After our success with the chair experiment, the Paranormal Discover Club headed back to Richardson Theatre the next day, not just to finish up our experiment, but to test out a few new recruits. The total headcount for the afternoon was 9 people: myself, Becca, Jenn, RJ, Jake, and then the new recruits Josh, Emily, Dani, and Melissa.
When we take potential members on a run-through, we don't ever do anything that we haven't done before. Not only is it risky to do new experiments/investigations with a group of first-timers, it's also hard to judge how well they handle themselves compared to the rest of the group. If we put them through the same things we've already done, we can see how well they do compared to us.
So really their test-run was just a repeat of the chairs, and it started off pretty smooth. We met the new recruits out front of Richardson Hall and laid out the basic rules:
- Go with your gut- if you feel uncomfortable, unsafe, begin to get sick, or just need to leave for any reason whatsoever, tell one of the senior members, and then get out.
- Always stay with one of the senior members- Don't leave our sight at any time, no matter what. No venturing off to do solo missions, no leaving without informing one of us, and no going off in groups without one of the senior members.
- Use common sense- don't do anything, whatsoever, to put yourself or anyone else in harms way. That includes venturing off into dangerous places, climbing up anything, and crawling under anything (leave all that to one of the senior members). And please, do not do ANYTHING to provoke anything in the investigation area.
- No faking anything- Evidence is always so much more awesome when it's genuine. Do not fake anything at any time. Accidents are understandable
- If you are caught breaking ANY of these rules, you will be escorted out of the investigation area and your request to join the club will be denied
Once we got the rules laid out and everyone agreed, we headed in through the main doors. Pitch black as it always is, the creep factor really wasn't that high. It was nothing we hadn't done before. Jake and RJ were still in class, so it was just the seven of us at first. To kick the investigation off, Becca and Jen each took a group of three, and I wandered between the two as we put up all the chairs in the theatre.
For the first time in a long time, Joshua's Chair wasn't down. Now I know that it's usually a good thing when chairs don't move by themselves, but in our case it's unusual and a little troublesome.
After checking the chairs, we gathered the group up on the stage and sat down in the dark to wait and listen for anything unusual. However, it had gotten pretty chilly in the theatre and the heater kicked in, making it near impossible to hear anything. There were a few taps and bumps, but we couldn't place them, and it became pointless to sit on the stage.
Becca led Dani and Emily down into the audience to do a quick seat check, Jen stayed with Melissa and Josh on stage, and I headed up to the right side dressing room to see if anything unusual was going on there. Let me tell you, the climb up to the dressing room is a steep and narrow one, and if you're not good with heights, you'd hate it up there.
A few seconds after I got up there, I got a killer headache and felt really light-headed. Since one of the rules that I stress the most is "if you suddenly feel sick or nauseous, get out of there and take a break" I followed my own advice and went back to the stage.
Really, nothing that exciting happened for about the first half hour. A few seats ended up moving half-down, but really, it was all calm. So, feeling adventurous, Becca and I decided to venture downstairs for a little look-around. Jenn was opposed to us going downstairs at first, because it could be potentially dangerous. But, wanting to have a look-around, and since we hadn't been down there since Halloween, we persuaded Jenn and headed down.
The temperature change was shocking, but until we get a temperature gauge, we're not making anything of that. Since there was a heater on up on stage as well, we're not jumping to any conclusions except that we were really freaking cold. Before we'd even gotten all the way down the stairs, we heard a shuffling noise coming from the gated area; obviously, since no one can get in there, and the only other people in the theatre were upstairs, it was a bit startling. We pressed on though, and partially split up; Becca went to check beneath the stairs, and I was over by the gated area. When we gathered again in the center of the room, from behind us in the corner we heard what sounded almost like a chuckle. And, as always, there was no one there.
Contributing the "chuckle" to the wind or a draft, we headed into the boiler room. Being cautious (and okay, a little paranoid) I had Becca stand in the doorway so I wouldn't get locked in. The huge fire door that's supposed to stay open could always somehow slide shut, and that wouldn't be a good thing. The boiler room was even colder, but I count that off to the fact that the floors are cement, the walls are brick, and the old, cheap windows probably let quite a draft in.
While I was in there, Becca called out to me and said, "it sounds like someone's walking around in the gated area, come here". I walked quietly over to her, and sure enough, I heard what sounded like footsteps shuffling across the cement. Almost immediately, Becca and I got killer headaches; it was so bad and so sudden that I made the decision to head back upstairs.
As we got to the stairs, there was a huge thud from up above; someone had dropped something on stage and, being completely honest, it scared us senseless. We were up the stairs in two seconds flat. A few minutes after we got back upstairs, our headaches disappeared.
I was more than startled to come up onto the stage and see Jake and RJ there; we hadn't even heard them come in. So with most of the group together (DeeDee was busy with schoolwork), things fell into motion. The heaters turned off a few minutes later, and we were able to sit up on stage and listen like we always do. Though we heard some noises, it really just sounded like the building settling, so we counted them off.
While sitting down on the stage, Jenn suddenly grabbed my arm and said, "look up there!" I looked up at the right-side dressing room and noticed what looked like a shadow up on the wall. A moment later the shadow disappeared back around the wall of the dressing room, and Jenn and I were left wondering.
Almost immediately after we saw the shadow, our entire group (minus Becca, Emily, and RJ) heard a voice come from behind us. I thought it was Josh, but when I turned on my flashlight, I saw the rest of the group in front of me on the stage, and the three others out in the audience; chills ran down my spine.
I really wanted to go investigate, because I had a feeling that the noise came from the basement, but Jenn didn't feel right about going down there. Once again, following the rule of "go with your gut", I sided with Jenn and decided not to go downstairs. We'd already been down there once, and really we hadn't caught anything we could prove.
Melissa and RJ, really wanting to explore down there, insisted we go down. Melissa told us that she "feels like we need to go down and look around". Jenn was adamant about not going downstairs though, and I had already agreed with her. When the rest of the group appeared on stage, I told them we'd be leaving in a few minutes.
I heard a noise come from the basement, and immediately whirled around; it was just RJ, heading down the stairs. RJ had never been in the basement before, and now he was heading down alone, which broke a few of my rules. So, even though I had agreed not to go down, I went down after RJ because I wasn't letting him go alone.
Sure enough, everyone ended up following us downstairs. I hate going in large groups for investigations because I believe that if there is something there trying to communicate, it won't happen with a group of nine people crowded in the tiny basement. To prove my point, we really didn't have anything happen. Jake and RJ left halfway through being down in the basement, but even then nothing happened. After about five minutes of showing everyone the basement, we decided to head back up. I pulled Becca aside; I wanted the two of us to stay down here and see if we caught anything now that there were less people down here.
The group wasn't even all the way up the stairs when we both heard a voice hiss GET OUT and a moment later, I felt something touch my arm. Our nerves already frazzled from being in there for so long, the two of us had a good ole fashioned freak-out and raced up the stairs.
After that last encounter, we decided it would be best to call it quits for the day and meet back another time. Jenn and I led out Josh, Dani, and Emily, and we expected to see Becca and Melissa right behind us. After a few moments of waiting in Richardson, I grew increasingly worried and told Jenn to stay with the recruits while I went to look for them.
I was startled to see Becca on stage, nearly in tears, refusing to move because she was so scared. After a few minutes of calming her down, I finally got her to tell me what was wrong.
"I was heading towards the door (she points to the door where we always hear growling and see shadows) and I heard something growl my name. I just... I got scared, I don't want to go over there right now."
Eventually, Melissa and I coaxed Becca off the stage and out of the theatre.
It was an investigation full of mystery and scares, and though we didn't get a lot of evidence, we found some new members, and we'll have some stories to tell for a while.
DeeDee is our adventurous semi-skeptic. While she believes in the paranormal, she'd rather jump to facts rather than fear when making a decision, which we all love about her. She's the first one to ascend the perilous ladders or crawl in claustrophobic spaces, and without her we'd have half the facts we do today.