As the group is leaving the house, Jessica asked Brenda why they didn’t go to the old mill to check for anything. Brenda, who was making sure the door was locked, replied, “The building is so old and there are so many of us, I was scared someone might get hurt. Remember what I said, safety first.”
This reply was good enough for Jessica. The rest of the group was hanging out by Brenda’s car waiting for her and Jessica. As they caught up to the rest of the group, they gave Brenda back her ghost hunting tools she let them borrow for the day. They all thanked Brenda, who was looking at the size of the group and the size of her car, “Don’t think we’ll all fit.” William laughed, “Don’t worry, were used to walking. We’re going back to my house to go over our evidence.” Brenda looked at them and decided perhaps they could meet later around six o’clock at the local diner to discuss what they found. Everyone thought this would work fine, since they all had told their parents they probably wouldn’t be home for supper that night, since they were unsure how long the hunt would take, and all were given a few dollars to grab something to eat. Samantha and Jacob were really excited, since they never went there before. As Brenda drove off, the group started walking back to town.
It was around twelve o’clock as the group started walking back to William’s place. The excitement in everyone’s voice as they discussed the case made it very evident that no one was disappointed in what they experienced. As they continued to discuss what they witnessed that morning, Jessica noticed William wasn’t part of the discussion. She walked up to him, “William, you seem a million miles away, what’s up?” William looked over at Jessica, “Nothing, it’s just that after remembering what happened before my mother passed away the other day, with the whole stairway to heaven and all, I’ve been thinking about her a lot today.” Jessica wasn’t sure what to do. She had no idea what to say to William, as she never lost anyone real close to her and she had two mothers, the one who adopted her, and the one who is supposed to come back one day. She was trying to think of what to say, when a voice inside her told her to take his hand. Without thinking, she placed her hand in his as they kept walking. William looked up at her, and cracked a little smile, “I always feel so much warmth when you touch me. You’re a very loving person.” Jessica smiled back, “And you’re a very strong person. But sometimes you need to learn that you don’t need to deal with all life’s issues on your own.” William looked back at the ground, “I know, but something’s just aren’t that easy to talk about.” William didn’t want to tell Jessica part of what was eating him up was the fact that he knew who her biological mother was, and he just didn’t feel like it was his place to tell her.
After a little while, William seemed to be coming around and started to discuss the recent events at the old mill with Jessica. “So what did you think about the overall experience of today’s investigation with Brenda?”
Jessica was glad to see William was starting to come around, “I thought it was great. Brenda and I really clicked while we were doing the EVP sessions together. It’s weird, but I felt very comfortable around her. I thought I would have trouble hunting with a stranger, but it seemed to be like we’d hunted together before.”
Matthew yield out to William and Jessica, “Hey love birds, do you want to get in on our discussions on today’s experiences?”
William and Jessica forgot they were still holding hands, and quickly let go of each other. William turned back to see Matthew with his arm on Alexis, “Look who’s calling who love birds. You too have seemed to become real close, real fast.”
Matthew look at Alexis and smiled, “I figure if the only way I can experience some of this crazy, paranormal world of yours is when I’m by Alexis, I’m going to keep her close.”
Sarah and Samantha looked at Alexis and started to giggle. Alexis looked at them and rolled her eyes, “At least with Matthew, I don’t have as much fear on the hunts as I did without him.”
Jessica broke up this conversation, “So let’s figure out what all happened today. After all, it’s still another fifteen minute walk until we get to Williams.”
The group started to discuss what had happened throughout the morning. There seemed to be a much lighter mood surrounded the group then in the past. Everyone was really enjoying themselves. Before they knew it, they were in front of William’s house. They went in and straight to the recreation room.
As they were all taking the same positions they had during the last evidence search, William, Matthew and Sarah realised that the three of them had no devices to review, since they had used Brenda’s equipment during the latest investigation.. They decided to pair up with other group members. William instantly said, “I’ll work with Alexis on the digital photos.” Matthew looked at him, “Very funny. I think I will work with Alexis.” William laughed, “Go ahead. I’ll work with Jacob on the video camera. Sarah, why don’t you work with Samantha on the digital photos she took?” Sarah figured that would be fine. As the group started pairing up, the two younger investigators were excited to be working with more experienced ones. They always liked to learn as much as they could, and both Jacob and Samantha thought this would be a great opportunity.
As they settled in to their tasks, William reminded everyone to make a note of what they find, and they will review all findings at the end. Everyone got right down to work on reviewing their devices.
Over at Brenda’s, she was already going through the EVP sessions she did with Jessica. She was also running the video of her infrared camera. The normally would do them one at a time, just in case a voice or unknown sound was picked up by the video camera, but she figured in order to save time, she would go through both together. She also had her still digital photos to go through, but figured she’d do them last since she only took around twenty photos in the house.
While listening to the digital recorder, she could hear the whispering, “yes” and the double knock on the wood in the attic, but nothing else. As she continued, she saw the different color shape of a figure on the bed in the infrared camera, while the group was in the room on the second floor that Jacob was able to photograph the ghost. As she was going along, most of what she was reviewing didn’t reveal anything.
Back at Williams, the group was eagerly going through their tasks, hoping to find more evidence. Jessica was able to capture the EVP of the whispering “Yes” in the attic as well as the knocks on the floor, but she also heard a faint response when she asked the spirit, “Are you upset that we are in your home.” She played it back a couple times but couldn’t quite make out what it was saying. She wrote down the location it was on the tape and continued.
Meanwhile, Jacob was hoping to uncover more ghostly evidence, with William as they went through his video. Jacob wasn’t discouraged as they made it all the way to the part of the tape that showed the fog like blur on the bed. He just smiled at William and told him, “At least I caught that ghost if nothing else.” William was just about to agree with Jacob when he heard a voice say “Out”, right after one of the girls asked “Where should we go to next?” He rewound it and asked Jacob to listen carefully to what sound like a response to the group’s question. As Jacob listened, he clearly heard a male voice respond, “Out”. He was so excited that it caught everyone’s attention. Jacob apologized for the outburst then turned to William, “You mean I also caught an EVP that wasn’t during a question session?” William noticed everyone was listening to their conversation and pretending to review their own data. “That’s correct Jacob,” he said, “And the rest of you might as well come here and listen to it so you can get back to what you’re supposed to be doing. The group all gathered around as William cranked the volume. As the voice said female voice asked the question, “Where should we go to next?”, and the male voice responds, “Out” just a clear as if he was standing there.
Alexis looks at Matthew, “That was when I asked you where we should go to next that the ghost responded! I wonder how many other questions are answered by spirits that we aren’t aware of.”
Matthew shrugs his shoulders, “I don’t know? Until today I would have said none, but now I just do not know what that answer would be?”
The group returns to their areas and continues the review of the data. Sarah and Samantha are going slowly through the images from the main floor where the orb appears between Brenda and William. They are trying to see if it turns up in any other photos. Samantha notices a smaller orb in the same location, of the same color. Sarah agrees that that must be when it first appeared. Since the photos were about fifteen seconds apart, they quickly ruled out dust or a bug as both of those would have moved.
Brenda wasn’t finding any new evidence as she was going through her data. She decided to take a break to rest her eyes a bit. Brenda pushed pause on the infrared camera and stops the recorder, and then went to make herself a cup of green tea. While in her kitchen, she decided she could use some caffeine to help make her a bit more alert, so she just made a cup of coffee instead. As she headed back to her study she was sipping on the coffee. Right before she sat down, while glancing at the video screen over her cup, she couldn’t believe what she was seeing. She somehow almost missed a reddish orange image moving quite quickly across the screen. She rewound it and watches the whole scene again, right from when Matthew entered the sitting room. Almost as soon as he entered the room, the translucent image moves from one side of the room to the other towards the same window as the traveller. She is surprised none of them saw it as it happened. She recorded the time on the video and continued to see if anything else shows up, but this time she is only watching and listening to the video and not the digital recorder.
Sarah and Samantha were still going through the photos from the sitting room, when they come across the ones where Sarah decided to play model. As they were looking at the photos, on the third photo an orangey fog is visible behind her. As they continue looking at the photos, it appears again in the seventh ‘pose shot’, but this time away from Sarah. The girls are rather stunned, and as they finish going through the rest of the images, sit very impatiently waiting for everyone else to finish.
Jessica was done her review and noticed the two girls looking around. She went over to see what they found in the photos, and as they showed her the two ‘photo shoot’ shots with the orangey fog in them, she is quite amazed. In the first one the fog is clearly behind Sarah, and in the second photo the entire fog image is visible, though translucent.
Everyone else finished their reviewing within the next fifteen minutes and as William is asking them what they found, outside of what they discovered at the house, Samantha tells the group, “I also caught a ghost today. It was in the sitting room, so I bet it’s the traveller.” William is a little stunned by this claim. He goes over to the computer, and opens up both images that the girls had minimized. Everyone gathers around they notice that the orangey fog is moving in the same direction the traveller did towards the window in the original video. William prints a copy of the two images to show to Brenda. As they are waiting for them to print, Alexis announces, “I believe I caught the traveller as well.” The group all goes around her computer and notices the same orangey fog in one of her photos of the sitting room, only this time it is curved in a semicircle by the window. William quickly prints this image as well.
As William is picking the papers up from the printer, Jessica walks over to him and whispers in his ear. He puts the pages back on the printer and takes her digital recorder to his laptop. He plugs it in and asks her if its set. Jessica nods and William copies the data to his laptop and opens his audio editing software. He positions it at the same spot Jessica stopped her recorder at. He turns up the speaker volume and selects play. The group is all rather riveted by what is happening, as William stop what he was doing and went straight to downloading the audio file. As they listen, they hear Jessica ask, “Are you upset that we are in your home?” and then the response, “No, your home too”. Everyone is amazed. Though they don’t understand the response, they definitely know what they heard. As they gather their evidence and notes to share with Brenda, they wonder if she’s found anything. Since the time flew by during the review of the evidence, they start to hurry and get ready to go to the diner.
Brenda was finishing up her review of her recordings, when she realized she hadn’t looked at her digital photos. She burns a DVD copy of the video from the infrared camera to show the group at the diner. As it is copying, she opens up the folder with the still images in it. She opens the first photo and notices that in the window of the second floor, looks to be a face. She zooms in on it, but cannot make out a clear definition of it. She chalks it up to an illusion from the daylight, and goes through the rest of her photos. She did not manage to capture anything paranormal in any of her photos, so she prints a copy of the one with the entire group in front of the old house, to show them how easily light can play tricks on you. She grabs her portable DVD player and the DVD she just burned, as well as the photo, and heads out to meet the group at the diner.
Brenda arrives at the diner a few minutes before the group does, so she has the waitress push a couple tables together to allow for seating of all eight of them. Brenda orders a coffee and is looking around at the fifties décor of the place. There is an old Juke Box, a couple old bikes hanging from the ceiling, and even a period pay phone. As the group arrives, they all take a seat around the table. Jessica and William take the seats directly beside and across from Brenda. As the waitress takes everyone’s drink order, the group is busy looking around a all the old artefacts in the diner. Jacob asked Brenda what was with the large phone in the corner. Brenda told him that was a payphone. People would put in a dime and call whoever it is they wanted to talk to. Jacob was having trouble comprehending this. He grew up with a cell phone in his pocket, so he couldn’t figure out why someone would pay to use a phone. Samantha asked Brenda where the music was coming from, and Brenda pointed to the juke box, saying it was like “the mp3 player of the fifties.” The waitress brought everyone’s drink orders and started taking the food orders. For the most part it was the typical burgers, hotdogs and fries but when it was Matthews turn to order, he asked for the meatloaf. Everyone looked at him kind of funny. Brenda decided to try the meatloaf as well. Alexis asked him why he didn’t just order something simple like a hotdog or hamburger, but Matthew just said he was in the mood for a real meal after a day of hunting.
The group started to discuss what they found, when Brenda pulled out her portable DVD player and played the video of the reddish orange image moving across the sitting room. Everyone was amazed that no one saw this when it happened. They looked at Matthew and Alexis, but neither one of them wanted to say they were flirting with each other and not watching the LCD screen on the camera.
This image made Samantha remember about the orangey image she photographed, twice. Samantha started to tell Brenda about the images as William was pulling out the printouts and handing them to her. Brenda looked at the photos and was amazed at how similar they were to the video. Brenda remarked that there were three photos, when Alexis said the other one was one she caught.
Jessica started to tell Brenda about the unexpected EVP she got in the attic. She explains how when she asked the spirit, “Are you upset that we are in your home?” She received a response that William was able to clean up, “No, your home too”. Although they were puzzled by the response, they figured it had to mean something.
Sarah mentioned that as her and Samantha were looking through the photos, when the got to the ones in the bedroom where the orb appeared between Brenda and William, they found another photo that showed the same color orb in the same location, only much smaller. Brenda was quite impressed. She told Sarah, “You realize that it can’t be dust or a bug if it’s in the exact same location?” Sarah told Brenda that she had come to the same conclusion.
Jacob told Brenda about the unexpected EVP on his video as they were leaving the upstairs bedroom. Brenda said it is strange for a spirit to answer a question directed at someone else, but not completely unheard of. It is a very unique situation to actual capture it. Of course hearing it was unique made Jacob feel very important again and his smile showed it.
Brenda pulled out the photo of the group in front of the house. As they were looking at it, Jessica mentioned, “Nice picture of the group.” Then Matthew noticed that a face was in the window beside where he was standing at the top of the stairs. Everyone started speculating who it could be, when Brenda interrupted them, “The human mind is programmed to recognize faces. It will see a face in anything that remotely resembles one. Experts refer to this as ‘face perception’. Our brains are hardwired to recognize faces automatically, and because of this we see faces in almost anything we see that may resemble one. The image in the window is actual just a reflection of the sunlight bouncing off of it.”
William: “So why did you show us this then?”
Brenda: “To show you guys that you can’t always accept what you think your seeing is what you are actually seeing. Look who noticed the face, the groups sceptic. I just want you guys to be aware that these things will come up quite frequently in your investigation.”
As Brenda was finishing her explanation to William, the waitress was distributing the food orders around the table. Everyone put away the evidence they brought and started to enjoy their meals.
After they were done, they sat around for about another half hour, discussing the evidence further. At around eight o’clock, Brenda told the group she was going to be heading home. The group decided that would be a great idea, considering they had been out early and have really been going nonstop until now. Brenda walked up to the waitress and asked her to put all the food on one bill. She then paid for everything and walked back to the table. She put a tip on the table for the waitress and told the group that the bill was taken care of. They were surprised, and a few of them told her she didn’t need to do that. She just smiled and told everyone, “I know I didn’t have to pay, but I wanted to. The time I spent with you guys today have been the most interesting since I moved back. I want to thank you guys for a wonderful day.” The group all thanked Brenda for allowing them on the hunt with her and for paying for their food. As Brenda left, the group decided they should too. Everyone walked home together and by the time William got home it was already nine o’clock, as his house was the last one along the way. He went inside and put on some music to relax to as he laid on the sofa.