This is an automated archive made by the Lemmit Bot.
The original was posted on /r/nosleep by /u/HeadOfSpectre on 2024-04-08 22:09:51.
Excerpt from the journal of Brother Michael Chester
August 19th, 2022
As of 6:00 PM today, the site has been fully secured as per the instructions of Grandmaster Parsons. He requested that I keep him updated on our investigation/progress during the coming days and I will make a point not to disappoint him. He seems to believe that there is something of value at the bottom of this lake, and though I personally have my doubts, I am in no position to question him.
Not openly, at least.
In private, I can’t help but wonder if this little salvage operation is a waste of our resources. Our organization has more important things to do than chase conspiracy theories. And hell… what’s he thinking sending us out to Tevam Sound? That place is crawling with Fae shit that I’d rather not fuck around with. It’s basically Imperium territory. There’s enough dangerous things out here that we already have to deal with without adding rumors of crashed spaceships into the mix… but I digress. Orders are orders. I don’t have to like them, I just have to follow them.
I suppose to be fair, there are a few eyewitnesses in town who claim they spotted several ‘floating orbs’ in the sky a little over a month back. Supposedly, one of those orbs ‘burst into flame’ and crashed into the lake.
If I had to guess, what they’re describing sounds more like either a meteor shower (unlikely) or some sort of light show. Tevam Sound is in cottage country, and Silver Lake has several cottages scattered around it. It’s likely that some kids were having some fun with drones or fireworks and a bunch of local idiots saw them and thought they were having a close encounter. Ultimately, I don’t expect this little expedition of ours to turn up anything more than junk at best. Although with all that said, I guess there could be worse dead end postings.
The lake is beautiful at this time of year, and while my team and I conduct our preliminary survey, we’re renting a small cottage on the water.
If I didn’t know any better, I’d suspect that Grandmaster Parsons was sending us on some sort of glorified vacation, although I’m quite certain that word isn’t anywhere to be found in Parsons vocabulary. Either way, I don’t suppose I have a real reason to complain much. We’ll conduct our search, collect our data and send our updates to the Grandmaster. In a week or two, he’ll see how pointless this all was, and call us in. Until then, maybe I ought to make the most of my time here.
A couple of the men Parsons sent with me are among the more devoted followers of the Brethrens doctrine… but I’ve never been a particularly religious man myself, and Tevam Sound is a college town. I know at least one of my Men is going to try and have some fun. Maybe I ought to as well?You know, the more I write this down, the less agitated I feel about this whole situation. Maybe the Lord really does work in mysterious ways?
Excerpt from the journal of Brother Michael Chester
August 23rd, 2022
As expected, we’ve had no meaningful updates during our time here. We’ve used every tool at our disposal to sweep this lake up and down. We’ve sent down divers near the alleged crash site. Nothing. I can’t say I’m surprised, although Parsons is adamant we keep searching.
Given how cozy this posting has become, I’m really not obligated to complain. This whole pointless operation has basically turned into a glorified fishing trip. My team has, for the most part, taken the same attitude towards this posting as I have. You’d think a few of them had gone back to college, with the way they’re acting.
Andrews sent most of us a picture from the bar last night. A photo of his big, dumb, grinning face with a bunch of girls from the local University seated at a table behind him. It was accompanied by the message: “Which one am I fucking tonight, boys?”
A couple of the other men, Jenkins and Roberts tried to take bets, but no one was that interested in it. Edwards and Thornton, our more zealous members didn’t seem to appreciate their attitude. They requested that I discipline Andrews, but I’m not going to bother with that.
I don’t care where that potato faced lout sticks his dick and I don’t care if Edwards and Thornton are bothered by what he does after dark. We’re here to do a job. That’s my concern, and nothing else. It’s a stupid job, but we’re going to do it.
We did have one mildly interesting encounter the other day.
Someone from the University came by to check in on us, a man. He introduced himself as ‘Mr. Frost’. I never got his first name. There was something off about him. Although I couldn’t quite put my finger on it. For the most part, he seemed normal, although I got the impression that he was trying a little too hard to be friendly. He had this overeager, too wide smile that didn’t sit right with me.
Honestly, I’m surprised the University sent anyone to check in on us. We had informed them that we would be undertaking a survey of the lake, just to make sure that they were keeping out of our way, and at the time they hadn’t really seemed to care. We hadn’t told them exactly what we were looking for either… although Frost already seemed to know and he didn’t exactly mince words on the subject either.
Simply put, he told us that both the local police and the University had already investigated the allegations of some sort of UFO. They’d combed the lake about a month back, turned up nothing and dismissed the whole thing as a hoax.
Although…
Well.
The way he said it didn’t quite sit right with me.
“You’re wasting your time,” He said. “There’s nothing you want out here. That I can guarantee.”
Maybe it was his choice of words? Like he knew something I didn’t? Either way, I explained to her that our organization wanted to independently verify that data, and once he seemed to understand that we weren’t leaving, I could see a sort of disappointed look cross his face.
I told him that I figured we probably were just chasing a hoax, but the top brass had given us our marching orders, so our hands were tied. He said he completely understood, saying “We are all deferential to our employers.”
Weird way of phrasing that… but he left without a fuss, so there was that, and there weren’t any other prominent red flags about the man.
Still… I keep thinking back to that encounter. Something was just… off about it. I just don’t know what.
I’ve seen some shit during my time with the Brethren. The kind of shit most people wouldn’t believe. I know there’s more to the world than meets the eye, and I’d like to think I’d notice if the man I was talking to wasn’t entirely human. But none of the usual red flags popped up with him. I don’t know… maybe I’m overthinking all of this.
Last month, we put down a group of fucking vampires. Now we’re out here digging into this sci-fi bullshit. I’m not used to having so little to do… not that I’m complaining much. It’s peaceful out here… even now that I’m sitting here, writing this I’m sitting on the back porch of our little cottage, watching the sun go down over the lake. Through the light shining through the trees, I can see Jenkins, Edwards and Thornton sitting around a fucking campfire, like a couple of kids. Pretty sure Roberts went fishing. I’ve never been on a job this quiet before. It’s probably normal for a guy like me to start jumping at shadows…
Probably.
Excerpt from the journal of Brother Michael Chester
August 27th, 2022
Thornton found something during our sweep today. We were out a little further than usual from the crash site. There’s a large creek that shoots off of the lake. It was too shallow to take the boat through, so we waded up and down, searching for anything of interest. There’s a lot of rocks scattered about and a lotta trash caught by said rocks… I didn’t think we’d find anything of value there, but I guess I was wrong.
Thornton found it at the bottom of a short waterfall, lodged between a few of the rocks. A chunk of burnt metal. I figured that it might’ve just been a standard piece of debris. A chunk off a boat, or something. At best, the results would be inconclusive. But we still brought it back to the cottage so Edwards could run some tests on it.
The results are not inconclusive. Not entirely. I’m not sure what we’ve found, but it’s some sort of weird high strength, heatproof aluminum alloy.
Well… supposedly heatproof. It’s been burned almost completely black. He’s still looking into it, but he doesn’t think something like this came off a regular boat. He doesn’t want to say with confidence where it might’ve come from… but I know what he’s thinking.
It’s what we’re all thinking.
I dunno… I’ve seen some weird shit in my day, but aliens? Guess I shouldn’t close my mind off to it… but the idea just seems too weird for me. I’ll file my report with Parsons in the morning, although I already know he’s going to make us redouble our efforts. If there’s one piece of this alleged spaceship out there, then there’s probably more. And now that we know what we’re looking for, it might be easier to find it.
Excerpt from the journal of Brother Michael Chester
August 29th, 2022
Andrews is missing. He went out drinking last night and didn’t come back. I spent half he fucking day in town, looking for him. Far as I can tell, he was at one of the bars last night. The bartender saw him leave with a woman. He described her as: “Red hair, dark skin and a nice body.”
After that though, the tra…
Content cut off. Read original on https://old.reddit.com/r/nosleep/comments/1bz7xzb/the_recovery_job/