Peace had finally come to the house that stood at 102 Van Dyke Court. Sensing that Helga had seemed to regain some level of emotional balance from earlier that morning, Phoebe and Gerald finally felt it appropriate to head back to their respective homes. Just as Gerald's hands grasped the door to his ride, a muffled screech filled the waning afternoon air.

"Oh no."

"What now?"

Bursting open the door, the two of them came upon the sight of a petrified Helga Pataki holding her phone out as if it had spontaneously started to exude some venomous sludge. Speech failed the woman and her body began to shake violently as she held up the device's screen to her friends. Phoebe almost fainted while Gerald's jaw hit the floor as he attempted to break her fall.

Sitting beneath the rusted out 'Hillwood' sign were the bound and gagged trio of Cecil, Eleanor and Thomas. Their helpless eyes stared back into the camera with fright. Under the image was the following text: 'Find book of blue in back pack and I return kids.'

"It literally came in just as you shut the door…"

"Oh my goodness, Helga. You must call the police."

"I…this has to be a prank. I…it just has to…" She continued frantically.

Gerald made a bee line to the huddle of backpacks that sat unmolested since the children departed the house almost an hour ago. Something in his gut told him to start with the unfamiliar bag adorned with an image of the Milky Way as opposed to those he knew belonged to Cecil and Eleanor or the bag monogrammed with the name "Thomas C. Rodriguez." Sure enough, the first object he pulled out a Navy colored journal. Turning to a random page, Gerald's brow furrowed in confusion and his lips moved up and down as he attempted to decipher the contents on the page: other than a triangle akin to a Greek "Delta" and an upside-down tri-barred Byzantine cross, he could fathom no frame of reference for whatever alphabet this was. Further weirding him out is the insignia boldly stamped upon the cover: a sixteen-ringed star with two lightning bolt lines in the center circle. More words in the text could be seen in the four central rays.

The first thing Phoebe notices about her new fiancé upon his return to the kitchen is the quizzical look he sports while staring at the book. As soon as she asks what has his mind in a knot, Gerald gave her the book and asked what she made of it.

"I'm sorry Gerald." Helga snapped. "We're looking for answers, not the ledger of the Zodiac Killer Appreciation Society."

"Yeah, but Helga…" Gerald began as he tapped on the cover. The blonde-haired girl also notices the logo courtesy of his finger.

"Alright hair boy, it's the blue book." She replied snarkily. "But where do we return it to? Who do we even return it to? Do we call Area 51 to set up a rendezvous, or will Spock and Marvin the Martian beam in here any minute to discuss the terms of surrender?"

As her best friend and fiancé revert to their childhood state of antagonism, a brief but harrowing sense of déjà vu cloaks Phoebe as she too sees the image on the book's front cover. She knew for a fact she'd seen it before: a colleague of hers once had it on a poster. But which one? Before she could wrack her brain any further, Phoebe's train of thought derailed as the book was curtly tossed in her direction followed by Helga's voice.

"Well Pheebs, you're the hotshot linguist, get cracking."

But try as Phoebe might, making heads or tails of what had been laid before her was impossible. Some illustrations of assorted landmarks around Hillwood were scattered here and there which helped a great deal, but when all was said and done whatever alphabet (such as it was) this had been composed in appeared to defy every linguistic rule she had studied. The sound of Helga and Gerald arguing combined with the faint hints of seeing this somewhere that taunted her further hindered Phoebe in her attempts to decipher the journal. After ten minutes that felt like ten hours, she furiously tossed the journal aside and roared:

"GOD HIMSELF COULDN'T SPEAK THIS NONSENSE!"

In the ensuing pall of silence, it suddenly hit Phoebe like a bolt of lightning. As the scattered memories of her time in New York started to come into focus, in particular, those involving a science professor whose obsession with cryptozoology lead to his unceremonious dismissal. Among the items in his possession was a poster bearing the image of the winged chalice. Gerald and Helga watch in paralysis as she turns to them. She speaks at long last, but her voice is quiet and imperative:

"But I know someone who can…"