by Rick Kueber
*** Allison Bettiger never awoke again on this earth, and though her friends mourned her passing, there was a comforting feeling that none could deny. As Rick Hayes had so aptly put it, 'She seemed very happy, and peaceful... not that she wasn't before. I feel like she has reconnected with someone she hasn't seen in a very long time, like a very close friend, or even a family member'.
The EVP Investigations team held a holiday party of our own, and even with the passing of Ms. Allison Bettiger, it was a happy time for us. We had helped the public, and the patrons of the Owl’s Nest, to understand that a haunting isn't always just a scary situation. Often times, it is merely a situation that requires understanding and guidance for a lost soul, and many times the needs transcend the planes of existence. Katie was beaming and the thrill of being a first time mommy showed on round tummy, and the radiant glow of her face. Sean was a proud 'future' papa, and we could all hear the paternal excitement in his voice when he and Katie chatted about how different Christmas would be next year, and the years to come.
“I just want to let everyone know how proud I am of you.” I boasted to my team mates and friends. “Once again, you have gone far above and beyond the call of duty. I only wish there were some medal of honor I could award each of you with, but since there isn't, let me just make a toast.” I raised my glass of spiced rum eggnog towards the center of the group, and was met by every glass in the room, including Katie's glass of sparkling flavored water.
“Here's to the most amazing paranormal team I could have ever imagined... here's to a team that is made up of friends... and to friends that are more like a family. I am honored to call each of you my friend.” With the clinking of glasses and cheers of 'here, here,' and 'we love you too, E-VPrick!', we all toasted one another's uniqueness and our similarities. I choked back the tears as I drank my toast, and blamed my watery eyes on the drink being too stout.
“So, what's next?” Jenn shouted over the racket of conversations and slightly too loud holiday music. “A break!” I shouted back, and was shot looks of dismay. “Take it easy guys... just a short break... and that's only if nothing imperative comes up, but I think we all need a little family time, and time away from the all-night frights and emotional roller coasters that we've been on.”
“I'll second that.” Katie cringed as she spoke up. “I'm going to have to take a break for a while, whether I want to or not.” She rubbed her belly in reference to her 'son' who would be arriving in a few short months.
The conversation ran on and on, all afternoon and evening. Everyone ate and drank to their heart's content, and before the night was over, we found ourselves all gathered around a big, flat screen T.V. watching 'It's a Wonderful Life', and it truly was.
EPILOGUE
The time off from paranormal investigating was needed and well appreciated. The winter months were typically slower for us anyway, so it was not as if we were greatly missed, but as soon as the spring thaw came, so did our next request. This time it came in the form of a phone call from a friend whom we had grown close to through our world-wide paranormal family.
“Hello?” I answered the unknown phone number.
“Hi, is this Rick?” The woman on the other end said. “Yes it is. Can I help you?” I kept my professional tone until I could figure out who I was talking to.
“It's Hilary. Remember me from the conventions?” she said lightly. “Hilary! How have you been?” I did remember her, a sweet young woman who was raising money to save a wonderfully historic landmark near her home town...in northern Ohio.
“Been pretty good... okay, look... I know we both know hundreds of people, famous and not so famous, in the paranormal field... but I really want you and your team to help me out here if you can.” She wasn't exactly beating around the bush, but she hadn't gotten to the point yet either.
“What can we do for you?” I expected her to ask for help with a fund-raiser, or something like that. “It's Maddie...she has gotten worse and I can't handle her anymore... I can't even bring myself to go to the 'Infirmary' alone now. There is no real rush... she's been waiting a hundred years, but if you think you could pencil us in, we could really use your team's expertise.” Her voice was troubled.
“Send me what you have... everything... history, photos, time lines, whatever you have managed to dig up, and if you need help with that let me know and one or two of us will come and work with you. Once we have that in hand, we can form a plan.” I knew this was a serious situation, just from the sound of her voice as she spoke about it.
“Thank you so much! I won't keep you, and I'll be in touch via email, in the next few weeks, okay?” Hilary, once again, asked for confirmation that we would be willing to help.
“Of course! Just email, or call, or whatever you need to do. We're here for you.” I meant every word I said, but part of me was honestly worried.
*** I met up with Jenn, Katie and Theo on a fairly regular basis throughout our winter break. Like most, this particular meeting was at the Starbucks inside of our local Barnes & Noble Booksellers store. Our chatter rambled for quite some time about family and friends and the reappearance of the ground, after a long and 'white' winter, but mostly about Katie's new little boy, and how difficult and stressful parenting could be. Jenn and I tried to give her comforting advise, but Theo just sat back blushing and grinned.
“I have no idea about being a parent, and I don't plan on ever having an idea about it.” He chuckled knowing his choice of lifestyles had taken that possibility out of the equation. “But, I think you will make a wonderful mom.”
“Well, no sense in prolonging the inevitable.” I said, and stopped the conversation cold. “We have another investigation request... in Northern Ohio.”
All eyes turned to me, and mouths dropped open. Even though there were mostly complaints about taking a break, I knew it would be a shock to the system to jump back in to investigating 'with both feet'. It was obvious to the team that this case must be important, and someone must be in dire need, for me to suggest trekking to northern Ohio.
“When do we go?” was the first question that was asked...by Katie, who smiled. “I haven't set it up yet, but there is apparently no rush, so we can probably do some research and planning before we have to set a date. Theo, Jenn... are you two on board?” I asked, already knowing the answers.
“Uh.... nah... I'm just going to sit this one out.” Jenn replied calmly.
“Really?” I asked, both confused and concerned. “DUH! Set it up! You know I'm in!” Jenn's sarcasm had, for the first time in a while, surfaced and caught me off guard. We all laughed at how I had fallen for her comment, hook, line and sinker.
“Just let me know ahead of time so I can make schedule the time off, but you know I'll be there.” Theo said, still laughing a bit between words.
“It's settled then. I'll contact Hilary and let her know, and then we will have another meeting to plan a schedule, probably in a couple of weeks.” I sat back in my chair and sipped at my French vanilla cappuccino.
“No rest for the wicked.” Katie said jokingly. “Or us...” I mumbled under my breath. “...here we go again.”
JENNIFER
KIRSCH
Jennifer is a 40 something mom of three and with the recent marriage of her oldest son, is now the proud mother-inlaw to one.
Jenn's interest in the paranormal began when she was only a small child. Her grandmother’s spirit would visit and comfort Jenn, while her father was away serving in the Vietnam War. Though as a child she didn't recognize it, Jennifer had a strong sensitivity to spirit activity.
Growing up in a Christian household, her interest in the paranormal was squelched as a child, but was rekindled as an adult when she found herself living in a house that had a wide variety of frequent paranormal activity.
While living in an actual haunted house, and EVP Investigations was still in its infancy, she contacted Rick Kueber to come investigate the house and was asked to join the group. Jennifer has been the Te
am's Lead Investigator ever since. Her interest in the paranormal has spread to her youngest child, who wants to follow in her footsteps.
KATIE COLLINS
Katie Collins was born and raised locally in southern Indiana. Her interest in the paranormal began around the age of 8, when she had her first personal paranormal experience involving the spirit of her Grandmother. Katie joined the EVP team and quickly grew to be an integral part of the group. Known to be the "McGuyver" of the EVP team, she always has a backup flashlight, batteries or spare roll of duct tape in her equipment case (pink of course).
As a level headed and forward thinking member of EVP, she's always looking for an explanation behind paranormal happenings. Katie has also been known to be quiet at times and is an excellent observer, though she can also cut-up and infuse sarcasm in her rhetoric as well as any team member.
The mother of a young toddler, she has a maternal and sympathetic approach to investigating, and is readily aware when a situation needs to be handled cautiously and sensitively.
Like all of EVP’s members, Katie is a great asset to the team on many levels, such as paranormal, social, research, and planning, and she can be individualized by one obvious constant… Katie loves PINK.
THEO KOSTARIDIS
At 41 years old, and a sixth generation psychic with a long family ancestry of intuitives, Theo was born in Athens, Greece. He moved to the United States at the age of 4 and lived in Florida until after college, when he finally accepted his destiny of intuitive arts, accumulating 20 years of professional experience in psychic readings. In 2001 Theo moved to Evansville, Indiana and now resides in Henderson, KY. He has worked various psychic fairs in numerous states as well as New Age and Spiritual Shops. Over the years, Theo started by honing his natural abilities, and then became very proficient in the use of tarot cards, psychometry, tea leaf and Greek coffee readings, and a variety of other tools. Theo has become the talk of the psychic world in Indiana and hosts seminars and workshops at Barnes & Noble and other locales. Theo has also worked missing persons cases with local police departments with phenomenal results.
Working with Evansville Vanderburgh Paranormal on several investigations as well as hosting seminars with E.V.P. as his invited guest speakers, Theo has become an integral part of the EVP family. Being a Trance Medium*, Theo specializes in communicating with those who have crossed over and channeling messages from your spirit guides and angels.
*A Trance-Medium is a person who is in contact with spirits and communicates between the living & the dead. A spirit uses the medium's mind & body to communicate. The medium does not have clear recall of the messages conveyed while in an altered state; such people may sometimes work with an assistant. The assistant records the medium words as they are delivered.
Terms and Equipment:
EMF: acronym for either electro-magnetic field, or frequency. EMFs are generated by many sources, both natural and manmade. The human body emits a natural e.m.f., while a cell phone or microwave oven would emit a man-made e.m.f. EMFs are measured with several different devices, and can have a wide range of strengths and ‘speeds’. Much like a sound wave, an electro-magnetic frequency is measured by the strength and frequency of its waves. An e.m.f. detector registering a .5 would represent a wave that occurred .5 times over the set length of time and space, whereas it would take an exponentially stronger e.m.f. to register a 1.5 on the same scale.
Various EMF Detectors/meters used in paranormal investigating:
K-II Meter MEL-Meter Cell Sensor
EVP: acronym for ‘electronic voice phenomenon’. Many times people experience hearing voices in a haunted location. An ‘e.v.p.’ is a voice or sound that is not heard by the human ear, but instead it picked up by electronic means, such as an audio or video recording device.
Often times a paranormal researcher will use a digital recorder to perform an 'EVP Session'. This is a series of standard and site specific questions that will later be reviewed and scrutinized using high tech computer programs to detect any voice phenomenon that may occur randomly, or in response to the questions being asked.
Any type of recording device can be used for these e.v.p. sessions, but a digital recorder records the audio into files that can be easily transferred to a computer for analyzing:
Infra-Red Camera: often called I.R. cameras and 'night-vision', these cameras can film in complete darkness by capturing infrared light that cannot be seen by the human eye, the video or
photos captured by these cameras often has a green cast, or will only be in black and white. While these images are not always the best for capturing shadow phenomenon, they are very helpful due to many investigations being done at night in complete darkness. Many times the un-natural movement of an object has been recorded using this type of camera. A series of infra-red lights can be seen surrounding the camera lens and though they are only seen when looking directly at the camera with the naked eye, the I.R. light allows the images to be recorded into a format that can be seen.
Digital Laser Thermometer: this hand held tool uses a laser beam projected onto any object and reads its surface temperature. It can often be used to detect 'cold spots' and temperature fluctuations which may indicate paranormal activity. It can also be used to find the source of these temperature fluctuations, and at times can prove the opposite: that there is a logical reason behind an apparent cold or hot spot.
Laser Grid : a laser grid is a series of laser beams that can be used to identify distant shadow movement that may not be obvious to the naked eye when lighting is minimal, or nonexistent.
About the Author:
RICK KUEBER
Rick Kueber was raised Catholic, and has attended many different churches and denominations. He has always had a knack and immense love of science, graduating high school with more than a double major in science. This combination has given him an edge as a paranormal investigator and team leader.
Rick has spent more than two decades in the construction industry working his way from an apprentice, journeyman, foreman, superintendent, and finally, a representative of hundreds of union workers. This leadership ability has been key in every aspect of his life.
Rick has appeared as a guest and speaker at many paranormal events and on numerous radio programs. He has also written smaller published articles.
While he writes about the experiences of his team, Rick says he finds his greatest inspiration and motivation comes from his love and bond with his son Daniel.
Frost & Flame Trilogy by Rick Kueber Stellium Books
Book One
Forever Ash: The Witch Child of Helmach Creek Revised Edition
Book Two
Shadows of Eternity: The Children of the Owls Book Three
Neverending Maddness: A Girl Lost to the World Autumn 2015
Amazing Paranormal Encounters Volume 1
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