinz and looked at his class. “Are there any questions?”
Half of the students raised their hands.
“I need to see you outside right now,” Heinz whispered to Warren.
“Hold those thoughts,” Warren told the class. “I’ll be right back.”
Warren walked briskly to the door and Professor Heinz hurried to catch up to him. They stepped out into the hall and walked a few feet down from his classroom door.
“Warren, what are you doing in there? We can’t let you lecture on that kind of stuff.”
“Why not?” Warren had heard this argument already from Heinz and the other professors here many times now.
“Because it’s science fiction. It’s not proven. It’s just conjecture.”
“No, it’s reality, and you know it. From the farthest reaches of the universe to the smallest particles, everything’s still a mystery to us. Everything—all of reality—is stranger than any of us could’ve ever imagined.”
“I understand the particle physics of it, I know it’s real, but you can’t go in there and talk about alternate universes and different dimensions like they are facts.”
“I’m only offering suggestions, trying to get these students to open up their minds.”
“Yeah, to an afterlife. To a Great Spirit. To a God. That’s not science.”
Warren controlled his anger as he stared at Heinz.
“Warren,” Heinz said, his expression softening. “You’re one of the most brilliant scientists I’ve ever known. Why are you doing this? Why are you publishing this stuff? Lecturing on it? You’re going to ruin your career.”
Warren didn’t respond.
“I know you want answers to what happened to your daughter, I can understand that. I just don’t want to see you flushing a great career down the toilet.”
Heinz didn’t know anything, Warren thought. It wasn’t just that his daughter had died; it was the things that had happened afterwards. There were some things that he’d seen and felt that he could tell Heinz about, but why bother? Heinz would only think he was crazy.
The cell phone clipped to Warren’s belt vibrated.
Heinz looked annoyed at the intrusion as Warren glanced down at the number on his phone and held up a finger with an I-need-to-take-this gesture.
“Dr. Warren Savage speaking,” Warren said as he answered his phone. He walked a few steps away down the empty hall with Heinz’s eyes on him the whole time.
“Yes, I’m still available,” Warren said.
A pause as he listened on the phone.
“I’ll be there shortly.”
Warren hung up his phone and turned to Heinz who looked at him with pity.
“I need that time off that I told you about. I’ve already arranged to have Professor Kingston handle my classes for the rest of the week.”
“Warren …”
“I have a family emergency to attend to.”
Warren didn’t wait for a response from Heinz; he turned and walked back towards his classroom door.
“Please don’t do this, Warren.”
But Warren didn’t respond to Heinz. He had been approached by a woman named Kristen a week ago. She had given him an opportunity to be a part of a team that was going to film a documentary on a supposedly haunted island in the Caribbean Sea. But this was much more than some Sci-Fi Channel ghost hunting show. This was going to be an actual scientific investigation into paranormal phenomenon. It was being funded by the famous director and producer Nick Gorman and there would be experts in their fields on the team. Kristen had told him there was practically a guarantee of finding proof of the afterlife on the island they were going to. The money they were offering him for his participation was very generous—more than a year’s salary for him—but Warren didn’t care about money anymore. This wasn’t about money, this was about proving to himself, and to everyone else, that his daughter was still alive in some form, in some other state of being.
He would find his proof there … he was sure of it.
CHAPTER FOUR
Los Angeles—Nick Gorman’s offices
Nick watched the screen as Kristen clicked the button on her remote control. Warren Savage’s photograph on the screen was replaced with a photograph of a pale man in his late forties. The man’s expression was pinched in annoyance on his fleshy face, his features seeming to pull in to the center of his face in a frown. His cheeks were jowly, his mouth was a razor-thin slit, and his dull gray eyes seemed cold and calculating.
“And this is—”
“My skeptic,” Nick finished for her.
“Yes, he’s one of the most famous debunkers of the paranormal in the world,” Kristen continued her speech from the notes on top of the files. “He’s the one who debunked the Torrington case in London last year, and he proved the famous psychic, Esmeralda, to be a fake.”
“Nigel Cromwell,” Nick said in a low voice. “I can’t believe you convinced him to come along.”
Kristen couldn’t help beaming with pride.
• • • • •
Stamford, England
Two rough-looking men in their late fifties entered the pub. They made their way through the crowd of rowdy drinkers and football fans in their team colors cheering at the TV screens over the bars. The two men walked to the back of the pub where Nigel waited for them at a corner table, sipping a shot of whiskey.
The two men sat down at the table without a word to Nigel.
Nigel held up his whiskey glass and a weary-looking cocktail waitress worked her way through the crowd with three shots of whiskey balanced on her tray. She set them down on the table and walked away without a word or a smile.
“What’s wrong with her?” the taller and thinner man asked as the waitress walked away.
Nigel smiled at the man. “She thinks I’m rude.”
The two men downed their whiskeys in one swallow and set the empty glasses back on the table top at the same time like they were identical twins even though they didn’t look very much like each other. But Nigel had been informed that these two men were practically like brothers; they had worked together for decades and they were the best at what they did.
Both men stared at Nigel, ready to get down to business.
“I heard you two are very experienced at this sort of thing,” Nigel finally said.
“What’s the job?” the taller man asked. He seemed to be the spokesman for the duo.
Nigel plucked a folded piece of paper from an inside pocket of his suit coat. He unfolded it carefully and laid it on the table, smoothing it out flat. The paper was blank.
The two men stared down at the blank paper in front of Nigel.
Nigel took his time removing a Montblanc pen from another pocket inside his suit coat. He drew a circle on the piece of paper. He paused and looked at the men.
They stared at Nigel.
“That’s it?” the taller man asked.
“That’s part of it,” Nigel said and grinned at them like a shark that’s spotted a meal thrashing in the water. He drew out the rest of his request on the paper and then slid it across the table to them.
The two men
stared down at the paper for a long moment like they were weighing their options.
“Can you do that?” Nigel asked them.
The men glanced at each for a second, almost like they were using some kind of sibling telepathy to communicate with each other. They both shrugged and looked back at Nigel. “I suppose so,” the taller man said. “If the money’s right.”
“Oh, the money will be right,” Nigel told them.
The two men glanced at each other like they were communicating telepathically again. Then the taller man looked back at Nigel. “We’ll do it.”
“Splendid,” Nigel said and he snapped his fingers at the waitress as she hurried by with a tray of empty glasses and mugs. “Another round please.”
• • • • •
Stamford, England
The next morning a large group of people had gathered in front of a wheat field just outside the city limits of Stamford. Two police vehicles and a news van were among the vehicles.
Glenda Day, a beautiful young news reporter, stood in front of her cameraman. She held a microphone with the news station logo on it. She wasn’t happy about being here for this “fluff” piece of news. She was a serious reporter and she wanted to work her way up through the ranks quickly. But that wasn’t going to happen with silly assignments like this. She couldn’t believe Roger had sent her all the way out here for this stupid story.
But she was still determined to do her best.
“Ready?” her cameraman asked as he watched her through the camera.
Glenda nodded. “Let’s get this over with.”
“Three, two, one … rolling.”
Glenda smiled into the camera, feigning excitement and joy, a honed skill. “The citizens of Stamford are understandably on edge with the latest crop circles appearing just last night as they slept.”
Becky, Glenda’s assistant, hurried across the grass and walked right up to Glenda. She hated to interrupt Glenda during a broadcast but she had just received news that couldn’t wait. She knew she would get the demon glare from Glenda, but if she could just tell her the scoop before she endured a stream of insults …
“For God’s sake, Becky,” Glenda growled. “Can’t you see that the camera is rolling?”
“Yes, of course. But you might want to hear this.”
Glenda stared at her assistant for a moment, her gaze burning into her. “Well?”
Becky leaned towards Glenda and whispered into her ear.
Glenda froze as she listened, and then she smiled.
“Cut this,” Glenda told the cameraman. “We need to get the helicopter out here.”
• • • • •
An hour later Glenda and her cameraman were in the news helicopter, hovering over a different wheat field on the other side of Stamford. Glenda wore a safety harness and sat by the open side door of the helicopter, speaking directly into the camera over the roar of the blades.
“The very latest in a rash of crop circles is down below us. Only this time the message is much different.” Glenda flashed a knowing smile. “I think the aliens may be trying to tell us something.”
Glenda moved out of the way as the cameraman scooted forward and panned the camera down to the wheat field below. He zoomed in a little on the field, but instead of the typical crop circles usually found, the word HOAX had been carved into the field of wheat in giant letters.
CHAPTER FIVE
Los Angeles—Nick Gorman’s offices
The photograph of the word HOAX stamped down in the middle of the wheat field was still on the screen.
“Who’s next?” Nick asked.
Kristen pushed a button on the laptop and a grainy photograph of a slim and attractive woman in her early twenties appeared on the screen. The photo looked like it was taken some distance away without the woman being aware of it.
“This is Laura Coleman and it took a while to find someone like her … someone with her abilities.”
Nick nodded as he stared at the young woman on the screen. Laura was in mid-step in the photo, walking down a small-town street, and she was turning back towards the camera like she knew someone was following her and watching her, but not certain from exactly where.
“She’s twenty-two years old,” Kristen said, glancing down at her notes. “She lives with her Aunt Dorothy in McMinnville, Tennessee. She works part time at an insurance agency. But in her spare time she tries to help the police find missing people.”
“She’s a Finder,” Nick said.
Kristen nodded. “She finds things: things people have lost, missing persons … dead people.”
• • • • •
Bledsoe County, Tennessee
A torrential rain poured down as Laura navigated her way down a muddy hillside, sliding a little. She had to grab the trunk of a small tree to help keep her balance. After a few more careful steps, she reached the bottom of the hillside only a few yards away from the bank of the raging creek now swollen with rainwater that wound its way through these hills.
Laura stood in the rain, concentrating for a moment. She even closed her eyes and let the feeling come to her. She was close now—she was sure of that.
In her mind she saw a woman’s terrified face in the last moments of her life. She saw blood splattered on the woman’s pale face, her mouth opened wide in a scream, her veins bulging.
Laura felt the terror … the hopelessness … the pain …
She opened her eyes and turned to her right. She hurried downstream, trying to be careful, but still hurrying over the rocks at the edge of the water. After five minutes of walking the narrow path of jagged rocks, the creek bank widened considerably. She was relieved to be farther away from the churning water. She walked across the rocks and scraggly brush to the base of a hill that rose up to the trees which stood like a line of soldiers above the wall of mud.
Halfway up the hill there was a collection of brush that didn’t look natural.
It wasn’t natural and the woman was buried under that hastily assembled brush.
In her mind Laura saw more flashes of the murder victim’s last moments. She saw the woman leaving a bar in the late night hours. The woman was stumbling a little, almost too tipsy to walk. She was with someone, a man who was laughing along with her. They were having a good time.
But Laura could feel the man’s mind. It was squirming and wriggling with evil—it was the only way she could describe it. The man’s name was Johnny Lee Harlin and he was thinking of what he was going to do to this woman in a few hours. Things he had done to other victims many times before.
The man was getting a tingling sensation as he anticipated strapping the woman down to the wood table in the large shed behind his house. He was picturing the ropes pulling tight across her body, creaking as she struggled against them … the rag stuffed deep down into her mouth, strips of duct tape plastered over her mouth to hold the rag in place.
She would be trapped there. Helpless. She could struggle and scream all she wanted. She could cry and beg with her eyes. But it wouldn’t do any good. She couldn’t escape. She couldn’t persuade him in any way not to begin cutting her flesh away in small pieces. And when she looked up into his eyes and realized that there was no escape for her, then he would see the hopelessness in her eyes—that was the moment he was waiting for, that moment when she knew her life was over.
Laura saw more quick flashes of the torture in her mind. She squeezed her eyes shut, wishing she didn’t have to see it, but now that she was so close to finding the woman’s body, she couldn’t stop the onslaught of horror radiating from the dead soul.
Knife blades. A drill. Other power tools. Pliers. A blow torch.
Johnny Lee Harlin had taken his time with her.
It was like the dead woman’s voice was whispering to her now. He took his time and I couldn’t stop him. I couldn’t get away. I wanted it to end … I just wanted to die so it would all stop, but it just went on and on …
Laura managed to push the images and the
dead woman’s voice away for a moment. She hurried over to the bottom of the hill and looked up at the unnatural collection of dead brush halfway up the hillside.
She was about to scramble up the hill and pull that brush away even though she already knew that the woman was there. But then she froze when she heard a familiar voice from behind her.
“Laura Coleman. I knew you’d be down here.”
Laura turned to face Sheriff Dawson. He was a solidly-built man shrouded in a yellow slicker over his police uniform. His hat was soaked through from the torrential downpour and he didn’t look happy.
“How many times have I told you not to get involved, Miss Coleman?”
Laura glanced back up at the muddy hill as she wiped her wet blond hair out of her face. She didn’t answer him.
“I know you’re just trying to help,” Sheriff Dawson said, “but we have a job to do here. We can’t let you jeopardize your health and safety.”
Laura felt a sudden flash of anger surge through her. “Your men are looking in the wrong spot. I know Johnny Lee Harlin talked to you, I know he told you where the body was hidden, but he lied to you.”
For a moment Laura thought she would see the familiar look of doubt in the sheriff’s eyes. She’d been trying to help the sheriff’s department and local police stations in eastern Tennessee for years now. She didn’t want national attention, she didn’t want money, she just wanted to help catch these sick animals who killed people and she wanted to help find the victims that they buried, the victims and the evidence that they thought was so cleverly hidden that no one would ever find them. But she could find them—she could always find things.
“Johnny Lee Harlin lied to you,” Laura said again. “His latest victim is buried up there on that hillside underneath that brush. It was supposed to be a temporary burial spot; he was supposed to come back and move the body—and do other things to it. But he hadn’t planned on getting caught yet.”
As she yelled at the sheriff over the pounding rain, she saw his men approaching through the downpour, materializing out of the rainy grayness. Two of the men had shovels gripped in their gloved hands; one of the men carried a large black tarp folded up under his arm.
