My Condo is a Turtle Tunnel — Part 2

Series — A new homeowner turns to an unlikely ally for help, after accidentally breaking the seal of an ancient gateway hidden behind the walls of his spare room.

Earlier…

By the time I turned to Van for help, my life had become a living hell, and I was desperate enough to try anything.

My condo, it seemed, was haunted. The experience is nothing like what you’d watch some oblivious horror b-movie character blunder through, though. In fact, I mistook my first encounter for a home invasion. But after what I discovered in the spare bedroom, I knew I needed the kind of help police couldn't provide.

Hours of combing cryptid chat rooms, and amateur ghost hunting channels led me to this posting by a gentleman named Van Beckon.

“Tired of living with tough-to-tackle ‘pests?’ Other exterminators can’t seem to get their hands around the problem? Call Van Beckon for a free consultation.”

From his thick accent over the phone, I guessed he was a Midwesterner—probably Minnesotan. “I can be there this evening, for sure.”

Prompt and punctual, Van arrived at my doorstep at the stroke of six carrying a duffel bag, and a clear Pyrex full of lasagna. "I brought you hotdish." He held out the container and flashed a toothy smile.

"Um, thanks. Ah, here, come in." It wasn't until I took the plate that I realized he had been supporting it with a black and silver prosthetic hand. His fur-collared work jacket made it difficult to tell whether the rest of his arm was artificial as well.

He had a hardened, grizzled look that didn't quite match his friendly demeanor. Between his salt and pepper hair, and bushy chevron mustache, I guessed he was in his late thirties.

"So where's the trouble happening?"

"Right over here."

Van carefully wiped his boots on my welcome mat before following me into the kitchen.

"This cabinet is where the um—disturbance... starts. I've had to empty the whole thing out." I pointed to a stack of pots, pans, and the few unbroken dishes I had left, all piled on the counter top. "You wouldn't believe the crash this thing made when it first came through."

He clicked on a flashlight and shone it inside the perfectly ordinary pantry cabinet, which was roughly the same size and width as the fridge beside it.

"Nothing unusual, I know."

"Nothing we can see," Van corrected me. "Tell me about these encounters."

"Most nights around one, I hear footsteps walking from the kitchen to the spare room. They stop there for a few minutes, then come back. Last few nights though, it's been stopping at my bedroom door. Scratching and growling."

Van took a few steps down the hall, pausing to run his fingers across a set of deep claw marks. "I can see that. You sure this isn't some kind of animal problem? You call an exterminator?"

"Definitely not an animal problem." I pointed back to the living room, where a home security camera kept a watchful, digital eye on the apartment. "Nothing shows up in the footage. It's like I've got an invisible bear poking around my place."

"Interesting." Van folded his arms. "You have any idea what it could be attracted to? Old family heirlooms, artifacts, or what have you? Don't laugh—I helped this poor grandmother once, something caught the scent of this old necklace her husband brought back from France during the 40's..." he trailed off.

"There may, ah, be something in the closet." I shifted uncomfortably from side to side.

"Show me."

The second bedroom was a mess. Plastic drop cloths still covered the furniture; cans of pistachio paint stood in a row beneath the window; and my sledgehammer leaned against the gaping hole it had made in the wall.

Van whistled. "What on earth happened here?"

"I was trying to spruce the place up. Someone had plastered over some kind of doorway. Cracks were starting to show in the wall, see? It wouldn't take the paint. Previous owner didn't know anything about it. But the plans for the building showed there should be a closet space."

"And you decided to bust it open?"

"After I heard noises, yeah. Thought there might've been rodents or something back there."

Van stuck his head through the opening, and the open door beyond. "Okay. I need you to walk me through exactly what happened."

"Like I said, I was worried something was behind the walls. So I went at it with the sledge. First swing, the hammer splintered the door behind the wall. It made a hole big enough that I could see through. There was this flickering light. Candles, sitting on that stone table." I pointed.

"Stone altar," Van said. "And so you tore down the rest of the wall to handle the apparent fire hazard, without ever wondering how someone got back there to light them?"

"Didn't occur to me at the time, no," I admitted. "I cleared away the wall, and pushed in the door to see what was behind it. There was some resistance--"

"Probably all these chain locks. Good grief, there's half a dozen of them." Van held up half of a rusted chain, still dangling from the interior of the door frame. His eyes fell on the floor. "Probably broke this salt line, too."

"Yeah. I thought the door was just old, or stuck. So I shoved my way inside, and put out the candles."

Van smacked his forehead. "You put them out?"

"Yeah."

"Did anything happen after that? I mean right after that?"

"There was a gust of air. The kind of cold that cuts right through to your bones. It blew right past me and then just sorta..." I waived my hands, "I dunno, disappeared into the closet. After that I got this horrible feeling I shouldn't be there."

Van stepped into the closet and began inspecting the walls. "Did you see these? C'mere. Watch your step."

I followed him inside, and followed his finger to a wreath of symbols surrounding the interior of the doorframe.

"Got your basic Damoclan sealing glyphs here," he traced the inside of the doorway. "Big one on the back, see?" He closed the door partway, revealing a large rune, partially damaged by the sledgehammer blow that had split the door.

"All these locks were keeping something on your side out," Van said.

"Out of where?" I asked.

"That's the question, isn't it. But I've got another one first. How the hell have you managed to stay here this long? Most people would see this and run for the hills."

"Don't really have a choice. I've got an underwater mortgage and barely anything in the bank. No finances to pull off a move."

"What about friends?"

I shook my head again. "New to the city. Family isn't in the picture either, for reasons I'd rather not get into. Put simply enough: I'm here, or I'm homeless."

"Sorry to hear." Van gave a slow, sympathetic nod. "I'm gonna help you as best I can. Just as soon as we discuss my fee."

With a bit of haggling, we had a handshake agreement. Van set up a tripwire trap with a bag of flour in front of the pantry cabinet, connected my camera to his laptop, and barricaded himself in the bedroom with me.

We propped the display on the edge of the bed, and watched in silence as the hour grew later.

Van grabbed my arm and pointed toward the screen. "Look," he mouthed.

Goosebumps erupted across my arms, as I watched as the cabinet door creaked open on its own. With a low twang, the tripline snapped, tearing the hanging bag of flour in two. A cloud of white powder hung in the air for a moment, not settling on the ground as it should have. It clung to a hulking shape in my kitchen, tracing the rough outline of my tormentor.

Making out the details of the creature still proved tricky. It had fur -- or long hair, it was hard to tell which -- a long snout, and a prehensile tail that seemed to reach and prod around the room of its own volition. It lumbered down the hall on two feet, tracking white footsteps in its wake.

Van pressed a finger to his lips.

A guttural growl drew my attention from the screen, to the bedroom door. I swallowed hard, suddenly aware of how thin the barrier was between us and that thing. It scratched and slammed itself against the door, rattling the dresser and sending knicknacks flying from my bookshelf. Van braced his body against the barricade while I stood, paralyzed and sticky with stress sweat.

Would this be the night it got in? Would it hurt, being torn to shreds by some unseen beast the size of a bear? Before the panicked thoughts could completely overwhelm my mind, the beast gave up its assault and continued its patrol into the guest room.

A quiet sigh of relief escaped Van, as he slumped against the dresser. Neither of us spoke a word until the camera feed showed the entity march back down the hall and into the kitchen, where it proceeded to crawl back into the cabinet.

"Well, you've for sure got a problem on your hands, friend." Van clapped me on the shoulder. "I've got my work cut out for me, eh?"

We waited another ten minutes before leaving the room, careful not to disturb the footprints left behind on the floor. Van started snapping pictures with a professional-looking camera. I just looked over his shoulder, trying to stay out of the way.

The footprints were easily longer than a foot, and about half as wide. Each of the four toes ended with a formidable-looking claw.

"Anything you recognize?" I asked.

"Hmm. I don't think you're haunted, but then again I don't actually believe in ghosts."

"But--but you're a ghost hunter," I stammered.

"No, I'm a trapper." He stepped around the flour pile on the kitchen floor, and peered inside the still-open cabinet. "I just trap things that most people don't even know exist." He leaned inside the space, pressing against the back of the storage space. "Still solid," he muttered to himself.

Van straightened up, following the footprints down the hall and toward the second bedroom. I tiptoed after him to avoid disturbing the trail, which seemed to end mid-stride at the back of the closet.

"What do you make of this?" I asked.

He clicked his tongue. "I think you've got a classic case of turtle tunnel going on here."

"Pardon?"

"Turtle tunnel. You know, like a wildlife crossing." From the look on my face, he must've seen I still didn't get it. “Think of it like this: a huge forest gets split in half by a highway. The road is scary. The animals can’t understand it—certainly can’t cross it. So the forests become two separate worlds.

"Let’s say all the wolves ended up on that side of the forest.” He pointed toward the kitchen. “They don’t have enough space to hunt. They’re going to starve. A human realizes this—feels bad for them, and decides to make them a little tunnel… through the human world, that connects them to the rest of the forest. We just can't perceive the entrance and exit.”

“Sucks for all the critters minding their own business over there,” I quipped.

“Yes!” Van clapped his hands together. “What do you imagine those critters would do if they were smart enough to realize where their predators were coming from?”

“Probably try to block it off.” Realization dawned on me. “They did block it off. Oh my gosh... I reopened the tunnel.”

“Precisely.”

I leaned against the wall with my head in my hands. “So what do I do now, just let it happen?”

Van shook his head. “Not a great idea. Whatever is cutting through your place is clearly tangible. If it can knock over your pots and pans and claw your door, it can smack you around too.”

“Then we rebuild the barrier.”

“First we would need to understand how the barrier worked. And I don’t. Do you?”

I shook my head.

“Luckily there’s another option.”

“What’s that?” I asked.

“We catch it.”

Next Episode

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Telling a friend about me is pretty cool too. Getting your words in front of eyeballs is honestly harder than doing the actual writing and editing…