Demensions - Waterhead: Part One

     Price "Waterhead" Rowes's house was next to a nice colossal new A-frame, if you call two hundred yards "next". The old professor who owned it passed away, and the children, who were about sixty, were renting it out. Waterhead's drive put him at somewhat of an elevation to the neighbors, but the A-frame's wall of windows faced the back of his place where he had sliding glass doors to his deck. The A-frame's drive was longer and wound down from the county road.
     Waterhead sat in his five legged wheeled office chair and his jaw and neck snapped from the sandman he was on. He had to keep watch while Drake went for the groceries and gear. They had to stake out the A-frame with binoculars the first day and used the old bionic ear they had mounted on the satellite dish to disguise it. The group was suspicious and did not know that Waterhead was an investigator for the county, they seemed to have no natural curiosity. Rowes was entitled with an official warrant. They wanted to see if the group, which varied in size, was doing some of the counterfeiting, drugs, and militia terrorism in the county.
     Once Waterhead got used to sandman it made him a better agent, cut the anxiety and focused his thoughts better. These possible perps right next door were quiet on this first day. Waterhead said he had things to do, and Drake spread it around he was going to witness in Denver.
     Drake was back with the new infrared scope-recorder and a frozen pizza or two, he ran up to the next county where he was not well known, for the pizza and met another undercover unit who was breaking down a surveillance. Waterhead was glad to hear him on the gravel drive, he needed a nap. All he could do is nod in and out dreaming about giving that chick in the A-frame the schwantz downtown in the interrogation room, but he did not know what they were up to. It seemed as the men in the A-frame were afraid to touch her, she might be the boss. He thought how good it would be to get a search and entry warrant, and give those punks a "good one". Waterhead rubbed his wrist he sprained on the last bust, he had more muscle than his smaller than expected hands and wrists could take, and always wound up close to breaking his wrist as he took a creep out.
     "No new tracks, we had about an inch," said Drake coming in the door with the pizzas and gear.
     "How heavy is that scope," Water head tried to boost out of the chair, half asleep.
     "I got it forget it. Did you see the van drive in again?"
     "No, it ain't there. Let's get this baby up and ranged in. This field effect should be good through the trees." Waterhead replied, grabbing and examining the scope. In minutes the infrared unit was up and working, the field effect did not show until dark, but then the figures through the windows were visible, through the light drapes, and the trees in between were not. It was better in winter work.
     "You're first. Nap time for me, I need it," Waterhead went flop on the couch. "Later," he said.
     Drake found the activity hard to make out. The group was working on and about a table. Suddenly there was a flash that illuminated the figures around the table. It was not a camera flash. The light from that sort of a flash would be a hue like that from their lighting, only brighter. This flash hung invisible blue tinges in the infrared scope eyepiece then disappeared.
     "Look at this!" Drake yelled surprised by the sight, although it had passed.
     Waterhead shuddered in a rapid eye movement state semi-asleep as he was just drifting off after being up the last thirty-six hours.
     "You asshole," was all Waterhead could half yell in his confused state.
     "Hey, nobody ever called me that before," said Drake in a false sarcastic tone, it was a code phrase the partners always used, when they called each other such terms of affection.
     "Damn, this better be good! I should kick the crap out of you for general purposes," Waterhead said as he barreled over to Drake and body blocked him over out of the way on the wheeled office chair with a grunt, to get his eye on the scope.
     "I don’t see a thing!" whined Waterhead through his teeth. "It’s not nice to mess with Mother Nature," he continued, not exactly the brightest of individuals when awakened and he made a menacing gesture to Drake as if he would like to snap his neck with a half-nelson, which he was known to do to the adversary on occasion.
     Waterhead watched for maybe ten minutes or so and told Drake, "You keep a log tonight, and tomorrow we’ll both watch. Tell me how many of these flashes you see. You haven’t been working vice lately have you?"
     "No, I ain’t trippin’, I ain’t been MK-Ultra-ed at the bar. Hell, I’ve been serving evictions the last two weeks. I’m sober as a judge. I only had a half a pot of coffee! Give me a break, I know what I saw!", Drake fumed, as Waterhead’s boisterous behavior put him well advisedly on guard.
     "Evictions, serves you right! Now listen, I’m going to get a few ‘Zees’,"
     Waterhead calmly growled in a low reserved baritone and flopped back on the couch.

     The sun rose dappled through the aspens holding on to the majority of the fall leaves although there was a nice early autumn carpet on the ground as the aspens predominated. As the sun came late on this northwest slope Price Rowes blinked and flipped about on the couch some as the first rays met his eye about seven. Waterhead grunted and relaxedly hacked up a lung oyster and sat up. Drake was totally nodded out and snoring in the chair by the scope. Waterhead thought what an excellent lookout Drake was for a detective from office administration, as most of the whiners Waterhead took to the field probably would have curled up on the floor with a blanket. Rowes skipped the tough-guy approach, acted as if he was unaware Drake was asleep on the lookout and said quietly, "How’s it going?"
     "Uh, uh, uh," muttered Drake. "Oh, uh, the last flash was at 5:15am."
     "O.K. It’s quarter after seven. Enjoy your nap?" Waterhead said as he peered through the scope.
     "The van has not rolled yet, I see the dew and leaves on it. You did O.K. for an administrative secretary at that. How many flashes all night?"
     "Uh, look here. All the times are logged in. I guess I counted five. Last night you got an e-mail.
     The judge gave you a search warrant. I printed it out. Kee-rice sakes, do you snore! A bomb could have went off," Drake said as he regained himself after the nap.
     "Hell, if you were up 36 hours....hey, we can go hunting as soon as the van rolls. You go get those hiking boots out. We gonna have a little fun! Hit the couch here in the pig-pen or try the bed for a few minutes..uh, hours? I’ll get you when it’s time," Waterhead cheerily said as he looked around the pig-pen, his pet phrase for the dining room kitchen combo area which was just a guy’s den. His old award plaques from twenty eight years with the department covered one wall. He kept thinking about dumping the illuminated case with the softball and bowling trophies as he "did in" his bowling shoulder about five years ago. Rowes dwelt on this sentimentality. but since he never ushered any female guests into this area of his house the trophy case made a nice what-not sort of center, and he kept some extra rounds in the lower area.
     Waterhead was amazed at how little the neighbors slept. That immediately made him think they were into narcotics, meth or coke, maybe angel dust. They had two dusted kids in lock up the last week or so, or was that ecstasy? Any way, coke was a trafficking scenario, the others could be homemade, a production scenario. There were no flashes. Waterhead had not seen a flash through the scope yet, just with his naked eye. In daylight the scope’s field effect infrared capabilities were of little use, but the regular optics were usable. The leaves were beginning to be a problem as a light breeze freed them and at times lifted those already fallen. The group seemed busy from what he could see, but the semi-sheer drapes blotted anything but major motions in the A-frame from his view.
     One of the group popped out and took a look in the van, and went back in the A-frame in less than a minute. Waterhead hollered to Drake, it was after nine and they were probably making a grocery run as Waterhead saw them bring in a couple of gallons of milk, a couple cubes of soda-pop, and only a half dozen bags about three days ago.
     "Uh, yeah. I didn’t even take my boots off. Whaddayuh.....", muttered Drake reviving after his collapse on the couch in the pig-pen.
     "I’m betting they are leaving. We need all four to go before we can get in and do a little undercover. Yes, there they go. They don’t seem to be taking anything big to the van. One of the guys has a zippered portfolio tucked under his arm, the rest of them are empty handed. Wait, the chick...oh, she’s going too. I never saw her so well before. She has her hair fixed up, or a wig. "’Big hair’, auburn, sort of a flippy deal, like an old Arlene Dahl doo from the sixties....strange, but she looks great! I hope we haul them in for something, I want to get a good look at that, y’know?", Waterhead said excitedly as his neighbors went grocery shopping.
     "Yeah, what would you do to her, Waterhead?" Drake asked in a condemnatory tone.
     "Oh, nothin’. Just see if it’s a wig.", Rowes said calming himself. "We are going hunting, Drake."
     The two were off on the deer trails that Waterhead knew so well. He quit hunting after the locker plant had him down for twenty extra pounds of venison two years ago. He knew how he did his kills, but those other dirty bastards bothered him due to the talk he heard when he went out on volunteer fire department calls. They were "sick mess" in his estimation, so that was the end to his hunting, as he was not going to wrap the meat himself, too big a hassle. As they walked Drake asked Waterhead, "What’s this I hear about you and Debbie?"
     "Oh. she’s a great kid, the department is lucky to have her."
     "No, I mean, somebody said she was up to your place."
     "Yeah, she was over right after she got engaged. Wanted to look through my personal files on some of the more complicated cases. You know, being an office person, she needed to know more about field work. She’s marrying a new "office dweeb" under you, in your department. That’s the same reason why you are assigned to me, remember?" Waterhead said as they walked.
     "Yeah, there was a rumor you boned her. I ain’t sayin’ who, just a rumor." Drake coyly replied.
     "I got a rep. The girls know I never tell. Never will. Nuff said?"
     "Yeah."
     "You are right, yeah, you ass," Waterhead barked in a conclusive tone.
     It was a nice day to walk to the neighbors from a strategic point of view. There tracks were being covered by the leaf fall and breeze. The two detectives had to consider the subjects to be as wary as they were. Since it had not rained lately they should not make any tracks near the A-frame which was in the expansive aspen grove as well. At the A-frame they looked at the phone lines and around the windows to see if there was an alarm, and fortunately the place was still as the old professor had left it, basically unsecured. After a five minute look-see outside they found no evidence of a security system. The new neighbors did not even keep a dog, dopers always had dogs as a early warning system and sometimes as a last line of defense. Peeking through the door they saw no further signs of security, and turning the knob found the door unlocked.
     "I guess you won’t get to practice picking locks, rookie," said Waterhead as they entered.
      They wanted to be in and out as quickly as they could, and they wanted to see what went on where the flashes occurred. That was obvious and instinctual. Walking into the dining room they found a piece of equipment on the large dining room table. It looked like a corporate sized copy machine with an unusually large upper hinged deck.A standard grounded 120v power cord plugged in the wall. "Counterfeiting " the two thought without saying a word. There was no paper to be found and no finished money. Things did not add up.
     Against the wall were plastic sheets the color of old 35mm film about two by three feet in dimension, that appeared semi-rigid, and at first glance definitely plastic. The men wore gloves and felt the material, unafraid of leaving fingerprints. They noticed the material felt noticeable thicker than the standard credit card. It was obvious that the plastic sheets were placed in the copy machine, they were exactly the size of the copy machine apparatus with it’s thick hinged lid. Drake and Waterhead studied the copy machine for brand and serial number and found neither of the identifying marks. Waterhead could barely lift the machine as Drake looked underneath and there again was no clue to the machine’s manufacture. Drake pulled out the camera and shot a half dozen photos, while Waterhead looked about and found what looked like small credit card sized cuts of the plastic sheets in a box. There were dozens of the credit cards in the box and Waterhead grabbed one. Less than five minutes had passed, a good length of time for a surveillance hit, and Waterhead whispered low, "We’re outta here."
     The wind whipped the leaves even more so as they walked back to Rowes place. Both men examined the card which was obviously thicker and larger than the standard credit card. They noticed a faint rainbow iridescent fingerprint sort an effect fade each time they left loose of the card, then it assumed the 35mm film coloration.
     "I say it’s credit card counterfeiting, what else?" said Drake.
     "I was in on a case of that, they get the cards painted, with magnetic strips and watermarks and all, before they stamp them. Oh, and by the way, they are not this size."
     "O.K. So they are an R&D group for a new kind of card," Drake whined.
     "No, why would they need more than one. If each flash means printing a sheet, and they cut out a few dozen each sheet, that means manufacturing. Back at my place, first thing we do is call this in. I got an encrypted line to downtown. You do the report. Don’t forget to include they left with the business pouch file when they went to the store. Ask for a reply, I’ll bet we do not move in," Waterhead rattled out the detective worked need to be done as they walked through the woods.
     "Ten-four all the crap, will do. But, what about Debby?" Drake asked, hoping to get Waterhead off guard.
     "Well, I threw the used rubber on the floor. She was gone before I got up, and I never found the rubber. What she wanted with that, I’ll never know," Waterhead shot back laughing.
     "You sick--!"
     "You’re the sick one if you ever repeat that, and if I hear you did, I’m going to lump your ass like it’s never been lumped before. Got that asshole!"

     Rowes got right back on the scope as Drake called in the report. A half hour later Drake put an e-mail reply in Waterhead’s hand as he watched the A-frame through the scope. Downtown did not want a move at this time and did not want the two men to break their surveillance watch either. They were curious about the card the two took from the A-frame and sent the description to technical for an opinion.
     "Those son-of-a-bitchs are like clockwork. They do not spend any time looking around for groceries. By my estimation they spent ten minutes in the store. Yeah, I timed the run to the food store for my own convenience. Weird, nobody does that! What are these people doing. They are almost like machines. The chick has the pouch pinched between here thumb and forefinger. Looks like it’s lighter than when they left. Note that !" Waterhead scanned the email. "Like I said, we stay on look out. Drake, my neck injury is flarin’ something awful. Let me have twenty winks, then I’ll do a full watch and let you sleep." Waterhead said.
     Usually half a Xanax took care of Rowes neck injury problem, and he used them very sparingly, but in the heat of battle the tension could make it cramp. He popped half the pill and rested the neck injury, and rested his head on the couch back still holding the seized credit card in his hand. Waterhead cursed the oversized head he was born with. Seven and five eight’s was large in any body’s book. He was sixfoot and 220lbs., maybe 190lbs of muscle. He called his gut camouflage, the torque-meister, his reserve for the famine. He moved around like a man twenty years younger when needed and was dedicated to bicycling off hours and hit the grades hard, like he was in the Toure-de-France, up to four days a week, if he was lucky. The neck problem was from motocrossing in his youth, and the large head. Rowes tried to train hard to cure the problem at a fully equipped gym, head harnesses, standing German flies, and bridging on a mat.......nothing relieved the pain, but in the training process he built himself world class carotids that stood out like three quarter inch ropes when he grunted admiring his torso in the gym mirrors. The problem was his bighead. The doctors could not pin the injury, or condition, on anything else.
     Waterhead dozed comfortably until about one in the afternoon, when Drake called for relief from watching the scope. Waterhead still had the seized card in his hand in the semi-darkened pig-pen, the drapes were drawn except a slit for the scope. As he awoke the card projected a colorful image on the ceiling in three dimensions much thicker than a slide projector display. The image looked about a foot thick and was about three by five feet. Waterhead’s half opened eyes recognized something like a computer homepage and he thought he was having a vivid dream of some kind, a dream he had never experienced before.
     "Uh.", was all Waterhead could utter as Drake turned and also looked , and gazed an open mouth gape at the image.
     Waterhead’s heart started to race as his eyes opened wide, and after what felt like fifteen seconds after the image was first projected from the card, that is, as he awakened to full consciousness, the image was gone. Rowes looked at the card on his thigh and somehow knew he wanted the image to project again, but it would not.
     "Holy frickin’ Geez....uh!" was all Drake could say, as he looked at Waterhead. Drake could not believe he sounded like Rowes, but in his excitement, he did. Both men were equally enrapt in amazement by what they had just saw and virtually speechless. Drake continued, "Now what, how are we going to report this? You’re the boss!"
     "I’m going to e-mail downtown again. What time is it?" Rowes said as his heart stilled somewhat.
     "My watch says two fifteen," Drake replied.
     "Yeah, they’re never going to believe this downtown. What the hell happened here? Oh, never mind, I’ll do the best I can."
     By two thirty Waterhead had the report in, as best he could relate it to downtown. The reply e-mail mocked him to a certain extent, and they asked if he could make the card "do it" again. Rowes replied he could not, and they acknowledged that they wanted the card tomorrow, or later, so as to not break cover, and ordered him to not move in. With that done Waterhead relieved Drake and wondered what the card had done and why it would not repeat the image. The card sat on the trophy shelf as Waterhead watched the A-frame. The activity in the A-frame was not much different than observed to this time. Rowes put together the situation as it was when the card manifested it’s ability, and decided to placed the card on Drake’s lap and then kept an eye on the card hoping for a repeat performance, and nothing happened for hours.
     Right at sundown the field effect started to kick in in auto and the surveillance became about an order of magnitude better. The blue flash alerted Waterhead for the first time about 7pm. and Rowes kicked himself for not listening to Drake. It was a darn shame that he had been so tired the night before after being up for nearly two days. He might pay a bit more attention now that he was rested up some.
     The first look at the flash impressed Waterhead, but the connection with the card projecting as it did, just did not register in his mind, it was to out of the ordinary. He immediately thought the card was an advanced computer that had no power source. He did not understand why it functioned earlier and not later, and had no idea what could power something so small, so small, but with such a great capability. He was definitely experiencing some excitement and felt like a rookie detective again. Waterhead logged in a couple of flashes by nine. They had gone through nine sheets that were officially logged just these past two days on stakeout.
     Waterhead’s attention was riveted on a blue star in the night sky that seemed to be a very high airplane that periodically blinked a nearly hypnotic blue violet in the onyx field of night. The star grew. It moved towards him, and he was hypnotized by the beauty as he watched it transform into a hazy semi-transparent ball that descended into a small clearing twenty five yards from the A-frame. The four individuals from the A-frame moved rapidly to the clearing. Waterhead was unaware of the time that passed in this occurrence, but he routinely looked around at Drake and the card, which had both been been doing nothing.
     Four figures stood about the sphere of light, which seemed to have a figure, vaguely man-like, suspended in it’s center.The sphere was blurry, yet luminescent, captivating, and nothing he had seen before. Finally Rowes called for Drake to awaken, to witness what he had been watching. As Drake awakened the card projected as it had done for Waterhead in the afternoon. Drake and Rowes were not as shocked as they were before, but felt the stunning reality of what they had felt was a hallucination earlier in the day. This time the projection was actually tuning into the events that Waterhead had been observing in the clearing by the A-frame. Waterhead knew this, Drake could not as he awoke.
     Rowes looked at faintly familiar character in the projection and heard an unintelligible language that was for all apparent purposes human, but as unfamiliar as Latvian, of which he knew not a word. Drake awakened fully, and as in the situation in the afternoon the projection from the card ceased.
     "Hurry! Get your ass over to this scope, now," Waterhead bellowed.
     Drake saw the hazy sphere for about ten seconds, and Waterhead was kind enough to poke him in the ribs and tell him he was not sleeping. To Waterhead’s naked eye the sphere was nearly perceptible, and he wanted the scope back. Back on the scope Waterhead watched the sphere disappear much in the same way it had appeared what seemed fifteen minute ago. He told Drake to look at the violet blue star recede into the sky, and indeed Drake acknowledged what he saw.
     As Waterhead focused on the clearing the infrared picked up the four figures each carrying a two by three foot bundle about eight inches thick, obviously the plastic sheets that were imprinted in the copy machine they saw in the A-frame. Both men were adrenaline pumped, neither could sleep the rest of this night. They were on to something very high-tech and mysterious, and puzzle pieces were beginning to fit.
     "What time is it?" Waterhead asked in a noticeably excited, anticipatory, yet assured voice. Drake mentioned it was going on ten. "We gotta raise one of those tech geniuses from downtown from the dead. Nine-to fivers, damn! What do you you suggest? We got orders not to leave here or move in. Hell, what do we really have to do, roll in some units and grab those people and their damn!"
     "Yeah, yeah.....they’ll never believe this. I say wake up the chief and talk to him. I agree we should act." replied Drake.
     "Do it. Do it. I can tell they were laughing about the report I made on the card projecting. They thought we were kidding." Waterhead watched the next dozen or so cards get flashed in their machine. "These cards have to be a military communications systems. I couldn’t catch a word of that the card projection when I woke you up. This is freakin’ crazy!" said Waterhead who toned down the profanity as things got interesting, and who actually was polite to perps he busted.
     The communication went as well as could be expected with the chief who asked if they both wanted to go back to uniformed duty. There had been a rash of UFO sightings in the area lately and the chief was awakened in the middle of the night about the two "dusted" kids who were babbling in a strange way in lock up about a week ago. The chief said he would set up a special UPS truck delivery for them tomorrow and that they better have the disc out of the scope’s recorder ready for the delivery man. He made it clear in no uncertain terms that they not call him until they review the disc downtown.
     Rowes and Drake both eagerly sat up for many hours logging in the flashes the second night speculating as to the capabilties of the card. They concluded that it must only be for communications as there was no power source they could see. They reviewed what happened and both decided that the card must be in contact with a living being to work, leading to wild theorizing that the card drew electricity, Brownian motion, or something from the holder of the card. They both noted that the card projected only if they were in a less than conscious state.
     What about the kids on the designer drugs? They spoke in a strange tongue while under the influence. Drake and Waterhead went around in circles on the clues for hours. Both decided it would be a thrill to bust into the A-frame and get those four people in interrogation. They thought about the looks of the four. All were medium build and sharp dressers. The inhabitants of the A-frame were up all that night manufacturing the cards, tirelessly. They popped the disc from the scope that night while things were slow and popped in a new recording disc. Although excitied both men decided to catnap in the wee hours, on rotation of course, they might need thier energy tomorrow.
     They both let each other nap and then awoke each other to watch the card work as they became conscious from the naps. All they saw was the homepage, something that resembled a PC’s Internet Explorer, but neither man could tell how to push the buttons that were labeled in undecipherable characters neither had ever seen. It was frustrating to them, especially Waterhead who was awake when Drake made the card project the first time, the time when the sphere was in the clearing.

Waterhead: Part One

© 2001 Paul H. Prochnow