Ghost Hunt 2: MORE Chilling Tales of the Unknown (7 page)

“It’s not like any park I’ve ever been to,” his brother said. “Before flying out here, I read a few blogs by people who’ve visited Alcatraz. They were pretty spooked by what they saw.”

“Grant and I have always wanted to investigate this place,” Jason said. “Can you imagine being trapped in there? It’s a small dot in the middle of nowhere.”

“Yeah, I can’t believe we’re finally able to check it out for ourselves,” said Grant. “We’ve heard a bunch of interesting claims.”

Lyssa had heard stories about Alcatraz since she was a kid.
She was just as excited as the rest of the team to investigate the place. But as the boat approached the island, she couldn’t help thinking about how scary it looked. She glanced back once more toward land and got a quick shiver. She imagined the prisoners being locked up in their cells, staring at the wall every day, just as she was doing. But they knew there was no way out!

The captain stopped the motor, and the boat gently slid into the dock. Lyssa took a deep breath. The walls of the prison towered up ahead. Could anyone still be trapped behind those prison walls?

Shrugging it off, Lyssa grabbed a box of gear and scrambled out of the boat. The rest of the team followed. On the dock, they met a man with a bushy beard and thick glasses.

“Welcome to Alcatraz,” he said in a booming voice. “I’m Frank. I’ll be your guide today.”

“Thanks for allowing us to come investigate,” Jason said.

“I’m excited that you’re here. Over the years, I’ve heard so many strange stories,” Frank said. “I would love to find out if they’re true. Load your gear into the van over there, and I’ll drive you up to the top.”

After a quick drive up a steep road, Frank stopped the van in front of the entrance to the prison. Lyssa stared up at a huge iron gate. It had to be at least twelve feet tall. It was in the middle of the brick wall that surrounded the entire prison. Through
the gate was a yard. Past that was the entrance to the main building.

“Lead the way, Frank.” Grant gestured for their tour guide to go first.

As Frank led them into the yard, Lyssa lagged behind a little. The ground was very hard, and each step vibrated up to her shins. She felt as if something were holding her back, as if there were energy around the building pushing her away. She felt almost as if she were walking in her sleep. She barely realized when the team had reached the building. But as soon as she walked through the entrance, she snapped back to reality.

The team went through a caged room with heavy doors on both sides. It reminded Lyssa of a trap to catch wild animals. Frank explained that the cage was originally a holding area for visitors so guards could make sure no one was bringing in anything to help the inmates escape.

When Frank led them into the main hall, Lyssa saw rows and rows of bars stretching out in front of her. She stared into the cells around her. They were all the same. Flat metal beds, single toilets, bars on windows. Above her head, she could see inside the cells on the second level. They were the same as well. There was barely enough room inside a cell for a person to walk three steps in any direction.

“This is what we call Broadway,” Frank said. “A little prison humor, I guess. This is the main hallway. All the new prisoners
were led through this hall when they arrived. As soon as a new inmate entered the prison, the older prisoners would yell at them. Call them names and throw whatever they had at them.”

Lyssa gazed down the hall. She estimated that the walk would take several minutes.

“That must have been terrifying for the new inmates,” she said. Jen nodded in agreement.

“Absolutely, especially for the ones who had never been to jail before. I’m sure it was the first time they realized what was in store for them.”

Frank started walking slowly. The team followed.

“What kind of claims have people made about this area?” Lyssa asked. “What paranormal things have people reported?”

“Noises. Footsteps. Shadows.”

Lyssa looked from side to side. Each cell had one light, giving the rooms a sickly yellow color. “Do the sounds come from inside the cells?”

“Not exactly.”

“Then from where?” Jen asked.

“Most people say they hear the noises coming from or leading to D Block,” Frank said, waving his hand toward some stairs.

“What’s D Block?” Mark asked.

“The inmates at Alcatraz had nothing to lose. So they were brutal at times—using weapons or causing riots. When a prisoner was violent, he was punished by spending time on D Block,”
Frank explained. “Most prisoners who were sent there started to behave better when the punishment was over. No one who came out wanted to be sent back. Follow me, I’ll take you there.”

Frank led the team up a narrow set of stairs and down a short path. He stopped in front of a green door.

“D Block is through here. It was a solitary confinement area, which means prisoners were alone,” Frank explained. “They were only allowed to leave their cells for one hour once a week. Inside the cell there was no light. No way to tell if it was day or night. Think about that for a minute. You know that feeling of waking up in the middle of the night, and you have no idea what time it is? You know that panic you feel in your chest before you calm down? Now imagine that happening all the time. A prisoner in one of these cells had no idea when he was going to be let out. It must have felt like they would be there forever.”

Everyone looked at each other and shook their heads. They could only imagine being stuck somewhere like that. It would be awful!

Frank showed them into D Block. The doors for each cell were open. Lyssa noticed these cells were much smaller than the regular cells. The steel floors inside looked very cold. There were no beds. The cell was more like a locker for a person than a room.

“What kinds of activity have people seen in D Block?” she asked Frank.

“Much of the activity revolves around cell fourteen for some
reason. Some visitors on my tours will walk in and get dizzy and sick to their stomachs. I had a visitor once, a grown man, run straight out to Broadway, his face totally white. He had gone into cell fourteen alone. When he was able to talk again, he said that first he felt a tap on his shoulder, and when he turned around, there were two glowing red eyes. A voice growled into his ear the words
you’re mine.
I don’t believe just anything people tell me, but I could see this man wasn’t fooling around.”

“Have you ever experienced something like that yourself here in D Block?” Jen asked him.

“Nothing like that. But I have seen big shadows that look like they’re going in and out of the cells. I was never able to figure out where they came from.” Frank shrugged.

Next he took the team back through Broadway and down more steps to what seemed to Lyssa like a dungeon with brick archways and a brick floor. The ceiling was low and the air was muggy. Everything about Alcatraz made Lyssa feel uncomfortable, as if it were closing in on her. She checked out the rest of the team. Everyone’s shoulders were raised high—she could tell they were uneasy being down there, too.

“This is the Citadel,” Frank said. “This space was originally used as solitary confinement until it was decided that being here was cruel and unusual punishment. That’s when they built D Block. Down here it was like you were forgotten. Like you didn’t exist. No time out of your cell at all. No letters from the
outside. No food except when the guards remembered to bring it. If you take a close look at the walls, you can see where prisoners carved their names. They weren’t allowed to have any sharp objects, so it’s anybody’s guess what they used. Some say they carved into the stone with their own fingernails.”

“Has the same type of activity that happened on D Block happened here?” Mark asked.

“Not quite the same. I’ve heard voices when no one else was around—and I mean no one. After all the visitors leave, I always walk through the prison to make sure no one was left behind. I always call out to see if anyone is down here. Twice, I heard someone answer, but when I checked, no one was there…”

“What did the voices sound like? Could you hear actual words?” Lyssa asked.

“At first it just sounded like mumbling,” Frank said. “So I called out again. Then I walked toward the sound. Then the voice got louder… almost like a shout. Honestly, I can’t really be sure about the words. But I know I heard a voice. No doubt about it, it was a human voice.”

“Could you tell if it was male or female?”

“It was a man’s voice. Very gruff.”

When Frank finished speaking, the group stood for a few moments, not moving at all. It was so silent that Lyssa could hear everyone breathing.

“It gets so quiet down here,” she said out loud.

“Exactly,” Frank said. “Follow me. I have one more place to show you.”

Frank took the team to a spiral staircase and led them up.

“This is the hospital ward,” he said, and kept walking.

The wing was big. In a strange way Lyssa was getting used to the cramped spaces of Alcatraz. But now, being in such a large hallway was jarring. The sound of the group’s footsteps bounced off the walls. It made Lyssa feel as if someone were following her. She peered into each room as she passed. The ones right in front of her were still caged in with bars, but they were much bigger than the cells on Broadway. Some had nicer beds and sinks. One even had a bathtub. Some of the rooms farther on had no bars at all. Those rooms had sinks and cabinets, and a few had benches along the walls, like the waiting room at a doctor’s office.

Out of curiosity, Lyssa walked over to the nearest cell. She tried to swing the door shut. But it was very heavy, and it squealed as she pulled. Jason tried moving another one, and it made a loud noise, too. Frank told them that since the doors were out of use, they had rusted.

“What kind of reports have you heard about the hospital ward?” Lyssa asked.

Frank took a deep breath. He started rubbing his hands together. He seemed nervous.

“Something happened to me here that I won’t ever forget. I take tour groups through the prison. Usually I take fifteen to twenty people. But I never take more than twenty. One time a while back I was leading a tour, and right before going into the hospital ward, I did a head count. Twenty people exactly. On the way out, I counted twenty-one. I thought I must have counted one person twice. So I counted again. Still twenty-one. At that moment I realized I was standing right in front of a man I didn’t recognize from the group. He was wearing a white shirt, blue pants, and black shoes. The same clothes the prisoners wore. At first it didn’t really click with me. But it hit me a second later. I scanned the tour group, looking for the extra man. But he was gone.”

Lyssa looked around the room. They were standing in front of a room with an operating table.

“Where did that happen?” she asked.

“Right here. Right where we’re standing.”

Everyone in the team turned their heads around at the same time. The bars on the cells looked like bones crossing each other. But you could see right through the spaces into the cells. There was no place for a person to hide in the hospital.

Finally Frank began walking back to the stairwell.

“That’s about it,” he said over his shoulder. “I’ll take you back to where you left your gear.”

After the team set up Central Command, Mark and Jen went back to the hospital ward. They settled around the area where Frank had seen the extra man. Mark got busy setting up cameras and making sure they covered the whole hall. When Mark was finished, Jen pulled out a small gray metal tube.

“What’s that? I’ve never seen that piece of gear before,” Mark said.

Jen pointed the tube at the floor and flicked a button. Little red dots appeared next to her feet.

“Laser grid.”

“Whoa! High tech. Very impressive. How does it work?”

“A laser is just a very focused beam of light,” Jen explained. “So if a person—or a spirit—walked in front of the light, the little dots would go away.”

“Cool,” Mark said.

“I know,” Jen said, smiling. “Way cool.”

Jen’s walkie-talkie clicked on. Jason’s voice came through a moment later.

“Everybody ready? Good. Going dark in three… two…”

Mark looked around the hospital ward one last time. The paint on the walls was peeling off. Some areas had tile, but most of the tiles were cracked. And the bars on the windows made
him feel like he was inside a machine. Everything, from the cracks in the corners of the room to the dust particles he tasted in the air, was very depressing. Mark couldn’t imagine it being any more upbeat when it was in use either.