The Supernaturals (61 page)

“What we have here is the photo history of the Vilnikov family,” Leonard said. He spread the stolen photos out on the bar for Gabriel and the camera to examine.

“For the benefit of our viewers, Mr. Sickles, could you explain just who the Vilnikov family is?” Julie asked.

“Uh, yeah, sure.” Leonard looked into the camera with his eyebrows bunched up, trying his best for that Clark Gable look. “The Vilnikovs are third cousins to the former Romanov dynasty from Russia. They were the family of Elena Lindemann, or so we were led to believe.”

“Explain the phrase,
led to believe
?” Julie asked. The camera looked over Kennedy’s shoulder as he examined the pictures.

“Put simply, we can’t find any evidence that Elena Lindemann, or Elena Vilnikov, ever existed.”

“You mean to say that there is no evidence of Elena in any of these family photos?” Julie asked. Kennedy raised one of the pictures and examined it closer. It was a father and mother, both of stern visage, and two daughters—each the wrong age to be Elena—and a son. No older daughter was apparent in any of the photos.

“The boy in the pictures is Vasily Vilnikov. There is no Elena.”

Gabriel laid the photo down and looked at Leonard, not saying anything. As he turned, the camera stayed on him, but before he could say anything to Julie, the house lights went out completely and didn’t come back on.

They were now cut off and in the dark.

Gabriel ordered the
double oak doors to the ballroom closed and locked. Through his twenty years of research, he had learned that the worst thing that paranormal researchers could do was let an entity control the situation. When entities struck, they did so brazenly and with little tact. After a supernatural encounter, most people preferred to move on and not attract any scrutiny. Yet those encounters were exactly the ones that needed to be researched, analyzed and documented. Gabriel excelled where others had failed because he made those shy individuals want to tell him their stories. And now this was what they were working with tonight—his and others’ experiences.

“Okay, let’s get some battery powered lighting up and running,” Kennedy said as he surveyed the large ballroom. The Number One camera and sound crew that had been assigned to his team kept the camera on him and him alone. “We’ll use the ballroom as our starting point, and with our battery-powered lights, we’re declaring this room out of bounds to whatever is out there.”

“What the hell are you talking about?” Jackson said, moving the camera’s lens from his face.

“Again, you have heard the voice of a Pennsylvania state policeman as he questions the Professor on his tactics,” Julie Reilly said into her personal microphone.

“If what’s out there is what you think it is, why the hell would it follow your rules of conduct?”

Kennedy smiled and tried his best to ignore the constant hum of the camera as it zoomed in on him. The first set of small Krieg lights came on in the corner, adjusted to shine light on Father Dolan and his injuries.

“It won’t follow the rules, but this is the best spot in the house in which to work, at least for the time being. This is where we have Father Dolan, and I don’t think it’s wise to try and move him. This is where we start.”

Damian Jackson looked taken back. He hadn’t been expecting Kennedy to have such a clear and concise answer to his question—and one that made sense.

“Professor Kennedy, why the sudden shift in the power of Summer Place? I mean, why would it come alive so fast?” Julie stood next to Kennedy, watching as he placed a rolled up jacket underneath Father Dolan’s head.

“To start with, the attempt of Father Dolan and Lionel Peterson—”

“All right, you have nothing that shows I was involved with that,” Peterson interrupted, forgetting that his denial was going out live to forty million viewers. He looked toward Wallace Lindemann who was pouring himself a drink at the bar. The small man caught the accusing look and started to protest, but he saw the camera turn his way and decided to fight for his defense another day.

“We already have his confession, Peterson,” George Cordero said. He stepped up beside Wallace and opened a bottle of water, not so gently moving the owner of Summer Place to the side with his elbow and a stern look.

“Regardless, all we’ve seen here is that the man who admitted to placing the speakers down in the basement was involved in another hoax that went wrong, and now that man is hurt.” Peterson finally realized that the camera was following him. He dipped his head and decided he may as well start fighting for his job right then and there. “There are several people in this room and in New York who have far more to lose than I.”

Kennedy shook his head. “These are all things that the network can take up tomorrow in the daylight. Right now we have something upstairs, and it became active as soon as Leonard here was brought the information on Elena. That’s the starting point. Why would the house care whether there’s history of Elena Lindemann as a child or not?”

“Working on that right now, boss. We’re trying to get an independent phone line out. All cell phone service is down. It’s like its being jammed,” Leonard Sickles said. He and three of the computer techs worked to reestablish contact with the satellites above.

“Dalton, are we attempting to enter the house from the outside?” Kennedy asked into his production microphone.

“Harris Dalton is the director in charge of tonight’s special. He is located in the network production van outside of Summer Place,” Julie explained. She went to one of the frozen windows and pulled back the thick curtain.

“Uh…yes, Professor, we have three men trying to break through the front doors and the rear kitchen door as we speak. I am surprised you haven’t heard them.”

The voice coming from the production van was but a whisper that was picked up on the air. Harris Dalton didn’t like the fact that the viewers could hear him, but they were all flying by the seat of their pants.

“Thus far, we are unable to break through. I can’t explain it yet,” Harris said.

Outside they saw another flash of lightning through the frozen glass, followed by the roar of thunder. Damian Jackson wondered why they could hear that and not the sound of men with axes trying to batter down the doors. He turned and left the ballroom and made his way out to the front doors through the darkness of the living room. Leaning toward the double doors, he thought he could hear thumping noises, but they seemed distant and far away. He pulled back and placed his hand on the frozen pane in the center of the front door. The glass was like ice. As he stepped back he could see some light passing through the glass from a lightning strike not far away. As he did, he saw the figure start to take shape as if someone were dragging a finger through the frost on the window. As he watched, he saw a rough outline of a pole, and attached to that pole was the figure of a man. A hanging man—lynched. The dark figure was hanging by a rope and as another lightning strike hit, the body attached to that rope swayed. Jackson backed away from the glass. The large room had become colder.

“What is it?”

Jackson felt his heart go into his throat. He turned and saw John Lonetree standing behind him. When he looked back at the glass to point out the anomaly, the pane of glass was completely frosted over and there was no figure etched in the moisture.

“Nothing,” he said.

“Can you hear anyone out there trying to get in?” John asked.

“They’re out there, but that’s about all I know.”

Lonetree turned back to face Damian.

“Not like your typical police investigation, is it.”

“I’m still not buying it, Lonetree. Come on, you’re a cop. You can’t believe this shit, can you?”

Lonetree shook his head. “Detective, I learned a long time ago not to question the natural world. There are things out there that our science has never touched on. There are worlds we know nothing of, and one of those worlds is alive and well and in this house. Now, that may not be the answer you’re looking for, but it’s one you better start considering. Your closed mind just may be your undoing.”

Jackson snorted.

“If your mind is closed off to those things, just how can it come up with a defense?” The big Indian moved away toward the ballroom. “And you may want to join us. Gabriel’s getting ready to explain the plan of attack.”

“Attack?”

Lonetree stopped and turned. “You didn’t think we came here just to study, did you?”

“What else would you have come here for?”

“To go to war. Did you think Gabriel was going to allow this house to kill one of his students and get away with it?”

Jackson watched Lonetree disappear into the ballroom. He turned and looked at the glass again, and then turned just as quickly away from it.

“Yeah, well in case you hadn’t noticed, he’s already down a man.”

Damian placed his hat on his head and started to follow John back into the ballroom. Upstairs he heard the sound of a door slamming shut. He wondered if it was something entering a room, or coming out. He glanced up the broad, darkened staircase, and quickened his step toward the ballroom.

Harris Dalton removed
his headphones, careful to mute the microphone. He turned and looked at the lead mechanic, who was trying to explain what was happening.

“You mean to tell me you have all of this power flowing into the breaker boxes, but nothing is flowing into the house? How can that be possible?”

“It isn’t possible. It’s like the electricity is being siphoned off before it reaches the breakers.”

“Siphoned? Do you know how that sounds?” A thought slowly crept into Dalton’s mind. “Look, you stand by outside the van. You’re going to go on live with Julie Reilly, and she’ll interview you remotely from inside the house. Explain to those people inside Summer Place what’s happening out here. Tell that fireman to also stand by. I want him to explain why they can’t bust in through the windows or doors.”

“Oh, I don’t think our union will allow—”

Harris almost exploded. He took the man by his right shoulder and squeezed. It took all of his will power to calm himself. Using his most menacing voice—the one that had carried him through five Superbowl telecasts—he leaned in toward the man.

“I don’t give a good goddamn if you worked directly for Jimmy Hoffa in the day. If you don’t go on, I swear to God I will make sure you’re bundling electrical cable in Oklahoma City this time next week. Clear?”

“Yes, sir,” the mechanic said. He turned and left through the plastic strip curtain.

Harris Dalton placed the headphones back on and took a deep breath.

“Julie, you’ll be conducting two interviews after I run a three minute commercial break. One is with the lead mechanic and the other is with the fire chief.”

After Julie had her questions answered, Harris watched the monitors in front of him. He examined the ambient light cameras on the second and third floor and saw absolutely no movement on either. He changed headphones and then checked the directional microphones on those floors. All he heard was the distant sound of thunder outside. He switched to the basement microphones next, and then he froze. He pressed the headphones into his ears and waved everyone in the control room to silence. The sounds he was hearing didn’t seem to be coming from the basement, but the subbasement. They were distant and hard to define. He turned a switch and brought the sounds out through the large speakers.

“Can anyone tell me what the hell that noise is?” He tilted his head and closed his eyes as his brain worked to identify what he was hearing.

“Sir, it sounds like crying,” his assistant said.

“That’s what I get. Women, a lot of women. At least more than three or four,” said the sound engineer.

“Can you boost the gain on the basement microphone?” Harris asked..

“That’s as high a gain as we have. We need to place the microphones in a different area, like as close to the trapdoor as we can.”

“Okay. As soon as Julie finishes with her interview, we’ll see what Kennedy wants to do.”

“Maybe they can convince that asshole Peterson to go and do it,” his assistant said.

The elicited laughs told Harris that his production team was at least thinking about what was happening. And if they believed something was afoot inside Summer Place, then most of America would be believers.

“I’ll suggest just that, but don’t hold your breath. I don’t think Peterson will risk his neck for a job that won’t be there tomorrow.”

The van quieted as they all listened to the sounds. The crying was definitely female, and full of anguish.

Just as Harris was about to order the commercial break from General Motors, incoherent gibberish started to replace the crying, like a hundred voices speaking a foreign language at once. It was joined by another noise: pounding on the trap door to the subbasement.

Each pounding of the wooden door made everyone in the production van flinch.

“Julie, get Professor Kennedy on the line. Tell him to connect his microphone, damn it. And while you’re conducting the interviews, we need someone to check out the basement. We have something happening down there. We’re picking up voices…and what sounds like crying.”