The Lost Treasure Map Series

by V Bertolaccini

  “Which paranormal investigators from throughout history would have dreamt of?”

  “Yes!”

  Bryson could recall seeing him with the device on occasions, and had not noticed it as they had other stuff, and had ignored it as another piece of equipment of theirs to investigate!

  “Did you discover stuff in the jungle, and about the island?”

  “Yes! But we never properly investigated it! Much of it is dangerous and not possible to investigate properly with it!”

  Things sounded trapped in some form of field or something, and he could not identify anything further!

  The scientists rushed back and started setting up all their equipment and started to realize the mistake that they had made – and that they had used up all their battery power, and that there was no power supply to plug it into.

  Bryson tried to mentally control the corridor wall there as he had in his room to view the outside of the castle, and was amazed when he made a working electric socket appear on the wall for them to power their equipment, at the exact point where he had wanted it.

  “Where the hell did that come from?” one of the scientists gasped, and they all marched over and stood looking confused, and Bryson took the plug from the equipment and plugged it in and gasped with the others when it actually worked.

  He immediately decided to keep it a secret until he had investigated it further, and to see what the others came up with!

  The possibilities were tremendous! If it made other things appear like it had!

  “What do think?” Merton asked him, leaving Bryson with little to say.

  He gave Bryson the impression that they might be going to do something or come to a conclusion!

  Mortimer also gave him the impression that things were different there and they were not fully themselves! They had not been fully prepared for all the occurrences and trip, and had little power over their own fate, and had little information on the overall future and what was behind everything.

  Bryson realized the implications of things and that they would have to check what was there and things of great danger!

  Mortimer quickly told the other scientists: “Investigate all the walls, floor and roof!”

  Bryson then watched him in amusement working out what an electrical plug was doing there, and the only one that they had seen there.

  In the darkness at the end of the corridor two figures came rushing towards them from the central stair region, and he finally recognized the figures as two of the archeologists, who were on guard there, and they rushed up to Mortimer and whispered things in his ear.

  Mortimer’s face turned pale, and Bryson saw that he had turned desperate to do something and he rushed away with the two men, to where the men had been at the stairs.

  “What are they up to?” Merton gasped, staring, bewildered, and Bryson knew something bad had happened.

  “This is a hell of a place!” Bryson mumbled, seeing an awkward situation arising.

  Bryson realized that he really felt like going back to bed. It had been a long previous day and this day could even be longer and more deadly, and he watched Mortimer rush to the stairs, and he wondered what he was missing there. Even though he felt like rushing back into bed!

  Some of the others that had come out of their rooms to see what was happening there, and looked tired like him.

  He watched them arrive at the stairs and realized that he would have to get a conclusion on what was happening there, but he might have to stay there for a long time and he realized that he had better follow them to get it over with.

  Merton shrugged and followed him, and they eventually started rushing over to them.

  In the sounds behind him from the disturbance he heard a rhythmical tapping, which increased in volume, making him slow to listen and he realized that it was footsteps rushing towards him from behind, and from behind him two more of the archeologists came running along, while they were fixing gun holsters around their waists.

  Bryson saw Mortimer going up the stairs with the others. The situation looked bad! If something never happened there it would be surprising! All the dangers and occurrences had been so deadly so far and it was incredible nobody had been killed!

  Bryson and Merton rushed to them and swiftly crept up the stairs to the next floor, where they heard them.

  At the next floor he watched their figures creep around, going from room to room looking for something, occasionally giving a significant gasp, which most of them had given since they had arrived at the island!

  Bryson now felt wide awake, but tired and avoided staggering.

  “I saw the figure of someone here with a weapon!” one of the archeologists muttered over to them, moving along to them.

  How had he seen anyone there he wondered? He felt like questioning him further but left it.

  When they went to a room where Mortimer was he heard someone gasp loudly, grasping Bryson’s attention as he knew that they had definitely found something, and they rushed there.

  When they reached the region he moved his head to search in every direction and to where he saw strange rooms with haunting dark shapes, and they arrived at a room where Mortimer was kneeling in the dark, next to the body of one of the scientists.

  Chapter 8

  The First Death

  A few hours later Bryson went back to bed and immediately entered a surreal dream, with him mildly viewing it, floating freely from all the problems of the outer world.

  Shifting things with no form floated wildly by in a deep void everywhere, with fascinating sounds like whispering thoughts from out in invisible zones, which taunted him.

  Energy of the universe blasted and blazed, which was normally invisible in the immense galaxy, and he saw mist formations throughout it of gases and other formations and he realized that he was seeing it all as it really was, which seemed powerful and intelligent, which never really made sense when thought about it, but it did as a fantasy.

  Golden places appeared around the strange energy lights that twinkled brightly through thick areas of the energy mist and a bright light appeared deep in the mist, and he realized the depth of the galaxy and that he was further off from it than he thought. It was tremendous and like looking into the deepest depths of space.

  He felt the presence of things mysterious and alive that were vast, which existed all around him and which he could not account for, and again he looked out at it all and wondered what it all was, and studied it, and determinedly tried to grasp it.

  Suddenly he was awakened by a loud knock at his door and he rolled sideways and checked the time and automatically listened to behind the door, and heard the silent voice of Mortimer asking him where he was, and he shouted telling him he was dressing.

  Even though it was so modern looking and like a future hotel he and the others still thought of it as being shrouded with vines and other vegetation with bright stars glowing everywhere above it, and in the middle of the jungle.

  He finished putting on his clothes and yanked open the door and saw Merton and Mitchell, who both studied him.

  “You told us to contact you if anything happened!” Merton stated, excitedly. “Well, something has! You’d better get over to our new meeting room if you do not want to miss the action!”

  “What action?” he answered, shifting out of the door and studying the corridor, watching some of the scientists up ahead, who were checking an area of the corridor.

  “We just found a faint shoeprint of the killer at another door further along from the crime scene!”

  “Is that everything ...?” Bryson asked firmly. “What are your theories?”

  “We’ll have to question everyone on what they were doing and where they were located! The scientist was killed while alone and exploring the rooms up there, and I think he might have discovered something ...”

  “He shouldn’t have been there on his own!”

  “Exactly!”

  “What is the shoeprint like ...?”

&n
bsp; “We are having a discussion on it in the meeting room and wanted you there!”

  “But this means a killer is amongst us now?”

  Both Merton and Mitchell nodded in agreement!

  Chapter 9

  The Meeting

  They all silently sat in the large room, which was bigger than a normal large house lounge, where everything seemed to have massive proportions to other rooms, which grasped Bryson’s imagination.

  They all sat still in various large seating objects at various angles, found there and in the surrounding rooms.

  Parker resumed pacing across their path, leaving a faint trail over the solid floor there. With his expression barely altering and slightly showing that there was trouble ahead, and some of the time he was in deep thought not quite mentally there, and Bryson noticed many of the others, especially the scientists, also reacted in similar ways and clearly thought it was against the scientists!

  Bryson wondered if any of them had really been confronted with such a crime before, and why?

  In fact, after a careful examination of all the people there he realized that he and the two psychic researchers must have the most experience, especially from the murders at the last two castles! And he realized why they had really wanted him there and Merton had taken Mortimer up to get him, and he then realized that he could have a lot of problems ahead!

  They were not experienced enough and never had the right means to conduct a proper investigation, and the last time it was the police that had been doing things and they had helped.

  He was sure that Parker and Mortimer had some facts about the killing that they were not revealing, and he noticed that they had an agreement together, and he tried to think what they would not say and what they would do! Yet there was too little to go on at the moment and he left it for later!

  There were hidden facts to it and he would wait until they surfaced, and he stopped troubling himself!

  The others were mainly discussing the death but knew little, going by what they came out with. They were waiting for something to occur and come to some conclusion. Perhaps even waiting for an argument to break out! Then perhaps they might get some information to enlighten them! But he knew they knew it would be little!

  Bryson gave occasional shudders from still being tired.

  Merton and Mortimer sat at his sides, silenced by the whole event, glimpsing Parker as if they were waiting for something and did not want to say anything.

  Bryson turned and coughed into a handkerchief.

  “I don’t understand,” Merton argued, “why someone would want to kill him? What was he doing up there on his own ...?”

  “You could be right!” Parker replied. “Why did he want to be up there on his own? We have questioned the scientists that knew him and had last seen him and they never heard him say anything!”

  “How did he die?” Bryson asked curiously.

  “He was choked, as we thought when we found the body! I could imagine him easily as a lunatic ...”

  Bryson tried to examine everyone there for reactions, but never saw anyone react. It surprised him one of them kept trying to use his pocket phone to get to the airplane, and try and get information out about what had happened, as though he had forgotten where he was and what had been happening.

  “It’s going to be really tricky explaining the place and this situation if we get away from this island?” one of the other scientists announced from beside him.

  “Anyway!” Parker announced. “We wanted to question you! Did anyone see anyone leave their room or go towards the stairs?”

  He watched them silently waiting for a reply and nobody moved in the room, and they all started nodding that they never one by one.

  Bryson knew the person must have been missing when it took place and he wondered if the killer had made a mistake there, and Bryson heard from them that they had checked up on them and that there had been at least half of them that had not come in contact with anyone when it took place, and most had been sleeping, and Bryson realized that they had made a mistake and there could be more than one person in on it.

  Bryson realized that they now had a killer, who had a motive to kill, and all the evidence showed that the person had gone to great lengths to carry it out, and that they would have to sleep there with him lurking in shadows.

  Chapter 10

  The Top Floor

  The castle was colossal, and dangerous beyond belief at times, and they had checked all the stuff that they had accumulated and found there had been many occurrences of visions of things, and they seemed not to want to enter into the unexplored regions, where many of them thought deadly dangers lurked waiting for them!

  They mostly rested and investigated things around them for what they were missing and Bryson soon realized that none of them had noticed his discovery of activating things mentally, and he decided to keep it his little secret until he could complete exploring it and its capabilities.

  The major problem would be food, and maybe drink if they entered the interior of the castle as they got water from outside.

  His attempts at creating food had failed, as well as for other things, and he realized that the walls only had so many functions.

  Yet after many attempts he eventually created a food and drink dispenser in his room, but had to alter it from creating weird food substances, which he never liked, and he eventually altered it to make the food and drink that he wanted and finished it off by creating simple controls for them to use, and once finished he hid it away and found an unexplored room nearby to create another one, and later informed Merton and Mortimer of his discovery in the meeting room.

  Most of the scientists there were confused over the discovery and asked questions about it, but he just avoided detailed replies! He was curious if they would discover what he had found, and wanted know what they would come up with!

  “What type of food does this dispenser give?” Merton enquired, seeing him joking.

  “It recreated all the food samples that I gave it, as well as giving other edible food and drink!”

  “This isn’t a joke is it?” Mortimer asked him, examining him closely, and Bryson nodded to disagree.

  “Where did that come from?” one of the scientists gasped, and laughed. “We could do with something like that around here! The food portions are getting smaller and smaller, and the remaining food is all the rubbish left ...”

  “And most of the water from out there is full of dirt!” an archeologist continued.

  “All right follow me then!” he ordered, and you can have some proper stuff.

  “Does this magical food and drink dispenser happen to give pints of beer?” Merton joked, and Bryson nodded that it did.

  As they all marched to the room others in the rooms joined the group, and they entered the room amazed that there was something there that resembled a food and drink dispenser, which now resembled an airport food dispenser machine to Bryson.

  Bryson typed in beer into the dispenser keyboard and a pint of beer appeared in it, and he handed it to them and they handed it about, and he got more and handed them about.

  Most of them examined it and drank it confused, wondering what it had been doing there, and why it created Earth food and drink with an Earth keyboard, and the others gasped at the possibilities of it, and Bryson wondered what they would create.

  “What do think?” Merton asked Mortimer, and he laughed loudly, and the others joined in.

  Later he was surprised when Parker came in, from the outside with water supplies, and was amazed to see them all drinking beer and tea and eating restaurant meals, and when he enquired about it he ended up more confused!

  Bryson eventually told them, and that he had found how to control the major functions of the walls!

  When they started their investigations deeper into the castle it was in search of the treasure there and it was organized by Parker and some of his men, with Bryson and the two psychic investigators, and some other scientists and archaeo
logists helped, who were curious what was there in the unexplored regions.

  They had been no further than at the bottom floors of the central stair region, at the castle’s entrance, and Parker’s idea of going up the spiral stairs to the top floor was really interesting.

  Bryson slowly climbed all the steps studying everything, while curiously watching Parker, as he followed Parker up, and occasionally listened to the others behind him, and Bryson noticed that his surroundings suddenly seemed to get dirty and dirtier the further up they went and by the time they reached the top they were sweeping away thin vines, like plant roots, which hanged down from the roof overhead, which increased, and he saw the structure at the top was cracked in places where the vines had entered, but he realized no large amount of water had got in and onto the stairs, and he started to consider there being dangerous insects there.

  “Well!” Parker conclusively announced, breaking his silence. “We have reached the top! There must be many other staircases throughout the building as it goes out for miles.”

  They entered deeper into the top floor, and turned on their lights, and it looked incredible to Bryson! It looked entirely different, and it had not preserved itself like the rest of the structure, and it looked like the whole structure might have originally been like it, but newer.

  It was like seeing a real alien haunted castle, where strange supernatural existed, and he considered it as being one of the only places like it and one of the most powerful places on the island, and world.

  The corridor had to be the most ghostly darkest places in a modern building that he had seen, and it was even more still, silent, and empty as was possible. Even with the lights on there were strange haunting dark shadows and glows that held secrets and dangers!

  They soon started thinking of the lost treasure that was thought to be buried away somewhere! Most of them had intended to do something when they could to find it! The cost of the building proved that if there was something there that it could have far more value!