The Shadow Fixer

by Matthew S. Cox

“Wonderful.” Captain Eze’s smile became even wider. “Stand by.” He looked to his left. “Bianca, my people have secured the hostage. Give your team the green light.”

  A female voice in the background said, “Nice, Jonathan. Time to rock and roll.”

  Must be another captain if they’re using first names.

  Kirsten stood to block the girl’s view of a large box sliding out from under the cot and going into the corridor seemingly by itself.

  “What happened to me?” asked Kena. “I don’t understand why I walked from my bedroom to the garage where these creeps kidnapped me. My body just did it.”

  Kirsten bit her lip. She’d feel horrible not being truthful with the kid but telling her a ghost possessed her might traumatize her for life, leaving her constantly afraid of a repeat attack. However, she felt far more comfortable being honest—gently. “What happened to you is a little outside events people expect from the ordinary world. It’s an extremely rare situation, and also the reason we found you.”

  “You guys are like the psionic cops, right? Did someone have like a vision of me? Clairvoyant, right?”

  The girl’s lack of fear or derision around the word ‘psionic’ surprised Kirsten. She smiled. “Clairvoyant is what we call anyone who can see people or places far away, but it’s not how we found you. There’s someone out there doing bad things. He made a ghost take over your body and kidnap you.”

  Kena fidgeted. “I never saw a ghost, but I caught some EVPs in my apartment building.”

  “Wow.” Dorian gestured at the teen. “Nice to run into someone who doesn’t think you’re crazy.”

  “I didn’t know ghosts could take people over and control them.” Kena relaxed somewhat, lowering her legs so her knees no longer blocked most of her face. “Did I make one angry?”

  “No. The ghost who attacked you didn’t want to do it. Someone forced him to. As soon as the control stopped, the spirit came to me and told me what happened so I could help you.”

  “Umm. Weird. Why did he find you?”

  “She does all the ghost stuff.” Nicole grinned. “Much easier for spirits to get help from people who can see and talk to them.”

  “I can explain everything once we get you out of here and safe, okay?” Kirsten glanced down at the E-90 in her lap. “We’re going to sit here and protect you until Division 1 secures the building. This looks like a panic room, so it should be a good place to defend for now.”

  Kena tugged the T-shirt down, trying to make it cover more of her thighs. “Okay. Why did they steal my clothes?”

  “To hide evidence. Didn’t want any identifiable materials in the building. Or maybe they were worried you had trackers sewn into whatever you’d been wearing.” Nicole looked away, her expression saying she likely thought the kidnappers wanted to hide evidence in the ashes when they set off the device in here.

  “Oh.” The girl shivered.

  “Captain?” asked Kirsten. “The spirit mentioned a possible extortion or demand of the father. Can you please have someone inform him we’ve got her safe?”

  “Of course. I will call him right away.”

  “What’s the ETA on Div 1?”

  Captain Eze glanced at another screen to his left. “They should be landing outside right now.”

  Kena leaned closer, looked at the captain’s image on the screen, and seemed to shed the last of her doubt the police and found her. She grabbed Kirsten from behind. “They were gonna kill me, weren’t they?”

  A lump formed in Kirsten’s throat, but she swallowed it, positioning herself to shield the teen from bullets coming in the doorway. “I’m not going to let anyone hurt you. Stay behind me.” She raised her E-90. “Anyone who tries to get in here is going to regret it.”

  “Damn right.” Nicole took a knee in the door, pointing her E-86 down the hall. “Not bad, K. I still can’t believe you never reattempted the UAT course.”

  Kirsten rolled her eyes. “They didn’t think I’d ever need it. Remember, I’m supposed to walk into a completely safe scene and figure out what the ghost did.”

  “Not working out quite the way they expected it to,” said Dorian, his expression grim.

  “Wilbert?” asked Kirsten.

  “Yeah. I’m still here.” The ghost phased out from the wall, ending up inside the autoshower tube for a moment, fogging the plastic. He stepped away from it, fading from transparent to seemingly solid. “Was keeping an eye on the hallway.”

  “Do you know where the man is who forced you to attack Kena?”

  “Not exactly. He found me at my office… but I can go look for him. Assuming he doesn’t control me again.”

  Kirsten peered through the E-90’s ring-dot sight at the door. “Please… just keep a good distance. Depending on how strong an astral he is, he’ll be able to feel your presence if you get too close.”

  “Understood.” Wilbert ran back into the wall.

  A blaring alarm tone sounded out in the hall, followed by a man’s voice.

  “Attention: by authority of the National Police Force, the Sencor Electronics building is on lockdown. All occupants are to consider themselves detained at this time. Security personnel are hereby ordered to disarm themselves immediately and move at least fifty feet from any weapons. Noncompliance may result in lethal force.”

  “Here we go,” whispered Nicole.

  Kena shivered.

  “Don’t worry. The hard part’s over.” Kirsten squeezed the grip on her weapon. “We’re just being extra careful.”

  26

  Risk Management

  Hours later, Kirsten sat at her desk in the squad room, filling out a form while slurping down a strawberry-chocolate latte.

  Division 1 had basically detained everyone inside the Sencor building, processing them individually and releasing anyone who they had no reason to suspect knew about the abduction. Fortunately, Kirsten, Nicole, and Kena didn’t need to sit there the whole time. As soon as armored patrol officers found them in the panic room, they escorted them outside.

  The most difficult part had been trying to convince Kena’s mother not to try suing the ghost, which turned out to be harder than convincing her parents ghosts existed at all. Dorian appearing briefly made getting past their skepticism relatively easy.

  With the girl home safe, her parents gearing up to sue the hell out of Sencor, and the rash of random hauntings seemingly over, Kirsten set herself to the task of stopping the not-so-random hauntings. Unfortunately, Abernathy and Elan Mendoza had little success in Carlos Bennett’s office beyond overhearing someone confirm ‘the fixer’ had been successful in arranging Mendoza’s death. Elan’s revenge would be petty, chilling every hot meal Bennett tried to eat for as long as it took him to get bored doing it.

  She finished filling out the form to request video from the office building Wilbert Yong haunted, hoping to catch a glimpse of the rogue astral. It seemed almost an odd coincidence for him to also have Suggestion. Marley didn’t, nor did Hannah—the teen Division 0 activated in East City to fill the same (or as same as possible) role as Kirsten in the west. Hannah couldn’t lash, so her only recourse for nasty spirits was a bound sword.

  Captain Eze’s voice came out of her terminal. “Wren? Got a minute?”

  Since she hadn’t done anything even close to questionable lately, and his tone sounded concerned, the usual twisty feeling in her gut whenever he summoned her to his office didn’t happen. “On my way.”

  She submitted the request, locked the terminal, and got up.

  Not seeing the captain waiting for her in the doorway also indicated good news—or at least the absence of bad news. She walked in to find him seated at his desk, no particular emotion on his face.

  “Yes, captain?”

  He gestured at the chairs facing his desk. “Merely looking for an update. You have an astonishing number of open Inquests pending report completion.”

  “Oh. That.” She exhaled into a slouch, then sat, staring into the carved eyes of mini A
frican tribal masks standing in a row along the front edge of his desk. “I know they’ve been piling up, but it’s been one after another after another. Trying to put the fires out first before I waste time in the office typing reports. Not saying reports are a waste of time, but I figured it would be better to find the reason so many spirits are going crazy first.”

  “Understandable. Kirsten, the kidnapping of Kena Carlin set off a shitstorm with the brass. I need a status update, something I can give them to explain the situation.”

  She squirmed, worried how Command would react to someone weaponizing ghosts. “We had two separate issues going on at the same time. Marley Santiago, the other astral I registered a few days ago, is the reason the random hauntings spiked by a thousand percent. She didn’t realize she had psionic abilities. Her getting so emotionally invested in her music, plus being high on Placid Rain, affected the emotions of people and spirits around her. Somehow, her Telempathy integrated with her Astral Sense. It’s not quite the same as me, since Lash is totally different from Mind Blast. In her case, she’s using Telempathy on spirits, which doesn’t work normally. Also, her radius of effect on spirits is noticeably larger than on live people depending on what kind of audio equipment she has set up. In her apartment, where the walls mostly contained the sound, she affected only people up to about four stories overhead. Spirits could hear her music for over a mile. If she played at a concert, she’d affect her entire living audience.”

  Captain Eze pursed his lips. “I did notice the influx of haunting calls had dropped off again, thankfully.”

  “Yes. Since she’s now aware of her ability, she’s able to contain it. I showed her how to Blockade her home studio. It should contain her power, at least so it doesn’t affect spirits.”

  “How did she accidentally influence a ghost to possess and abduct this girl?” Captain Eze brought his hands together, steepling his fingers in front of his chest.

  “She didn’t. Marley had nothing to do with the Carlin case. We have a second problem.” Kirsten hesitated. A few seconds of delay gave him a few seconds where he might not be tempted to lie to Command. “It’s scary bad, sir.”

  He raised an eyebrow.

  “I have reason to believe there is another astral sensitive out there who has figured out how to use Suggestion on spirits. I haven’t really worked on my Suggestion enough to do much beyond short command phrases, but this guy is able to implant complicated… umm… almost programs. Wilbert Yong, the ghost who possessed Kena, sought me out as soon as he broke free of the command.” She explained meeting him, his plea for help, and everything leading up to going into the Sencor building undercover. “The suspect ambushed Wilbert at the office he haunts. Lennox Beake, another ghost, told me a man mind-controlled him to attack a construction site with the intent of driving the workers off and forcing the company to abandon the project. This guy is basically an underworld fixer, sir. But instead of liaising between shady people with money and mercenaries willing to break the law, he’s arranging for spirits to unwillingly do the job.” She explained the ghostly spying at Lyris Corporation, which resulted in suspicious stock market trading—and a call from a Division 2 detective. “I wasn’t sure if it would be wise to tell Detective Winfield exactly what happened.”

  “What is making you hesitate? Think he’ll laugh about the idea of ghosts?” Captain Eze smiled.

  “No, sir. Think about it. How could anyone possibly defend themselves against a spirit? They could go anywhere, watch anything. Eavesdrop on the highest levels of a corporate boardroom meeting or even the Senate.”

  Captain Eze exhaled. “This is potentially the scariest thing that’s ever happened.”

  She blinked, then started to smirk, but stopped herself. “Hardly.”

  “I mean to the brass.” He chuckled. “Someone capable of sending ghosts anywhere to do anything with total impunity?”

  They stared at each other. She bit her lip, remembering how Theodore and The Kind put pressure on Senator Winchester at her request. Even a man as powerful and connected as him could do nothing whatsoever about ghosts. The look Eze gave her said he knew she could, in theory, ask ghosts to spy on anyone the same way as the suspect. But then again, she wouldn’t have to. Anyone capable of Astral Projection could do simple spying themselves.

  “It’s not quite the same,” whispered Kirsten, fighting off a twinge of guilt. “This guy can force ghosts to do whatever he wants. I can only ask. And ghosts are not the most helpful of beings. Most of them can’t or don’t want to go very far away from where they haunt. Even Wilbert, the ghost who possessed Kena? He literally couldn’t leave the place where he died. The poor man had no perception of reality, being unable to see live people the way normals can’t see ghosts. He re-lived the moment of his mortal death over and over like a residual haunting. He’d been possessing people in the lab where he died continuously, trying to keep working, unaware of how much time had passed since his death. This guy yanked him out of that and fired him off like a guided missile.”

  Captain Eze took a moment to process her words. “Off the record, because I know you would never do anything like this… but if you were inclined to use a spirit to obtain secret information for financial gain, how likely is it you could succeed?”

  She gripped her knees. “Well, umm… speaking purely in a theoretical sense, I wouldn’t have to. Just spying on people can be done via Astral Projection. No need to affect physical objects. However, if someone with Astral Sense couldn’t project or didn’t want to for some reason, they would have to find a spirit capable of going to the place they need, one who isn’t bound to their remains or scene of death. Then, they’d have to somehow convince the spirit to help them out. Depending on the integrity of the ghost’s mind, they may or may not be able to remember everything clearly or could always make stuff up. Nine out of ten ghosts would probably tell them to go away. The astral would almost have to find a spirit with an unfulfilled need, like ‘go get this info for me and I’ll kill the person who killed you’ or a similar situation. If it even worked, the ghost would only help once. They couldn’t keep asking the same ghost to do job after job.” She paused to breathe. “I suppose it’s maybe possible for someone to threaten the spirit’s remaining family, or even save the life of their grandkid or something and earn long time gratitude they can use as leverage for favors. Doing stuff like hurting people can’t be done by a projection since we’re totally intangible. Assassination or scaring people away would require ghosts—but the same complications of finding one willing to help apply, plus finding one old and powerful enough to affect the physical world. Ugh. I feel sleazy even talking about this.”

  Captain Eze leaned forward, resting his arms on the desk. “Sounds like it’s not terribly plausible.”

  “Not really. I told you about, umm, certain parties no longer being a threat to me or Division 0, thanks to the intervention of certain ghosts, but… totally different scenario.”

  “Of course. And, if you ask me, completely above board.” His expression said, ‘serves the bastard right.’

  Kirsten picked at her uniform leg. “I have no idea yet where the suspect is located, but I’m working on it. Gotta stop this guy before astrals end up being declared a national security risk.”

  “That entirely depends on the impression we make on Command. Based on what you’re telling me, this is something of a one-off situation. The complications involved in an astral doing anything like this when they lack the ability to forcibly control spirits makes it impractical.”

  “Yes. Even calling it ‘impractical’ is a bit soft. I’d say impossible, but it’s not. Just really, really unlikely. It would totally be easier to hire living people.”

  “All right. Let me know if there’s anything I can do to help.”

  She smiled. “I just submitted a request for video surveillance. You could approve it.”

  Captain Eze laughed. “Consider it done.”

  27

  Culpable


  Kirsten’s armband gave off an alarm tone simultaneously with Captain Eze’s terminal.

  After almost two weeks of near-constant 21-47 calls, the tone made her want to scream ‘what now?’ but she held back. She raised her arm, the holo-panel scrolling into view automatically.

  “Lieutenant…” The image of a twentyish man in an Admin uniform appeared on the screen. “We have a high-priority situation at the Division 1 precinct office in Sector 2514. I’m not sure what code to use because it’s a complete mess. Officers down. Electronics and tech going crazy. Reports of unexplainable paranormal events.”

  Kirsten jumped out of the chair, glanced briefly at Captain Eze who spoke to someone on his holo-panel, and decided this situation couldn’t wait for him to finish, so she ran out the door. “Don’t worry about codes… officers are down? What’s going on?”

  “It’s difficult to get information since communications in or out of the precinct station are extremely distorted. Audio-only contacts report a heavily augmented individual rushed the front doors and opened fire. Officers have been unable to defend due to equipment failure.”

  Son of a bitch is attacking police now… She growled, sprinting harder down the hall to the elevator. Due to her arm moving rapidly from running, the call to Dispatch leapt to her earbud.

  “Trying to get more information, but all I’m hearing is gunfire and screaming.”

  “Shit,” yelled Kirsten, jumping into the elevator and mashing the button for the ground floor. “2514 isn’t far from here. Like thirty miles. I’ll be there in like a minute. Console, power up the patrol craft and open my door.”

  “Copy, lieutenant,” said Dispatch. “Monitoring.”

  “Command confirmed,” replied a placid female voice from her forearm guard.

  Kirsten squeezed herself between the elevator doors as soon as they started to open and sprinted down the hall to the garage. Her patrol craft already gave off a cloud of cryonic mist and sparks, the driver-side door open.