ForumsArt, Music, and WritingA (mostly true) Thriller Story

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Jake297
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Jake297
306 posts
Shepherd

Ok. I was there, but I don't have myself in the story. Whenever I refer to "me" or "I", it was my dad. The rest is completely true. And, it was last night.

The night wasnât cold, but it wasnât warm, either. Maybe that had something to do with it, I donât know. Anyway, it had never happened in 15 years of its existence, at least according to the foreman. And it certainly wasnât supposed to happen tonight. It all started on an annual hydrant flushing night. After a year, the hydrants build up with iron inside them, and I'm supposed to open the hydrant and blow all that iron-filled water out onto the street. It was not any different that all the other years. You open the hydrant, turn it on, it blows orange water into the street, gets clear after a few minutes, and you turn it off. Not so with this one. As my regular routine was, I jumped out of my truck, grabbed the wrench used to open the hydrant, and turned that baby loose. This hydrant was one of our more powerful ones, being that it was less than 2 miles from 2 different wells. It was supposed to draw water from both of them, but the closer one a little more than the other one. When I opened it up, it was like Niagra Falls, as it should be. It was so powerful that you could feel the ground shaking beneath your feet. Now, like all other hydrants, it blew orange-brown water out onto the street. But, unlike all others, that was all it did for about 10 minutes. This was actually normal with this area I was in, because the aquifer from which the closer well drew was rich in iron. I let it run for a while longer, and then it happened. From about 2000 gallons of water blowing onto the street, it went to about 200. Now, this was not normal. Pretty bad, actually. This meant one of the wells wasn't doing its job, and it had to be the closer one, becasuse there was a trickle of cleaner water still coming out, obviously from the farther well. When something like this happens that has never happened in 15 years, you just gotta go check it out. A well not running properly is not something you just shrug off. Even though the drive to the well was no more than 2 minutes, it was 11:30 PM when I arrived at the faulty well. The main drive shaft was producing a high-pitched whine, just like all the other wells do. But something was wron with this one's sound. The high pitch of the whine had a certain hollowness in it, that I can't even begin to describe. I was the only guy within 20 miles that wasn't sleeping that even remotely knew about these wells. Come on, it's Boise. We are malls and small shops, not "Institutes Devoted To Malfunctioning Wells At 11:30 PM When Everyone Is Supposed To Be Sleeping". So like the awesome dude I am, I stepped inside the small building that housed the well. It was probably 50 degrees Farenheight outside, but it was a sweltering 90 inside the wellhouse, where the machines were working their gears off, but not getting any water through. I walked over to the control panel, and the screen that should have been reading the PSI and the gallons per minute. Instead, it said: ##########. Not "error", not "fault 1297", but ##########. I looked farther up the control panel, and saw the warning sign "Danger: 400 Volts". How comforting. I looked to my left, and there was the well, still not working. The drive shaft was still spinning, yet we weren't getting any water. Spinning and screaming, like a drag racer's tire after he peels out. Only 10 times louder and about 400 volts more dangerous. To my right was the master control lever. Ah, the lever. The magical lever that controls the water going out to half of all Boise's plumbing. I grabbed the lever, and pulled down. Hard. The well sound got quieter, and then, the sound of a million machine guns. Only much sharper. Those were the ball bearings helping slow the shaft down. It made me jump 5 inches out of my rubber boots. Then, everything was silent. I swear, this was like Jurassic Park, minus the dinosaurs. Same equipment, same level of creepiness. I grabbed the lever again, and threw it back up. Same sound. The drive shaft was now much quieter, like it should be. I drove back to the fire hydrant, and it was now spewing water with as much force as it sould be. Good, I thought. I was wrong. Within 30 seconds, we were down to the ol' 200 again. Again, now for the second time, I drove back to the Well of Despair and Creepiness, (and no water) I had named it. I pulled up outside, and could hear that same old high-pitched hollow scream coming from the drive. I had not taken two steps to the door, and then it quieted. It was like it was just taunting me. Taunting me to get in there, so it could do something like explode, I don't know. If this was Jan. 1, 2000, I would blame it on the millenium bug. But its not. "There has to be a logical explanation for this", I thought. I left that night, with my hair at least 2 shades lighter. That night was creepy. To this day, it hasn't done it again, and we haven't found out what was wrong. (Although, it was just last night).

  • 1 Reply
Jake297
offline
Jake297
306 posts
Shepherd

Ok, problem has been solved. The machine overheated because multiple screens were clogged and a fan was broken. This made the electronics go haywire. A (not so scary) ending to a (not so scary) scary story.

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