Gap Year in Ghost Town

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Gap Year in Ghost Town Page 6

by Michael Pryor

‘No. Just really bad handwriting. Awful. Like a drunk spider fell in an inkwell and staggered across the cards.’

  ‘I can cope.’

  ‘How?’

  ‘How does anything monumental get done? By doing it a little bit at a time.’

  ‘When?’

  ‘I’ll fit it in. I’ll make it turquoise on my timetable.’

  ‘Aargh.’

  Bec’s time management was legendary. Her schedules were things of beauty. Her diary was god-like. Her timetables used colours that would fall outside a Pantone chart.

  ‘And how is uni working out for you?’ I asked.

  ‘I love it. I’m sciencing all over the place with other people who are doing the same thing. Heaven.’

  ‘Must keep you busy.’

  ‘That’s why the timetable.’ She frowned. ‘I’m thinking of moving out, though, getting a place of my own.’

  ‘Why? Can’t be to save travel time.’

  ‘Independence. Growing up. Rite of passage. A chance to have houseplants of my own.’

  ‘And so the world changes,’ I intoned.

  ‘In little ways and big ways.’

  ‘With all this, you still want to organise our archives?’

  ‘It should make your job more efficient, and it should help your dad.’ She sipped from her mug. It had a picture of a bunny on it. ‘It’ll make things easier for him. He’ll be able to cross-reference, make connections, construct graphs.’

  ‘Your eye is starting to glow.’ I had to be straight. It was Bec I was talking to, after all, and we told each other stuff. ‘Look, you know that Leon hates computers. And he doesn’t understand them. Hatred and lack of understanding. Put them together and that’s how wars start.’

  ‘Leave him to me. I can handle Leon.’

  I sighed. ‘Go ahead. No skin off my nose. I’m going to bed.’

  ‘You’re being unusually evasive,’ Bec said. ‘It’s that girl, isn’t it?’

  ‘What? Who? Rani?’

  ‘If I take that last one as a question, that’s three questions in a row. Nice going. I must have hit a sore spot.’

  ‘No sore spot here. I checked.’

  ‘So what’s going on between you and hot sword-toting babe?’

  I sniffed. ‘That’s a horribly gendered description.’

  ‘So what’s going on between you and strong female role-model babe?’

  ‘Better. Nothing.’

  ‘Nothing? What, did she suss you out that quickly?’

  ‘What? Cut it out, this is purely professional.’ I tried as hard as I could to look dignified. ‘Not that it’s any of your business, but we decided that our approaches to ghost hunting were incompatible.’

  ‘You came on too strong, hey? Not strong enough? You offered to buy her a hamburger and she turned out to be a vegan?’

  ‘She thinks all ghosts are dangerous and need to be hacked to pieces upon sight, and I don’t.’

  ‘A basic incompatibility. Don’t worry about it. Great relationships have been built on less.’

  ‘What is this, Bec’s Romantic Advice?’

  ‘You could do worse.’

  ‘Than her, or your advice?’

  ‘Both.’

  ‘I can’t handle this now,’ I mumbled. ‘I need to get some sleep before I start to hallucinate.’

  ‘Oh.’ Bec hesitated and, tired though I was, I frowned. Bec was rarely hesitant. She was assertive, certain, sometimes blunt, but rarely hesitant.

  ‘Something’s bothering you,’ I said. ‘Spit it out.’

  She let out a long breath. ‘You’re right. Something has been nagging at me for ages, and now is a good time to get it out in the open.’ She put her fists on her hips. ‘What exactly are ghosts?’

  Pow. ‘Are you sure you don’t want to start with an easy one? I mean, this is one of the biggies in ghost-hunting circles.’

  ‘Since I’m coming on board as part of Marin Ghost-hunting Enterprises, I figure I need to know stuff like this.’

  That sat me back a bit. ‘Yeah, you’re right. And I know that you have a habit of being right, so you don’t have to tell me again.’

  ‘Just as long as you don’t forget.’

  I linked my hands behind my head. ‘So, you want the official version or the Anton version?’

  ‘There’s an official version?’

  ‘There are about a hundred different official versions.’

  ‘And the Anton version?’

  ‘Is my take on the hundred different official versions.’

  ‘Hit me with it, then.’

  ‘Okay.’ I leaned forward. ‘Have you ever tried to do a scan, or make a photocopy, but you accidentally moved the document while it was happening?’

  ‘Sure. It went all weird and smeary.’

  ‘But you could recognise that it was a copy of the original.’

  ‘Well, if I looked at it hard enough.’

  ‘That’s ghosts. They’re created at the moment of death – some deaths – and they’re like a bad copy of the original.’

  ‘They’re not us?’ Bec asked a small un-Bec voice.

  ‘No,’ I said. ‘And let’s sort this out now. Ghosts aren’t us. They’re independent creatures that are based on us. Badly.’

  ‘And that’s why they retain some memories?’

  ‘Fractured, fuzzy, unreliable memories.’

  She chewed this over for a while. Three sips of tea, it took, and a couple of dozen frowns. ‘This prompts more questions than it answers, you know.’

  ‘I know, but in my state, I think I’ve done pretty well on this one. Enough for now.’

  ‘Okay.’ She looked at me. ‘Thanks.’

  ‘Don’t mention it.’

  She finished her tea. She reached around and put the mug on the sink drainer. ‘Lemons. I need some lemons.’

  ‘A top-secret science experiment?’

  ‘I’m making lemon delicious pudding.’

  ‘Plenty on the tree out the back. Help yourself.’

  ‘I usually do. I just thought I’d ask this time.’ She gave me a look. ‘You don’t have one?’

  I smacked myself in the forehead. Forgetting was a sign of how tired I was. ‘Okay, try this one. What’s a printer’s devil?’

  ‘Give up.’

  ‘A printer’s devil, in the old days, was an apprentice to a printer, a youngster who used to mix the big tubs of ink, run messages, that sort of thing.’

  ‘Good enough. Just wait, though, I’ve got a special for you next time.’

  ‘Good. Great. Whatever. Just make sure the door’s locked behind you when you leave.’

  CHAPTER 6

  That night, I had to catch a bus and face a fair stretch of walking to get to the area of Grender’s tip-off. One does not simply walk to Yarra Bend, after all. A licence and a car was on the drawing board, but they were only rough sketch outlines.

  I don’t mind the night, which is lucky for a ghost hunter. But add the dark to some of the out-of-the-way places I have to visit and it’s enough to make wariness a way of life.

  It was cold enough that I’d worn my old grey greatcoat, an ex-army number complete with brass buttons, that I’d found at a school fete. It was heavy but like +5 magic armour against wind. I had gloves and a scarf, too, over an old black suit jacket with extra-wide lapels that was my current fave. It was hard to get my backpack on over the top, but I was used to it.

  Hat? A woollen footy beanie Bec had given me as part of her stealth campaign to make sure I stuck with her team. Good colours.

  No rain was forecast, which was a good thing. Ghost hunting in the wet was a pain. I’d done it, and I’d learned that the non-solidity of ghosts was never more obvious than when cold rain dripped down the back of my neck but passed right through a moaning spectre. There weren’t many benefits of being a ghost, but not being bothered by rain was one of them, I expect.

  The solid mass of cloud overhead was low, which meant it caught the lights of the city, turning the greys or
ange and yellow. It was a little nauseating, to tell you the truth; sort of like looking at the innards of a giant animal.

  After getting off the bus, I had to walk down Yarra Bend Road towards the freeway. The area is a funny bit of open space, almost wilderness on one side and the NMIT campus and psychiatric hospital on the other side.

  Finding the location of Grender’s ghost was as easy as he’d claimed.

  The pillar was standing just off the road, right on the edge of the huge cutting of the freeway. It was the last remnant of the original asylum, a part of the main gate to the facility, and was now a lonely prop for a brass plaque that very few people read, most likely.

  Grender said that the pillar was the site of the ghost’s manifestation.

  I took off my pack, found myself a nearby tree, and sat against it while I waited.

  It was a weird sort of double state I found myself in. On one side, I could imagine I was in bushland, with plenty of young gum trees, the smell of fallen leaves, the sound of foliage shifting and moving in the irregular breeze. On the other hand, the nearby Eastern Freeway meant I was fully aware that the city had a claim to this part of the world.

  Finally, my pendant started humming. I had that itchy, prickly feeling and saw the ghost making an appearance.

  The Watcher faded into existence, a bit patchily, and I had to strain to see it. It wore old, old clothes – a long, grey, high-necked dress with a tiny lace collar. Round spectacles. Bare feet hovering just above the ground. It had one hand on the pillar, anchoring it there.

  I stood and brushed myself off, moving slowly. The Watcher bobbed there, waiting as she must have done for more than a hundred years, in front of what had once been a major asylum full of unhappy souls.

  As I approached, I kept up a soothing monotone. ‘It’s okay. Nothing to worry about. I’m not here to hurt you. It’s okay.’

  I guess some people would have called it a ghastly stare, but all I saw was a lost and lonely thing that was here long past her due. I got the tiniest touch of fear, but no chilling horror. Whatever death had spawned this ghost was long ago and probably unremembered.

  I held up my hands, palm outwards. ‘Time to go.’

  As gently as I could, I pressed forward, right into the Watcher’s chest. She didn’t flinch, didn’t recoil. Instead, she folded her shoulders inwards, as if welcoming what I was doing.

  I nodded, then twisted, and the Watcher vanished. I staggered as I was buffeted by visions of a large kitchen, heat and steam that became an even larger laundry full of the same. Then, last of all, startling and unexpected, a parrot on a windowsill. A galah, all pink and grey and perky. Then there was nothing.

  ‘Whoa.’ I sagged against the pillar and tried to stop my knees from trembling. A successful easing, but it still took it out of me.

  I rubbed my hands together, then my face. My stomach growled. ‘Food,’ I muttered aloud. ‘I need food.’

  Another ghost appeared.

  I didn’t have to strain my eyes to see this one because it snapped into existence like a searchlight coming on. And it had so much presence I could barely see the pillar through it. It was wild, with floating hair that moved as if it was underwater, and staring, flashing eyes. When it drifted against the pillar I heard it rasp against the stone.

  Zowie. I had a Rogue on my hands. A freaking Rogue. Terror planted a flag inside me and said, ‘I claim this territory in the name of Utter and Outright Fear!’

  Despite what I may have said – and what Ms Rani Cross might have said – no ghosts are exactly a walk in the park. There’s the fear, for a start. Even if you know what they’re doing, the fear they create usually gets at you. You find yourself sweating, maybe trembling, and jumping at noises.

  Then there’s the danger of them attaching themselves. Civilians get it bad enough, and they can’t see the awful thing that’s doing the attaching. Ghost hunters can, and it makes it double-plus awful.

  And, of course, there’s the physical danger. The more solid the ghost, the more hurt it can do.

  I’d heard about Rogues – tall tales from Aunt Tanja – and read about them too. I knew that they were a whole different kettle of horrific. They’re ghosts pumped up on steroids, with enough solidity – when they choose it – to do plenty of damage.

  This Rogue was tall and he had shoulders like two bags of cement. He was wearing an all-over apron sort of thing, stained white trousers and a close-fitting white cloth cap. Had he been spawned by an orderly? A doctor?

  He flew straight for me, his heels a few centimetres above the ground, his toes making furrows, hands extended like claws.

  Standard-issue ghosts want to latch onto people. Rogues, however, are more ambitious. After they maul you, physically, they want to possess you. Their greatest desire, and it’s a burning, hungry need, is to merge with us and take us over. That way they have an ongoing existence of a solid and fleshly kind, which is like the ghost equivalent of nuts and sprinkles.

  Oh, and Rogues are insane, too, which doesn’t add any attractiveness points.

  The only good thing about Rogues is that they are rare, and that they’re even more closely bound to a location than an ordinary ghost. That’s why running is a useful tactic with Rogues. You hope that it’s like running from a guard dog with a very strong chain. Get to the end of the chain and it’s sore neck time, poochie.

  That’s the theory, anyway. With a Rogue you can’t take a squiz at the chain around its neck and get an estimate of how far you have to run before it’s brought up short.

  At first, I just ran, heading back down the road away from the pillar. The trouble is, that went right against the Marin family grain. Leaving the Rogue around wasn’t an option. It had to be dumb luck that no one had stumbled on it. The remoteness, the relative isolation of the location must have helped, but sooner or later someone would come close enough while the thing was manifesting and then it’d be bloody mess time. Or, even worse, possession time.

  I had to do something.

  I took a quick look over my shoulder and the Rogue was still after me. I slewed sideways off the road, across the path and into the trees. I kept going, trying not to trip in the dark and hoping to find the end of Rogue Boy’s home range.

  It didn’t help that the apparition made a hideous whistling through his teeth, like drawing a knife across a blackboard.

  Solid worked both ways, of course. If he could claw and bite me, that meant I could return the favour. Not clawing and biting, of course, but something a bit more stylish, a bit more intelligent, a bit more like something a panicked and skinny eighteen-year-old could manage in the dark.

  I sorted through the options as I wove around a tree that was determined to get in my way. I could trip him, then jump on his back and pummel his skull with my fists. I could scoop up a nice heavy branch and smash his face in. I could flick up a rock with my heel so that it caught the Rogue right in the gut. I could jump over a park bench, roll, come to my feet and give him such an uppercut that he’d be no good for anything.

  In my dreams. Actual combat isn’t my strength. I work in other, more subtle and less bruising, ways.

  Out of the corner of my eye, I saw someone standing in the shadows of a clump of tall gum trees just off the bike path I was now hurtling along. A bad situation was getting worse. Even if I got away, the Rogue had a civilian victim nice and handy.

  The whistling ghost noise behind me changed abruptly, becoming more of a high-pitched scream. If a screechy noise can sound triumphant, this one did, probably at the prospect of two warm and live humans to wreak its revenge on. Believe me, Rogues like nothing better than a good wreaking.

  I skidded to a halt. The Rogue had swung around towards where the civilian was. I had to make it centre on me so the civilian would have a chance to escape. At my expense, but I had a few tricks up my sleeve.

  I could see him, for one, and I could taunt him, for two.

  ‘Hey,’ I yelled to his back. ‘Big bad and crazy! This way! Co
me on, try tangling with someone your own size!’

  My gestures were obscene. I hoped they’d translate down the years.

  Something worked, because he whirled around and I had to swallow the grapefruit-sized lump of fear in my throat. From the feral fury on the thing’s face, I’d succeeded a little too well. He sped at me.

  Then he split himself in half, from head to groin, and flung both sides of himself to the ground where they bounced and raised a little dust.

  At least, that’s what it looked like. When Rani Cross stepped forward she had her sword raised in a salute. ‘You see, Anton,’ she said as she marched past the demi-Rogues on the ground, ‘ghosts are dangerous.’

  I swallowed. ‘Rogue!’

  She spun around, blindingly fast, but the pieces’o’Rogue had already righted themselves and were well on the way to stitching together.

  I weaved around Rani and, before the Rogue could attack, ploughed into him with my hands outstretched.

  I gasped at the greasy cotton-wool feel as my hands sunk into his substance, and he screeched. I’d enjoyed the evening breakfast of toast and orange marmalade I’d had before setting out, but not so much that I wanted to taste it again, coming up this time. I swallowed hard while I hung on.

  He was big, as I’d said, and my hands were wrist-deep in his chest, something that was bound to annoy anyone, alive or dead. He twisted and hissed, and his fists thumped on my back. I kept my head down as he spun around and around crazily, with my chin tucked in so he couldn’t get at my throat or face. That meant I had my nose against his clammy substance. He smelled vile, sour and sickening, like whatever the heck that months-old thing was you found right up the back of the fridge.

  Rani flashed into sight. She had her sword raised. ‘No!’ I squawked as the Rogue swung me past her. ‘Don’t! I’ve got this!’

  And, the next second, I had. I squeezed, twisted and the ghost dissolved.

  Centrifugal force didn’t, though. I was flung through the air and would have kept going for forty or fifty metres, easily, if a tree hadn’t intervened.

  Trunk. Much trunk. So ow.

  I didn’t have that convenient blackout, though, so I felt every bruise and every scrape as I lay there on top of twigs and little rocks and other nature stuff that’s specially designed to be uncomfortable.

 

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