The girl awoke, eyes blearily gazing out the window at the ever darkening sky. This had become a habit recently. The only reason she even continued attending classes what out of obligation to Rose, her former tutor. To not attend classes would be tantamount to spitting in the face of her beloved mentor. Plus it’d be a waste of all that scholarship money, but she was at the point of not caring about that minor detail in the slightest.

Her sleep schedule, minus classes, had become reversed and she was now primarily a nocturnal creature. It fit the material she was researching, she thought, and nighttime was a much better time for the occasional experiment she would try. She had always been more productive in the evenings anyway. A morning person she was not, and never would be unless getting most of your work done at 0200 counts as “morning.” Besides, tonight she had a specific mission in mind, one that really would be best suited for the night. It was a full moon, after all, which everyone with an inkling of knowledge on the occult knows is a powerful time for certain rites and rituals.

She got her supplies together. Sturdy boots were a must-have of course; only a fool would go where she was going in anything but solid hiking boots. Err...with one exception, she thought. Dark clothing also, as being spotted during her work would cause a lot of issues further on down the line. Dark, but warm. Autumn was fast turning into winter, and it wouldn’t be good to end up with hypothermia. She couldn’t help save Rose if she froze to death during her experiment, after all.

Likewise she also had a pack, filled with extra food, water, a flashlight, several ways to start fires, an air panel, flare gun, emergency blanket, emergency GPS transponder, air panel, IR strobe, topographic map, and compass. And on her body she carried a handgun and spare magazines, having just turned twenty-one recently and become able to legally carry a firearm. She may have been pushed down weird avenues by the grief of losing someone she loved immensely, but she wasn’t stupid; things can get dangerous and the best way to deal that danger is to be prepared, as the Boy Scouts say. She wasn’t planning on staying out for too long but relying on things going as planned was foolhardy. Rose had certainly expected not to be out for more than a quick hike, and she was still missing. Going out in the mountains at night was dangerous, and all the more so if half of what she had read in those manuscripts about boggles and boogymen was true.

If she accepted that Rose had experienced some sort of supernatural event, then she had to come to the conclusion that the rest of what people wrote about, of monsters, fairies, and spirits that go “bump” in the night, was true. Before she had lost Rose she had initially thought it was all a load of bullshit, but as she dug deeper and deeper into the dark corners of the internet she had to concede that there were a lot that was unexplained. She was almost half-way sold on the Lizard people even before she realized how absurd that was, and even then she had the sneaking suspicion that the Government was up to something with the occult. There was Project Stargate and MK-Ultra, as well as the weirdness with the National Park Service’s approach to missing persons in their parks.

The only reason more people aren’t actually aware of this is the tendency of the average person to dismiss anything outside the mainstream as just a “conspiracy theory.” This tendency flies in the face of logic and the girl, someone who prided herself on her rationality, felt like kicking herself for not being more open-minded to this possibility previously. As a matter of fact she felt there was ample evidence of the government propagating this idea in the first place, propagating the stereotype that anyone with spooky backroom tales of conspiracies and plots must be a nut job.

Since the supernatural was real, it made sense to be prepared for any contingency. The girl ascribed to no particular religion and creed. But, as would have been apparent to anyone watching her get dressed, she had no real bias against any particular belief system. A pentagram necklace found its way onto her neck, followed by a Catholic rosary; a bit redundant to anyone who’s delved deep enough into the occult, they’re both in their own way Christian, but redundancies can pay off. A bracelet with sigils against the evil eye went on her wrist, and a phylactery filled with Kabbalistic incantations found its way into her pocket along with ofuda and a conjure bag purchased from a Root-worker she found on Etsy. Ideally these would protect her from anything, from minor poltergeists to cursed mummies of Egyptian High-Priests.

She was a bit uncertain about how efficacious these would be with her lack of faith in a specific, well, Faith, but she was sure they would do in a pinch. There’s no atheists in the foxholes, as the saying goes, and a face-to-face confrontation with a spoop would likely drag out the last remaining bit of adherence to rationality and bend it into faith in some sort of higher power. Worst case scenario, she already super-glued a bit of silver leaf and sanctified salt into the hollow points on the ammo in her carry piece. It was kind of janky, but there’s no reason why it wouldn’t work, right? Fortune favors those who are prepared far more so than the bold.

All that was left was to grab the tote bag full of the materials needed for her experiment, her purse, and a travel mug, and out the door she went. She had a long drive ahead of her, heading deep into the mountains to the site of the experiment. She put on a recording from her lecture earlier that day, soon was lost in thought as her car drove on through the winding highways and back-roads.

She pulled up to the trail-head at around 10:00 PM. The full moon was already rising in a clear, star-filled night sky, and although the shadows cast by the trees made it difficult, the words Old Hobbs Hollow Trail could be seen on a sign. She could hear an owl hooting in the distance, as well as the odd chirp of the last few bugs hanging on before the icy frost came to kill them off. A service road led off one side of the trail head, down which she drove a few dozen yards before killing the lights and throwing a camouflage net over the car.

Technically the game lands was on State Forest land, so primitive camping in theory was allowed, but she’d rather not draw more attention that she already was. She already seemed suspicious, pulling up to a trail-head in the dark, wearing dark clothing, with the glint of silver from protective charms peaking out from under her cloak.

Yes, she was wearing a cloak. She had done her research, and was of the belief that atmosphere played a major role in the success of something of this nature. The mind and the perception of the main person performing the experiment she had planned seemed to have more influence than anything else on the outcome. Tools and garb may seem superficial but, like the incense and stained glass of a church, it helped to evoke the proper air. It could almost been seen as a form of self-hypnosis in a way. At least, that was the general idea. The charms she wore should work because she believed they should work, and the clothing she wore would contribute to her success because she believed they would. It’s the power of positive thinking taken to the extreme.

As she made her way down the trail, her thoughts went to Rose, her missing mentor and the girl she loved. She wondered what thoughts she might have had as she had walked this trail before her disappearance. Knowing her, probably some weird tangent about early explorers. She did tend to lean towards the romantic thoughts of history, and stories filled with adventure and discovery. That was one thing the girl had always admired about Rose. To someone so fixated on the nitty-gritty of science and the observable, meeting someone who was just so free and open was like seeing a rainbow after a storm. She had been so...bright, if a bit spacey. She definitely was prone to daydreams and mood swings. Or so thought the girl, shrouded in darkness as she made her way up the trail in the moonlight.

Eventually she reached the clearing. The clearing. The one where Rose’s boots and jacket had been found, neatly folded on a rocky outcropping. The girl knew it well. After all, as soon as she heard Rose had gone missing from the friends she had been with, she had rushed to the scene to assist in the search. Though Rose’s belongings had been found before she had got there, it had been a focal point of the search and she had spent hours roaming grids set in the surrounding woods, searching for any sign of Rose. So she was intimately familiar with the clearing.

She looked at her watch. Still an hour until midnight, but it couldn’t hurt to prep. She unpacked her tote bag, laying all the supplies out on a blanket. A cloth. A vial of perfumed oil. A knife. And a plastic bag. She was not following a set ritual of any specific set of practices. Rather, she pieced together her own, taking pieces of various ritual practices that seemed to be the most long-standing. It was a more loose, free-form approach to the occult that would offend the sensibilities of anyone who followed any sort of specific magical tradition.

She pulled out a compass, checking it against the stars to be sure. It was a rocky area, and there was always the risk of the rocks possibly messing with magnetic fields. There was even the possibility of other phenomena messing with it. This was the area where Rose disappeared, it stood to reason that others might experience the same, or maybe lesser supernatural happenings. Heading to the north of the outcropping, she dropped some oil and pointed her knife while muttering under her breath.

It was a ritual most of those familiar with the modern practice of Wicca might recognize as being at the very least inspired by their own practices, but the girl felt it was worth trying despite being from a set of beliefs dating from WWII at the earliest. Gardner, the founder of Wicca, did take a lot of his ritual practices from other esoteric societies of the time, and a fair amount of them did their research. Using some sort of protective circle for use in rituals goes back ages, long before even Christian occultist using the pentacle as a form of protection from demons. Even religious rituals could be said to be done in a similar setting, with churches and temples being consecrated ground.

Finished this work, she returned to the blanket and waited. When the clock hit midnight, she lit a pair of candles, opened up the plastic bag and withdrew a bouquet. In it was a selection of flowers and plants. Having done her research into the meanings of different plants, she picked ones she felt would best exemplify her feelings towards Rose. The ideal goal would be not just to make her feelings known, but to actually summon Rose, but even letting her know she hadn’t been forgotten would be enough. The girl muttered under her breath an incantation of her own invention. She poured more of her feelings, and her will, into what the bouquet represented. She continued pouring her thoughts into the flowers, when her mind was pierced by a splitting headache and a blinding light.

In her minds eye, she saw a room, somewhat rustic. In it, lit by a candle, she saw Rose. But she was not wearing her usual clothing. She watched as she slowly removed a bodice and skirt that seemed vaguely historical. The girl slightly blushed when Rose removed the stays, although even in the shift that was left Rose was still modestly covered. And she watched with fondness and a strong feeling of wanting to protector as she curled up in bed. The girl couldn’t help but speak.

“Rose Snyder… Where are you...”

With those words the spell was broken. The candles were extinguished and she could feel a recoil, as if the protective barrier around her location had been assaulted. Hurriedly, she packed up her belongings and headed back down the trail to her car. After a long drive home, she wrote down her notes on what had occurred on a Google doc she had for her occult research, and fell asleep with the rising of the sun.