As the intrepid investigators returned to Arkham that early Monday afternoon, they realized that the only one who might make heads or tails of the photographs was Dr. Emmett Brown, or simply "Doc Brown". Mackie called him on the telephone as the film was lying in vats of development fluid, and Doc Brown showed up within the hour. Using a magnifying glass, he looked closely over the photographs, and after quietly talking to himself for a quarter of an hour, he looked up, and stated dramatically that the Topsfield Power Plant simply wasn't connected to the power grid. It may very well produce power, considering the vast hydroelectric turbine, but it was not distributing a single Watt. It was indeed odd, and to get their thoughts off the matter a bit, Mackie and Jules decided to once and for all try out the three buttons that Doc Brown had installed in Jules' Ford. They drove out of Arkham, and found a long straight length of road to try out what might happen. Doc Brown had not even mentioned installing the buttons, and no one had thought of asking him. Jules pressed the first button, and the results were spectacular: Mackie was instantly and unceremoniously ejected from the passengers' seat through a hatch in the roof. She landed with a thud and an expletive, and the angry and battered Egyptologist reached into the car and pressed the yellow button. She barely managed to jerk back her arm as the Ford accelerated along the road at breakneck speed, Jules held on to the steering wheel for dear life, and he barely managed to keep the ford on the road. The experiment ended when a small sign popped up, saying "NO NOX". Clearly a useful feature, if one would be better prepared. The third button raised an armored shield at the back of the vehicle, and Jules felt rather pleased with his upgraded vehicle.
Mrs. O'Flaherty's dinner was particularly good, and there was much to talk about between power plants, crazy car rides, and why someone was still looking for Howard Lake. The party retreated fairly late for a Monday, and Jules fitful sleep was interrupted by unrelenting knocking at his bedroom door. It was Diana Spinoza, and she was clearly distraught, claiming that something was clawing at her window, and it seemed big! Jules grabbed his trusty .38 revolver and went into Diana's bedroom. There were no unknown horrors lurking under the bed or in the closet, but the windowsill was covered in some very odd and disturbing form of prints, and there were scratch marks all around the window frame. Strange indeed, and Jules was not even distracted by Diana's flimsy negligee. Next evening would find the sultry widower in Jules' bedroom with quite different intentions, but then, these were strange - and lonely - times.
Diana Spinoza is an old and special friend of Jules Pollack.
Next day, following a hearty breakfast, Irwin and Mackie went to the Arkham city archives to do some research on the ownership and history of the Topsfield Power Plant. Howard, Jules and Moira headed north to the Barrow and Locke (B&L) mine in the Halliburton Hills. The clerk at the Arkham Town Records' Office was not really interested in cooperating, but when Mackie mentioned that they were chasing Communists, the clerk shone up and provided ample amounts of documentation, enough to keep Mackie busy for hours while Irwin carried stacks of documents back and forth between shelves and the Mackie's desk for the day. It was to be a most productive day.
Pleasantville
The B&L mine.
Unorganized Polish miners.
Howard, Jules and Moira spent several hours on the road, and they eventually reached a forlorn little mining village named Pleasantville, in addition to a Polish name seemingly only composed of the letters "s" and "z". The mine was guarded by B&L security thugs, while what seemed to be native American laborers were toiling in the mine itself. There was, of course, a Catholic church dedicated to St. Barbara in Pleasantville, and it was headed by father Wolfram, and he had a most difficult time tensing for his flock. Besides abject poverty, there were a handful cases of suspected radiation poisoning. Moira Baker had, of course, brought along her Geiger counter as well as her most sizeable doctor's bag, and she could indeed confirm the radiation. The sick were tended for as best as Moira could, and a pair of contaminated gloves were secured. B&L were clearly abusing the poor Polish miners, and Jules gave them some pertinent information regarding labor laws and unions. Jules and Howard also managed to find out that all the contaminated miners had been working in a "Shaft Z" and that the ore was transported from the B&L mine to the Topsfield Power Plant.
Father Wolfram
Meanwhile, Mackie had figured out that although the power plant had been built by General Electric, the money behind the operation came from a shady character named Otto Argo. She could not find a photograph of Mr. Argo, but records did indicate several odd and interesting facts about him, including that he had died several times, most recently in New Mexico. They also secured a copy of the news clippings that Lake's strange follower had ordered from the Arkham Advertiser, and by now, Mackie was quite fed up with living off coffee and cigarettes alone while enduring Irwin going on and on about that Bogislav Klimnik character. That evening, Doc Brown came over to analyze the radioactive dust on the gloves. It was, of course, Cobolttorium-G.
Wednesday, April 8, was to become a day that would live on in Arkham memory for decades. It all started at around ten o'clock, when a tall and broad-shouldered stranger walked up to J. Pollack Fine Antiques. It was indeed the man searching for Howard Lake, and since all the intrepid investigators were gathered in the back of the shop, they scrambled to fetch their firearms while Burlington Jones distracted the stranger. Moira headed out through the back door, followed by Mackie, while Jules and Lake guarded the store, with Lake taking up a firing position on the second floor. Irwin Bowers seemed to be more than a little confused, though, and he began looking at old books, finding a copy of Alexandre Dumas "Three Musketeers" in the original French to be particularly fascinating. The stranger said that he would return.
Beware of strangers with Tommy guns!
Moira and Mackie confronted the stranger outside Jules' store, but the stranger simply grabbed Mackie by the throat, choking her with enormous force. Moira let her Springfield rifle do the talking, and a round slammed into the chest of the stranger, followed by another one right into the side of the stranger's head. To her utter revulsion, the stranger seemed to ignore the impact of the rounds as a whitish-grey fluid and strange tubing seemed to pour out of the wounds as well as the mouth, nose and eyes. One eye rolled out of his socket and onto the cheek of the stranger, but he calmly popped back the eye into the socket while producing not one, but two Tommy guns. By now, Jules and Howrd had started firing at the stranger, but he answered by emptying his magazines of .45 rounds into J. Polack Fine Antiques. Jules and Burlington took cover, yelling to Mrs. O'Flaherty to get out or take cover.
Meanwhile, Mackie returned into the building, bolting upstairs with half a gallon of vodka, a rag, and a box of matches. This stranger, or strange creature, would require the McNamara treatment: firebombing! The strange creature started to reload his Tommy guns, while Jules loaded odds and ends into his real authentic replica Revolutionary War 4th of July Saluting Cannon. Moira finished off her magazine, hitting the creature repeatedly, but the rifle rounds seemed to provide mere distraction. However, that distraction was enough to enable Mackie to drop first a moose hunting trophy and then the lit firebomb at the creature. The crowning event was Jules Pollack firing off his cannon, and the monstrosity, now flaming and with multiple wounds, was seen running at an incredible speed out of Arkham. He left mayhem in his tracks, as well as several dead or injured national Guardsmen and police officers, in addition to a couple of small fires.
All of this, and it was still before lunch...
Mackie's handiwork.
As one might expect, the rest of the day was spent dealing with everything from the Arkham PD and insurance companies to simply cleaning up. At one point, just before dinnertime, two Federal agents came into J. Pollack Fine Antiques, introducing themselves as Special Agent Corrigan and Special Agent Leiter. They said that they had been searching the room that "Mr. Smith", i.e. the stranger, rented, and they also said that he must have been quite the "Buck Rogers Fan". As Pollack and Lake looked at the Federal agents quizzically, they handed over a news article printed on a strange, oily sheet of what seemed to be some form of epoxy:
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