A Ghost for a Clue

by C L R Draeco

  “If there’s a natural law we’re about to break, then something’s bound to block our way,” I said, the image of black and red football players all crouched into defensive positions inside my head.

  Starr centered her sights on me. “She never used to think like this.” She jabbed a finger at me. “You’ve pushed her over the edge. The same way some godless lawyer pushed Darwin to question the omnipotence of God.”

  “Now wait a minute—”

  Torula laid her hand on my arm to appease me. “Stop aiming at Bram because he’s the only atheist within range. This is what I believe. Genesis and evolution agree on one thing: Life started out biologically immortal—and then we lost it. What if what we’re going through now is God finally revealing the science on how to claim his promise of eternal life?”

  Starr took a step back and, for a moment, teetered on her high heels. Then she raised her chin, her eyes glinting with resolve. “God has given us His promise of salvation, and it’s in His hands how we get to earn our immortal life. I can’t let you step in like this just because you think God isn’t doing His job right.” She turned and left in a harried gait. “I’m going to tell Eldritch to put an end to this.”

  “Don’t do it, Starr.” Torula followed her, dashing down the stairs. “You’re throwing away our only chance to study this.”

  36

  For Humankind’s Sake

  (Torula)

  The bluster of the morning assaulted me and Starr as soon as we exited the nursery. Starr whipped around, sending her skirt in a whirl as she confronted me. “Why are you so blind to the consequences, Tor? We should be helping Thomas move on, not trap him and dissect him like some specimen to appease your curiosity.”

  I ignored the wind that tousled my hair. “You know this has gotten far beyond curiosity about a ghost. Or the health of my brother. Or creating computer programs to talk with the dead. It’s a study for humankind’s sake now. It’s so people would understand death and not have to fear it anymore.”

  “Then leave me out of it. There’s a reason people fear death. It’s because it comes with judgment. Eternal life is meant to be a gift, not a science experiment.” She strode away, fists clenched by her side.

  “Do you really want to leave the study of the soul in the hands of agnostics and atheists?” I called out. “Didn’t God give the key to genetics to an Augustinian monk? That should tell you something.” And Mendel was a botanist too, like you and me.

  Starr paused in the middle of the stone path.

  “I need an ally, Starr. Bram and Roy think a hyperwill is software in need of a gadget. But you believe Thomas is alive. You believe that of every soul.”

  Starr turned and thrust one of those fists into her hip. “You want to know what I believe? I don’t think it’s logic guiding your actions anymore.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Remember what Eldritch said? Happy ghosts feed on joy. Angry ghosts feed on fear. And Thomas probably feeds on . . . lust? Love?”

  I scoffed at the implication, even as a knot tightened inside my chest. “So this is your new angle of attack? That Bram’s feelings for me aren’t real?”

  “Think about it, Tor. Why did it take him so long to open up about why he came here? Or even just to tell you about Svalbard? Maybe he really just came for a visit to say goodbye but then slowly reconsidered.”

  I opened my mouth, but my mind ended up flashing back to all the times Bram had stuttered and stammered whenever I’d asked why he had come.

  Wind chimes jangled in an angry chorus in the trees as Starr continued her cruel assessment. “I think even you’ve been influenced somehow. You used to talk of Bram as just a friend. The friend who never cried for you. But he’s obviously more than that now, isn’t he? Thomas has probably been stimulating and feeding on those strong feelings you now have for each other.”

  I snapped out of my defensive stupor just in time to keep Starr from having the last word. “You’re accusing me of being blinded? What about you? Can’t you see I’m trying to be a Good Samaritan? I think Thomas has been left for dead on the roadside, and he’s asking for our help. I can’t believe the first thing you want to do is send him faster to his grave.”

  “But he’s already in the grave!”

  “Not in his mind, he isn’t. He hasn’t accepted it. Take a long, hard look. Death is something even the dead would want to escape.” I marched forward and past her, trying to block out her words that now spun in my head.

  The wind made it hard to breathe. Hard to think. What I felt, what I knew, what I wanted. What Bram wanted. I couldn’t tell what was true anymore. Things changed when this hyperwill appeared. I’d been perfectly content, and now I was considering leaving it all for someone who had once left me? Maybe it was best to bring things back the way they were and put my heart away where Bram couldn’t reach it. Or hurt it.

  Far is far. What difference did it make? I have to let him go.

  37

  Just Taking A Break

  Sometime after Torula went chasing after Starr, Eldritch showed up in the greenhouse. He gave no greeting. Asked us nothing. Barely even looked our way.

  Roy and I simply sat down and watched him from the central platform as he paced in front of the glass chamber, staring at our 3D composite of a ghost.

  As we waited, Roy slid his chair next to mine, leaned over, and asked, “So what about Sunday? I got somethin’ to show you in my garage.”

  I shrugged. “Yeah, sure.” I could do with some beer as he showed off his souped-up creations. After all, the only thing I was waiting for was an answer from Torula—and all I had to cling to for hope was her search engine history.

  Eldritch called out from beside the chamber. “You said the hyperwill transmission is still coming from somewhere out there?”

  “Yup,” Roy said.

  “Can you pinpoint where?”

  Roy scratched his shaved head. “Not exactly. But based on Morrison’s simulation, he’s gotta be in some secluded area. Some enclosed and empty place. Away from lotsa noise. With a cool and steady temperature.”

  “That message to ‘adjust the frequency,’” Eldritch said. “Would making such an adjustment help us communicate better? Can it help you locate Thomas so that—”

  The sound of boots angrily crunching on gravel had us turning our heads to check who’d arrived. Dressed in a black tee, camo pants, and army boots, Torula looked like someone about to start a private assault instead of a conversation. The hyperjammer dangled from her neck like a rifle bullet with a sliver of blue light near its base.

  I got up and switched off the Verdabulary before it could do her any harm. She stopped about an arm’s length from Eldritch and stood there, panting, with a frown on her face.

  “Is everything all right?” I asked.

  “Of course, everything’s all right.” She gripped the hyperjammer and aimed her piercing gaze at me. “I’m wearing this thing around my neck, aren’t I? My trusty defense against that mindless transmission of inanimate data that has no influence over me. Or you. So everything’s perfectly all right, right?”

  My head throbbed just trying to process her answer. “Uh . . . right.”

  “Did you manage to convince Dr. Benedict to reconsider?” Eldritch asked.

  “Reconsider what?” Roy asked.

  Torula shook her head. “If anything, she convinced me. I came here to ask to be excused too.”

  “What?” I asked. Excused from what?

  “Your disagreement with your friend has upset you,” Eldritch said. “I can sense the aura of gloom around you.”

  “What’s going on, Spore?”

  “It appears both she and Dr. Benedict wish to step away from the project for a while,” Eldritch said.

  Step away? “Do you mean . . . leave?” I stood frozen, gawking.

  Roy clucked his tongue. “Yo, I know we can’t keep Benedict in the party if she doesn’t wanna dance anymore. But Jackson, it’s your p
arty.”

  “No. It’s her nursery, Roy,” Torula said.

  “But it’s not ’er ghost. If anyone can claim ownership, it oughta be you guys. It’s only around ’cause o’ both of you.”

  “Give this more thought, Dr. Jackson,” Eldritch said. “And some time.”

  “I just need to process things.” She glanced at the darkened glass chamber. “Away from that. Away from all this.” Then she looked at me. “Away from the smell of you.”

  Roy leaned towards me and sniffed.

  “What did Starr say to you?” I asked. “Something about me being a demon to be exorcised from your life?”

  “She thinks . . . this has all gotten out of control. Like, we’re not in control.”

  Eldritch stepped closer towards her. “Please tell Dr. Benedict she has my word. We will not entrap any spirits and will only work towards finding a reliable means of communication with the other side. If she agrees to stay on the project on those conditions, I hope you will too.”

  Without another word, Torula spun around and left as irately as she’d arrived.

  “Did she just quit?” If that was the case, I was leaving too.

  “She’s just taking a break,” Eldritch said.

  “From something I got into—only because of her?”

  “Like I said, she’s just taking a break. She knows the importance of what we’re doing, as I hope you do too, Mr. Morrison. We need to find Thomas.”

  I let out a weary sigh, wondering if my stay here in California had just gone from pointless to even more pointless. “Look, even if we could locate it, all we’ll find is a faded tangle of broken threads.” I gestured at the 3D chamber. “You asked me to play the game, and this is how I played it. I’ve made the most of the cards we’ve been dealt.”

  “Then obviously we’re not seeing all the cards,” Eldritch said. “We only get to see what you’ve programmed for us to see. But what if there’s more to him than—”

  “Holy shit, that’s it!” Roy cried, looking at me wide-eyed as he pointed at the chamber. “We aren’t seein’ the whole goddamned deck! Sweet bejeezus. I think I know what we gotta do!”

  I wanted so badly to back away and fade into the background. Just disappear without having to say goodbye. “Listen, if Torula’s going to quit—”

  “She’s just taking a break!” they both cried.

  I swabbed a hand over my mouth, wondering if goodbye was even necessary.

  Roy grew somber and approached me. “Hey, man. Don’t just do this for your girl. Do this for everyone alive. You gotta see this for the big thing that it is. It’s us, puttin’ an end to death.”

  “I get it. You’re trying to stop the dead from dying.”

  “No, man. It’s us! It’s us not ever losin’ anyone anymore. It’s bein’ able to keep everyone special to us from leavin’. It’s just like you said. You don’t wanna think o’ your parents suffferin’ after death. Nobody wants to think that of anyone they lost, or anyone they’re about to lose. You showed it in your simulation. There’s a chance for us to save ’em.”

  That’s what I tried to do. With remembrances kept inside a robot. “It’s just storing data so you can hold on to something. It’s not saving lives. It’s saving memories—to be relived like old home movies. Recordings. Playbacks of the past that have no hope of a future.”

  “Not if they remain alive, like Jackson says. We still aren’t sure they aren’t.”

  “The living dead.” I shook my head. “It just makes no sense, Roy.”

  “You’re right, Mr. Morrison,” Eldritch said, moving closer towards the platform. “Death has never made sense. Not even to the dead. They walk around confused about their own existence. They remember what they’ve lost, and they know they have no future here. They’re living memories paralyzed in time. If you can see and hear them the way I do, you would want to help them too.” Eldritch stared at me, unmoving, and I imagined him trying to use some pseudo-mind trick on me. “In your few remaining days with the Manor, will you help us? Try to come up with a way to find Thomas?”

  My forehead twitched involuntarily as I considered the words of a man who had grown up believing that the only people who relied on him were dead. I glanced at Roy and saw a kid looking at me trustingly, suspended high up on the other end of a seesaw I was ready to abandon.

  In my few remaining days . . . As though stung by a nasty bug of compassion, I gave a barely perceptible nod. It was enough assurance for Eldritch who broke his gaze and walked away. The mind trick had worked.

  I glanced sideways at Roy. “So I’m guessing you have a plan?”

  “Damn straight. First is to stop thinkin’ o’ Thomas as human. I mean, he’s not in a body anymore. He’s an electromagnetic wave—not constrained to seein’ light that’s visible to our eyes or hearin’ only sounds human ears can pick up. He’s surfin’ across everythin’ with no need for a medium to go anywhere.” He paused. “Ehrm . . . by medium, I don’t mean the deep-breathin’, alpha-theta borderin’ kind.”

  “We’re on the same page on that one, mate. So what’s step number two?”

  “That crosstalk glitch gave me an idea. I got a feelin’ Thomas has got more things to tell us if we listen every possible way. So far, we’ve just been listenin’ to a single frequency band. So, I’m thinkin’—what if a hyperwill’s part ultrasound, part infrared, part ELF, part gamma, part this n’ that.” He tapped on his temple. “Need some time to rummage through the engineerin’ scrap yard up ’ere on how to go about it.”

  I blew out my cheeks, feeling incredibly tired. “Sounds like a plan.”

  “Yeah, well, in the meantime, I need you to do the most important thing to make all o’ this worth anythin’ for you.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Get your girlfriend back in the game.”

  38

  This Is It

  I could have called to ask if she was ready to talk. Or if she’d like to have dinner. Instead, I’d driven to Torula’s apartment on a gamble she’d be home.

  Holding a finger over the doorbell, I took a deep breath, then rang it.

  This is it.

  I shoved my hands into my pockets and glanced down the empty corridor. With its high, arched ceiling, modern art, and contemporary lighting, the hallway should’ve felt hospitable, but it only grew increasingly stifling as I waited.

  The door opened, and she stepped out in torn jeans and a loose sweatshirt—worn-out masculine pieces that, no matter what, always looked fresh and feminine on her. “You should’ve called first.”

  “I did. From the lobby.” I grinned, trying not to look nervous. “May I come in?”

  She folded her arms and looked down the same corridor that was now gloomier and stuffier than a few seconds ago. “It would probably feel this awkward all evening.”

  “Why?” I failed to breathe in the long pause that followed.

  “When you first came back here, you said you were at a crossroads.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Did you mean, at the time, you were still deciding between staying or going? Or did you mean, you still hadn’t decided if you’d ask me along or not?”

  “What?”

  She gazed at me with eyes that held a thousand questions. “When did you know for sure that you wanted me to come along? Before or after your exposure to the hyperwill?”

  “The second I was given the offer.”

  “To work on the hyperwill?”

  “To go on the mission! What’s going on, Spore?”

  “Why didn’t you ask me sooner?” she asked with a frown. “Is it because you weren’t sure when you first got here?”

  “Of course not.” I tried to sound sure of myself but couldn’t stop myself from swallowing.

  She stared at my Adam’s apple.

  Bugger. “Look, it was a huge dilemma. I don’t want to leave without you, but it also means redefining your life. And then, I found out about your claustrophobia—”

  “Which
I said is no major concern. I can start treatment anytime if I want to.” Her shoulders rose and fell as she sighed. “I need to know—Did your feelings change after you saw Thomas?”

  “What the hell?” My mind erupted with objections charging through like an angry mob. “Is that what Starr planted in your head? That that . . .‘thing’ possessed me and is controlling my mind? No bloody way!”

  “Eldritch said hyperwills manifest depending on what they feed on. They can feed on fear. Or joy. Or . . . feelings, like . . . what it’s making us feel.”

  “Making us feel?” I cracked my neck. Cracked my knuckles. Anything to dispel the need to punch a goddamned ghost in the face. “Damn it. Whatever that psychic has to say has got nothing to do with us. I know what I’ve always felt. Always. And that’s never changed.”

  “All our lives, you’ve stayed at a distance. Then a hyperwill comes along and suddenly you’re—”

  “Whoa.” I raised my hands to stop her. “Did you just say I’ve stayed at a distance? You’re the one who keeps—”

  “You left.”

  My mind stalled at her words that were like two solid rocks lobbed at my chest. “I was. . . ” Helpless. Grieving. “. . . fourteen. I had no choice.” My legal guardians, who’d been good friends of my parents, had come to take me to live with them. Torula knew that.

  “You didn’t even cry,” she said.

  I squinted, disoriented. Did that comment even belong in this thread? “What?”

  “When you came to say goodbye, you didn’t shed a tear.”

  “Because I never said goodbye.”

  “Well, you came by to say . . . something. And you didn’t even grow misty.”

  My mouth hung open for a while—because I had no bloody idea what the hell needed to be said. “I don’t . . . understand . . . the problem.”

  “When your parents died, you cried a river of tears. An ocean of tears.”