The agents continue examining the opened grave, but come to no conclusions regarding the manner of death other than the victim seems to have been drained of blood. They do not see any wound that could account for this. Agent Sangumbo chances to notice a quantity of disturbed dirt spilling from behind a copse of manzanita bushes, and here they find the body of the other missing camper, similarly exhumed. Coyote prints are evident here too. Agent Jones notices that there is but one set of prints leading to this hole and one set leading away, suggesting that this was the work of a single, industrious coyote. They follow the prints a few dozen feet away from the hole, where they suddenly and mysteriously cease.
Sheriff Colorados nods knowingly. Agent Jones asks him what he knows of coyotes, but he is reticent among the white agents. “It’s nothing you white men would believe,” he says. “If I told you, you would just come up with some rational, scientific explanation anyway.” Agent Jones presses him, and ultimately persuades Colorados to elaborate. “We have legends of the Coyote-Spirit, an ancient and unpredictable spirit who sometimes helps those who call on him.” Agent Jones asks Colorados if he knows how to summon this spirit, but the Sheriff has only seen parts of the ritual. “There are wise men in our tribe who could do it, but they area on a spiritual retreat in the mountains for a few more days. You can ask them when they return, but I don’t think they will show you.”
Jones calls O’Brian and asks him to look up “Coyote-Spirit”. He also requests a coroner’s van to come up and collect the bodies. Frank Garrett overhears this, and following a short argument over which agency should head up the autopsies, he relents to the FBI. “We believe there is a Satanic cult involved,” says Jones. “It would be better if we handled the autopsies.”
With only a few more hours until nightfall, the agents call on local volunteers and Garrett’s CHP officers to conduct a perimeter sweep of the campsite. After several hours they find no further bodies, and the return to San Diego.
Meanwhile, all O’Brian finds with respect to his “Coyote-Spirit” search is a heavy metal band of the same name that is active in Arizona. “I don’t think that’s what they were looking for,” he says to himself.
The next morning, Agent Jones finds a package on the front doorstep of his home. There is no postage on it, suggesting it was hand-delivered. He is suspicious and takes it to be analyzed by bomb specialists at the Bureau. They find no trace of dangerous chemical agents or explosives, nor are they able to extract any prints from the package. It is totally clean. Inside are several clippings from national scientific journals and local newspapers concerning a substantial meteor shower that occurred over Tecumseh and Lowery counties in West Virginia six months ago.
The results of the autopsies are in. The bodies were both drained of blood by several needle-like holes to the heart and lungs. The coroner found traces of what appeared to be a tranquilizer in the central nervous systems of the victims, but was not able to identify it. Agent Jones examines the sample, and determines that it is neither of natural origin, or consistent with any tranquilizer that is currently known to science, or at least, not publicly manufactured.
The agents get a call from Garrett, who had been surveying the reservation using a CHP helicopter this morning. Some distance up the highway from the area of the disappearances, and off to the side of the road, they spotted the white vinyl roof of an older sedan that had until recently been buried. Coyote tracks were once again evident. The agents get in the car and drive back to the reservation.
O’Brian follows up on the article clippings included in the unusual package. He finds that there was a rash of disappearances and cattle mutilations in Lowery County for about five weeks following the meteor shower. Most people believed they were the work of a serial killer or a devil-worshipping cult. A group called SaucerWatch believed the incidents abductions somehow related to the meteor shower. Finally, a dismembered body was found wrapped in garbage bags in a tree, and suspicion fell on a certain Mack Tooley, a friend of the victim who was last seen with him. When the police went to collect Tooley for questioning he shot himself in the head.
Further searching uncovers that the coroner who performed the autopsy on Tooley abruptly quit his job the next day and relocated to Nashville. O’Brian tried to contact this man, but found that he had killed himself shortly after arriving in his new city.
O’Brian looks again for “Coyote-Spirit” and this time has better results (“I knew I shouldn’t have Asked Jeeves,” he says). He finds a dissertation on this Native American legend written by a man called Scot Thompson, who researched the legends and the rituals, and claimed to have induced a vision of this spirit himself. Scot Thompson, as it turns out, lives in San Diego. O’Brian contacts the agents and relates this information.
Jones calls Thompson, who is enjoying his summer break. “I’ve told you everything I know about the Putkin/Brewer case!” he says. “It’s not about that,” says Jones. “It’s about your knowledge of the Coyote-Spirit.” Thompson is not interested, but following some coercion regarding Thompson’s role in the aforementioned unresolved Missing Persons cases, Thompson agrees to meet with them. “But I don’t have a car, so you’ll have to pick me up.” Jones calls O’Brian, and instructs him to deliver Thompson to the reservation. O’Brian’s feeble objections to this task are overruled by Hobbsman, and he is forced to comply.
Scot Thompson carefully places the Rupert-cylinder in a large backpack, in which he cuts a small hole for the cylinder's ocular organ to see through. (Tired of the Zach-cylinder's endless pleas to "kill me, kill me," Scot settled on hiding it in the girls' locker room at the high school. It was later discovered by a janitor who assumed it was some sort of wireless webcam and threw it into the school's dumpster. Its current whereabouts are unknown.)
Jones and Sangumbo find Garrett, Colorados and the CHP trying to extract the car from its hole. When they finally succeed, they see it has Texas plates, and that there is a body inside. It seems to have been there for several weeks, and the stench causes both agents to vomit. The corpse has a large hole in its abdomen, and the intestines are spilled out onto the front seat, but strangely there is not much blood elsewhere in the car. Jones notices that the victims lungs have been removed, but apparently after death. The driver’s license identifies the man as Kenneth Braverman of Houston, Texas. Bureau contacts reveal that this man was an ex-police officer in Houston who had been under suspicion for a series of prostitute killings. When the investigation began, he allegedly killed his two children (who were found partially cannibalized in their home), kidnapped his wife, and fled the city. He was last seen almost six weeks ago.
The agents drive down the street to investigate the Begay Ranch. They pull into the long driveway and begin to walk the grounds. Here they find no less than twenty-six exhumed graves. In each they find the desiccated body of a sheep, and in the last, a much larger hole, the bodies of the four family members. The turned earth is still damp in the hot sun, suggesting that this digging took place last night. Coyote prints are everywhere, and again vanish several hundred yards from the last grave. They contact headquarters to order a remote forensics lab be set up on the Reservation.
The agents meet O’Brian and ask Thompson about his “meeting” with the Coyote-Spirit. Thompson tells them that it told him what to do with his life. “To be a high school teacher?” they ask. “To give back,” he tells them. Though he has tried, he has never been able to recreate his vision from the New Mexico desert years ago. “And as far as I know, spirits don’t leave footprints. You’re looking for something else.”
O’Brian is visibly disturbed by the sight of Braverman’s corpse, so they send him to the Begay Ranch to keep an eye on things until the forensics crew arrives. He remains in the car, and heads back to headquarters as soon as he is allowed.
The other agents, with Thompson, head to the gas station. They speak with the attendant, who knew Felix Royos well. They find he had no known enemies. They decide to perform another search to see if another grave has been dug up, and with some additional Bureau resources they eventually find an unusual mound of dirt several hundred yards from the gas station. They produce some shovels and find Royos buried not far under the ground. Darkness falls, and they hear a coyote howl in the mountains.
“That could just be a coincidence,” says Thompson.
Agent Sangumbo drives to the Hot Springs Ranch in Warner Springs and gets himself a room for the night. Agent Jones tells him he will be along shortly himself.
Thursday, April 26, 2007
Monday, April 16, 2007
Session 5: Puppet Shows and Shadow Plays
New Investigators:
Special Agent Cornelius Jones, FBI. Criminal Investigation Division (Profiling). Has been with the Bureau for eight years;
Special Agent Phillipe Sangumbo, FBI. Criminal Investigation Division (Forensics). Fifty-six years old and looking forward to his impending mandatory retirement on his next birthday;
Special Agent Harley O’Brian, FBI. Criminal Investigation Division (on indefinite loan from Cyber Division). Socially awkward and psychologically fragile.
Still Alive and Mostly Sane:
Scot Thompson, Mission Bay High School science teacher.
The Investigation Begins:
The FBI Special Agents of the San Diego Branch Office assemble for their weekly Monday morning planning meeting. Special-Agent-in-Charge Patrick Hobbson describes, among other ongoing cases, a series of Missing Persons cases on and around the Los Coyotes Indian Reservation (near Warner Springs, CA) that the FBI is being brought in on. Special Agents Jones, Sangumbo and O’Brian are assigned to this case based on their availability.
A follow-up meeting with Hobbson reveals the details as the FBI understands them. To wit:
1) On 4 July, Allen and Karen Curtley were driving along Highway 79 from Oceanside to visit their son in the Alpine area, when they mysteriously vanished. Their car was found abandoned on the side of the highway later that day and impounded by the California Highway Patrol.
2) On 6 July, Felix Royos disappeared from the gas station on the Los Coyotes Reservation sometime during his night shift.
3) On or around 10 July, two friends, Ed Stoltz and Chris Martin, vanished from the campsite where they had been fishing by a reservoir on the Reservation. Their disappearance was reported by Martin’s girlfriend when he did not return to work the following Monday. The campsite was undisturbed.
4) On or around 15 July, two European couples disappeared along the same stretch of highway. Rolf Trautner and Freda Ollenburg, an elderly German couple, disappeared leaving their rental car behind. Likewise, Dutch couple Dieter and Vera Van Olson (Deiter Van Olson being a retired Vice-President for Petroleum Exploration for Royal Dutch Shell Corporation) vanished leaving their car behind with all property still in the trunk. Both cars have been impounded, with personal property now in an evidence locker at the San Diego FBI branch office.
5) On 27 July, neighbors of the family of Victorio Begay reported that the family of four had not been seen in a week, although the family car remained in the driveway of their ranch on the Reservation.
In all cases, there have been no signs of struggle or property theft. CHP and Tribal police have jurisdiction on the case, but because of its Missing-Persons nature the FBI is being enlisted to provide whatever aid it can. The CHP investigation is being lead by Major Frank Garrett, and the Tribal police liaison is Sheriff Mangas Colorados.
Agents Jones and Sangumbo travel to El Cajon to examine the impounded automobiles. They remove the seats, vacuum for trace fibers and search for blood or other bodily fluids. On the rental cars, they predictably find many sets of fingerprints and hair samples. On the Curtley vehicle they find less, and the prints they find are consistent with those on file with the DMV for the Curtleys themselves.
Meanwhile, Agent O’Brian searches for credit card transactions for the missing persons. The last charge for the German couple was for a hotel by the Grand Canyon four nights before their disappearance. The Begay family’s last transaction was a debit card transaction at a Valley Center grocery store on 19 July. The camping friends last transactions were on 8 July at an REI store and an Escondido grocery store (for firewood). Felix Royos apparently does not have a credit card.
Agents Jones and Sangumbo return to the Bureau and requisition the recovered personal belongings. All clothes and souvenirs remain for the tourists, including a wallet of travelers checks in the luggage of the German couple. They call O’Brian and tell him the sequence numbers of the travelers checks and he sets some flags to be alerted if they are used. The agents decide to visit Warner Springs to investigate the ominous stretch of highway where these cars were found.
Warner Springs, which is south of the Los Coyotes Reservation on Highway 79, boasts a hot springs ranch and little else. The main street has a general store which also serves as the post office, a video store, a restaurant and several other family-owned businesses. The agents speak to the proprietor of the general store, who is clearly uncomfortable with their all-business appearance (“I paid my taxes, I swear it!”). He knows about the disappearances and even knows some of the victims, Louisa Begay being a regular customer, and Felix Royos who comes in from time to time. When asked where the cars were found abandoned, he can give a general location but no specifics. “You’ll have to speak with the Highway Patrol for that,” he tells them. He offers to take their business card and call them if any information turns up.
The two agents drive up to the Reservation, where they meet Sheriff Colorados speaking with Major Frank Garrett. Garrett plays at being a cowboy, with a Stetson hat and all. He comes off as boorish and perhaps not very good at his job. When he is unable to say exactly where the cars were found (he can tell them the general area), the agents request to see the fishing campsite where the two men were last known to be. Sheriff Colorados tells them the roads are not good, so he suggests they take his truck, a large 4x4 crew-cab Ford with the Los Coyotes Tribal Police emblem painted on the door.
They soon arrive at the campsite. The four-man tent is still standing, and their other camping gear is present, including a tackle box. Rods and reels are missing. The sleeping bags look slept in, and a cooler remains filled with beer. Colorados tells them they haven’t dragged the reservoir yet. The men walk down to a well-worn path to the dam, which is a popular fishing spot. There is no sign of a struggle that they can see. Suddenly, Colorados notices birds circling overhead in the wooded hills that climb from the water’s edge. He hikes up the hill, followed by the Agents and Garrett, and comes to a clearing. There they come upon a rather deep hole, at the bottom of which is the pale and shriveled corpse of a man of about thirty. The corpse is covered with dirt, and there is a large pile of dirt beside the hole, giving the appearance that the body was until recently buried. Agent Sangumbo searches around the opened grave and finds animal footprints everywhere.
Sheriff Colorados examines them and tells the agents that they are the tracks of a coyote. However, the corpse remains mostly intact (in fact, the cause of death is not immediately apparent). This is not consistent with coyote behavior; coyotes would normally devour a piece of found meat like this.
Colorados looks up at the sky and closes his eyes for a moment. The investigators can almost see his mouth moving in a silent prayer.
Special Agent Cornelius Jones, FBI. Criminal Investigation Division (Profiling). Has been with the Bureau for eight years;
Special Agent Phillipe Sangumbo, FBI. Criminal Investigation Division (Forensics). Fifty-six years old and looking forward to his impending mandatory retirement on his next birthday;
Special Agent Harley O’Brian, FBI. Criminal Investigation Division (on indefinite loan from Cyber Division). Socially awkward and psychologically fragile.
Still Alive and Mostly Sane:
Scot Thompson, Mission Bay High School science teacher.
The Investigation Begins:
The FBI Special Agents of the San Diego Branch Office assemble for their weekly Monday morning planning meeting. Special-Agent-in-Charge Patrick Hobbson describes, among other ongoing cases, a series of Missing Persons cases on and around the Los Coyotes Indian Reservation (near Warner Springs, CA) that the FBI is being brought in on. Special Agents Jones, Sangumbo and O’Brian are assigned to this case based on their availability.
A follow-up meeting with Hobbson reveals the details as the FBI understands them. To wit:
1) On 4 July, Allen and Karen Curtley were driving along Highway 79 from Oceanside to visit their son in the Alpine area, when they mysteriously vanished. Their car was found abandoned on the side of the highway later that day and impounded by the California Highway Patrol.
2) On 6 July, Felix Royos disappeared from the gas station on the Los Coyotes Reservation sometime during his night shift.
3) On or around 10 July, two friends, Ed Stoltz and Chris Martin, vanished from the campsite where they had been fishing by a reservoir on the Reservation. Their disappearance was reported by Martin’s girlfriend when he did not return to work the following Monday. The campsite was undisturbed.
4) On or around 15 July, two European couples disappeared along the same stretch of highway. Rolf Trautner and Freda Ollenburg, an elderly German couple, disappeared leaving their rental car behind. Likewise, Dutch couple Dieter and Vera Van Olson (Deiter Van Olson being a retired Vice-President for Petroleum Exploration for Royal Dutch Shell Corporation) vanished leaving their car behind with all property still in the trunk. Both cars have been impounded, with personal property now in an evidence locker at the San Diego FBI branch office.
5) On 27 July, neighbors of the family of Victorio Begay reported that the family of four had not been seen in a week, although the family car remained in the driveway of their ranch on the Reservation.
In all cases, there have been no signs of struggle or property theft. CHP and Tribal police have jurisdiction on the case, but because of its Missing-Persons nature the FBI is being enlisted to provide whatever aid it can. The CHP investigation is being lead by Major Frank Garrett, and the Tribal police liaison is Sheriff Mangas Colorados.
Agents Jones and Sangumbo travel to El Cajon to examine the impounded automobiles. They remove the seats, vacuum for trace fibers and search for blood or other bodily fluids. On the rental cars, they predictably find many sets of fingerprints and hair samples. On the Curtley vehicle they find less, and the prints they find are consistent with those on file with the DMV for the Curtleys themselves.
Meanwhile, Agent O’Brian searches for credit card transactions for the missing persons. The last charge for the German couple was for a hotel by the Grand Canyon four nights before their disappearance. The Begay family’s last transaction was a debit card transaction at a Valley Center grocery store on 19 July. The camping friends last transactions were on 8 July at an REI store and an Escondido grocery store (for firewood). Felix Royos apparently does not have a credit card.
Agents Jones and Sangumbo return to the Bureau and requisition the recovered personal belongings. All clothes and souvenirs remain for the tourists, including a wallet of travelers checks in the luggage of the German couple. They call O’Brian and tell him the sequence numbers of the travelers checks and he sets some flags to be alerted if they are used. The agents decide to visit Warner Springs to investigate the ominous stretch of highway where these cars were found.
Warner Springs, which is south of the Los Coyotes Reservation on Highway 79, boasts a hot springs ranch and little else. The main street has a general store which also serves as the post office, a video store, a restaurant and several other family-owned businesses. The agents speak to the proprietor of the general store, who is clearly uncomfortable with their all-business appearance (“I paid my taxes, I swear it!”). He knows about the disappearances and even knows some of the victims, Louisa Begay being a regular customer, and Felix Royos who comes in from time to time. When asked where the cars were found abandoned, he can give a general location but no specifics. “You’ll have to speak with the Highway Patrol for that,” he tells them. He offers to take their business card and call them if any information turns up.
The two agents drive up to the Reservation, where they meet Sheriff Colorados speaking with Major Frank Garrett. Garrett plays at being a cowboy, with a Stetson hat and all. He comes off as boorish and perhaps not very good at his job. When he is unable to say exactly where the cars were found (he can tell them the general area), the agents request to see the fishing campsite where the two men were last known to be. Sheriff Colorados tells them the roads are not good, so he suggests they take his truck, a large 4x4 crew-cab Ford with the Los Coyotes Tribal Police emblem painted on the door.
They soon arrive at the campsite. The four-man tent is still standing, and their other camping gear is present, including a tackle box. Rods and reels are missing. The sleeping bags look slept in, and a cooler remains filled with beer. Colorados tells them they haven’t dragged the reservoir yet. The men walk down to a well-worn path to the dam, which is a popular fishing spot. There is no sign of a struggle that they can see. Suddenly, Colorados notices birds circling overhead in the wooded hills that climb from the water’s edge. He hikes up the hill, followed by the Agents and Garrett, and comes to a clearing. There they come upon a rather deep hole, at the bottom of which is the pale and shriveled corpse of a man of about thirty. The corpse is covered with dirt, and there is a large pile of dirt beside the hole, giving the appearance that the body was until recently buried. Agent Sangumbo searches around the opened grave and finds animal footprints everywhere.
Sheriff Colorados examines them and tells the agents that they are the tracks of a coyote. However, the corpse remains mostly intact (in fact, the cause of death is not immediately apparent). This is not consistent with coyote behavior; coyotes would normally devour a piece of found meat like this.
Colorados looks up at the sky and closes his eyes for a moment. The investigators can almost see his mouth moving in a silent prayer.
Session 4: Music of the Spheres
(correction: it was previously stated that Scot lived near Mission Beach High with college student roommates. Scot actually lives on a boat harbored in Mission Bay itself.)
Unable to turn away the telescopes or turn them off altogether, the investigators decide to head to the Quonset hut to find supplies to burn the tower down. Dr Guest, who is slipping in and out of consciousness, they decide to leave as "he looks tired". They take
his security badge, and head to the hut with the fire axe recently wielded by Dr Neal.
They find the hut locked (with a key lock) and so they use the axe to hack a hole in the corrugated metal beside the door, and reach in to unlock it from inside. In the hut they find two trucks: a canvas-covered jeep, and a larger truck with a winch attached. After
failed hotwiring attempts they settle on taking a mostly-empty can of gasoline and return to the tower.
The tower seems deserted now. On the first floor is the library, and they grab armloads of astronomy periodicals and carry them upstairs to the control room. Rupert, no doctor, concludes anyway that Dr Guest is now dead. They scatter the magazines around the room, douse them in gasoline, and set them on fire. It is now sometime past 2:00am,
and they decide to meet their mysterious visitor by the demolished radio telescope. They take Zach's car down the rails, but only after convincing him that he will be recompensed for his deductible in the event the car is damaged.
It is pitch black and pouring rain, and as they approach the dish they can see by the car's headlights a figure standing near the base, in a large overcoat and a broad-brimmed hat. The figure does not look at them. They pull up and step out of the vehicle, but do not approach.
"Who are you?" asks Rupert.
The figure responds in a buzzing voice, as though speaking through a kazoo. "We seek to stop the music of the spheres," he says.
"Who's we?" asks the investigators. They look around, but see no one else. The figure reaches into his overcoat and produces a round object, about the size of a cantaloupe. He stoops and rolls it toward the investigators.
At this point, a terrible thing happens. Zach Brewer, still suffering from paranoia, panics at the sight of the mysterious object and draws his weapon. He has historically had trouble hitting his target, but suddenly he's a sharpshooter. As the object rolls toward them he fires and hits it, and it explodes in a massive blast of purple flame. Scot dives behind the door of the car, which provides some cover, but Zach and Rupert suffer the full extent of the explosion.
The Civic is mostly ruined, with extensive body damage and all the windows shattered. Scot peers over the door and the figure slowly stands upright. "Tend to your fallen," he says. Scot feebly tries to piece his friends back together, but ultimately decides that it is
impossible. Suddenly two bizarre, fungous, bat-winged creatures with insect legs drop clumsily from the sky and collect the bodies of Rupert and Zach, and silently fly away. The figure in the overcoat, which Scot can now identify as one of these creatures in disguise, produces another round object and instructs Scot to take it back to the control room of the main tower. As Scot looks at it, he somehow intuits that rubbing a slightly discolored part of the ball's surface will activate the thing.
Scot drives back to the tower, which is now in flames, and runs inside. He mounts several flights of stairs but the heat is too intense to go on. From the base of the staircase to the top floor he rubs the sphere, which begins to vibrate, and throws it up the stairs.
It ricochets once off a wall and bounces into the control room. He flees. The tower rocks with an explosion and as he emerges to the outside he sees the main dish in several pieces lying beside the tower. The thrumming, discordant space-music from the loudspeakers has stopped.
He tries to hotwire the Charger, but is unsuccessful. He drives North, away from the Observatory and away from Mecca, skirts Palm Springs, and takes smaller highways back to San Diego. This takes some time, as he has no windshield. After several hours the radio reports indicate that the mayhem has subsided in Mecca.
Scot returns to his boat, leaving the car in the harbor parking lot, and heads to Ensenada for a week. He receives a call from the parents of Stan Arnold, who tell him that Stan committed suicide in his cell the night of the disaster in Mecca. The photograph that Rupert took of the radio telescope exploding, that included a glimpse of one of
the strange buzzing creatures and which he forwarded that night by email to his editor, is for some reason never printed in the paper.
One morning, Scot wakes up in Ensenada to find two iridescent metallic cylinders on the deck of his boat. Examining them, he sees strange devices connected to the outside, including speakers of some sort. Suspicious, he begins to roll one to the edge of the deck, until it says "Scot! It's me, Rupert!" The other introduces itself as Zach Brewer. Scot looks around for a device that could be transmitting these voices, and even sails way out to sea to escape the transmit range. The cylinders relate that the last thing they remembered was an explosion, and then became conscious again in these devices that
allow them to speak, see and hear. Their human bodies are gone, but their brains live on in these brain-cylinders.
Upon returning to San Diego, Scot finds that he is now a Person of Interest in the missing-persons cases of Rupert Putkin and Zach Brewer, given that Zach's car is parked near his dock and that he was in the papers following the outburst at the NSCA press conference (where Rupert's Charger was later discovered), and told not to leave
the county.
With the help of voice-recognition software and Scot's computer, Rupert began a conspiracy theory blog. It can be read at http://braincylinder.blogspot.com/.
Unable to turn away the telescopes or turn them off altogether, the investigators decide to head to the Quonset hut to find supplies to burn the tower down. Dr Guest, who is slipping in and out of consciousness, they decide to leave as "he looks tired". They take
his security badge, and head to the hut with the fire axe recently wielded by Dr Neal.
They find the hut locked (with a key lock) and so they use the axe to hack a hole in the corrugated metal beside the door, and reach in to unlock it from inside. In the hut they find two trucks: a canvas-covered jeep, and a larger truck with a winch attached. After
failed hotwiring attempts they settle on taking a mostly-empty can of gasoline and return to the tower.
The tower seems deserted now. On the first floor is the library, and they grab armloads of astronomy periodicals and carry them upstairs to the control room. Rupert, no doctor, concludes anyway that Dr Guest is now dead. They scatter the magazines around the room, douse them in gasoline, and set them on fire. It is now sometime past 2:00am,
and they decide to meet their mysterious visitor by the demolished radio telescope. They take Zach's car down the rails, but only after convincing him that he will be recompensed for his deductible in the event the car is damaged.
It is pitch black and pouring rain, and as they approach the dish they can see by the car's headlights a figure standing near the base, in a large overcoat and a broad-brimmed hat. The figure does not look at them. They pull up and step out of the vehicle, but do not approach.
"Who are you?" asks Rupert.
The figure responds in a buzzing voice, as though speaking through a kazoo. "We seek to stop the music of the spheres," he says.
"Who's we?" asks the investigators. They look around, but see no one else. The figure reaches into his overcoat and produces a round object, about the size of a cantaloupe. He stoops and rolls it toward the investigators.
At this point, a terrible thing happens. Zach Brewer, still suffering from paranoia, panics at the sight of the mysterious object and draws his weapon. He has historically had trouble hitting his target, but suddenly he's a sharpshooter. As the object rolls toward them he fires and hits it, and it explodes in a massive blast of purple flame. Scot dives behind the door of the car, which provides some cover, but Zach and Rupert suffer the full extent of the explosion.
The Civic is mostly ruined, with extensive body damage and all the windows shattered. Scot peers over the door and the figure slowly stands upright. "Tend to your fallen," he says. Scot feebly tries to piece his friends back together, but ultimately decides that it is
impossible. Suddenly two bizarre, fungous, bat-winged creatures with insect legs drop clumsily from the sky and collect the bodies of Rupert and Zach, and silently fly away. The figure in the overcoat, which Scot can now identify as one of these creatures in disguise, produces another round object and instructs Scot to take it back to the control room of the main tower. As Scot looks at it, he somehow intuits that rubbing a slightly discolored part of the ball's surface will activate the thing.
Scot drives back to the tower, which is now in flames, and runs inside. He mounts several flights of stairs but the heat is too intense to go on. From the base of the staircase to the top floor he rubs the sphere, which begins to vibrate, and throws it up the stairs.
It ricochets once off a wall and bounces into the control room. He flees. The tower rocks with an explosion and as he emerges to the outside he sees the main dish in several pieces lying beside the tower. The thrumming, discordant space-music from the loudspeakers has stopped.
He tries to hotwire the Charger, but is unsuccessful. He drives North, away from the Observatory and away from Mecca, skirts Palm Springs, and takes smaller highways back to San Diego. This takes some time, as he has no windshield. After several hours the radio reports indicate that the mayhem has subsided in Mecca.
Scot returns to his boat, leaving the car in the harbor parking lot, and heads to Ensenada for a week. He receives a call from the parents of Stan Arnold, who tell him that Stan committed suicide in his cell the night of the disaster in Mecca. The photograph that Rupert took of the radio telescope exploding, that included a glimpse of one of
the strange buzzing creatures and which he forwarded that night by email to his editor, is for some reason never printed in the paper.
One morning, Scot wakes up in Ensenada to find two iridescent metallic cylinders on the deck of his boat. Examining them, he sees strange devices connected to the outside, including speakers of some sort. Suspicious, he begins to roll one to the edge of the deck, until it says "Scot! It's me, Rupert!" The other introduces itself as Zach Brewer. Scot looks around for a device that could be transmitting these voices, and even sails way out to sea to escape the transmit range. The cylinders relate that the last thing they remembered was an explosion, and then became conscious again in these devices that
allow them to speak, see and hear. Their human bodies are gone, but their brains live on in these brain-cylinders.
Upon returning to San Diego, Scot finds that he is now a Person of Interest in the missing-persons cases of Rupert Putkin and Zach Brewer, given that Zach's car is parked near his dock and that he was in the papers following the outburst at the NSCA press conference (where Rupert's Charger was later discovered), and told not to leave
the county.
With the help of voice-recognition software and Scot's computer, Rupert began a conspiracy theory blog. It can be read at http://braincylinder.blogspot.com/.
Session 3: Music of the Spheres
They search the pockets of the dead man on the sidewalk and find a set of keys, one of them bearing the VW logo. After much deliberation, with Zach proposing that they all just pack it in and return to San Diego, they locate Scot’s mini mag lite keychain and Zach’s low-light camcorder, they enter the abandoned Yacht Club. The windows are all boarded up so it is almost completely dark inside. They look for a phone at the reception desk but find none. Receipts litter the ground, and look to be dated no later than 1955. Open archways gape to their right and left, and a large, regular hole in the ceiling is all that remains of a once-majestic stairway. With some trepidation, they go through the archway to their right, and find an old dining room littered with decades of garbage left by squatters. At the far end is a door, presumably to a kitchen. They cross the lobby and go in the other archway and come into a lounge area, old rotting leather furniture still present. Scot shines his mag lite over the couches and sees two forms lying on the floor, one face-down, the other face-up. One is a man and the other a woman, and their heads and faces are also bloodied; these two presumably murdered in their sleep. The investigators cannot determine what kind of instrument would do this kind of bodily damage, but decide not to wait around and find out. They escape to the daylight.
There is no cell phone coverage in North Shore, so they wait until they’re back on the highway before they call the murders into the police. They speak to a dispatcher, who takes the information and tells them that all the officers are at NSCA but, that one of them will call shortly.
They arrive at the press conference. There are more news outlets present now, and the whole staff of the NSCA is on hand. Sheriff Kaufmann returns Zach’s phone call as they pull in, and they go over to speak with him in person. He tells them that they have dispatched another officer from County to the scene, and he will speak with them after the press conference, which is starting momentarily.
Sheriff Kaufmann stands before the reporters, and states the facts as they currently know them. Based on a mysterious device they found near the site of the destroyed radio telescope, they believe that it may have been sabotage, however, the device is not something that they have ever seen the likes of before, and it is in the hands of the bomb squad. For the time being they will not be providing details to the press concerning it. Nobody was hurt in the explosion.
Questions follow. Rupert, in the capacity of a reporter from the Union Tribune, asks the Sheriff if the explosion was somehow related to the work the Observatory was doing in regards to the Nemesis Star. As he mentions this, Dr Neal becomes noticeably enraged. He storms over to them, with Carl Wilson, roaring and screaming at the investigators for divulging this highly secret project to the assembled media. There is a scuffle and the three men are escorted off of the property. In leaving, Scot flips off the camera crews and his photo is later splashed across the pages of many local newspapers, under the byline “Area Crackpots Disrupt Press Conference.”
They return to Mecca in the Charger, and go to visit Stan, since it is now officially visiting day. When they arrive he is already with his parents, who are telling him how they heard on the radio that three men at the press conference were asking about “Nemesis.” He looks stricken, and then sees his friends enter the room. He can’t believe that after all those months of work, the secret was slipped before publication.
Zach takes the time to negotiate more money out of them, claiming that the work is more dangerous than he is used to taking on. The parents leave, and the investigators try to convince Stan that the sounds mixed down from the radio signals is the cause for the strange behavior in the area, and he sounds as if he is starting to believe that may be true. He asks to be left alone, as he is very depressed.
By late afternoon they return to the Sunset Café and order milkshakes. Zach and Rupert grow increasingly anxious, and could it be that man in the corner is staring at them? Yes, they believe he is. Zach tells the man to mind his own business. The man looks bewildered, and Zach and Rupert continue to berate him, even inviting him outside to settle it with their fists. The man leaves a $20 on the table and makes a hasty retreat. Scot, meanwhile, no longer is motivated to do much of anything, and wants to return to the motel. Maybe have a nap, yes, a nap would be nice.
Rupert, now convinced that the NSCA must stop their Nemesis research, wants to return to the Observatory to speak with Dr Guest. Scot will have none of it though, and Zach, spotting some overweight ladies passing by the café, invites them back to the motel’s Jacuzzi. Rupert pockets a steak knife from the restaurant and heads to the NSCA by himself.
Zach and Scot sit in the Jacuzzi with the two women. Scot is not much interested, but reasons that sitting here is as good as sitting anywhere. The women seem to be not interested either, as they are irritable and complain a lot. Zach tells them to beat sand, and then it starts to rain. There is a crash out on the street, and when they go to see the cause they spot a man in a battered pickup truck careening around the street. There is what appears to be blood on the fender. The fire alarm in the motel goes off. They also see a roving band of young men coming down the road, breaking the windows of storefronts and laughing.
Zach decides that it’s time to get out of town. San Diego is to the south, and he debates finding Rupert before they leave. They return to the room and see a note affixed to the door. In a strange, spidery hand, it says “meet me by the ruined telescope at 2 am.” Zach takes the note. They grab their stuff, get in the Civic, and leave the parking lot. The rain is now a downpour. They see a man on the roof of a building with a shotgun, firing wildly. A bullet strikes Zach’s car. “Oh shit!” he says. With all hell breaking loose around him, they pull out of town, past a gas station. They are only a few hundred yards beyond it when the tank explodes, killing dozens of town residents who had taken to the streets.
Meanwhile, Rupert finds his way to the main tower at the NSCA. It is late, but the lights are on as the scientists are working through the night to finalize their findings. He enters the tower and heads upstairs. He hears a lot of yelling; it is clear that tensions are at an all-time high. The sound of the telescopes are playing at a high volume over the loudspeakers. Dr Guest and Dr Neal see him at the top of the stairs. Dr Guest rushes to his side to tell him that perhaps it’s not a good time; they are now in a crisis situation because of his announcement today. Dr Neal throws a laptop at Rupert and misses, then grabs a chair and hurls it toward them, impaling Dr Guest in the stomach. Rupert grabs Dr Guest and pulls him outside, to listen to the radio reports of mayhem in Mecca.
“I’m dying!” yells Dr Guest. Rupert puts the radio on in the Charger, and rushes into the admin building to find a first aid kit. He tells Dr Guest to please wait outside the car, as he doesn’t want him to bleed all over the leather upholstery. He is busy wrapping gauze around Dr Guest’s midsection when the others arrive in the Civic. Dr Guest, now convinced, tells them they must turn off the telescopes from the top of the tower. He can barely stand, so they support him and together enter the tower once again.
The “music” continues its monotonous drone. They can smell smoke. They go back upstairs to the lab from which Rupert recently fled, and find it empty. Suddenly, a man leaps from a darkened office and attacks them. Soon another man arrives from upstairs. They are both in their thirties and strong, perhaps even stronger because of their mad rage. They manage to throw one man down the stairs, and the other they beat down with their fists and feet, and a heavy desk lamp. They continue to the top floor.
In the main control room, they confront Dr Neal. He is completely batshit crazy. He grabs a fire axe and charges the investigators. Zach draws his weapon and shoots him dead.
They all crowd around the console. Dr Guest, barely conscious, is unable to deactivate the telescopes. Zach, Scot and Rupert all in turn try as well but to no avail. Maybe Stan Arnold could do it; maybe Dr Neal could have done it, were he not crazy and dead. On the horizon they can see a glow as Mecca continues to burn. The time is now 1:30 am…
There is no cell phone coverage in North Shore, so they wait until they’re back on the highway before they call the murders into the police. They speak to a dispatcher, who takes the information and tells them that all the officers are at NSCA but, that one of them will call shortly.
They arrive at the press conference. There are more news outlets present now, and the whole staff of the NSCA is on hand. Sheriff Kaufmann returns Zach’s phone call as they pull in, and they go over to speak with him in person. He tells them that they have dispatched another officer from County to the scene, and he will speak with them after the press conference, which is starting momentarily.
Sheriff Kaufmann stands before the reporters, and states the facts as they currently know them. Based on a mysterious device they found near the site of the destroyed radio telescope, they believe that it may have been sabotage, however, the device is not something that they have ever seen the likes of before, and it is in the hands of the bomb squad. For the time being they will not be providing details to the press concerning it. Nobody was hurt in the explosion.
Questions follow. Rupert, in the capacity of a reporter from the Union Tribune, asks the Sheriff if the explosion was somehow related to the work the Observatory was doing in regards to the Nemesis Star. As he mentions this, Dr Neal becomes noticeably enraged. He storms over to them, with Carl Wilson, roaring and screaming at the investigators for divulging this highly secret project to the assembled media. There is a scuffle and the three men are escorted off of the property. In leaving, Scot flips off the camera crews and his photo is later splashed across the pages of many local newspapers, under the byline “Area Crackpots Disrupt Press Conference.”
They return to Mecca in the Charger, and go to visit Stan, since it is now officially visiting day. When they arrive he is already with his parents, who are telling him how they heard on the radio that three men at the press conference were asking about “Nemesis.” He looks stricken, and then sees his friends enter the room. He can’t believe that after all those months of work, the secret was slipped before publication.
Zach takes the time to negotiate more money out of them, claiming that the work is more dangerous than he is used to taking on. The parents leave, and the investigators try to convince Stan that the sounds mixed down from the radio signals is the cause for the strange behavior in the area, and he sounds as if he is starting to believe that may be true. He asks to be left alone, as he is very depressed.
By late afternoon they return to the Sunset Café and order milkshakes. Zach and Rupert grow increasingly anxious, and could it be that man in the corner is staring at them? Yes, they believe he is. Zach tells the man to mind his own business. The man looks bewildered, and Zach and Rupert continue to berate him, even inviting him outside to settle it with their fists. The man leaves a $20 on the table and makes a hasty retreat. Scot, meanwhile, no longer is motivated to do much of anything, and wants to return to the motel. Maybe have a nap, yes, a nap would be nice.
Rupert, now convinced that the NSCA must stop their Nemesis research, wants to return to the Observatory to speak with Dr Guest. Scot will have none of it though, and Zach, spotting some overweight ladies passing by the café, invites them back to the motel’s Jacuzzi. Rupert pockets a steak knife from the restaurant and heads to the NSCA by himself.
Zach and Scot sit in the Jacuzzi with the two women. Scot is not much interested, but reasons that sitting here is as good as sitting anywhere. The women seem to be not interested either, as they are irritable and complain a lot. Zach tells them to beat sand, and then it starts to rain. There is a crash out on the street, and when they go to see the cause they spot a man in a battered pickup truck careening around the street. There is what appears to be blood on the fender. The fire alarm in the motel goes off. They also see a roving band of young men coming down the road, breaking the windows of storefronts and laughing.
Zach decides that it’s time to get out of town. San Diego is to the south, and he debates finding Rupert before they leave. They return to the room and see a note affixed to the door. In a strange, spidery hand, it says “meet me by the ruined telescope at 2 am.” Zach takes the note. They grab their stuff, get in the Civic, and leave the parking lot. The rain is now a downpour. They see a man on the roof of a building with a shotgun, firing wildly. A bullet strikes Zach’s car. “Oh shit!” he says. With all hell breaking loose around him, they pull out of town, past a gas station. They are only a few hundred yards beyond it when the tank explodes, killing dozens of town residents who had taken to the streets.
Meanwhile, Rupert finds his way to the main tower at the NSCA. It is late, but the lights are on as the scientists are working through the night to finalize their findings. He enters the tower and heads upstairs. He hears a lot of yelling; it is clear that tensions are at an all-time high. The sound of the telescopes are playing at a high volume over the loudspeakers. Dr Guest and Dr Neal see him at the top of the stairs. Dr Guest rushes to his side to tell him that perhaps it’s not a good time; they are now in a crisis situation because of his announcement today. Dr Neal throws a laptop at Rupert and misses, then grabs a chair and hurls it toward them, impaling Dr Guest in the stomach. Rupert grabs Dr Guest and pulls him outside, to listen to the radio reports of mayhem in Mecca.
“I’m dying!” yells Dr Guest. Rupert puts the radio on in the Charger, and rushes into the admin building to find a first aid kit. He tells Dr Guest to please wait outside the car, as he doesn’t want him to bleed all over the leather upholstery. He is busy wrapping gauze around Dr Guest’s midsection when the others arrive in the Civic. Dr Guest, now convinced, tells them they must turn off the telescopes from the top of the tower. He can barely stand, so they support him and together enter the tower once again.
The “music” continues its monotonous drone. They can smell smoke. They go back upstairs to the lab from which Rupert recently fled, and find it empty. Suddenly, a man leaps from a darkened office and attacks them. Soon another man arrives from upstairs. They are both in their thirties and strong, perhaps even stronger because of their mad rage. They manage to throw one man down the stairs, and the other they beat down with their fists and feet, and a heavy desk lamp. They continue to the top floor.
In the main control room, they confront Dr Neal. He is completely batshit crazy. He grabs a fire axe and charges the investigators. Zach draws his weapon and shoots him dead.
They all crowd around the console. Dr Guest, barely conscious, is unable to deactivate the telescopes. Zach, Scot and Rupert all in turn try as well but to no avail. Maybe Stan Arnold could do it; maybe Dr Neal could have done it, were he not crazy and dead. On the horizon they can see a glow as Mecca continues to burn. The time is now 1:30 am…
Session 2: Music of the Spheres
The investigators return to the motel. Based on their observations of Stan Arnold, the mad dog, and the irate bar patrons, Rupert posits that perhaps there is something in the water. He and Scot decide to avoid drinking tap water for the time being. Zach puts no credence in this theory, and so Rupert suggests that he drink large quantities of tap water over a period of several hours. Zach drinks a glass of tap water every fifteen minutes for the next two hours, while they sit watching a Magic: The Gathering tournament on ESPN2. After several trips to the bathroom Zach feels no different than before, and they turn in for the night.
The next morning they decide to visit the NSCA and head there in Zach’s car. Scot, slightly cotton-mouthed and perhaps a little paranoid, decides to ride in the trunk with the surveillance equipment. They travel 4 miles down the highway and see the turnoff for the CalTech NSCA observatory to the east, but opt to continue down the highway to the abandoned town of North Shore.
North Shore was a popular tourist destination several decades ago, but rising salinity in the Salton Sea killed most of the fish and agricultural runoff made the water murky and unpleasant. Driving around the empty streets, they keep their eyes peeled for any human activity. They finally spot a Volkswagen Bus parked in front of the once elegant North Shore Yacht Club, and decide that it probably belongs to a bunch of hippies camped out inside. Rupert notices that in addition to the usual seagulls, there also seems to be a lot of crows and blackbirds about.
They turn around and head to the NSCA, arriving at about 8:30am. On the way there, they pass through fields of cultivated alfalfa, and can see large radar dishes on their right before they actually reach any buildings. They spot a low, cinder-block building with some cars parked in front, and behind this they can see a tower with a large dish mounted on top, at the intersection of two sets of rails on which mobile dishes can be positioned. They drive towards the tower and pull over beside what appear to be staff living quarters, and see a man in a battered jeep crossing the rails to a metal Quonset hut. He gets out of the jeep and produces keys from his pocket. Rupert attempts to observe the man through the telescopic lens of Zach’s camera, but the man sees him and comes over to talk with them.
The man introduces himself as Carl Wilson, and tells them that in addition to being the facilities manager, he is also the head of security, and that they are not allowed to take pictures at this site. He directs them to the lobby.
In the lobby, they meet the receptionist, the 40-something Nora Kelly, and introduce themselves as friends of Stan Arnold. They have no appointment, but she calls Dr Neal and then Dr Guest to see if either of them are available. Dr Neal is not, but Dr Guest arrives and takes them first to his office and then to Stan’s workplace. They see a spiral notebook and ask if they can look through it. Dr Guest is hesitant, but allows for it as long as he can keep an eye on them. They flip through pages of software architecture notes and other scribbling, but when they turn to a page titled “NEMESIS” Dr Guest snaps the book shut and tells them that they are getting into sensitive material and can look no further. The men ask if they can wait for Dr Neal to be available, and he directs them to wait in the front lobby with Ms Kelly.
After a half an hour, Dr Neal returns from his meeting and greets the investigators. He is distracted and short with them. Rupert asks if perhaps Stan had any rivals at work, specifically if he had any “nemesis who meant him harm.” Dr Neal balks for a moment at the mention of the word, but assures them that he did not.
As they leave, Rupert decides that it might have been better if they had located the observatory on Google Earth and snuck in at night. On the way out, Scot looks at one of the telescopes through the camera’s zoom lens and spots some numbers on a readout on the side.
They return to the Sheriff’s station to speak with Stan again. The deputy asks them if they know anything about the break-in at Stan’s house last night, but they say they do not. The deputy tells them that the computer was left on, but he couldn’t find anything missing. He takes them to Stan, whose shoelaces have been taken from him as part of his suicide watch. He is still extremely depressed. They ask him about NEMESIS, and he explains that that there was a theory proposed in the 80s that Earth’s Sun was part of a binary system that included another distant star, called the Nemesis star. According to the hypothesis, Nemesis periodically (roughly every 26 million years), passes through a denser region of the Oort cloud, disrupting the orbits of comets, and sends millions of comets into the inner solar system and potential collision with the Earth, which it suggests is the cause for the seemingly cyclic period of mass extinctions on this planet. Researchers at the NSCA believe that they have located this star via its radio emissions, and that it is near the lower part of the constellation Bootes. He implores them to not speak of this to anyone, as the findings have not been published yet.
They return to the hotel, this time to look up this theory on their own, and to analyze Zach’s flash drive copy of Stan and Carrie’s email. Among the scores of emails they find one sent to Stan’s home address from his work address. There is no subject or body text, but just an attachment of a file called “nemesis.mp3”, a 10 second long audio file. It sounds like a strange, discordant whale song. Using Zach’s equipment they speed it up, slow it down, play it backwards, analyze the data in a hex editor, loop it, and so on for several hours. Scot becomes increasingly anxious, and believes that the police will be back to get them. He closes the blinds and stands at the door, peering through the peep hole.
After stopping by the Sunset Café, where they dine on chicken fried steak, pig-in-a-blanket and blueberry pie, they return to the hotel to wait until dark. Around 9:00pm they step out into the dusk, and Rupert says “look, there are those black birds from North Shore.” Scot, who was in the trunk at the time, says “we were in North Shore?” and then tells them that blackbirds and crows are natural enemies. As he says this, hundreds of the birds converge on a man crossing the street, pecking at him in a flurry of beaks and feathers. They all make a break for the car, but Zach and Scot arrive first, and Scot locks the door with Rupert still outside. The birds swarm him, pecking him until he successfully flees to his own car nearby. As quickly as they came, the birds disappear, and the investigators regroup in Zach’s car.
They head to the turnoff for the NSCA but go a few hundred yards farther and park on a disused dirt road. Scot’s paranoia now prevents him from leaving the car, but Rupert takes the keys. Zach and Rupert head through the alfalfa fields to the observatory, when they notice a large, winged creature flitting overhead in the moonlight. It flies clumsily, whatever it is, and emits a buzzing sound like an insect. Rupert takes the telescopic lens and looks through it to the west, where the outermost radar dish sits about a half mile away. As he is examining the dish, it explodes in a flash of purple flame. He quickly starts snapping pictures. The two investigators panic and run back to the car, and return to the motel.
They examine the pictures that Rupert took just minutes before. In one of them, in the flash of the explosion, they can see a creature at the top of the frame. It doesn’t look like any bird they have ever seen before, but the details are obscured so it’s hard to tell. Afraid to fall asleep, they try to stay awake all night, with Scot at his position by the door. After several hours, however, they drop off to sleep, and then Scot and Zach are visited by the same, strange dream.
When the dream begins, they are in the motel, and they hear the sound of glass breaking outside. They rush outside and realize that there has been an earthquake, and looking to the sky, see dark clouds part overhead. A huge, red planetoid looms above them, with lightning crackling across its surface. Suddenly two molten seas split across its face, like a pair of demonic eyes. It emits a low, rumbling sound of weirdly-layered low- and mid-frequencies. There is a deafening clap of thunder and then the dream is over.
The two men wake up, and relate their common dream to each other. They are both quite shaken by it.
The next morning, they plan to head back to the NSCA early and step out of the room at around 6:00am. On the ground in front of their door is a strange metallic object. It is cylindrical, about a foot and a half long and comprised of many half-inch discs that rotate around a central shaft. There are strange mathematical symbols along its sides. Rupert, who has some background in cryptography, correctly recognizes that it is some sort of message. Zach enters the symbols into an spreadsheet and writes a macro to sort them in various ways, and within an hour has decoded the message.
The message speaks in cryptic terms about some entity, called Ghroth, who is also called the Harbinger, who visits worlds to set them right, to raise the sleeping things from their sunken tombs and to raise the tombs themselves, and to reward those who would presume to serve as stewards to this being. Rupert hides this device in the trunk of his car, in the compartment where his spare tire is kept.
When they arrive at the NSCA, the Sheriff, his deputies, and other law enforcement are on the scene and staging an investigation. There are also local news reporters from Palm Springs and Los Angeles. They try to glean some information from anyone, but the Sheriff tells them that the investigation is ongoing, and that he will hold a press conference at 9:00am. They overhear him tell a reporter that the explosion could have been a malfunction, but they are not ruling out sabotage.
With several hours to wait, they decide to return to the abandoned town of North Shore, to see if there is any sign of the hippies, who could perhaps be affiliated with an eco-terrorist organization. They arrive at the Yacht Club and see the bus still parked out front. As they walk around it, they see a man’s body splayed out face down on the opposite side. He looks like a hippie, but a hippie whose head is mostly caved in from the back. Rupert suggests he might be dead, and pokes his bloodied head with a stick. The stick pokes most of the way through, confirming that he is indeed deceased. They search the van, finding fast food wrappers, clothes, and a bag of marijuana in the glove compartment. Scot takes this for himself. They look at the open entrance to the Yacht Club, and contemplate entering…
The next morning they decide to visit the NSCA and head there in Zach’s car. Scot, slightly cotton-mouthed and perhaps a little paranoid, decides to ride in the trunk with the surveillance equipment. They travel 4 miles down the highway and see the turnoff for the CalTech NSCA observatory to the east, but opt to continue down the highway to the abandoned town of North Shore.
North Shore was a popular tourist destination several decades ago, but rising salinity in the Salton Sea killed most of the fish and agricultural runoff made the water murky and unpleasant. Driving around the empty streets, they keep their eyes peeled for any human activity. They finally spot a Volkswagen Bus parked in front of the once elegant North Shore Yacht Club, and decide that it probably belongs to a bunch of hippies camped out inside. Rupert notices that in addition to the usual seagulls, there also seems to be a lot of crows and blackbirds about.
They turn around and head to the NSCA, arriving at about 8:30am. On the way there, they pass through fields of cultivated alfalfa, and can see large radar dishes on their right before they actually reach any buildings. They spot a low, cinder-block building with some cars parked in front, and behind this they can see a tower with a large dish mounted on top, at the intersection of two sets of rails on which mobile dishes can be positioned. They drive towards the tower and pull over beside what appear to be staff living quarters, and see a man in a battered jeep crossing the rails to a metal Quonset hut. He gets out of the jeep and produces keys from his pocket. Rupert attempts to observe the man through the telescopic lens of Zach’s camera, but the man sees him and comes over to talk with them.
The man introduces himself as Carl Wilson, and tells them that in addition to being the facilities manager, he is also the head of security, and that they are not allowed to take pictures at this site. He directs them to the lobby.
In the lobby, they meet the receptionist, the 40-something Nora Kelly, and introduce themselves as friends of Stan Arnold. They have no appointment, but she calls Dr Neal and then Dr Guest to see if either of them are available. Dr Neal is not, but Dr Guest arrives and takes them first to his office and then to Stan’s workplace. They see a spiral notebook and ask if they can look through it. Dr Guest is hesitant, but allows for it as long as he can keep an eye on them. They flip through pages of software architecture notes and other scribbling, but when they turn to a page titled “NEMESIS” Dr Guest snaps the book shut and tells them that they are getting into sensitive material and can look no further. The men ask if they can wait for Dr Neal to be available, and he directs them to wait in the front lobby with Ms Kelly.
After a half an hour, Dr Neal returns from his meeting and greets the investigators. He is distracted and short with them. Rupert asks if perhaps Stan had any rivals at work, specifically if he had any “nemesis who meant him harm.” Dr Neal balks for a moment at the mention of the word, but assures them that he did not.
As they leave, Rupert decides that it might have been better if they had located the observatory on Google Earth and snuck in at night. On the way out, Scot looks at one of the telescopes through the camera’s zoom lens and spots some numbers on a readout on the side.
They return to the Sheriff’s station to speak with Stan again. The deputy asks them if they know anything about the break-in at Stan’s house last night, but they say they do not. The deputy tells them that the computer was left on, but he couldn’t find anything missing. He takes them to Stan, whose shoelaces have been taken from him as part of his suicide watch. He is still extremely depressed. They ask him about NEMESIS, and he explains that that there was a theory proposed in the 80s that Earth’s Sun was part of a binary system that included another distant star, called the Nemesis star. According to the hypothesis, Nemesis periodically (roughly every 26 million years), passes through a denser region of the Oort cloud, disrupting the orbits of comets, and sends millions of comets into the inner solar system and potential collision with the Earth, which it suggests is the cause for the seemingly cyclic period of mass extinctions on this planet. Researchers at the NSCA believe that they have located this star via its radio emissions, and that it is near the lower part of the constellation Bootes. He implores them to not speak of this to anyone, as the findings have not been published yet.
They return to the hotel, this time to look up this theory on their own, and to analyze Zach’s flash drive copy of Stan and Carrie’s email. Among the scores of emails they find one sent to Stan’s home address from his work address. There is no subject or body text, but just an attachment of a file called “nemesis.mp3”, a 10 second long audio file. It sounds like a strange, discordant whale song. Using Zach’s equipment they speed it up, slow it down, play it backwards, analyze the data in a hex editor, loop it, and so on for several hours. Scot becomes increasingly anxious, and believes that the police will be back to get them. He closes the blinds and stands at the door, peering through the peep hole.
After stopping by the Sunset Café, where they dine on chicken fried steak, pig-in-a-blanket and blueberry pie, they return to the hotel to wait until dark. Around 9:00pm they step out into the dusk, and Rupert says “look, there are those black birds from North Shore.” Scot, who was in the trunk at the time, says “we were in North Shore?” and then tells them that blackbirds and crows are natural enemies. As he says this, hundreds of the birds converge on a man crossing the street, pecking at him in a flurry of beaks and feathers. They all make a break for the car, but Zach and Scot arrive first, and Scot locks the door with Rupert still outside. The birds swarm him, pecking him until he successfully flees to his own car nearby. As quickly as they came, the birds disappear, and the investigators regroup in Zach’s car.
They head to the turnoff for the NSCA but go a few hundred yards farther and park on a disused dirt road. Scot’s paranoia now prevents him from leaving the car, but Rupert takes the keys. Zach and Rupert head through the alfalfa fields to the observatory, when they notice a large, winged creature flitting overhead in the moonlight. It flies clumsily, whatever it is, and emits a buzzing sound like an insect. Rupert takes the telescopic lens and looks through it to the west, where the outermost radar dish sits about a half mile away. As he is examining the dish, it explodes in a flash of purple flame. He quickly starts snapping pictures. The two investigators panic and run back to the car, and return to the motel.
They examine the pictures that Rupert took just minutes before. In one of them, in the flash of the explosion, they can see a creature at the top of the frame. It doesn’t look like any bird they have ever seen before, but the details are obscured so it’s hard to tell. Afraid to fall asleep, they try to stay awake all night, with Scot at his position by the door. After several hours, however, they drop off to sleep, and then Scot and Zach are visited by the same, strange dream.
When the dream begins, they are in the motel, and they hear the sound of glass breaking outside. They rush outside and realize that there has been an earthquake, and looking to the sky, see dark clouds part overhead. A huge, red planetoid looms above them, with lightning crackling across its surface. Suddenly two molten seas split across its face, like a pair of demonic eyes. It emits a low, rumbling sound of weirdly-layered low- and mid-frequencies. There is a deafening clap of thunder and then the dream is over.
The two men wake up, and relate their common dream to each other. They are both quite shaken by it.
The next morning, they plan to head back to the NSCA early and step out of the room at around 6:00am. On the ground in front of their door is a strange metallic object. It is cylindrical, about a foot and a half long and comprised of many half-inch discs that rotate around a central shaft. There are strange mathematical symbols along its sides. Rupert, who has some background in cryptography, correctly recognizes that it is some sort of message. Zach enters the symbols into an spreadsheet and writes a macro to sort them in various ways, and within an hour has decoded the message.
The message speaks in cryptic terms about some entity, called Ghroth, who is also called the Harbinger, who visits worlds to set them right, to raise the sleeping things from their sunken tombs and to raise the tombs themselves, and to reward those who would presume to serve as stewards to this being. Rupert hides this device in the trunk of his car, in the compartment where his spare tire is kept.
When they arrive at the NSCA, the Sheriff, his deputies, and other law enforcement are on the scene and staging an investigation. There are also local news reporters from Palm Springs and Los Angeles. They try to glean some information from anyone, but the Sheriff tells them that the investigation is ongoing, and that he will hold a press conference at 9:00am. They overhear him tell a reporter that the explosion could have been a malfunction, but they are not ruling out sabotage.
With several hours to wait, they decide to return to the abandoned town of North Shore, to see if there is any sign of the hippies, who could perhaps be affiliated with an eco-terrorist organization. They arrive at the Yacht Club and see the bus still parked out front. As they walk around it, they see a man’s body splayed out face down on the opposite side. He looks like a hippie, but a hippie whose head is mostly caved in from the back. Rupert suggests he might be dead, and pokes his bloodied head with a stick. The stick pokes most of the way through, confirming that he is indeed deceased. They search the van, finding fast food wrappers, clothes, and a bag of marijuana in the glove compartment. Scot takes this for himself. They look at the open entrance to the Yacht Club, and contemplate entering…
Session 1: Music of the Spheres
The Investigators:
Rupert Putkin, a newspaper reporter. After graduating from SDSU, he attended the School of Journalism at University of Missouri before returning home to take a job at the San Diego Union Tribune. Having grown tired of celebrity reporting he is looking for his own niche. Friends and coworkers generally regard him as a responsible person, but that did not stop him from recently overextending himself to purchase a black ’07 Dodge Charger SRT8.
Scot Thompson, a disaffected science teacher at Mission Bay High School. A strong swimmer and lifelong surfer, he lives near his school in a sort symbiotic frat-boy existence with roommates a decade younger than he is, some of whom he taught several years back. He is becoming increasingly dependent on marijuana and its derivatives. After an abortive college career on the East Coast, he transferred in his sophomore year to SDSU, where he and Rupert shared an apartment. He does not currently own a car.
Zach Brewer, a private investigator. Spent most of his twenties couch-hopping and taking correspondence courses in such diverse fields as locksmithing, photography and gun repair. It dawned on him that these skills would befit a private investigator, so he saved until he could afford to pay for his certification process, and went on to found ZB Investigations, Inc., of which he is the sole employee. The majority of his work involves staking out adulterous husbands and wives with their paramours and gathering photographic evidence. He is, by his own admission, a “chubby chaser.” Drives a nondescript grey ’04 Honda Civic with surveillance equipment in the trunk.
Session 1:
Rupert gets a call from the parents of an old college friend, Stan Arnold. After SDSU, Stan attended MIT, and then returned to work at the prestigious North Shore Cruciform Array (NSCA), a radio telescope observatory affiliated with CalTech, near the Salton Sea. It seems that following a dispute that Stan, normally a mild-mannered individual, killed his girlfriend of six years, Carrie Osbourne. Although he admitted to the crime and turned himself in, Stan’s parents believe that someone framed him, and implored Rupert and Scot, as his old friends, to go look into the situation. Rupert thought that his friend Zach Brewer’s skills might be useful, and on his referral, the Arnolds enlisted his aid as well. The next morning, Scot and Rupert drive to Mecca, California in Rupert’s Charger, and Zach drives up himself to meet them.
Mecca is a town of perhaps 600 people. It’s high summer, and very hot, with early afternoon temperatures around 115 degrees. The investigators first visit the San Bernardino Sheriff’s Station in Mecca, where Stan is currently incarcerated. Sheriff Kaufmann is on duty and tells them that visiting hours are from 10:00am until noon on Saturday, and today is only Thursday. Zach Brewer makes an appeal, as a sort of law man himself, that Kaufmann allow them to speak with Stan, and the Sheriff relents. Deputy Horner escorts them down the hall to Stan’s cell.
Stan is despondent. He readily admits to the crime but can’t explain why he did it. He came home from work, and had been feeling agitated all day. Carrie told him that she had taken his vintage Mustang to the store and accidentally put a scratch in the door. Stan relates that he became enraged, and strangled her with his bare hands. After some time he came to his senses, and turned himself in. Zach suggests that maybe somebody drugged him, and Stan tells him he thought of that already. The NSCA is a very competitive place, and while he is only a computer technician, he would not put it past some of the scientists to do something like that to each other to avoid losing credit for a major discovery.
Scot, on the sly, tries to slip him a bag of pot-laced cookies. The Deputy sees him do this, but fortunately does not recognize the cookies for what they are. Scot apologizes and pockets the cookies again.
Rupert calls Stan’s public defender, and requests blood work be ordered. Zach requests that Stan be put on suicide watch, and he and the Sheriff exchange business cards.
The trio head to the Sunset Café, where they attempt to get a feel for the local reaction to the murder. The waitress says that everyone is disturbed by it, as nothing has happened in this town since a hit-and-run last year. When asked if there’s a bar in town, she directs them to a sports bar down the street called O’Malleys.
O’Malley’s is one of those Irish bars that is Irish in name only; except for the promotional Budweiser St Patrick’s Day banner on the wall, the place is indistinguishable from any other dirt bar in America. Two large screens show monster trucks and UFC. Zach and Scot play pool. Rupert changes the channel to baseball, which causes grumbling among the local patrons. At some point Scot saddles up to the bar and lights a cigarette, blowing the smoke at two rough-looking gentlemen beside him. When they tell him to put it out, he is belligerent. A fist-fight breaks out, and tensions escalate when the bartended produces a shotgun from a low cupboard. Everyone involved flees outside, where Scot continues to antagonize the men, and the fight erupts anew. The bartender comes out and menaces them with the shotgun again, going so far as to fire it off in the air, and tells them to get away from his storefront. Finally the investigators and the other men go their separate ways. Scot leaves this encounter with a shiner.
It is now around 10:00pm, and the investigators decide to go to Stan’s house, which is still a protected crime scene. They park on the main street and begin walking the two blocks to the house, when Rupert notices a large dog skulking near a dark home. It ambles closer to them, and Zach gets nervous and pulls a taser from his bag. Then the dog lunges, and bites Zach in the buttocks. He madly fires the taser and misses. Rupert grabs a wooden stick from a nearby lawn, and they all attempt to fight the dog off. Scot is bitten as well, and finally Zach draws his 9mm and with three bullets, kills the mad dog.
Lights go on in many of the houses as the shots are fired, and soon a man in a housecoat comes walking down the street. He is enraged that the investigators killed his dog, who he claimed to be the nicest dog in the world. Soon Deputy Horner arrives, and as Zach threatens the man with legal action, he diffuses the situation and takes Zach and Scot to the local family practitioner’s home office, where the doctor was still awake, and dresses the wounds. Zach insists that the dead animal be taken by animal control and tested for rabies. The doctor offers Zach a toroidal pillow, of the kind used by hemorrhoid patients, but he refuses.
Finally, after midnight, the group return to Stan Arnold’s house. They sneak around back and find it all locked up. Zach tries all the doors and windows, and eventually succeeds in picking the lock on the back door. Inside, he finds Stan and Carrie’s computer and manages to log in. Without much time to look around, he copies the contents of the couple’s Inbox and Sent folders to a flash drive. Rupert, near the front door, spots Stan’s security badge from the NSCA, a contactless smartcard. Then he notices a car pulling up, and hazarding a glance, sees that it is Deputy Horner. Somebody must have noticed them trying to gain entrance and called the police. They all flee out the back door, but Rupert is spotted by the Deputy, who chases him several blocks before becoming winded and turning back to see if the crime scene had been compromised.
Rupert Putkin, a newspaper reporter. After graduating from SDSU, he attended the School of Journalism at University of Missouri before returning home to take a job at the San Diego Union Tribune. Having grown tired of celebrity reporting he is looking for his own niche. Friends and coworkers generally regard him as a responsible person, but that did not stop him from recently overextending himself to purchase a black ’07 Dodge Charger SRT8.
Scot Thompson, a disaffected science teacher at Mission Bay High School. A strong swimmer and lifelong surfer, he lives near his school in a sort symbiotic frat-boy existence with roommates a decade younger than he is, some of whom he taught several years back. He is becoming increasingly dependent on marijuana and its derivatives. After an abortive college career on the East Coast, he transferred in his sophomore year to SDSU, where he and Rupert shared an apartment. He does not currently own a car.
Zach Brewer, a private investigator. Spent most of his twenties couch-hopping and taking correspondence courses in such diverse fields as locksmithing, photography and gun repair. It dawned on him that these skills would befit a private investigator, so he saved until he could afford to pay for his certification process, and went on to found ZB Investigations, Inc., of which he is the sole employee. The majority of his work involves staking out adulterous husbands and wives with their paramours and gathering photographic evidence. He is, by his own admission, a “chubby chaser.” Drives a nondescript grey ’04 Honda Civic with surveillance equipment in the trunk.
Session 1:
Rupert gets a call from the parents of an old college friend, Stan Arnold. After SDSU, Stan attended MIT, and then returned to work at the prestigious North Shore Cruciform Array (NSCA), a radio telescope observatory affiliated with CalTech, near the Salton Sea. It seems that following a dispute that Stan, normally a mild-mannered individual, killed his girlfriend of six years, Carrie Osbourne. Although he admitted to the crime and turned himself in, Stan’s parents believe that someone framed him, and implored Rupert and Scot, as his old friends, to go look into the situation. Rupert thought that his friend Zach Brewer’s skills might be useful, and on his referral, the Arnolds enlisted his aid as well. The next morning, Scot and Rupert drive to Mecca, California in Rupert’s Charger, and Zach drives up himself to meet them.
Mecca is a town of perhaps 600 people. It’s high summer, and very hot, with early afternoon temperatures around 115 degrees. The investigators first visit the San Bernardino Sheriff’s Station in Mecca, where Stan is currently incarcerated. Sheriff Kaufmann is on duty and tells them that visiting hours are from 10:00am until noon on Saturday, and today is only Thursday. Zach Brewer makes an appeal, as a sort of law man himself, that Kaufmann allow them to speak with Stan, and the Sheriff relents. Deputy Horner escorts them down the hall to Stan’s cell.
Stan is despondent. He readily admits to the crime but can’t explain why he did it. He came home from work, and had been feeling agitated all day. Carrie told him that she had taken his vintage Mustang to the store and accidentally put a scratch in the door. Stan relates that he became enraged, and strangled her with his bare hands. After some time he came to his senses, and turned himself in. Zach suggests that maybe somebody drugged him, and Stan tells him he thought of that already. The NSCA is a very competitive place, and while he is only a computer technician, he would not put it past some of the scientists to do something like that to each other to avoid losing credit for a major discovery.
Scot, on the sly, tries to slip him a bag of pot-laced cookies. The Deputy sees him do this, but fortunately does not recognize the cookies for what they are. Scot apologizes and pockets the cookies again.
Rupert calls Stan’s public defender, and requests blood work be ordered. Zach requests that Stan be put on suicide watch, and he and the Sheriff exchange business cards.
The trio head to the Sunset Café, where they attempt to get a feel for the local reaction to the murder. The waitress says that everyone is disturbed by it, as nothing has happened in this town since a hit-and-run last year. When asked if there’s a bar in town, she directs them to a sports bar down the street called O’Malleys.
O’Malley’s is one of those Irish bars that is Irish in name only; except for the promotional Budweiser St Patrick’s Day banner on the wall, the place is indistinguishable from any other dirt bar in America. Two large screens show monster trucks and UFC. Zach and Scot play pool. Rupert changes the channel to baseball, which causes grumbling among the local patrons. At some point Scot saddles up to the bar and lights a cigarette, blowing the smoke at two rough-looking gentlemen beside him. When they tell him to put it out, he is belligerent. A fist-fight breaks out, and tensions escalate when the bartended produces a shotgun from a low cupboard. Everyone involved flees outside, where Scot continues to antagonize the men, and the fight erupts anew. The bartender comes out and menaces them with the shotgun again, going so far as to fire it off in the air, and tells them to get away from his storefront. Finally the investigators and the other men go their separate ways. Scot leaves this encounter with a shiner.
It is now around 10:00pm, and the investigators decide to go to Stan’s house, which is still a protected crime scene. They park on the main street and begin walking the two blocks to the house, when Rupert notices a large dog skulking near a dark home. It ambles closer to them, and Zach gets nervous and pulls a taser from his bag. Then the dog lunges, and bites Zach in the buttocks. He madly fires the taser and misses. Rupert grabs a wooden stick from a nearby lawn, and they all attempt to fight the dog off. Scot is bitten as well, and finally Zach draws his 9mm and with three bullets, kills the mad dog.
Lights go on in many of the houses as the shots are fired, and soon a man in a housecoat comes walking down the street. He is enraged that the investigators killed his dog, who he claimed to be the nicest dog in the world. Soon Deputy Horner arrives, and as Zach threatens the man with legal action, he diffuses the situation and takes Zach and Scot to the local family practitioner’s home office, where the doctor was still awake, and dresses the wounds. Zach insists that the dead animal be taken by animal control and tested for rabies. The doctor offers Zach a toroidal pillow, of the kind used by hemorrhoid patients, but he refuses.
Finally, after midnight, the group return to Stan Arnold’s house. They sneak around back and find it all locked up. Zach tries all the doors and windows, and eventually succeeds in picking the lock on the back door. Inside, he finds Stan and Carrie’s computer and manages to log in. Without much time to look around, he copies the contents of the couple’s Inbox and Sent folders to a flash drive. Rupert, near the front door, spots Stan’s security badge from the NSCA, a contactless smartcard. Then he notices a car pulling up, and hazarding a glance, sees that it is Deputy Horner. Somebody must have noticed them trying to gain entrance and called the police. They all flee out the back door, but Rupert is spotted by the Deputy, who chases him several blocks before becoming winded and turning back to see if the crime scene had been compromised.
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