Falls of the Pines

                The geologist strolled amongst the mahogany towers as she was searching for her testing grounds. Weaving through winding shrubs and bending palm leaves, she found her testing grounds: Falls of the Pines. The Falls of the Pines was an extending, cascading descent of crystal transparency. Its rigid cliff had undiscovered stories within each stratum of stone just anticipating to be unfolded. After the geologist completed her routine sampling, she drove back to the lab.

                The geologist received the results for the test approximately half an hour later. This routine was a typical for her and occurred weekly, just to simply observe the density of the stone. Skimming through the results of her samples, she uncovered something truly, and rather frighteningly astonishingly. Her discovery was an anomaly like no other; an aberration that remains incomprehensible to this very day: Sample (September 16^th, 2002)…….. Decomposing human debris.  The entire laboratory was frozen in bewilderment. Exuding a single emotion became an extraordinary task. They were equivocating on whether to convey sadness, anger, or even happiness.

                “It seems like you made a typing error or may have scanned something wrong in the testing process,” the geologist said.

                “Now miss, it’s rude to doubt a person’s profession when they have been trained in it for over twenty-three years. I can assure you, the entire text is one hundred percent accurate.”

                “Ok, If you say so,” the geologist said sarcastically.

                The geologist wanted to perform a complete and thorough examination on the cliff of the waterfall. She drove another twenty miles back to where she had come from and practically retraced her steps. As she walked along the rugged terrain, she heard an odd sound behind her that disturbed Mother Nature’s golden silence. She disregarded the noise and proceeded with what she was doing. With her tools in hand, she chipped off a piece of the cliff and allowed it to roll between her fingers. She observed the human debris with absolute scrutiny and placed it in a separate sampling bag. Taking her tools again, she chipped away more of the cliff except she gathered samples that were more beneath the surface of the supposed human debris. She took these newfound samples and had them do more testing.

                Two hours had elapsed and she obtained the results. The results were exactly the same as the tests that were conducted previously.  The geologist could no longer endure the suspenseful mystery behind the results of the testing and drove another twenty miles back to her testing grounds. Now she took this truly and solemnly to heart and was determined to discern this geological puzzle. She retraced her steps for the third and last time, and examined the ‘stone’ with unequivocal diligence. With the assistance of her equipment, she gently broke yet another piece of the cliff and brushed it off in quick, precise strokes. After the sample was entirely cleansed, she retracted a notebook and multiple writing implements from her briefcase; jotting down any unusual characteristics that may have been on the ‘stone.’

                “Well, the texture it somewhat sedimentary,” she reminded herself, “and the appearance is rather- dead.” She was rotating the sample as she was speculating the very limited possibilities.

                The noise returned; a sudden rustle of leafy plants interrupted her thinking process. Again, she disregarded it and resumed.

                “This whole cliff cannot possibly be composed of the same sedimentary material all throughout. It could not even sustain itself let alone sustain water if it were, and there is no way that these sediments are remains of dead bodies. Although this sample does contain miniscule fragments that may be shattered bones, but again, they could also be tiny pieces of broken rock,” she whispered to herself. Her mind was leaping through scientific obstacles left and right.

                The same noise returned, except it was more frequent and sounded like it was coming closer. She then felt a frigid exhale travel down her neck and her jaw began to quiver. Cautiously turning her head, she was only to discover that she had become a part of the boundless waterfall of dead bodies known as the Falls of the Pines.   

Reviews

[Coyote Poetry]

The story took me in and your storyline held my attention to the last words. I like the feel and desire in this poem. To do research into nature can take you to some places of mystery. A very good ending to the story. A outstanding short story.
Coyote

[Truman S. Booth]

An interesting horror. Rather disturbing, and it leaves many ponderable questions (which is good with this sort of genre). I would try to rewrite the final sentence, perhaps simplify it to provide more of a punch.

[halflives]

This is quite an imaginative story. I enjoyed the storyline and I found it rather frightening. Excellent.

[Arsenic Nemesis]

I really enjoyed this, it's wonderful! Really well written with a nice choice of words and rather chilling. I love it, great job! Keep up the good work!~