Puzzle (Haunted Series)

by Alexie Aaron

  map pieces leave Th t to ite for

  EG

  Burt stepped back from the board and studied it. He walked back and circled the initials EG. “I think this is part of the puzzle,” he explained.

  “Puzzle pieces,” Ted mused.

  “What do you do with pieces of a puzzle?” Mike asked the room. “Put them TOGETHER!” he said as he clapped his hands.

  Cid looked at him as if he’d lost his nut.

  Mike smiled and tapped his temple. “Just woke up the gray cells.”

  Burt looked at Ted for confirmation, and Ted nodded his head.

  map pieces leave together t it fo

  “Last two words are fit and to,” Ted started, speaking before Burt had the words written on the board. “Fit map pieces together to leave, or To leave, fit map pieces together.”

  “Well you heard him, gentlemen, time to get to work. I wonder how many maps are on this floor. Do we have to put all of them together?” Burt asked and looked to the board for instructions. None came.

  They started by picking up all the papers and clearing a spot on the floor on which to sort and lay out their stacks of ripped maps from old homework assignments.

  Cid looked at each homework paper as it was laid out. He commented, “This kid’s got all A’s so far. I. Levisohn. Watch your back, Ted, I. Levisohn is coming up fast.”

  ~

  Murphy moved through the trees surrounding the ugly school. To him, the square building was little more than a prison. Earlier, he voiced his observation to his friend and was surprised that Mia couldn’t find anything wrong with his assessment. He wondered if this had to do with the present situation or her memories of her academic life. He was proud of his eighth-grade education. It gave him all the tools he needed to exist and thrive in his timeline. Today, however, if PBS was to be believed, you needed the full twelve years plus college to be able to support yourself.

  The Public Broadcasting System had been a way for him to relate to the corporals living in the house he built. Before he learned to manipulate static fixtures in this word, Murphy was at the mercy of the viewing habits of others. Now, as long as he didn’t blast the volume, Ted let him watch whatever he wanted, whenever he wished. Before this, his world was Antiques Roadshow and This Old House. Now he catered to anything that would improve his education. If he was going to be able to compete with Angelo Michaels, he knew that he needed a better handle on this century and what came in between.

  ~

  “I’ve got a piece of Mozambique, some ocean and most of Madagascar,” Ted announced.

  “Hand it here, I’ve got a lot of Africa,” Burt told him. “I’ve got Kyrgyzstan. I assume it goes somewhere near all the other stans.”

  “Pardon?” Mike asked.

  “Pakistan, Afghanistan, Kazakhstan…” he listed. “But I’ll be damned if I know where?”

  “Guys, you’re over thinking this,” Cid said taking on a school teacher’s tone. “Look at the colors and the shapes of the pieces. You don’t need a master’s degree to see what fits and what doesn’t.”

  “Cyclops has a point,” Ted said, getting off the floor and looking down. “Mike, last time I looked, Greenland was in the north Atlantic.”

  Mike shot him a go-ef-yourself look and traded Greenland with Antarctica. “I used to be so smart. But it’s all these numbers that I keep in my head that are fouling me up.”

  “Numbers, really? Wasn’t it you that couldn’t subtract five point five from seven point five just a half an hour ago?” Ted accused.

  “Phone numbers,” he clarified. “I have hot Tina’s number memorized. Can’t put it in my phone because Nosy Rita will find it and ask who Tina is. Cicero Cindy’s phone number is the same as Tina’s - can you believe it? - except for the area code. I called her thinking I was calling Tina. Ended up okay, but when you’re in the mood for Tina, Cindy just isn’t going to do,” he explained.

  Ted looked at Mike and then over at Burt. “I thought this was going to be an academic discussion, but, whoa, I was wrong there,” he said, shaking his head.

  “It is academic,” Burt argued. “Mike’s doing an anthropological study of the sexual habits of Chicago women, depending on what side of the city they grew up in.”

  Ted stared at Burt, until Burt broke out laughing.

  “I had you going there, didn’t I?” Burt said.

  “You, sir, are a good liar. Makes me wonder about all those compliments you’ve been throwing around,” Ted said suspiciously.

  Burt just laughed.

  Cid pulled the teacher’s desk over and stood on top of it. “Guys, we almost have it. It’s a Rand McNally world map. Alaska in the left corner. Arctic Ocean in the right one. Let’s treat this like a jigsaw puzzle. Corners first. Straight edges, and then it shouldn’t take us too long.”

  Cid stood there and directed the other three. Soon the map was taking form. There were a number of missing pieces and no paper to be found on the floor. “What’s missing?”

  “The Netherlands, Chile, Illinois… no, next to it, Missouri just part of it, and the east side of England, the part facing the English Channel,” Burt said.

  “Do you think they’re missing or destroyed? I mean the teenagers may have been in here before us,” Ted mentioned.

  “What makes you think that? Is it the globes used for kickball or the blood?” Mike asked.

  “Sarcasm noted,” Burt said. “Moving on, what do you think of when you think of these places? Think in a middle-school-lesson way,” he suggested.

  “Holland’s in the Netherlands,” Mike informed them. “I think of windmills…”

  “Wind,” Ted said looking around. “No fans, but we have an air vent.” He pulled a chair along with him. He stood on it and looked into the vent. He nodded. “There is something in here. He reached into his pocket and looked at the change there. He extracted a dime and used it to unscrew the common-headed screws holding the vent into place. He loosened one side and took the screw out of the other. Ted reached inside and pulled out a small torn piece of paper folded up. He tossed it to Mike who was waiting below him.

  Mike opened it up and shouted, “The Netherlands!”

  “Chile,” Cid called out.

  “Cold,” Mike answered lamely.

  Ted jumped down off the chair and ran over to the thermostat. He pulled off the cover, and tucked inside was the part of the map they were looking for. “Here I was thinking that Mike was dumb, but turns out he’s just a savant.”

  Chile was laid in place.

  “Missouri,” Cid called out.

  “Stubborn people,” Mike replied.

  “Rams, Cardinals, Aces, Blues,” Burt listed.

  “Show me state,” Mike piped in, then his face lit up. “Gateway to the west.”

  “Gateway… door… Which is the west door?” Ted asked, trying to get his bearings.

  “That one, the one we haven’t been through.” Burt pointed.

  It took Ted two strides to get there. He examined the doorframe and shook his head. He next looked at the knob itself and reported, “Nothing.”

  “Gateway assumes we have to go through, look under the door,” Burt instructed.

  Ted dropped to the floor. He flattened his hand out and inched it under the door. He withdrew it and pulled out a scrap of paper. He flipped it over and called, “Missouri!”

  “That leaves England,” Cid said getting down. “But just the part facing the channel.”

  “I’m running every movie about England in my head, and it’s too much,” Ted complained.

  Burt looked at the map and then at himself. He dusted off the chalk from erasing the anagram. “Is Dover there, the chalk cliffs?” he asked the other three.

  “Does it matter? Go look, Amerigo,” Ted ordered.

  Burt walked over and ran his hand along the chalkboard. At the edge of the right side a small piece of paper jutted out. He drew it out carefully and opened it. “Dover.” He handed it to Cid who carefully put it in plac
e. The west door swung open.

  “I’d say that was an invitation, men,” Burt said, walking boldly towards the door.

  “As predicted, the tests are getting harder,” Ted commented to Mike as they walked through the door and congregated in the hall.

  “We should expect the tests or trials to get harder and harder,” Mike said and then asked, “But why?”

  Cid walked through the door, and it slammed behind him.

  “It’s testing us to see how smart we are,” Ted observed. “I expect later it will test us individually. It’s looking for something or someone. Right now it’s satisfied in taking us on as a team. My common sense tells me that soon it will try to turn us against each other to weed out the weak ones. That’s how I’d do it if I were making a video game,” Ted answered.

  Cid nodded in agreement. “I hate to think of being separated from you guys. Together we are a hell of a team. Apart, we have some weaknesses.”

  “Speak for yourself, Popeye,” Mike joked.

  “At least I can do simple subtraction,” Cid fired back.

  “Boys, boys, you just proved Ted right,” Burt said. “His ego is big enough as it is. Come on, the drops lead this way. By the way, there are fewer of them. Either the kid has stopped bleeding or…”

  “He has run out of blood,” Ted completed.

  They quickened their pace. Cid stopped, letting the others go by him. He thought he heard something. A solitary voice screaming something he couldn’t quite make out. He pulled his ear com from his ear and tilted his head. The sound was coming from the floor.

  Ted noticed Cid had fallen back. He grabbed Burt’s arm and stopped him. They both turned to see Cid lying on his stomach with his ear pressed to the floor. He raised a hand to keep them quiet. Cid got up and trotted over to them. “I heard a faint voice. It said that we were in danger if we continued. If we chose to carry on, we better learn to run,” he reported.

  “Was it the entity?” Burt asked.

  Cid shrugged. “I got the idea that it was on our side, whatever it was.”

  “We have no choice but to continue, but let’s heed the advice, team. Let’s run to our next test. Wait. Run like we are one. Left right left right,” he called in cadence.

  The others fell into step with Burt. They ran as one down the hall.

  Chapter Seven

  Dave lugged the generators over to where Mia wanted them. They were heavy, and he was aching, but he continued, still wanting to do his part. The afternoon was waning, and soon it would be dark. There was a chill in the air already; by nightfall it would be cold. He kept an eye out for the axe man. Mia assured him that he was a friend and was to be trusted. Dave, however, never took anyone on recommendation only. Be it saint or spirit, they had to prove themselves to him. Gullibility and blind trust only had brought him misery when he was growing up.

  Mia was a strange bird. She had a toughness to her but was so vulnerable at the same time. He watched her dance between the confidence of knowing what her role was, to worry, because she was unused to being the one waiting outside of the fray. She had confessed that the person waiting had the hardest job of all.

  He grabbed the cables and attached them into the side of the truck. The PEEPs vehicle was impressive. It looked like a painted, small moving van, but on closer examination, it was a technological marvel. There were places for everything needed for a professional ghost investigation inside. It did have an overwhelming scent of bygone fast food and stale coffee, but after a few minutes he got used to it.

  Dave walked around the truck and was enveloped in a mass of ice cold air. Breathing in the iced oxygen hurt his lungs. He fought the overwhelming urge to run. Fear, hurt and anger filled his body. He heard the screams of men on a battlefield, the pleas of mercy, the deniance of God, and the calls for parents from voices too young to die. He took a step backward and out of the entity he had unknowingly stepped into.

  Before him, emerging out of the still air, stood a man in a tattered blue uniform. His eyes bore into Dave’s. Dave tried to walk around him, but the man stepped to intercept him.

  “Not the axe man,” Dave managed to squeak out.

  “Did you say something… Whoa, who do we have here?” Mia said, walking towards them.

  The Union soldier looked from Dave to Mia and back again.

  “We can see you. What do you want?” Mia said, her eyes taking in the ghost and the stealthy approach of Murphy behind the entity.

  “Home,” the ghost managed.

  Mia watched the entity’s eyes fill with tears, and as they fell, he drew out a patched and worn handkerchief to wipe them away.

  “Where is home?” she asked tenderly.

  “St. Charles, do you know it?”

  “If it’s the St. Charles along the Fox River, I do. Do you have a name you care to share with us? I’m Mia Cooper and this is David Hult.”

  “Captain William Shelby of the Evan Shelbys.”

  “William, are you aware that you’re dead?”

  “Yes’m.”

  “A lot of time has passed, and home may not be what you remembered it to be,” Mia warned him.

  “Nothing is as it was,” he answered sadly. “But I must return.”

  “I’m from those parts. I’ll take you home, but I can’t leave until I finish here,” Mia explained. “I have a friend, Stephen Murphy, of the Cold Creek Hollow Murphys, here with me. He can explain things to you.”

  “Thank you, miss,” William said.

  “Murph,” Mia called. “Come over and meet William Shelby, he’s from St. Charles. He’s lost his way home,” she explained.

  Murphy touched his chest and pointed north.

  “I told him, we could take him home after we resolve this situation. He’s a bit confused, could you please talk to him?”

  Murphy indicated that he would try but no promises. He walked over and extended a hand of friendship. The soldier tried to grasp it, but the physics weren’t right. He nodded instead. Murphy waved him away from Mia and the truck that was filled with electronics that his and William’s electromagnetic field could foul up.

  Dave watched the two walk away and fade into the trees.

  “How freaking cool was that!” Dave said, forgetting he was a sullen teenager for a moment. “Can we do it? Can we get him home?”

  “We can try,” Mia said, not making any promises. She still didn’t know why he wanted to go home, whether he was tied to the area, and where his remains were buried. All these questions she hoped Murphy would sort out for her. “Right now, we need to get set up for nightfall. I’m expecting Homely and Doc soon. I hope to dear god they thought to bring food. I’m imploding.”

  Dave smiled at her exaggeration. He was starving too.

  ~

  Richie rolled up his hoodie and placed it under Mason’s head. The tough guy looked at him in appreciation. He was too weak to talk. The boys had laid him on the bottom bench of the bleachers. The teenagers were surprised when they found the doors to the gymnasium open. It was barely bigger than a regulation basketball court, with two upper decks accessible by stairs in each corner of the lower floor. The playing court of the gym was made of a rubber-like polymer. Its silver sheen sparkled when the overhead lights burst into life.

  John went immediately to the exit doors and tried each one. He didn’t expect the ones to the outside to allow them escape, but the boys’ and girls’ locker rooms may have been unknowingly left open. They weren’t. Whatever game they were in, it was well thought out. An expert in gaming systems, John realized early that the odds were stacked against them, but it was possible to win. After all, he had been in impossible situations before. True, they had been in a world where he moved the player with a controller or keyboard and watched with little passion as the avatar died over and over again until he got it right. Unfortunately, in this game, they had no choice but to get it right the first time.

  The last room, it had taken them almost a full day to figure out. It wasn’t that the
y weren’t smart. But their focus was on getting Mason out and to a hospital. John knew the kid was hours away from dying. He had sat there on the floor of the geography room, leaning against the far wall. He watched them through swollen slits as they tried to figure out the message on the board. It was he who finally rasped out, “Anagram,” before he slid over, falling once again into oblivion.

  Troy was scratching at his arms again. The pain med he dry-swallowed, he knew he was allergic to it. Still, he preferred the itching to the thought of coming down from his high. He knew that he should have given the pill to Mason, but he selfishly held on to it. Mason wasn’t long for this world anyway. Why waste the high on him?

  John motioned for the guys to congregate across the court from Mason. Chuck and Josh lumbered over, their energy depleted as they had taken it upon themselves to carry Mason through the last corridor.

  “Richie, how is he?” John asked.

  “Not good. Without water he is fading fast. The bleeding has stopped, but without any food or water he’s got nothing to run on.”

  The doors they had not long ago walked through opened, and Chuck and Josh didn’t hesitate to run towards them, pushing aside the fact that they hadn’t been asked to complete a task or solve a problem yet. John and Richie went back for Mason.

  Chuck reached the door first and hit a wall of what he thought was flesh. He pushed at the invisible form, and it pushed back. Josh inched his way around Chuck and had made the door when he heard the steady stamp of feet falling in unison. He stood back and watched in amazement as four adult males ran down the hall towards the gym. He backpedaled inside, running into Chuck and the invisible warden. Both boys were flung away with such force that they rolled several feet after they hit the ground. Chuck slid towards Troy, toppling him as if he were the lone pin in a bowling alley.

  Burt caught a glimpse of the kid and raced to the door. With the others close behind him, he made the open door just as the hall lights went out. He wasn’t sure, but it was as if the energy was being sucked out of the lights and into the room they just entered. Room wasn’t a correct assumption. He felt the spring in the floor and took in the large empty space before him. It was a gymnasium, equipped with bleachers and a broken array of teenage boys bleeding on the floor. Two sound males were supporting an unconscious boy between them at the far end of the court.