Welcome to Newonville

July 18th, 1984

Texas Highway

08:00

I tapped my black skinned hands on the passenger dash of the 1979 Ford Escort Harrier, humming along to the beat of Africa by Toto. The car was busted up, vibrating heavily as it drove over the small bumps on the Texas highway. There was nothing but desert to see out of the windows, my window had a small crack on it, and that was more interesting than the endless yellow sands. The man driving the car next to me seemed to love this bleak experience, his name was Harbour. Harbour Kelt to be more exact. He was an average sized man, with bitten fingernails and worn out wrinkles on his face. He was older than me, him being fifty-four and me being the prestine age of twenty-nine. Harbour was wearing gold aviators, with black lined edges. They blended well with his thick black mustache, and thinning black and grey hair. Me on the other hand, I was the complete opposite. I was a black man, sporting a nice brown suit and an unbuttoned white shirt, black shades hanging off of the edge. My shoes were brown, tattered loafers which I admit, could have been better cleaned in the moments before I got inside this very car, from my home in Brooklyn. I had a nice, short afro and a neatly trimmed goatee that had taken me a little while to grow. I fiddled around in my jacket pocket, and brought out my ID.

Name: Everest, Jeremiah. Date of birth: 05/17/1955

My job was a journalist. Not one that worked for a big newspaper company or publisher, I was freelance. Meaning I could do whatever the fuck I wanted to do and whenever I wanted to do it. It was a good bit of freedom, enough to make myself happy. If you could call it that. As I put my ID back in my pocket, I felt the touch of my favourite item. My Canon AE-1 35mm camera. It was an essential for a journalist and it was quite a camera, with great focus, depth of field, colour and an overall great and classy design. As I fiddled around with the camera, Harbour chuckled. I guess that was his way of telling me I'm a spoilt son of a bitch, but that was far from the truth. I was fairly broke in all honesty, the most I had in my wallet was twenty dollars and five quarters. And unless you count an old token I won from an arcade in Omaha as money, then I'm slightly broke. Of course, I didn't tell Harbour this as I promised him three thousand dollars to drive me all the way to Texas. Which was a twenty-seven hour drive. I also said I would pay him another thousand to help with my reporting and stay out in the car for two nights, but he was still considering that offer. I met Harbour through one of my bar friends, Harold Drey. Harold knew Harbour through school and said that Harbour did unofficial taxi jobs, sketchy to say the least. But when I met Harbour, he really wasn't all that bad. Africa stopped playing on the radio and we both let out a disappointing sigh, it was a great song. As the interval talk between songs was happening, Harbour decided that he wanted that Africa spirit back and started to sing accapella.

"It's gonna take me a lot to drag awayyyy, from yoouuuu, there's nothing that hundred men or more could ever doooo, I bless the rains down in Aaaaafricaaa, gonna take some time to do the things we never haaaaaaaaaaaadddd."

I let out a sarcastic little clap of applause and again, he chuckled, playfully punching me in the arm. I flicked my wrist and rubbed my eyes, carefully looking at the time on my watch. It was 08:05 in the morning, meaning we had been driving for twenty or so hours. In those twenty hours, we had visited three gas stations, stocking up on tons of junk and drink for the next hours of never ending boredom. Harbour had also been speeding above the limit the whole time, my safety clearly not in his mind. In fact, he was speeding right now, but just a couple mph above the limit. Meaning that I didn't have to fear flying out of the car and through the windshield.

"How long have we been in this damn car J-man?" Harbour asked, J-man was his nickname for me. I hated it.

"About twenty or so hours." I replied, trying not to trigger him.

"God damnit, I thought we was in here longer than that," he started, "Bullshit."

"Relax man, just think about the three thousand I'm giving to you, and keep driving."

"Ha, funny. At least stop playing around with your funny, expensive items, it reminds me of how poor I am."

"You ain't that poor, how'd you get this sweet car?" I said, tapping the dashboard.

"You call this sweet? This car looks like my grandma made it, and then got Rocky Balboa to punch it up."

"Well if you don't want it, I'll have it." I smiled at him.

"Fuck you."

Harbour boosted up the speed, forcing me to quickly grab hold of the handle at the top of the car. Harbour yet again, chuckled and kept speeding along.

"Pass me a coke would ya?" he asked.

I opened up the glove box and picked up a can of sweet Coca-Cola, that was sitting right next to the Taurus model 66 .357 revolver. I handed it over to Harbour's sweaty, greasy hands and we kept driving through the hot, Texan heat. I reached back into my jacket pocket and brought out a brown leather, thick notepad. I used this only for my journalism notes. When I am on an investigation, I note down every single piece of dialogue and intrests I see. A lot of the pad was yet to be filled in as I wasn't authorised for the high up, fresh scoops. But what I specialised in was old, urban cases from up to over decades ago. I think it's better to profit off of unresolved buisness. But when I tell most people that they laugh, Harbour being a prime example. I flicked past the last two cases I had done, and they were two out of four I had done in my whole career. After I flicked past the last page I had written in, which was filled with scribblings and miniature drawings, I brought out a crappy pen from my trouser pocket, and wrote in a new headline on the next page. The Newonville kidnappings. This title, was going to make me famous. This was the one, the big break. In less than a week, the whole world was going to know the name Jeremiah Everest, the man who did what police couldn't, find out what really happened in Newonville. Newonville was a great case, which not many reporters picked up on. And the ones that did didn't find anything, but I'm not those reporters. Newonville is a small town in Texas, right in the middle of nowhere. In 1907, outlaws created and built the town to hide from the law. Soon enough, people started living there normally. And for decades it was a pretty popular town for burnt out Texans looking for a place to settle down and start a family. And now, the juicy part. In 1973, eleven years ago, five kidnappings happened. Two men, Steve Hartland and Derrick King. Two women, Lucy Cleve and Sarah Poldridge. And one small baby boy called Ben Heartman. They were taken in a twenty minute span from midnight on the nineteenth of June 1973. The catch is, no one knew who took them, or why. This kidnapping was reported by the sheriff, who kept his name private, and the police started an investigation and man hunt. They didn't find the missing persons or the kidnapper. And it took them six months to realise there was no hope, and they closed the case. They advised locals to leave the town, but they didn't listen. They said they were ready. Ready for the day the kidnapper would come back. And they had a name for the kidnapper, The Snatcher. Some say that the snatcher never left town, and is still in Newonville, waiting for his next move. When I reached Newonville, I wanted to interview three main people. The sheriff, Marianne Hartland(Steve's mother) and the main one, the snatcher himself. Obviously, the last person was a bit ambitious but you never know.

After two more hours of endless vibrating on the sands, we pulled over into a small gas station. And when I say small, I mean it. The shopping area was not much bigger than a toilet row of cubicles, and there was only one pump outside. I wondered if this place was even open, or if it had been open for the last eight years. We parked beside the one pump and Harbour got out, I didn't feel the need to until we needed to pay. Harbour brought the pump and into the car, and luckily it was still working. As Harbour was filling up the tank, I started to write in my pad. Here we go, official case start. Currently in gas station, getting tank filled up by my associate. We are approximately around two to four hours away from Newonville. I stopped writing as soon as Harbour put the pump away and started walking towards the store. I got of the car slowly and carefully, trying not to hit the pump on the way out. Before I closed the door, I grabbed the revolver out of the glove box and tucked it underneath my belt. I then started to walk into the store. There were two aisles inside, but they were only a leg's length. There wasn't much stock, probably stolen from people taking advantage of the lack of security. But I wasn't here to steal anything, I couldn't speak the same for Harbour as he eyed a snickers bar. The shopkeeper was tucked away behind the till. He was an old fella, with no hair, wrinkly and withered skin and a ripped vest atire. Me and Harbour walked up to the till and Harbour asked how much the gas was.

"Thirty bucks." he said, his voice was fairly crackled.

"Sure thing."

Harbour brought out his wallet and looked at me, motioning his hands in a giving position. I sighed and passed him a five dollar bill, leaving me with fifteen bucks.

"What are you boys in Texas for? You don't look like you're from round here, especially you brown suit." he asked.

I didn't like that, but I held back and instead said, "I'm Jeremiah Everest, freelance journalist. I'm here with my associate Harbour to investigate Newonville."

The man froze, his eyes stopped blinking, "Newonville?" he said.

"That's right." I responded.

"Right, now if I were you I would turn the fuck back and head back to wherever you came from."

"Yeah, and why is that?" I asked, smiling. This could be my first interview.

"Last time I saw a reporter go there, I saw his car. It was a green Cadillac, sweet ride. It went past me, saw it through that window, then it came back. Filled up in my pump, and he told me the exact thing. 'I'm off to Newonville.' And I will tell you what I told him. Don't. Ironically, he went. And I never saw that Cadillac drive back on the highway."

I laughed, but took all of the information in, "Were you there when the kidnappings happened in '73?" I looked at Harbour as he said this and I could tell he was getting angry.

"Alright, I think that's enough. Thanks for the gas." Harbour grunted, grabbing my arms. He forced me out of the gas station and back into the car.

"What the fuck was that all about?" he shouted at me.

"I'm a journalist, that's what I do. Interview people."

"Could you not tell that that man might have gone through some shit? Hell, he could've known one of those stupid missing persons on the case."

"Well if he did, then I would be more than happy to go back in there."

Harbour didn't respond, and just turned on the engine, pulling out of the station and back onto the highway. I put my revolver back into the glove box, and took a quick picture of the gas station out of the window. I then took out my pad, and wrote my next piece. Went into gas station and met the clerk, old fella, probably around mid sixties. I told him I was a reporter and that I was headed to Newonville, and he told me to back off and not go. He said that a previous reporter had come to the station and told him the same thing, and apparently the clerk never saw the reporter's car return on the highway. It was a green Cadillac. He said he liked it. I finished writing and put the pad back in my pocket, now waiting to arrive at Newonville.