The Lost Tunnel Of Niagara

There is a story more than a thousand years old. It involves a secret Native American treasure worth more than a hundred million dollars in today’s money. The thing is no one has heard about. It was spirited off by a Native American chief and there was only one written record of it and that was on a stone buried on the Canadian side of the Niagara River. The thing is that the record is written in a language that died out more than a thousand years ago.

A couple of years ago an older man was walking around the whirlpool a few miles downriver from the falls. He was looking for strange stones at the bottom of the gorge. Now, he had been lucky most of the time but that day the gods were not shining on him. Despite all of his searching he had come up with nothing but that changed when he saw a stone sticking out of the rock wall. As soon as he pulled it out he saw that it was cut into a rectangle and there was writing on it…actually two styles of writing that he could not read. He dug it out and took it out of the gorge with him and, thinking that it might be worth something, he took it straight to the Niagara Falls Historical Society.

That was the first time he took anything there so he did not know what kind of reaction he would get when he walked carrying the stone. To his surprise that reception he received was a hell of a lot better than he ever expected.

“Hello or Bonjour,” the man behind the counter said as he extended his hand in friendship. The older man told him that he spoke English. “Thank you very much sir. How may I help you?

The older man held out the stone tablet and said that he had found it down by the Whirlpool Rapids. “I collect rocks down there and this was sticking out of the ground. It looks like it has some kind of writing on it.”

The man behind the counter took the rock, looked at it carefully and disappeared into a hallway leading to a series of rooms. The man ducked into the third room and almost as soon as he went in he and another man rushed back out and came running into the lobby.  “I am Dr. Fredric Depau, Director of the historical society. My assistant said that you have something that I should see.”

“I found this down in the gorge,” the old man said. “It was sticking out of the wall, I just had to do a little digging and it came right out.”

He took the tablet and held it out for the man to see. Depau took it gently and looked at it…it did have two kinds of writing on it just as the old man thought. One was a Seneca Indian language that was used when the white men discovered the Niagara region so it was easily readable. The other was older…much older…possibly more than a thousand years old.

Depau looked at it for several minutes, analyzing it in his mind. He knew that he had seen the writing before but he had no idea what it said. “Oh my God,” Depau said as he slowly sank into a chair. “Do you know what you have here?

“I have no idea,” the old man replied.

“Man, you have found the holy grail and the Rosetta Stone,” Depau said while grasping the stone as hard as he could. “We can know what people have wanted to know ever since the first white man’s eyes set foot on the falls.”

“What does that mean,” the old man asked.

“My friend you have found the key to a legend that has been told for a thousand years,” he said ask his eyes darted back and forth between the texts. “This will answer a lot of questions.”

“What questions,” the old man asked.

“There was an animal skin scroll written more than a thousand years ago. It was found up by the falls but it was in a language that no one knew how to read. If I am right…using this we may be able to find out what that scroll has to say. If I am right you are going to be a very wealthy man…I can promise you that.” Then, after making a Xerox copy of the stone for the old man he had him write down his name, address and phone number.” I should be calling you in a couple of weeks to let you know what we found out.” The old man nodded in agreement, put the paper in his pocket and left for home.

For the next several weeks Depau looked and relooked, read and reread and finally he was able to make a somewhat accurate translation of the ancient scroll. It read, “Under the falling water lies a tunnel. If you enter you will walk a long way into the stones. There I placed my treasure…a treasure meant for my people after I have left this world. It was vague but at least there was a glimmer of hope that maybe…just maybe the treasure was still there.

“Holy shit,” Depau yelled in a very unacademic tone. “We found it! We know where it is!” Immediately afterwards, rather after he calmed down enough, he got on the phone to set up a meeting at the University of Quebec. The meeting would involve him, academics from the university and the leaders of the Seneca Nation.

The meeting lasted about seven hours and when it was done there was a unanimous vote that an expedition would be launched  to explore behind the falls and find out if, as they believed, there was a cave hiding treasure or if the entire thing was just a prank played several centuries before.  The expedition was scheduled for the following week. It was to include Depau and five other scientists of differing fields.

Finally the day came. Their first stop was to be at Table Rock where they all met and bowed their heads and said a prayer to The Lady of the Mist. They asked for her protection during their upcoming endeavor. Each tossed a silver dollar into the flowing water as a kind of blessing to the woman who was to protect them.

One by one they entered the elevator which would take them down below the falls. It took about three minutes to make the trip to the bottom. Donning raincoats they stepped out on the deck and as they looked up they finally saw the power that they were facing. There were more than 500,000 gallons flowing over top of them.

“Oh my God,” Depau said loud enough to be heard over the roar of the falls. “How in the hell are we supposed to get back in there?”

They all strained their eyes as they looked behind the falling water. There, hidden by the mist, was what could only be called the echo of a long unused footpath. It was badly beaten and covered with moss from side to side and from what they could view of it, it had large sections that were covered by rocks. Now, they were not the huge rocks that lay at the bottom of the American Falls. Rather, they were small to medium in size. Not too bad but they would make the trip challenging to say the least.

Depau took the first step. The rock was slippery but he managed to keep his balance. The others followed closely behind. Each slipped in the same spot and he kept their balance.

The roar of the water was deafening. They were caught between the water and the solid rock so the sound was even louder than it was when they were standing up on Table Rock. The mist in the closed area was thick…so thick that even with their raincoats on within seconds their clothes was soaked and their vision was cut down to just a couple of feet in front of them.

Step by step the measured each movement that they made. All of them knew one thing…if they slipped and fell into the raging water there would be no chance to rescue them and that meant sure death. Maybe they were showing bravery maybe it was common sense but they didn’t have ropes tied between each other. That way, if one fell the rest would not be pulled into the falls with them.

Their travel went slowly. Depau felt every inch of the rock wall. There were hundreds of cracks in the otherwise solid wall. Even though he could not be heard Depau said, “How are we supposed to find the cave, That rock has been beaten so long no wonder…” Just then he felt something that was more than a crack. They were about half way across the walls and Depau’s hand was touching …nothing. He looked, smiled and yelled,” It’s here! I think we found it!”  The word passed from one member to the next and by the time it reached the end all of them were carefully jumping up and down and cheering.

There was a ledge outside of the hole. It was just big enough for Depau and a couple others to stand on. The rocks were moss covered and they saw ferns growing between some of the small cracks that had been formed. The scientists also noted that there was a strong wind blowing into the opening; it was strong but not strong enough where they would have trouble. They also noticed that it was a lot quieter that it had been for the last couple of hours.

Depau lead the group in. It was narrow but they were able to walk comfortably. Step by step they walked father into the tunnel. The light from the opening faded and the flashlights came out. The light revealed a cave of such beauty that no one could believe what they were seeing, Pink quartz, blue azure and gem stones  lined the walls. The floor was covered with wood planks, rotten somewhat yes but still able to holds a man’s weight. The tunnel went on for more than a half a mile and by the time they reached the cavern they were nearly exhausted,

“At last,” Depau said as he entered the room. It looked like a cathedral. Stalactites hung from the ceiling. “This is so beautiful,” he said.

At last they were where they thought, according to the scroll, the treasure would be. They spread out and one of the scientists found a box. It was nearly rotted away but the sides still held what remained of the lid. Depau slowly lifted the lid and looked in. Inside was a single gold disk. Not big at all. It was about the size of a fingernail…worth about $150. They searched and searched for several hours but there was nothing else anywhere.

Yes, they were disappointed but yet the expedition was a glowing success. They didn’t find the massive treasure they were looking for but that disk…that little piece of gold proved that the legend was true. That was the most they wanted to achieve…they proved an unknown part of history.

The old man…they called him and told him that they did find gold and Depau kept his word. He paid the man half of what they had found…$71.94.

As far as anyone knows that old man still searches the walls of the Niagara escarpment. He has found a few artifacts but nothing as important as the one he found that afternoon in the valley of the whirlpool

Ghost Gold

The year was 1842. Indians still controlled much of the lands in California which was still eight years from becoming a state. Both Mexican and United States troops patrolled the mountains and countryside, except for one section of the territory. That was the area that was known as Valle De La Muerte or Death Valley.

Valle De La Muerte lived up to its name. Hundreds of settlers, both Mexican and American lost their animals, their food, their hopes and finally their lives. The floor of Valle De La Muerte was covered with the bodies of those who did not know where the sparse water holes were located.

One group of American soldiers was ordered to patrol the edge of the desert but while on their patrol they noticed and young Indian boy running into the valley. The boy was dressed as most Indians they had seen in the mountains but there was one thing different…the bracelets the boy was wearing shined brighter than even the stars in the night skies.

The officer in change, Captain Fredrick Sir George, ordered his troops to follow the young boy while making sure that they kept enough distance as not to be seen or heard. They followed him for about an hour as he took pathways that no white man knew about but too the soldiers it seemed like they had travelled an entire day.

Their horses were exhausted and almost dead from not having any water since they left their camp and the men were almost as bad. It was as if they had become the walking dead in the 130 degree heat of the valley.

Finally the boy walked into a small community of Indians. Sir George looked at them from a ledge above the camp. They seemed friendly so Sir George and his men….all three of them…walked down and, once the Indians saw them, they were invited to share a meal, a drink and a chance to rest in the shade,

An Indian woman was cooking dinner in a big, roughly made metal pot. They were not sure what she was cooking…it didn’t matter they were hungry and would have eaten their horses if they weren’t government property. It ended up being a sort of rattlesnake stew but they didn’t care…food was food and that was that.

While they were eating Sir George noticed that all of the members of the tribe had gold. It was not just a little either. They had more jewelry than he had ever seen…bracelets, necklaces, rings and headpieces all made of the precious metal.

After dinner, out of gratitude, Sir George helped a young woman wash the dishes. As they cleaned he was washing a grease covered cooking pot. “What in the hell,” he said. Looking he saw that the pot he was cleaning was made of a shiny metal. Looking closer he saw that even the pots and plates were made of the same gold as was the jewelry. Then he looked at the rocks surrounding the camp….it was all rose quartz which was well known to be the rocks prospector looked for because it was the rocks that contained gold…a lot of it.

Silently, he called his men together and showed them the pot as well as the rocks he had found. They whispered between themselves while the Indians went on with their lives down below. Not one of Sir George’s men said anything as they stared down at the people below “Father forgive us for what we have done and what we are about to do,” he said as he raised his eyes to face Heaven. Sir George flicked his finger and the soldiers leveled their rifles and, within seconds, there was not a man, woman or child left alive.

Sir George ordered one of his men to get their horses but it wasn’t before the soldier came back and reported that all of the horses were gone. “That’s impossible,” Sir George said but the soldier confirmed that indeed all of their horses were gone. “Did anyone leave the camp while we were eating,” he asked. Another of the soldiers answered quickly saying that no one, Indian or soldier left the camp while they were there. “What in the hell…,” he yelled.

They climbed down off of the rocks. The soldiers took every piece of gold from every body and stuffed it in their pockets while Sir George went right over to that pot. He picked it and didn’t bother putting it in his pack. He carried it with him with the handle hung of the handle of his sword…like trophy he had just won.

They knew that they could not go back to the fort. There would be too many questions that neither Sir George nor his men wanted to answer. The nearest town was over 30 miles away. Not too far except they would have to cross the desert during the hottest part of the day but there was nothing else they could do so they started out heading south.

They started out with a limited supply of water and overloaded packs so the going was slow. It was less than a half of a mile away when the first soldier dropped. They all ran back and saw a bullet hole in the back of the man’s head. Not one of them heard a gunshot nor did they see anyone when they looked around. The man was shot but there was no way for the man to be shot. It was just impossible.

They continued walking after the remaining soldiers split the gold the dead man was carrying. Yes, it increased the weight each man was carrying but gold is gold and nothing was going to be left behind.

“Come on,” Sir George ordered. The men left the bodies to the vultures that made sure that all that would be left behind would be bleached bones.

A mile and then another passed by. The men were hungry, thirsty and tired but they knew that they had to make it to the town before they could rest because, for miles around there was nothing except flat ground and heat. There was no chance for shade or water so there was no reason to stop.

Another half mile or so and another soldier dropped. Again there was no sound and no one around to fire a gun but this time the men saw what happened. The private’s chest exploded right in front of them. They had seen this kind of would before and, when they turned the body over it confirmed what they thought. The young man was shot in the back by what looked like a bullet from a military rifle. They checked and they had their weapons including the one they took from the first dead man.

“Captain, what’s going on,” asked the last member of the patrol except for Sir George.

“I don’t know,” Sir George said. He was not just nervous…he was scared…more scared than any man should ever be but he could not show it. He was an officer and he had to show confidence to the man he had left. “Leave his gold. We have to keep going,” he said as he starting walking again, closely followed by that last man.

It took seven hours for them to cover the next five miles. By now, if they looked around they could see mountains in the distance but they knew that they were miles and miles away so they just kept walking.

The strange thing was, Sir George finally thought, there was not a noise when those men were killed. Not a gunshot, not the sound of a bullet and the men…they did not scream. The thoughts shook him but he just kept walking.

An hour later Sir George looked back and saw that he was alone. He didn’t see what happened or when that last soldier dropped but he could assume and that was probably going to be the right answer.

There are no records written that explained the incident but a few years later the body of Captain Sir George was found about 15 miles away from that small town. His body was merely bones but it was easy to see he had been shot in the back. They looked at the body and noticed one thing…his hand was still tightly gripping that golden pot and because of that the legend was born about the Ghost Gold of Death Valley.

Since that time in 1842 the legend has grown and dozens of people have searched for the campsite. Some came back and expressed frustration while other must have found the hold because they simply never returned. Yet people still come to town and still search for the gold and somehow they always will.

The Trip On The Devil's Highway

“Shit, I said to myself. I was in an attitude. I was hungry, thirsty. I know there’s no one with me but that doesn’t matter I am fuckin’ pissed and I gotta talk ‘bout it “Why in the fuck did I start when I did? I should have known better. The sun went down what…four hours ago? I can’t be sure. I don’t have a watch and the goddamn radio broke last week. How in the hell am I supposed to know where I am or what time it is?”

 I rolled down the window and screamed, “What the fuck time is it?” Yeah, I knew in the back of my mind that I wasn’t going to get an answer but I thought what the fuck?

While I was waiting for a response that’d never come I saw a sign along the road. It read “WEST US ROUTE 666.

I had heard about the road from a friend of mine who had taken it years before. If I remember right it was Jac, Donna, Guf and Ronnie who went on the trip. I wasn’t ask to go ‘cause I was spending 15 days down in the town lockup. I still don’t know why I was locked up…fuck I offered to share my beer with that cop when he stopped…he didn’t take it but he took it. I imagine those cops having one fuckin’ party after work. I had two cases and that sum bitch tool it all.

Jac was the leader. He always set up everything.

I remember they left about 6:00 in the evening. It was just getting a touch of the orange of a sunset and they were travelling west but the sun was up enough for Jac to need his sunglasses.

I watched from my cell as they drove off. Yeah, it bothered me but what was I going to do. Now, I have some shit to tell you. The next morning the judge stopped down and signed the papers to let me out with just a strict warning. “Thank you Your Honor,” I said as I stepped out of the cell and went out into the fresh country air. Yeah, I said “thank you,” but what I was thinking was that fuckin’ jerk cost me a trip and I wasn’t happy about it.

Anywho, I went down past Jac’s place. Now it wasn’t that I was thinking about the trip or anything stupid like that. It was just that I was on my way to the Pancake House and his house was on the way. Jac was sitting on the porch with Guf and they both looked like they seen a ghost or something.

“What’s goin’ on,” I asked. Neither of them answered. They just stared off in outer space or something. “What’s wrong,” I asked again.

“Ronnie…Donna…they went into the woods to take a pee and they never came back,” Jac said. “Me and Guf…we looked for them but there was no trace…not a single trace anywhere. I don’t even think that they went pee…at least I couldn’t smell no pee.”

Guf interrupted, “There was no lights and no strange noises. It was quiet as Dr. Baker’s tomb on a Sunday morning so that means that Bigfoot didn’t do it!” He was getting excited but I just let him talk. “Yeah, I believe in Bigfoot. I heard him…I know I did but not last night…it was quiet as Dr. Baker’s tomb on a Sunday morning. It truly was.”

“Where did all that happen,” I asked.

“Out on 666…I think it was mile marker 76…out by that exit for Murphysborough,” Jac said.

I got them to calm down, which was easy since they were almost catatonic already, then I called the cops. Jac and Guf retold their story again and as so as they finished the cops put handcuffs on them and took them down to the station. I don’t know what for but they were there most of the day.

Yeah, they did have a search. They used helicopters, dogs and even brought in the National Guard. The dogs did pick up their trail at the side of the road but it only went 50 yards into the wood. One guy said that the grass was messed up…you know footprints and everything but they ended at the same place the dogs lost the scent. Other than that…no trace was ever found and Ronnie and Donna were listed as missing and their case was kept open for a few years after that night.

Now, that was 37 years ago. Jac and Guf moved to Pennsylvania and set up a hooka plant outside of a small town called Carbon Creek. Me, I stayed in the town I was born in and I worked at one of the factories before they decided that I was making more money than they could afford so they let me go. Here’s something I still have trouble believing…last year both Ronnie and Donna came walking into town just as if nothing happened.

The thing was neither of them had aged one day in nearly four decades. They looked just the same as the day that they left…except for one thing…they were both pregnant…very pregnant. The town’s doctor examined both of them and they were about eight months along and in perfect health. Within a couple weeks both gave birth to beautiful babies, Ronnie had a boy and named his Alex. Donna had a baby girl named Alexis. The babies were beautiful and, amazingly they both looked alike.

Donna and Ronnie never told what happened to them the night they disappeared and they said….yeah they said that they have no idea how they got pregnant or who the father was so most people just let it go without really asking any questions.

I drive to Murphysborough a couple times a month to see my daughter and my two grandbabies and I always drive Rt. 666 but every time I pass mile marker 76 I don’t stop but I can’t stop wondering what happened to my two friends and if it ever happened to anyone else?

The Mermaid of Lake Erie

Throughout my time as a child I spent hours at a time fishing in the Portage Lakes. Many times I brought up crappies, sunfish maybe a keeper bass and even a few freshwater clams and crayfish but that was when I was using a cheap rod and reel and a bobber to let me know if and when I hooked a fish.

Now that I am a “grown-up” I sometimes still fish in those familiar lakes but now I have my own boat and I fish in the Great Lakes…especially the waters between Long Point in Canada and Presque Isle in the United States. The fish there are bigger, stronger and they will put up a more powerful fight than any fish I ever caught in shallower waters.

I remember, it was a week before summer officially arrived. It was cool…about 55 degrees I think. I decided that I would go out and get some fishing done before the summer tourists arrived and there would be too many people fishing to get the giant fish I wanted to catch. I found that within a few days after the tourists arrived those monsters went into even deeper water and would hide until the season was over in October.

That morning I got down to the marina sometime around 6 AM. Just as I knew it would be the marina was full of boats but, other than the attendant, I was the only person walking around. Anyway, I filled by boat with fuel and started out. I waved to the attendant as I was pulling out into the lake and as I did I noticed something strange…there were hundreds of fish covering the rocks at the opening where the marina opened into the lake. I am not talking about just the smaller fish but there were some lake trout that I guessed were more than seven feet long…which were a rare sight in open water much less than more than a dozen being washed up on the land at the same time. I made a quick note on my computer about what I had seen and set out to my favorite spot twelve miles off the coast of Presque Isle.

About a mile out I turned on my fish tracker and put my headset on so I could hear the returning signal. By doing that I not only can see where the fish are but I can also hear how big the schools of fish were.

Time passed slowly which isn’t uncommon when you are alone on a boat far beyond the sight of land. I saw and heard the usual traffic, birds hitting the water to catch the smaller fish in the lake, a couple schools of muskies and a few solitary lake trout. It wasn’t until I was out about five miles when I hit something that was interesting…there was a school of salmon about a half a mile off to my right. Quickly I changed course. It would take about twenty minutes to reach the school so I set the auto-navigation and went and got me a sandwich and a cup of coffee.

I was only gone for a minute or two but when I got back I saw that the salmon were long gone. Yes, I was disappointed but I did what I knew I should do. I increased the sensitivity of the fish hunter and settled back to eat my sandwich. It was just a second later that the alarm went off and I sat straight up. The salmon were just a little bit off. I readjusted my course and started after them. The course took me into deeper water. I knew I was almost in Canadian waters but I kept following,

I travelled about another mile before something happened. From somewhere down in the water a high pitched sound was heard. I hadn’t put my headphones back on yet…I was still drinking my coffee but it was so strong that my fish finder turned totally black and I could hear it clearly from the back of the bridge and it was not just one call…there were several that I could pick out over the next few minutes.

I looked around and called out on my radio…there were no ships within fifteen miles of where I was but I saw that the sound was closer, much closer than that. It was coming from no more than fifty feet below me and it wasn’t moving so I turned off my motors and sat perfectly quiet. My boat just bobbing in the waves but other than that nothing!

I sat there listening to chirps and whistles for the next hour. Eventually there was a second and even a third. I was by myself so I started talking to myself. “I have heard those sounds before,” I said. “They sound like whales or dolphins but the lake is fresh water. There is no way they could live here.” For a few minutes I didn’t know exactly what to do but that changed rather quickly. I got my rod and reel, tied on a big steel hook and baited it was a large minnow and I dropped the bait into the water.

The screen was still all black but I could still hear everything that was going on. It took forever to drop down the fifty feet but it reached that depth and I stopped it. I set the reel to a slight drag and sat back ready to catch nothing.

Suddenly, I felt a huge tug on my line. It was so strong that I was deathly afraid that either my pole would snap in half or, as a worst case, I would be dragged off the boat and into the depths where I would drown.

At the same time the line tightened there was a loud high pitched sound come over the headset followed by another and another. Some were faint and others were stronger. I could tell that the first one was still below me and it was in pain and fighting hard.

“Great,” I said as I fought the line…slowly winding it in while giving whatever it was a chance to rest while still wearing itself out. “It has to be a whale or something like that.”

I was reeling it in for hour after hour. The day had long since turned into a brilliant starry night. The moon was full so I had enough light to keep going and somehow that coffee I had drank was still giving me more energy than I should have had.

Finally, there it was…the yellow tag I always placed on my leaders. Only six feet to go. It was hard reeling in that last bit of line. My muscles were on fire and my mind was wandering but I still knew what I had to do…I had to get this damn thing up and on my boat.

I felt the line tighten as I started seeing the hook just below the surface. One more jerk and I would have it. By now it felt heavier than the biggest fish I ever caught and that one was a seventy five pound catfish in Presque Isle Bay.

One hard jerk and I finally saw what I had been fighting with for so long. Its appearance was a shock. I could see hair and wide open blue eyes that were glazed over. The skin was a grey color so naturally I assumed that I had hooked a body of someone who had died and drifted out into the depths. The thing was the skin was not decomposed in any way. It looked as smooth and healthy as mine. Still I thought it was dead.

I dragged it onto the boat. Yeah, it was extremely heavy. I guessed it was over one hundred pounds.

I knelt down next to it and placed my hand on its body. The skin was warm…a lot warmer than it should have been. Its hair flowed down between a pair of human-like breasts. I could not believe what I was looking at. Suddenly it opened its eyes. Its eyes were the bluest I had ever seen. The hook still hung from a hole in the creature’s bottom lip. I could see a look of pain in its face, I had never seen the before in anything I had ever caught.

I reached over and slowly, gently I removed the hook. I watched its eyes and I could see tears flowing down its cheeks. Even though there were tears in its eyes I saw its mouth form a slight smile. I looked at it and thought to my God…what have I done?

It opened its mouth and the sound was soft…almost forgiving. Now the tears were flowing down my cheeks. How could I have done this? How could I have hurt something with a soul of its own?

Again I looked into its eyes. They were so human I could not believe it.

I knew that with this creature I made the biggest catch of all history. I knew that my name would be well known. I also knew that, alive or dead, the scientists were going to have a field day over what I had caught. Now, I was never much for fame or fortune. I just liked going out and catching a couple fish for dinner but this was so much different.

I lifted its head and whispered, “I am so sorry I hurt you. I do not know what I could do to make it up to you.”

She looked at me and smiled. I knew what I had to do. I lifted her from the deck and slowly, gently lowered it into the water. She did not swim away as I thought she would. She lowered her face into the water and let out a call. Within minutes several objects appeared in the water surrounding my boat. They all looked at me and then into the heavens and they let loose with a loud scream.

I am not sure what it meant but as quickly as they arrived they were all gone and I was left alone with my boat, the stars and moon and one hell of a story to tell.

I have not shared this story in more than twenty years but I am willing to do it now since, well, I am the only one who knows the location and besides that I am just an old man making up fables…or am I?

Aunt Victoria's Secret

So many times I was over at my Aunt Victoria’s house. Sometimes it was just for a couple hours and other times it was for a week or more. I always loved going there and I let her know that on more than one occasion.

Now, my aunt was a stickler for cleanliness. I mean she would totally freak if we got the carpet dirty or dropped some food on the kitchen floor. But, for all that she was the sweetest woman you could ever meet and her kids, my cousins, were a lot like me. We were normal kids with muddy faces, scraped knees and a couple broken bones but she still loved us. But, despite all the love she had for us there was one room up on the third floor that, if we ever went near it she would be more than happy to beat our asses with one of the willow boughs from the back yard.

I was almost twenty five when she died. I cried for days before the job of cleaning out her house began. The first two floors were easy and with did find some unexpected treasures like a statement for a certificate of deposit for nearly $100,000 as well as a room that housed a couple hundred dolls. Yeah, they were freaky but we knew that she loved them more than life itself so we took them and donated them to a museum in New York City so thousands of kids could see them in addition to the fact that the entire collection would be kept safe from harm.

The place turned into an empty shell by the time we made it to that forbidden room. It was locked by one of the biggest padlocks I had ever seen. Luckily Sara, my youngest cousin, had found the key in an ebony chest my aunt kept in her bedroom. Now, that was one thing we were allowed to touch but we were too afraid of it. Even now, over twenty years after she got it, we were scared to open. I think it’s because we nicknamed it “The Coffin”. Mainly that was because of how it looked but who knows it could have been a coffin in a previous life.

Sara took the key from her pocket and held it out in front of her. “You know my mom is looking down at us right now,” she said with a smile. She paused a minute and asked who was going to break the sacred seal. After a couple minutes of debate my other cousin Theresa said that she would take the chance.

Now, none of us knew what the curse was that Aunt Victoria placed on that room and on anyone who had the utter nerve to be so curious that they would break her one and only cardinal rule. Maybe she didn’t put a curse on that room. We weren’t sure…after all Aunt Victoria was a strange old bird so she was capable of pretty much anything.

The key was loose in the lock. We could hear the grit of decades of nonuse as the teeth slid across the tumblers. Actually, the lock opened rather easy for its age. There was a cloud of dust that fell from the door frame as the last tumbler fell into place. The cloud was so thick that it was nearly impossible to see the door or anything else in the area and we were gasping for our next breaths. It took all of five minutes for the dust to settle but even that was temporary. Every time we moved we left a cloud behind us and our footprints became buried as soon as we made them.

I reached over to the doorknob. I saw that it was tinted gold but most of that had been worn off. It was cold to the touch. I don’t mean just cool as it should have been in the 50 degree air but it was colder, a lot colder. As a matter of fact my hand stung from the cold when I touched the smooth metal surface but it turned with just a little effort and the door swung open.

We looked in and there was a resounding, “What’s in there? What can you see?” from all three of us. It was almost musical but there was no music. Our voices almost had the sound of the times were telling ghost stories.

There was no light so Sara felt inside along the walls around the door and finally found an old gas light. She took her lighter, lit it and she stepped into the room. She turned the handle on the lamp and the flame shot to the ceiling before it settled down to a flame about four inches high. The inside was lined with shelves. I counted 10 shelves on the two walls. On each shelf were a large number of containers. Some were made of silver, some gold and more than a few made out of beautiful ornamental glass.

We walked in. The light from the lamp reflected back and forth across the room leaving rainbows of light across the walls. It was almost beautiful.

Theresa walked around. Now, she was usually clueless but, for the first time, she used her eyes and brain before she used her mouth. “Sara, Rob get over here and look at this.” We walked over and there was a plaque on one of the silver containers. It read “Elizabeth Marie Stone – 1924 – 1969.” The one next to it read “Paula Lynne Hannover – 1995.”

“That’s my sister,” I yelled. “She died at birth. I remember how broken up mom was. I was 13 and I had to hold her up. She was hurt so bad.”

Theresa and Sara looked at every container on the shelves. Each and every one of them had a name, a date of birth and a death date. There were a few that lacked any information and the lids were sitting next to them. Sara walked over and reached inside the first one. She let out a yell that sounded like she found a snake or, more likely, a spider but instead of either she brought out a letter.

I took it from her and looked at the front of it. It read “From Victoria Ann Stone to my eldest daughter.” I didn’t open it I just handed to Theresa.

She took it and fumbled with it a moment. “What do I do with this,” she asked in her normal confused state.

“Open it,” Sara responded. Theresa opened the letter and she handed it right over to Sara.

“What does it say,” I asked

“To my eldest daughter,” Sara started. “If you are reading this I must have passed on. Please know that I love all my children and my nephew. I do have one thing I have to tell you. You are standing among the ashes of every female member of my family. It has been a tradition in our family since the early 18^th Century. It is my hope that you will take on the responsibilities of maintaining this tradition. Please use one of the empty containers for my ashes – With all my love to all – Victoria.”

The next day Sara and I had Aunt Victoria’s body cremated and we did as she wished. Her ashes were placed in the silver container where the note was found. Sara bought out Theresa’s share in the house and, as part of the tradition, Sara hid the room away although she did make regular visits to clean and dust the room. Unhappily Theresa was the next to go. She was cremated and placed in an container right beside her mother and that is how Sara kept Aunt Victoria’s secret for decades to come.

Inside Area 51

God only knows how long, how many years, David Bencze spent on the desert mountains surrounding the secret military base called Area 51. He got the usual photographs of a usually empty, outside of some unmarked white planes, runway and several buildings that rumors said held any number of things from top secret aircrafts to flying saucers being reversed engineered and, the best of them all, the corpses of extraterrestrials.

He has tried a few times to drive up to the gates of Area 51. He was shot at, stopped and searched, taken to a local police station where he was held for nearly a month before he was escorted out of the state but most of the time the Men In Black usually just watched him from some black trucks parked on hilltops along the road. If he went too far they drove down and surrounded his car. The “guards” were huge…almost as big as some of the professional wrestlers he had seen on TV and man, were they scary?

Since driving in was basically out of the question Bencze started looking at how the civilians who worked on the base got in there day after day. The best way, he figured, was to “meet” someone who works at the base and share a few drinks with them. That really wasn’t as hard as you might think. There is a bar just across the street from the Las Vegas airport. He never did tell me what the name of the bar was but it is Las Vegas after all so there are probably fifty or more to search on that road.

He stopped in the bar a couple times when he glanced at a young woman he had seen boarding a Janet plane. Janet is the name of the airplanes he watched flying in employees to and from Area 51 as well as some of the other southwestern bases that no one supposed to know about. Yes, there are more. If you look at a map of the southwest and the bases were blacked out you would actually see more black on the map than you would any other color.

Her name was Sandra Lloyd. He got there one day at about 6:00 PM. She was there. Bencze walked over and introduced himself. He was a klutz at it but that seemed to relax her and she welcomed his to her table. They shared a whole bunch of drinks starting with wine and they ended up drinking Jose and Coke. By the time they were done the bar was closing and she was a lot drunker than he was so he walked her home all the time talking about her and her life.

Once he got her home they sat on the porch and talked. The sky above Las Vegas was clear so the air was cool, a lot cooler than normal so he put his arms around her and held her close. It only took a few minutes before they started talking about their jobs. He told her that he was a photographer for a research company. It wasn’t the truth but it wasn’t exactly a lie either.

Then she opened up. She said that she was a research assistant at Area 51. She added that she was working on an engineering project that has something to do with plasma propulsion. Then he asked her the question he really wanted an answer to…how did she get to work every day? It was a long distance between Las Vegas and Area 51. She looked at him and smiled then she said, “Well, I don’t have to drive. A bus picks me up here in the morning and we go to the airport. We get on a white plane from an airline named Janet. It flies us to Area 51 and then flies us home. The nice thing is we don’t have to pay anything for the ride.” She suddenly got real quiet and she asked Bencze to leave because she was getting really tired. He did as she asked and left but not before writing down the info about the airline and he was able to “borrow” her security name tag.

That night Bencze spent the night on Photoshop turning her ID into one with his name and photo. By the time he was done there was no way to distinguish his from the real thing. That was all he could do and he knew that even with the ID he might get caught and, possibly killed by the men in black.

He arrived at the Janet terminal sometime about five in the morning. Sandra was already there and she was searching like mad for her ID. Bencze walked over, lifted her from her seat and gave her their first kiss. He guessed that she was in some kind of shock or maybe her mind was on her missing ID but while he had her in his embrace he quietly put her ID into her left hand pocket. She didn’t feel him put it there but as he walked away he yelled back to make sure that she checked her [ockets. She found it right where he put and she got the biggest smile Bencze had ever seen from a woman. He just smiled back and sat down across the room from her.

Then a thought he should have had the night before came into his head. She knew what he told her he did for a living and it had nothing to do with Area 51. How was he going to get on one of the planes and actually get into Area 51?

As soon as that thought crossed his mind the loudspeaker calling passengers for flight N623RA to board the plane. Sandra got up and walked onto the tarmac, climbed the steps to the plane and within minutes the plane was in the air and she was gone. Then the announcer came back on and announced that passengers for Janet flight N273RH would be boarding in less than 30 minutes. That would be the one that would let him to “where no man has gone before,” to quote Star Trek.

The plane pulled up to the gate exactly 30 minutes later. Bencze showed his fake ID at the gate and without a single question he walked through the gate and onto the plane. Now, he said it was just a short flight but once the wheels touched down and he showed his ID couple more time he was on the base.

The first things he noticed were several warehouses for lack of a better word. They had windows but thick curtains were closed blocking off them view in as well as eliminating the chance of any employees seeing anything that was going on outside. All were painted white and each had guards at the doors. Behind them were barracks and dorms. Bencze figured that they were there to house the military and those black ops people that worked on some of the more delicate, sensitive experiments that Area 51 was working on.

He was walking when an Air Force Major approached him and asked him where he was supposed to be. “Sir, this is my first day on the job and I am not sure where I supposed to be,” he said. “They told me to report to Building 4 but I am not sure where that is.” The Major pointed a building down the way so Bencze thanked him and went on his way.

The door of Building 4 was locked so Bencze knocked and, within seconds one of those geeks who grew up living in their mother’s basement with just a computer as friend opened the door and he told Bencze that the building was going on lock down in less than thirty seconds. “What’s going on,” Bencae asked as he watched the curtains being pulled down of every window in the building.

Then the loudspeaker announced that anyone caught looking out of any window would be shot on the spot as a spy. Before it stopped whoever was on the mic ordered everyone into the center of the massive.

Again he grabbed the geek and asked him again what was going on?

“I heard that they were going to test a special plane from downstairs,” he said. “I heard that it used magnetic plasma for its propulsion.”

“That sounds like sci-fi,” Bencze said with a laugh.

“Everything you ever read it science fiction or saw on shows like Stargate maybe be sci-fi there but here more and more of it are coming true,” the geek said. “They even have a…” A Sergeant walked over and asked what they were doing.

“Sir, I am new here,” Bencze said. “He is just helping me get oriented.”

The Sergeant checked both of their IDs and told them that they had to go down to Lever 26. He didn’t say anything else. He just walked the two men to the elevator and waited for the door to open. Bencze asked why they were going down there and the Sergeant looked at him and only had once response…because they want two of you bookworms down there to analyze some data. That’s all I am going to tell you and that is all you need to know. Then he got coldly silent when the door opened and the three of them stepped in. The Sergeant hit the button, the door closed and they started the half mile trip down to Level 26.

After ten minutes the elevator stopped. The Sergeant hit a button on console and a moment later he heard two keys slide into the door from the other side. The tumblers clicked and the door slid open and before Bencze stood two guards. Both were well over six feet tall and Bencze estimated that they were both well over 300 pounds and they were armored to the teeth.

“Come,” one of the guards said. Bencze wasn’t going to be the one to argue.

They were led down a long, rather unassuming, hallway and escorted to a huge stainless steel door. Once again the Sergeant pushed a button and the door opened from the other side. All that faced them was another long hallway but this time the walls were not boring at all. All along the way there were glass cylinders. They were not clear galls in fact they looked kind of smoky and inside you could just barely see the contents. Inside of each cylinder was a body. Some of them were humanoid while others looked strange, but one thing he noticed was the way they were dressed. There were some of the stranger characters dressed in what looked like silver jogging outfits while the humanoids were dressed in everything from togas to bikinis to a Soviet space outfit.

“What is this,” Bencze whispered softly to his companion.

“I have never been down here before,” the geek said. “I have heard though that they are preserving the bodies of many ufo crashes down here.”

“What about the humans,” Bencze asked as his curiosity peaked.

“Supposedly all of them were taken by aliens all the way back in history,” he said. “When they were recovered they were so far out of their own time that they could not be allowed to wander around. They just wouldn’t fit in…after all could you see a Roman soldier suddenly showing up in Chicago? To tell the truth…I think some of them were lost in the Bermuda Triangle.”

There were people walking up and down the hallway. A few were stopping at each of the cylinders, checking some dials and making some adjustments.

“Are they..,” Bencze asked before he was interrupted.

“Alive,” the geek said finishing Bencze’s question. “Of course they are. They keep them alive until they can reverse engineer something from the ships they have down here so they can take or send them back to their own time.” Bencze didn’t talk any more about it.

At the end of the hall were two more of the base’s elite guards. They scanned both men’s ID badges and then closely checked a set of gold colored bars at the side of the badges. Both Bencze and the geek had five little and, since they were passed through without any problems, they assumed that having five bars meant that they were approved for entry into the final room.

As the door opened Bencze saw table after table after table. He guessed that there were thirty or more and each one had a piece of machinery on it with a team of men in white standing next to them, working on them. Bencze had never seen anything like what he saw resting on the tables except in science fiction movies.

On one of the tables was a small space suit hooked up to a pressurized tank of something called OsAr³. He thought back to his high school days and remembered the Periodic Chart. That symbol meant two parts argon and one part osmium. Those were gases that were rare on earth. He knew that if they were pumping that into the space suit there had to be a good reason. Maybe, he didn’t want to think about it but maybe the space suit has some kind of alien inside of it. That would be so cool, he thought as he started walking over to the table.

The minute he stepped away the Sergeant was right on him screaming in his face about the classified research that was going on in that building. One of the guards came running over and Bencze was escorted back to the others except he had a fully loaded .45 pointed at his back as he walked. He didn’t say another word to anyone as they approached a small room and locked inside.

It only took about ten minutes for a white gowned doctor walked in and handed them two folders. “We want the two of you to compare the figures in both of these folders and record any similarities and make note of any differences beyond a ratio of 1.75 millimeters,” the doctor said as he slid the folders of to the pair. “We need this done by 1700. Now get to work.”

The geek got right to the assignment while Bencze paused and played around be pushing the folder across the table and back. The geek looked over at him and told him to get started because they only had a couple hours to get the job done.

“What is all this,” Bencze asked.

The geek looked at him and told him that it was a biological comparison/contrast between a human and something they found or captured somewhere.

“Like what,” he asked as he finally opened the folder and started looking at the information inside.

“It could be anything. I have been here for aliens, people found after being missing for decades or centuries…hell one time I had to run the blood and DNA of a bigfoot that someone down in Virginia shot and killed. We are responsible to make sure that what they bring us isn’t what they really bring us. Hell, that bigfoot I looked over the information and I told them what they wanted. The official report said that it was a new species of bear. The unofficial report said it was exactly what it was… a bigfoot from Virginia. Now, what do you think they told the media...at least the media that heard about the event.” Then he asked a question that Bencze didn’t want hear much less answer. The geek asked him if he knew what he was doing.

Bencze paused for a second trying to figure out some way to answer with a lie but not make it so blatant that the man before him would call for security. It was almost as if his mind shut down and he could not believe what came out when he answered with a simple “no”. Now, it was out there so he figured in for a penny in for a pound so he told the geek everything, his plan, how he got the ID…everything.

Now it was just a waiting game to see if he would get turned in or not. Luckily, the geek didn’t go for the door and he didn’t reach for the phone all he said, “Good job.” Then he simply smiled and started helping Bencze do what he was supposed to be doing but while he did that Bencze was copying down all the information on the sheets as well as every detail the geek was telling him.

“See this…,” the geek said, “…a human’s would be at least twice, maybe three times the size of this one. This obviously came from that alien they were working on. If you look at everything theyt send us you’ll see exactly what they are doing. I will bet you that despite what I find here they will call it a hobbit or something like that. They did it a few years ago and the public ate it. They even did a whole TV special about the “hobbits” that someone found in a cave. Hobbit my ass! It was an alien that they didn’t want you to know about.”

“Do you think we can get a sample of the alien’s tissue that I can have examined,” Bencze asked.

“They never take tissue,” he said. “They don’t like to do that because of a video that someone snuck out of here showing them cutting open, what they called a ‘dead’ alien. I was here for that. That alien was still breathing. I swear that to God…it was still alive. Anyway, that caused such a stink that they stopped cutting about ten years ago.”

He understood exactly what the geek was talking about. Bencze had seen the video a couple hundred times and he had always wondered if it was faked or not. That man confirmed that it was a real autopsy even though the creature wasn’t dead at the time.

They spent the next six hours talking and looking of the information they were given. Finally, a general walked in and asked them what they had found but before they had a chance to answer he handed them both documents to sign. They were declarations of confidentiality. Bencze remembered one line that struck him as extremely serious. It read, “If in the course of time you speak of your efforts at any or all of the detachments of Edwards Air Force you shall be arrested and charged with treason and, without trial, you will be executed at the discretion of the base commander.” Bencze did sign the paper but not with his own name, rather he used the name that was on his homemade ID badge.

Then he and the geek explained to the general that the being they were investigating was, although a humanoid, not from the planet Earth. They said that they believed that most of the organs were propositional to a human of that height. However, the blood mass, heart structure and brain were vastly different in respect to their usability and the stress repulsion factors. Bencze had no idea what he was saying but it seemed to work.

Then the general handed them two more papers to sign. The first said that the creature being examined was a human of approximately nine years old. The other gave a detailed explanation of a creature from another planet with a lack of ability to survive within Earth’s gravity and atmosphere. They were ordered to sign both and not ask questions. They did as they were told.

A whistle blew. It was so loud that it could have been heard all over the base. The geek started gathering his things while Bencze parroted his every move. As soon as they were done two guards showed up and escorted back to the Janet plane they flew in on. A few minutes later they were in Las Vegas and getting ready to drive home.

Bencze went home and called his favorite author…me. He told me the story and showed me the notes he had taken. After a month of talking he had given enough of an interview to make an interesting story. That story is what you have been reading and in front of a priest he swore to God that every word written here is the truth.

After that Bencze disappeared. It was not clear if he just went off or if the men in black found him and he is locked in a windowless solitary cell in one of those buildings at Area 51. All anyone can do is wait and see if he ever shows up or at least contacts someone to let them know of his where abouts.

Get Out of the House Now!

Every year there was one day we celebrated and yet it was the one day of the year that each and every one of us over the age of six truly dreaded and that was the day the entire family, including the relatives that lived in Kentucky, came to visit my grandmother. Unfortunately, that meant that the Bakers (those relatives from Kentucky) would bring their 12 year old son Horace.

Now, Horace was a great kid…he really was except he never learned anything having to do with manners and that meant that he reached across the table for something he wanted, pushed Grandma out of the way so he could get into the bathroom first and even told off his mom and dad whenever he felt like it but, as we would find out was all kids play compared to his 12th year.

He showed up as usual kicking people in the shins and telling them off and he kept that up until Grandma called everyone to dinner. Of course he was the first in line and boy did he ever fill up his plate especially with my grandmother’s heirloom baked beans. No one had a thought about it. Hell, they were just happy the brat left food for anyone else.

We sat at a big table in the dining room. I am not sure where she got it but Grandma must have known that she was going to have a big family since the table sat 20 people in comfort. Anyway, Horace was at the other end of the table from me and I watched as he cleaned his plate in less than five minutes and then he rushed up and got another plate loaded with baked beans.

It was about a half an hour later when I saw people starting to turn green and rushing to the bathroom. It was like they were doing the wave the way it worked. Eventually everyone, including me, did their duty in the bathroom…the only exception was Horace. He just sat there and kept eating. The thing was, even the dog got up and ran from the room.

Uncle Fred and my grandmother looked at each other and then decided to call 911 since whatever it was may be killing all of us. I couldn’t hear what was being said but Grandma said we all had to leave the house and wait across the street until the house was cleared of whatever it was. So, we stopped eating and went across the street. The only person who seemed to be having fun was Horace who was simply smiling his ass off.

The police and Gas Company showed up first. They evacuated the homes next to my grandmother’s and taped the area off. Then the fire department showed up and, once they kicked the front door in, they went in and searched the house. The smell was still there when they came back out. The head fireman said they could not find a leak or anything that would cause the smell and they recommended that we get a hotel and spend the night out of the house.

Horace wasn’t smiling anymore he was laughing so hard that you could see blood vessels popping one after the other of his forehead.

“What in the hell are you laughing at,” Uncle Fred said with a very stern look on his face.

Horace looked at him. He was still laughing when he told Uncle Fred, “Dad, you know how I can’t eat beans? Well, Grandma made them so good I just couldn’t resist.”

“And…” Uncle Fred asked.

“I cut one during dinner. It was a great one. You used to call it silent but deadly. It must have really worked.” Horace had such a look of pride in his fart that it was hard to get mad at him.

The police, firemen and the gas workers filled out their reports and drove away after telling us that everything was safe and we could go back to having fun.

We all went back into the house. The smell was gone and amazingly the food wasn’t spoiled so we all sat down and we finally laughed about what had happened. It was pretty much the same as before everything took place except for one this…Horace was at his own table in the backyard as far away from the house as possible. We loved him…we truly did but why take a chance if you know what I mean.