DEVELOPINGENHANCED ×212so this is the first one I’ve written up myself without Uncle Warren going over it. He’s “too close to it”. he was sitting right under it. that’s what he means.
the setup
Christmas Eve, 2003. whole family at Boolaroo. Nan, Uncle Warren, Aunty Noreen, Mum, me (16), my sister, Dr Faraday (not family but he comes every year, Noreen says he’s “part of the furniture, specifically a lamp that won’t turn off”), and Cheryl, because Jaxon was at his dad’s. (she means Gary. Jaxon was at his grandmother’s.)
we’d done the ham. Noreen had brought out the pudding. it was about two minutes to midnight because Nan insists on waiting for Christmas “to actually start” before pudding, she’s been doing this since the war apparently.
the orb
the lights were down because of the candles on the pudding. and then there was another light. above the table. about the size of a cricket ball, white going a bit blue around the edges, and just… there. not falling. not floating like a balloon, which drifts. HOLDING. like it was on a shelf we couldn’t see.
everybody stopped. Nan said “oh”. Uncle Warren went for the camera but I already had it because I’d been filming the pudding for the website and I got about four seconds of it. Dr Faraday said “nobody move” in a voice I’d never heard him use. Cheryl said “it’s for me” and put her hand up like a kid at school.
it moved. slow. over the pudding, over the ham, over Uncle Warren’s head (he ducked, it’s on the tape), and then it went UP. straight up, into the ceiling, and through it. not a hole. not a mark. just into the plaster like the plaster was a curtain, and gone.
the candles went out. all of them. at the same time. Noreen says that was the ceiling fan. the ceiling fan wasn’t on. she says it was “the door”. the door was shut. she says “then it was Lyle breathing”.
after
Uncle Warren wanted to go up in the roof right then, Christmas Eve, midnight, with the torch. Noreen said no. Dr Faraday said the orb would be “in a dormant phase” and that disturbing it “in the first 72 hours” would be unwise. Cheryl said it would come back down when it was ready and that “they don’t like being rushed”.
Nan said “is somebody going to cut the pudding or not”.
Dr Faraday’s report (shortened)
- diameter 7 cm (“a cricket ball”)
- luminosity 6 Faraday Units (“modest, for an orb, but it was indoors”)
- behaviour “surveillance pattern, consistent with a probe doing a headcount”
- entry point “unknown, possibly the window, possibly already in the house”
- exit point “ceiling, directly above the pudding, which I don’t think is a coincidence”
- current status “in the roof space, dormant”
he says these small orbs are “scouts” and that where there’s a scout there’s a “collector”, and that the house should be “considered marked”. Noreen said the house has been marked since 1994 and it hasn’t made any difference to the rates.
the roof
ok so here’s the thing. it’s been three days. NOBODY HAS GONE UP IN THE ROOF.
Uncle Warren says he’s waiting for Dr Faraday’s 72 hours. Dr Faraday says the 72 hours was “a minimum”. Cheryl says if we go up it’ll leave and she “wants to talk to it first”. Noreen says she’s not going up in the roof on Boxing Day to look for a bit of dust and anyway the manhole’s in the linen press and she’s “not emptying the linen press for this”. Nan says she’d go up but her hip.
I’ll go up. I said I’d go up. Uncle Warren said “not you, you’re the one with the camera” which I think means I’m valuable. I think it’s probably fine. I think it’s probably just sitting up there in the insulation, dormant, doing a headcount, like Dr Faraday said.
I also think I heard something up there last night. Noreen says possums. we have never had possums.
A word from management
There was dust on the lens. Shane had been filming the pudding with the camera about ten centimetres from the candles and a bit of ash or dust got on the lens and caught the light. On the tape you can see it drift with Shane's hand. It "went through the ceiling" because Shane tilted the camera up. The candles went out because Lyle said "nobody move" in that voice and then blew out when he exhaled. Nobody has gone in the roof because nobody needs to. The possums are new. I'll give him that. — Noreen
status
DEVELOPING until someone goes in the roof. I’m going to go in the roof. probably. after New Year. when it’s not so hot up there. that’s the only reason.
merry christmas everyone. keep watching the paddock. and the ceiling.
— Shane, Head of Digital
Document U8MC-03-0208. Status: DEVELOPING. This file is retained indefinitely, or until the Men in Beige ask for it, whichever is never.