The Chardon Chronicles: Season One -- The Harvest Festival (17 page)

Kenny asked, “Who’s that? Seems totally
green.”

Robbie answered, “he’s a good kid… a former
intelligence analyst and electrical engineer. Dana speaks highly of
him.”

Kenny nodded. “That’s really a good guy to
have. We need some brains in this outfit.” he cackled.

David said, “yeah, we’re going to show him
what we’re really up against here. The Necropolis is a good place
to do that.”

Kenny said, “Your timing’s good. A whole
bunch of shit going on this weekend. Music Awards downtown. All
kinds of VIVs in town.”

David raised an eyebrow, “VIV?”

“Very Important Vampire” Kenny laughed so
hard he started coughing. “Oh shit. Anyway, I got your number. I’ll
call when I have a good lead.”

Dana caught up with Johnny. He had a hard
time looking at her.

“What’s up?” she said matter of factly.

“The crazy just keeps coming.” he said. He
rubbed his face.

“What do you think we’ve been talking about
for the past couple of days? A game?” she said angrily. “This
shit’s for real.”

“Wow. I believe you… but man, it’s so far
out. I mean, holy shit.”

“OK.” she said. “I get it. I remember what it
was like to be in your shoes. You can walk away now. I’ll be hurt,
but I’ll get over it.”

“No. I don’t want that.” he said.

“Well, soldier, things are about to get
interesting. You’re going to see this shit with your own two eyes.”
She said.

“Alright. I’m in your hands.”

She grabbed his ass cheek and pulled his face
down. “No.
Now
you’re in my hands.”

Kenny loaned them a Black Lincoln with livery
vehicle plates. They loaded a few bags of gear in the back in
addition to their clothes. The crew climbed into the car and Robbie
took the wheel.

“I’m glad you’re driving. I can take in the
scenery.” David lounged back in the seat, “or nap. Wake me when we
get there.”

Dana and Johnny were sprawled in the back
seat. “What’s the plan, man?” Dana yawned. The comfy seats were
sapping her will to stay awake.

Robbie said, “well, we will drive into town
and hang out in a hotel until we get the call, then the plan is to
catch these guys on camera and get some audio… and then distribute
it as widely as we can.”

Johnny was also getting ready to doze off,
“so, to kill a vampire, do you need to do the whole stake through
the heart thing?”

Robbie chuckled, “I’m not sure what the
origin of that lore is; I think if there’s any basis in reality,
maybe those was some kind of ritual to kill the thing thats
inside
the Vampire.”

“Ritual?”

“Yeah, for some reason, whenever humans are
dealing with these beasties, there’s almost always ritual involved.
If Matt was here, he could talk your ear off about it.”

They rented a couple of rooms in a hotel that
overlooked Centennial Park. The replica parthenon was lit by sodium
lamps. The streets were busy. Groups of college students strolled
down the road on the way to restaurants and clubs. The girls were
barely wearing anything in the summer heat.

Robbie unpacked some of the gear. There was a
camera with a huge telephoto lens, plus a little black box that was
mounted on a tripod.

“Hey Johnny, can you help me with this
thing?” Robbie asked.

“What is it?”

“It’s an I/R laser remote microphone. Let’s
try it out. Looks like there’s a couple of output jacks. I want to
be sure they’re both active.”

They went out on the balcony. There was a
couple in a car below.

Robbie pointed the box in their direction.
Johnny said, “oh cool, check it out, the camera picks up the I/R
dot. It’s on the street over there...”

Robbie smiled. “Oh excellent. Stealthy! now
we can aim.” he pointed the box at the car window. A faint
indicator LED labeled ‘LOCK’ illuminated. “I think that’s a good
sign… But man, we need to cover that up with some tape… might give
us away.”

They both plugged headphones into the jacks.
They heard the couple’s conversation. It was filtered by the signal
processing electronics in the box and sounded like a tin can phone.
Robbie and Johnny smiled.

“Hey, now that is cool! It’d make sense to
build that into the camera… like a lens ring.” Johnny said.

“Yeah, that’s a good idea!” Robbie said. “You
think you could do a job like that?”

“Yeah, sure. I don’t know about the software
that’s processing that signal. That might take a while.”

Robbie said, “don’t worry about that, we got
a guy--he’s out in Nevada.”

Robbie’s cell phone rang. “Kenny?”

“Ha yeah, it’s me, what no code names?”

Robbie put the phone on speaker and they sat
around it on two queen beds. “If you want a codename, you needed to
let me know ahead of time!” Robbie laughed.

“Call me Turd. Turd Furguson.” Kenny laughed
hard, and Robbie smiled.

“OK, Turd.” David said. “What’s the
word?”

“I got a guy working the Music Row corner… he
sells papers… Great guy. He’ll call you ‘Kings and Queens’. Give
him a good tip.”

“Alright. See ya Turd. We’ll be back tonight…
I think.”

They loaded up the gear bags and changed into
dark clothing and went down to the car. The summer air smelled
mostly sweet from blooming flowers, but there was an undertone of
rot wafting up from the city storm sewers. They made the quick
drive to the Music Row roundabout.

A tall African-American man was standing on
the corner flagging cars down, looking for donations for the
homeless produced newspaper. He had close shaved hair and a soft
face and eyes. David put his window down and the man leaned
over.

“What’s up Kings--oh and Queen, good evening
little lady.” he tipped an imaginary hat. “Would you like a paper
or two? every donation helps the homeless.”

“Hey, what’s your name? We’re friends of
Kenny.” David said.

“I’m Stan.” he shook hands with David.

“Kenny said call him Turd Ferguson.” Robbie
leaned over and said through the window.

“Oh that Kenny.” Stan laughed. “Say, I bet
you guys would like to know about two friends of mine.”

“Yeah, we sure would.”

“If you look for a yellow Lambo… the only one
I’ve seen in town, you’ll find ‘em. The one guy’s a producer…
dude’s got bad implants… I mean bad. Looks like a brillo pad.
That’s his car.” He laughed. “The other guy is his buddy. They
always together. The dude’s tall, always wears a dark suit, has
white hair, big ass gold ring.” he squeezed his ring finger. “That
guy works right over there,” Stan pointed at a glass office
building, “He’s some executive. Man the dude
looks
like a
vampire. Looks like, if Elvis lived, then became a lawyer.”

“OK, thanks. Keep up the good work.” David
handed over a wad of cash and did a fist bump with Stan.

“Lemme know how it goes, King.”

They drove around the hot spots in town.
Parked for a while at each, and watched slow moving traffic. They
found a whole lot of nothing.

“I see nothing but hay in this haystack.”
Dana said.

They crossed over the Cumberland River into
East Nashville and stopped as the neighborhood went from cityscape
to residential neighborhoods. Hipsters in skinny jeans rolled by
riding fixies with cowhorn bars. Tattooed girls wearing wispy
dresses and flip flops strolled to local shops like flowers in
motion.

Johnny said, “Hey, why don’t we split up. Me
and Dana can rent some bicycles--there’s a bike shop there. We’ll
go down by the river--looks like we can see a lot of road from that
spot.”

David and Robbie nodded. Robbie said, “sounds
good. You got my number?”

Dana checked her flip phone. She picked his
number and started the call. His phone started playing a crackly
version of Moondance. “Yup” she said.

Dana and Johnny went into the bike shop and
rented a couple of sky blue cruisers. A young guy with a thick mop
of hair helped them set up the rides. They rolled downhill toward
the river, where an elevated pedestrian bridge called to them like
a beacon. From the bridge, they could see along several streets,
plus the view was pleasant. People walked over the bridge between
events at the parks on the river bank and at the stadium.

They took up a position on a deck that was
cantilevered off the side of the bridge. The river was a
brown-green placid mass rippling by far below their feet.

“Oh man, this is a nice day.” Johnny said. He
held his arms up to the sky.

“This is the life.” Dana put a hand over her
eyes and looked around. “I’m gonna go get an umbrella. My skin in
this sun--I’ll be a lobster in no time.”

She walked down the steep incline to a vendor
selling parasols. On the west side of the river, the tourist crowds
rolled by. Cowboy wannabes in new boots, jeans, and hats stumped
by, stifling in the roasting heat. Asian tourists in pressed khaki
shorts and polo shirts went by in big groups. She spun the parasol
and hiked back up the steep incline.

“Dude, this is like a mountain!” she grunted
as she got back to the deck.

“Oh man,” Johnny stood up and pointed. “I
guess that’s a lucky umbrella.”

“Parasol,” she corrected him.

“Well, whatever it is, there’s the Lambo.” he
pointed along the river. The car was at a stoplight working its way
from the east side back over toward Music Row.

She called the boys on speaker phone, “let’s
see, uh ‘john has a long moustache. john has a long
moustache.’”

They heard laughter from the other end.
Robbie’s voice broke up a little, “....ere are they?”

Johnny announced. “It’s just crossing the
river now, near a big fountain… Just went out of sight. Seem to be
heading this way.”

“OK. Great. Probably back over toward Music
Row. We’re en route… head back up that way and we’ll pick you
up.”

“Let’s roll!” Johnny hopped on the bike and
took off. Dana gave the parasol to a little girl and followed. The
bridge was so steep Johnny had to shift his weight back when
hitting the brakes to keep from pitching forward. The brakes
squealed in protest. The Lambo was a few lights over. They crossed
the street and started riding hard to stay ahead for as long as
possible, but soon they were at the same light as the car.

Johnny glanced over through the heavily
tinted windows. A sixty-ish man was behind the wheel. He was
wearing a sport coat over a dress shirt with a bolo tie. His hair
was thinned, and permed. “Brillo pad is right.” Johnny said to
himself. The V12 rumbled as the car slowly pulled away up
Demonbreun Street, a hillside road that was lined with shops and
restaurants. The license plate was “PRDCUR”.

Dana shouted out, “let’s stop here.” They put
the bikes in a rack and waited for their ride. Ten minutes later
Robbie and David picked them up.

Matt fixated on one of the entries in the
Randolph notebook. Randolph wrote, “the veil is thin in certain
places
… had profound experience at Serpent
Monument.” The Serpent Mound State Memorial was only about an hour
away, and he drove along in that direction.

He’d been formulating and refining a theory
for a few years--that the other side was accessible through the
brain, which acted as a kind of receiver. He started thinking about
it in terms of radio signal demodulation.

The mystics, authors, and researchers that
were involved in the occult tended to be poetic and artistic in
their descriptions, and old lore that was written by men like John
Dee, who had a methodical, even scientific bent, were written in
archaic, or encoded terminology that didn’t translate well. Matt
had been filling in the gaps in their method one scrap at a
time.

He realized the mind, as a demodulator,
needed to apply a matched filter to extract signals from the
background noise. The methods long employed by occultists--smoke
gazing, scrying with magic mirrors or crystals, even the modern
practice of listening to static--suggested the conscious mind
interfered with this dormant ability to tune in the signals. Some
stumbled on it as children, others found it through long practice,
and still others found it after accidents or illness. Matt, as yet,
failed to even a glimpse the shadow of the other side.

He pulled into the State Park. The sky was
getting a little overcast, but the weather was still pleasant and
warm. The park was quiet, and the only sounds were bird song and
the wind in the trees. A few other people were walking around in
the park. He wandered around the trails and chewed on the problem.
He tried to picture the ceremonies in ancient America, and his mind
flitted around to the other ancient monuments, Stonehenge, the
pyramids.

Maybe, the structures were something like the
reflector on a satellite dish. He followed the path to what might
be the focal point, at the head of the serpent, sat down and
cleared his mind and waited for any signal. He didn’t really know
what to expect, he’d long assumed that the connection, once it was
made would be a completely novel experience.