"The Ghastly Chasm" by E. W. Farnsworth

The Ghastly Chasm

by E. W. Farnsworth

Dr. Jaspers had been hired at the small, liberal arts college for two complementary reasons: he had the reputation of being a daring archaeologist in the mold of the fictional Indian Jones, and he was a problem solver for cases where others had failed miserably—and unaccountably.  In his first semester as a faculty member, he had brought back artifacts from Iraq, Peru and the American southwest that were the envy of his colleagues.  He had deliberately waited to tackle the hardest problem on the college campus until he had made the time to study it thoroughly, as he did not mean to add to the long list of wannabe sleuths who had mysteriously disappeared in the middle of a semester.

What Jaspers had learned about the so-called Ghastly Chasm was that there was much more to its surface than seemed possible.  He studied photographs and films his predecessors had made, but he learned nothing about the brooding black, still water that filled the thirty-foot opening among the beech trees.  A deer visited the pond as part of its daily round indicating the water was potable and contained nothing to incite fear in a forest creature.  From letters and diaries of former explorers, he discerned a familiar pattern: cautious preparation followed by careful planning and meticulous execution—to a point.

Jaspers decided there was no alternative to engaging advanced technology as much as possible prior to taking the plunge physically into the depths of the chasm.  He shook off his foreboding sense of dread.  As his LIDAR imagery showed no obstacles to entry and every sign that the chasm had been employed for millennia for religious purposes, he fetched in his diving gear, underwater weaponry and camera with lights.  He engaged two of his brighter students to be his spotters, who would communicate with him while he made his descents and relayed his impressions to his tape recorders.  Jilliam and her friend Sammy had proven themselves steady while under duress and creative in case unforeseen circumstances arose.

The professor rigged a winch and pulley apparatus over the center of the chasm and lowered a camera with lights as far as its cable permitted into the gaping pond.  He pointed out to his assistants how the bare deer antlers formed a spiral around the center of the breach, and not without excitement, how shelves had been formed at intervals all the way down—at least as far as the cables extended.  He made a judgment to find an extension cable to take the camera much lower, just to be sure what he was getting involved with.

“Professor Fraser felt rushed,” Jillian said, “I wanted her to wait until she had done what you suggest now.” 

“So, she came thus far, but no farther?”

“That’s right.  She told me she would be making the descent alone, and she insisted I should not participate in any way.  The next thing I knew, she was gone.”

“I suppose the authorities raised the hue and cry?”

“That’s what happened.  Divers were amongst the rescue crew, and they dove to the depth our rig has fathomed now.  As nothing was found indicating she had gone to the bottom—wherever that is, the search was called off.  The college deduced she had run off with the chorus instructor, who had disappeared about the same time.”

Jaspers persisted in lowering his camera gear another two hundred meters.  As before, there was nothing new to be found, at least to the new depths he was sounding.  Again, in an abundance of caution, Jaspers called for more line and trained his camera lights down into the depths.   Another three hundred meters lower, he had a vison that made him and his assistants gasp.  At the nadir was a stone structure with a flat top, on which was splayed the open corpse of Professor Fraser, as if laid out for dissection.  She was clearly dead and decomposing naturally, bubbles rising from her mouth and entrails.  Jaspers sent Sammy for the sheriff with word he had found at least one of the missing persons in the chasm.

While the intern raced to fetch the law, Jaspers and Jillian adjusted the camera and lights to capture the scene at the bottom of the black hole.  The professor kept his spear gun at the ready, and he asked Jillian to train the rifle towards the center of the surface of the opening.

“Professor, what are you expecting to happen next?”

“Something seized Dr. Fraser and swam with her to the location below.  There he or she cut out her heart and her entrails in some form of ritual.  Whatever it was will not be happy that we have disturbed its sacred temple.  We are going to count the steps of the temple as I have a theory.”

“I count ninety-one steps leading up on each of four sides to the sacrificial platform on which Dr. Fraser was laid open.”

“I concur.  And that connects this site to the Machu Pichu culture by inspection.  Congratulations, Jillian, as we are the first to discover such a connection this far north.”

“Professor, I would like to live to report our discovery.”

“So would I, Jillian.”

“What is that tentacled creature emerging from the portal just under the platform?”

“That, Jillian, is trouble.  Just how long will it take Sammy to arrive with the reinforcements?”

“They should be here already.”

“Hold your fire until that thing breaks the surface.  I expect it is intelligent in ways we can only imagine.  It will detect and try to destroy our camera and light apparatus.  Then it will ascend quickly to kill the intruders—meaning us and the others.”

The professor watched as the enraged creature wrapped tentacles around the camera cable and ripped it down to the bottom.     The sheriff and his posse arrived, but they were training their weapons on Jaspers.

Suddenly Jaspers had an epiphany.  He heard two explosions of a shotgun and felt the grasp of tentacles.