The beam¶
The beam is an invisible, switchable line of heat and magnetic force at the fence of the Sherman Ranch, discovered in Walkers 06, which flings ferrous metal along a long arc toward Roosevelt.
| Type | Anomalous phenomenon |
| Aliases | Ranch heat-and-magnet beam; the line |
| Location | The yard fence of the Sherman Ranch |
| Direction | An arc pointing back toward town, in line with Roosevelt |
| Cause / operator | Never established |
| First appearance | Walkers 06 |
Discovery¶
At the end of Walkers 06, a rattling noise draws the party outside. The party's car, Betsy, is fine, but at the yard fence a sheet of metal is rattling with a faintly glowing vertical line running through it. Dante (as Kurt) throws a rock at it and it glances off the side.
Zack (as Huell) pokes the glowing part with a long stick. The dry grass starts to smoke, he lights a cigarette from it, and his hand heats up as it nears the line. Kurt tears a second sheet of metal off the fence and holds it over the line; it thrashes, is ripped from his hands and shoots skyward. Huell's Read a Bad Situation roll (an 11) shows dust and grit suspended along a curved invisible line, with clouds stretched along it (Walkers 06).
Properties¶
- Appearance. The line is invisible apart from a faint glow. It stands vertical, then curves away on an arc, and dust and grit hang suspended along it (Walkers 06).
- Heat. It heats and rattles metal near it. The hottest point shifts from red to yellow to white, dry grass smokes, a hand held near the line grows hot on both the palm and the back, and everyone's eyes begin to hurt. Dante (as Kurt) says: "Guys, I think we're being microwaved. I think we need to get out of here." (Walkers 06)
- Magnetic effect. Ferrous metal is strongly affected. The second sheet shoots away along the arc, and Kurt's broken watch, opened into three pieces and held out to the line, rockets upward at incredible speed. A penny is only slightly deflected; Dante points out that pennies are non-ferrous (Walkers 06).
- Switchable. As the party backs away, a loud electrical pop sounds and all the suspended dust drops, and the rattling stops. Rita (as Howard) says: "They just turned their thing off." (Walkers 06)
Connection to the vanishing car¶
Asked which way the arc ran, Andre says it headed back toward town, and when Dante asks whether it pointed toward Roosevelt, answers: "Yes, they're in a line." Dante (as Kurt) remarks that this might be exactly what happened to the party's car, which was found flattened in Roosevelt (Walkers 06). Earlier in the same episode, the junkyard owner Yusuf Ansari, who had been pressured by the Roosevelt police into confessing to crushing the car, told the party that his crusher does not flatten cars that much, and the party noted that there were no tracks around the wreck for a magnetic lifter. The episode ends on this cliffhanger. See also The vanishing car.
What remains unknown¶
The source, the operator and the purpose of the beam are never established. Howard's remark implies that someone controls it. The beam belongs with the other unexplained happenings under the Sherman Ranch phenomenon. The cavern beneath the ranch is not tied to the beam in any episode.
Trivia¶
- Dante summed up the scene at the table as "Magnet stole sheet metal." (Walkers 06)