Here is yet another entry from The Agency that I may post another part to. This one was inspired by a chapter from the role-playing series World of Darkness, specifically the book Mysterious Places. The premise of the location and some of the events that happen to people who visit this quarry are taken from there, but the majority of events and the fate those who meddle in the affairs of the quarry are entirely my own. 

Those who remember my post about my favorite characters from The Agency will remember that this entry is one that was listed. "Location 014Q" is the entry where Ewan Marsh is introduced. Ewan may not show up in this post about "Location 014Q" but he does make his appearance in this entry. 

"Location 014Q" also breaks tradition with the other entries. Like I said with "Location 059MV," I may add more to this one. The difference is, "Location 014Q" is planned to have one more entry to it, but I haven't written it yet as that final entry will be co-written with Myrrh. If there is a second post featuring "Location 014Q," it will feature that final entry.

Anyway, hold your breath and dive in to "Location 014Q." Hopefully, the quarry won't keep you. 

Location 014Q

Location Description & History

Location 014Q, a quarry on the outskirts of the small town of Sunby. Currently, it is fenced off with a sign warning against trespassing and claiming that the quarry is under ownership of a corporation known as Verdigris. Custodians of Location 014Q report that the trespassing signs are rather ineffective, especially with teenagers and particularly desperate adults. Despite efforts of custodians, it is still unclear whether Location 014Q is indeed a location or an entity living within in it. After an incident that led to the loss of Custodian Jess Herman, it has been decided that the custodians are no longer permitted to continue investigating this. Location 014Q is listed and categorized as a location until more information is provided by the location itself.

            Location 014Q was able to lure in prey from the surrounding town without much effort until the containment procedures were initiated. Even now, there is not much the custodians can do to prevent victims from wandering there should they be drawn there. The quarry has been there since at least 1910 when the town was founded, though it was initially just a water-filled hole in the ground that served as a local picnic spot in the summers. No one ventured into the water and even plants didn’t grow there. Even before then, there were rumors as the locals are willing to tell anyone who wanted to listen. The rumors were the usual warnings against swimming right after eating and stories of children who drowned, but they needn’t have bothered. No one swam in Location 014Q despite or perhaps because of the deep blue-green water.

            Before custodians took over Location 014Q, they learned a little about the area. Divers had ventured into the water, but grew sick around fifty to fifty-five feet under. No one dove further. The company who owned the area stopped production on it because it was deep enough to curtail advancement. That was when the true rumors of Location 014Q reached the custodians. According to the legends, bleeding into the waters results in a wish being granted. There have been several instances recorded, Testimonies 1990-02-13, 1995-08-09, and 2000-11-03, of people who have made wishes there and had them granted with mixed results. It was mentioned then that draining the waters would cause trouble for the town, though the custodians just assumed this was because they’d lose their local legend and picnic spot, and that no one particularly wanted a working quarry so close to town, which is understandable.

            Initially, custodians attempted to drain the waters. After incidents in the town resulting in ill luck and disaster for many citizens, this was stopped. Custodians then began trying to find out if Location 014Q was an entity or a location proper. Testimony 2016-03-04 details the results of their investigations. Location 014Q remains under the guardianship of custodians disguised as Verdigris employees and those caught trespassing are prosecuted or, in certain cases such as the one conveyed in Testimony 2019-05-17, brought into the employ of the Agency.

Testimony 2016-03-04

Arch. Spears: Statement of Custodian Tanner Guzman regarding Location 014Q and the events that led to the death of Custodian Jess Herman. Whenever you’re ready, Tanner.

Cust. Guzman: Right. Fuck. I just can’t believe that Jess is gone. It all started when we began draining Location 014Q to find out if there was an entity there or not. We didn’t realize that doing this would harm the town. We didn’t realize exactly how it would affect the town. If we had, we wouldn’t have started draining the water. Hell, who am I kidding? We still would have gone through with it, but we would’ve been better prepared. Anyway, we started draining Location 014Q. Several feet of water drained a day. Ballpark, I’d say six feet a day since we’re not working nonstop and also had outdated equipment. I mean, look, you’re using a cassette recorder.

Arch. Spears: Digital doesn’t work well, you know that.

Cust. Guzman: Anyway, we first noticed there were strange things going on when we visited Sunby for food. We didn’t notice anything immediately. No one ever does, do they? Everything’s always so normal until it’s not. We were grabbing a bite to eat at the diner and just enjoying the afternoon. Jess noticed him first. It was a local kid—Andy Clay, I think was his name—who drowned at the local pool a few months ago. We heard about it, of course. Everyone did. But there he was, skulking around the edge of the forest. Pallid, foam on his lips. He looked like he drowned, then just got up, still drowned and dead. We were on our way back to Location 014Q when we passed by the Davenport place. I swear to you, I saw Eden Davenport who killed himself a couple weeks ago standing in the window of that house. He couldn’t have been there, but I saw him. Even from the road I saw the bullet hole in his skull. I asked Jess and she said she saw him too. We stopped by and asked Louise Davenport about her son, mentioned we saw him in the window, and she said she was so grateful to the quarry, it brought her son back and she didn’t even have to bleed for it. She said that he was a little quiet and subdued, shy around visitors, but he was still recovering and would be back to his old self in no time, and she’d let him know we asked about him. We went back to Location 014Q, puzzled. That was against everything that had been established previously. Wishes require blood, that has been a constant rule. You want a wish granted, you have to shed blood into Location 014Q.

These weren’t the only odd occurrences, but they were the most noticeable. I mean, dead people show up suddenly, walking around again, you notice. But no one in town seemed concerned. I mean, Clay seemed intent on staying near the forest and out of sight, but here was Mrs. Davenport living with her formerly dead son who still had the damn bullet hole through his head and acting like it was the most normal thing ever. We were unnerved, but kept draining the quarry. We needed to know if there was something in the water doing these things, granting wishes.

Things...things got worse as the water dropped.

Andrea Lyons lost her hand in a garbage disposal and died of blood loss. Logan Gill hung himself out of the blue. Estrella Moon went to the hospital complaining of a pain in her side and the surgery revealed her favorite arrowhead in her side under a layer of muscle. Lost pets turned up, wild-eyed and feral. Their eyes were different, too. Blue-green instead of whatever they had been. They mostly stuck close to the outskirts, but we’d see them sometimes near Location 014Q. Paris Carr’s head just fucking exploded. Sloane Cunningham, a young man who went missing awhile back, returned, quiet and subdued. His eyes were different, but DNA testing proved he was Sloane Cunningham. His eyes went from dark brown to a blue-green color that still haunts me when I close my eyes. They looked like the fucking water.

Katherine Moore’s cat ended up dead and she blamed Rachel Shaw, her neighbor who never liked the cat. Shaw ended up suffering an allergic reaction that hospitalized her and everyone suspected Moore, even though Moore had no contact with her. Lily Lawrence spontaneously went bald and blamed it on Abby Barnes, a rival cheerleader, and threw a Molotov cocktail into her car at a stoplight. Tatum Galloway was an ex of Lawrence’s. He was bitter over their breakup. That’s not really important. What is important is the fact that Matthew Ross liked Tatum and wanted to be with him. Galloway and Ross ended up together for about a week before Galloway died. Choked on an apple. Paige Edwards, a girl who liked Ross, bragged about how Location 014Q didn’t like gays and that’s why it got rid of Galloway for her. Ross didn’t appreciate this and the cops found Ross sitting on the hood of his car, watching her body sway from the branch he hung her from.

We stopped draining Location 014Q. Slowly, the waters began rising again. But Location 014Q wasn’t done with us yet. It...it wanted to punish us for our attempts to understand it, to get answers it didn’t want us to have.

I don’t...I don’t know why Jess went to Location 014Q that night. It probably called her. I don’t know if it can do that or not. Probably can. It has to lure in victims somehow and stories of the wishes lure in some, but it likely calls to others. Those who won’t come to wish any other way. I woke up when I realized the room was colder than normal. The door was open and Jess was missing. I went outside and saw Jess down at the edge of the water. I walked over and saw the droplets of blood landing in the water, ripples spreading out and disturbing the calm surface. I heard her...I heard her wish. Do you know what she wished for? She wished to know about Location 014Q. She wished for answers. Heh. Even knowing what we know, she still wanted to know the truth.

God, it went so still that night after she spoke. Usually, it would take longer for Location 014Q to grant a wish, but like I said, it wanted to punish us. She looked over at me, eyes wide. She looked right at me as she stepped into the water. I went to the edge and reached for her, tried to get her back, but she kept walking. By the time the others came, she was up to her shoulders. Blue-green, darker under the night sky but still clearly blue-green. Like those damnable eyes Cunningham had and the others that returned. We were getting a boat when she went under. She didn’t drown. She just...slipped below the surface. Her head vanished, ripples from it making their way to the shore and then stopping. There was no noise, no splashing. There was nothing. She was just gone. We still took the boat out, but there was no trace. Nothing. We couldn’t dive. Divers grew ill past fifty or fifty-five feet so that was out. We knew that we wouldn’t find anything. We knew that Jess was gone. We knew that with as much certainty as we knew the rules of wishing. It was just a fact of Location 014Q.

Lorenzo (referring to Custodian Lorenzo Cardenas) asked me what happened and I told him that she wished to know the secrets of Location 014Q. Lorenzo asked if Jess told me anything. I told him that no, she’d had just enough time to realize that she had made a mistake before she walked into the water. She didn’t tell me anything, but she didn’t need to. I could feel the power in the air when she was taken. I felt the threat as fully as if I’d heard it spoken. “Stop your questions or I will claim another. Make a wish for knowledge and I’ll grant it. Be sure you want it before you ask.” I knew that Jess had gotten the answers we wanted and I knew that I didn’t want them anymore.

Arch. Spears: Statement ends. Custodian Guzman returned to work guarding Location 014Q. No further attempts were made to drain Location 014Q and no one again questioned whether it is the location itself that does this or an entity within the water. 

Well, since this is fairly long already, I'll just have to post Ewan's introduction and the final testimony of "Location 014Q" in another post at a later date. I hope you've enjoyed this excerpt as much as I enjoyed writing it.