The Lightning Strike at Thunder Road.

Allen, Keith and I were back on the road as fast as we could manage. Which is pretty fast, as it turns out. Robbing a bank will do that to you, put a little speed in your step, y'know? So, we were in California within three days. Thunder Road is not a real road, you know. It's actually kindof a strip of dirt, not a real place at all. It's marked on google maps, but I guess that's more for city planning. We scoured the area in the picture for about a day, and when the sun went down, we found a hotel, and got some food. Keith and I didn't know what we were looking for, but allen was determined. We spent two days like that, sifting through a desert. There was a small trailer-town nearby, and that's where we found what we wanted. It was the Omega symbol spray-painted on the back of a sign. We dug around the sign that night, a huge pit, actually. But there was nothing there. We were stumped again. We filled the pit, and stewed on it for a day. Keith studied the post that day, all day. He took notes on everything about it he could think of. Then he noticed the sticker on the back of it it looked like a normal I.D. sticker on a stop sign, you've seen them, with the manufacturer, date of printing, etc. Except for the fact that all of that info was changed. The manufacturing date was actually a time, and one of the slots said 500 yards. So, we waited till the time marked on the post, and stared out from the post for about 500 yards, but we didn't see anything to indicate to us. The next day, we tried again, and we figured it out. We used the shadow of the post at that time, and moved in a line from that point for 1500 feet. We marked the spot, and came back after dark.  We dug for fifteen minutes, and found it: A small metal plate, in the shape of the omega symbol, with three numbers welded onto the front of it. 184. Allen flipped his shit. We had finally found the clue for the little electronic device. We went back to the hotel and punched it in. Then the machine beeped out these words:

"The chamber should be a round room, 12 feet in diameter, and 8 feet high. Place the light three feet from one side of the wall, and two feet off of the ground. Use a 200 watt lightbulb. Align the triangle tick marks on the plate with one another, and point them toward the far side of the room. This is what they have been keeping from everyone. This is the formula that killed them."

We went to bed that night, pondering what we had heard. Allen listened to it again and again that night, sitting in the empty bathtub. I wasn't sure he even slept anymore. He scared me a lot. I'm almost glad he's gone.