A Spookies Compendium

by David Robinson

  Swede bared his teeth. “I’ll die first.”

  “It’s your choice.” The High Master looked up and then back down.

  Everything happened in a blur. The High Master’s right hand slipped into his robe and came out again, lashing sideways at Swede’s neck. Steel glinted in the thin moonlight. Pain coursed through him. His hands came to his throat in an effort to stem the flow of blood. It felt warm to his hands. He gurgled and collapsed to his knees. Darkness descended upon him.

  He looked up into the starlit sky, past their hooded heads, and with his dying breath, he hissed, “Let the power of Vali give my spirit the strength to avenge this injustice.”

  Then suddenly the lights went out, and he was floating above them, looking down on them as they studied his body. He was consumed with anger.

  The High Master spoke, but his soothing, mellifluous tones were gone. Instead, it was the harsh tongue of the streetwise barking orders at his lieutenants. “Pick that crap up and let’s get it outta here.”

  “What we gonna do with him, Master?” asked the squat gorilla.

  “I know just the place,” said the High Master with a chuckle. “And no one will ever think of looking for him there. Pick him up. Come on, move your arses.”

  And as they moved his body, he felt the fury rising in him.

  “Vali, Vali, Vali, Vali, VALI!”

  *****

  Despite Pete’s greater height and longer stride, it was Sceptre who got to Kevin first.

  She found him halfway down the stairs, slumped against the banister, his eyes glazed, fighting for breath. Scurrying to him, she grasped his hand and rubbed it. “Kevin. Kevin. Come back, Kevin.”

  His breath came in gasps, each shorter than the last, and he began to turn bright red.

  “Pete!” Sceptre cried.

  The ex-policeman arrived alongside her, his features grim, determined. He shook his old friend. “Kev. Come on, Kev, this is Pete.”

  “Ak …ak … ak” Kevin mouth was open, trying to draw breath.

  “He’s choking.”

  Pete rolled Kevin over. “Come on, Kev, breath in, man. Come on.”

  A gurgling sound was all that came back.

  “Pete, he’s dying.” Sceptre’s voice was practically a cry.

  “Not on my watch, he isn’t.” Pete rolled Kevin back, sat him up. His face was now purple, his lips blue. Pete slapped him across the cheek. Red marks appeared where his hand had struck. Still Kevin could not breathe. Pete slapped him again, and again, and a fourth time.

  Finally, Kevin pulled in a great WHOOP. He coughed and belched. Spittle dribbled from his open mouth. His pupils sharpened and came back into focus. Gradually his breathing settled, he clutched one hand to his head and rubbed his cheek with the other.

  Sceptre crouched alongside him, her arm around his shoulder, her face etched with concern. “Thank God for that,” she breathed. “Oh, Kevin, we were so worried.”

  “I’m ... I’m all right now.”

  She cuddled him, as much for her own relief as his. “Do you want to talk about it?”

  Alarm returned to his face. “It was him. The man in black. I saw him.”

  Pete handed over a bottle of water. Kevin gulped down a mouthful.

  “You okay?” Pete asked. “I had to slap your pretty hard there. I thought we’d lost you for a minute.”

  Kevin burped again and put the top back on the water bottle. “I’ve one or two bruises where I wouldn’t wanna show my mum,” he said, rubbing a hand on his buttocks, “a bump on the bonce, and I’ll not thank you for slapping me around like that, but I’ll be okay.” Once again, the urgency returned to his features. “Pete, Sceptre, I saw him. He came at me and then I was him.”

  Sceptre frowned. “I don’t understand.”

  Kevin flipped up the cap on the bottle and took another mouthful of water. “He was at the far end of the corridor, only he wasn’t and then he came straight for me and then I was him.”

  “Possession,” Sceptre gasped.

  Frowning, Pete looked up to the camera and back to Kevin. “So how did you end up down here?”

  Kevin’s chin jutted forward. “How the hell would I know? I was on the top step, fixing the camera feeds after some big-footed twonk fell over them. When the man in black joined with me, I must have rolled down the stairs.” His pleading eyes turned on Sceptre. “He’s not the old vicar. Emmet. He’s someone else and he was murdered.”

  As if he were trying to be kind, Pete nipped back up the stairs, and checked the corridor. “Well he isn’t here now, buddy.”

  Sceptre helped Kevin to his feet and up the steps.

  “I only saw him on the camera,” Kevin said. “When I looked away from the lens, he wasn’t here.”

  “Just like the image on the camera Sherlock spoke about?” Pete said. His face settled into a thoughtful pose. “I think someone’s playing games with us just like they did the movie people.”

  “No.” Kevin raised his voice. “Pete, you’re not listening. I watched him on the camera. He came towards me. And when he touched the camera, I saw how they killed him.” Eyes pleading for them to believe him, he turned to Sceptre. “This guy is — was — known as Swede. He was with these guys dressed in robes and hoods and this one bod, called the High Master, he sliced Swede’s throat.”

  “Just calm down, Kev,” Pete said.

  Kevin was not listening. “He kept saying Vali.”

  Sceptre stared. “You heard him?”

  “Yes.” Kevin’s eyes burned into her. “Is there something wrong with that, or do you think I imagined it, too?”

  Sceptre patted his arm. “Of course not, Kevin.”

  He looked up into her face and its distant, thoughtful composure, and his temper rose. “Yes you do. You both think I’m a bloody idiot.”

  “No, Kevin,” Sceptre assured him. “I’m convinced you’re a sensitive, and you wouldn’t lie about this.” She looked to Pete for encouragement.

  “I think he’s a sensitive too,” Pete agreed. “I think he’s sensitive to too many choccies and bottles of lager.”

  “I know what I saw,” Kevin shouted.

  “I’m not arguing about that. I’m simply disagreeing about the cause.” Pete sat with them on the top step. “Remember, the movie producers have seen this thing too. At least according to Sherlock they have. The way he tells it, they saw it on camera but not in reality. You’re the electronics man. What price someone was beaming signals in on their frequencies and they’re trying it with us right now?”

  Sceptre stood up. “Let’s find out.”

  “You’re asking Fishcake?” Pete wanted to know.

  “His name is Fishwick,” Sceptre said, “and yes, I will ask him.”

  “Fat lot of good that will do,” muttered Pete. “I don’t even believe in Fishwick.”

  Sceptre ignored him. “Fishwick? Are you there?”

  *****

  Alerted by the mistress’ call, Fishwick returned from the crypt where he had been mingling with other spirits.

  “I’m right here, Madam.”

  “Fishwick, we’ve had some activity up here. Is the Reverend Emmet with us?”

  “Indeed he is, Madam, but he’s in the crypt, keeping an eye on his beer money. I’ve been watching him.”

  “As far as you’re aware, he hasn’t been on this landing, hasn’t been in the library and hasn’t been tricking our cameras?” Sceptre asked.

  “No, Madam.”

  “Are you aware of any other spirits who may have been on this landing?”

  Fishwick was doubtful. “I’ve been keeping a close eye on the Reverend Emmet, Madam, and it’s possible that others may have been there. I regret, Milady, that in death, as in life, I cannot be in two places at once.”

  Even as he said it, Fishwick wondered whether he should have done. The mistress, however, did not take his words as an admonishment.

  “Of course,” she agreed. “Fishwick, we appear to have the spirit here of som
eone who was murdered. Is your angry spirit in the area?”

  “Indeed he has been here, Milady, but I do not see him now.”

  “All right, then,” Sceptre insisted, “are there any other spirits close by who could have been murdered?”

  “I shall make inquiries, Madam.”

  “Thank you, Fishwick.”

  While Sceptre went back to dealing with her colleagues, Fishwick put himself amongst the many spirits in the area, asking question here and there, receiving curt answers, often no answers.

  Even though the energy forms populating the Spirit Plane were aware that they no longer existed in the real world, many of them retained the territorial instincts that had plagued them as real beings. They regarded other spirits, like Fishwick, as interlopers, intruding on their private space.

  In the background, a spirit glowed angry red.

  “Oh, so you’re back,” Fishwick muttered. “Have you been upsetting the mistress and her chums?”

  “Vali,” said the spirit.

  “Sorry, son,” Fishwick said, “but it still don’t make any sense to me.”

  “Vali,” said the spirit.

  Chapter Seven

  In the real world, the debate carried on all the way from the upper landing to the dining hall. Kevin made his case, Pete disagreed, Sceptre tried to keep the peace.

  Once back at their base, Pete made tea while Sceptre made an effort to calm Kevin down sufficiently for him to begin work on the computer and recall the footage from both the library and the corridor.

  When Pete returned, they watched the replays.

  In the library, they saw nothing. The video system kicked in and the camera tracked left.

  “It must have detected movement in that area,” Kevin said.

  The camera stopped and focussed but the open scrapbook on the table was all they could see.

  “I told you it had been there all the time,” Pete declared.

  “Then what triggered the PIR?” Sceptre demanded.

  “How the hell do I know? It could have been a mouse, a fly, anything.”

  Kevin practically choked on his tea. “My gear is sensitive, but not that sensitive. You’d need a fly the size of a bloody owl to trigger the PIR. Besides, how many flies do you getting hanging round the library at this time of year? It’s colder than a polar bear’s chuff up there.”

  “The heating has been left on,” Pete reminded them. “It’s cheaper than shutting it down and rebooting it in the New Year, and it averts the danger of frozen pipes bursting.”

  “Never mind the bleeding heating,” Kevin whined. “I know what I saw and what happened and you can’t explain it away.”

  “You don’t expect me to account for every blip of our equipment, do you?” Pete demanded.

  “This is not the equipment,” Kevin said. “I set it up. It doesn’t go wrong, except when some brainless prat trips over the bleeding wires. You’re wrong, Pete, totally wrong. And heating or not, I was freezing on that corridor.”

  In an effort to divert the disagreement, Sceptre said, “Cold is often one of the first signs of a manifestation.”

  “Right. It freezes your brain,” Pete sneered.

  “There are times, Pete,” Sceptre said, “when I don’t know why you’re with us.”

  “Sceptre, I’m as interested as you are in the possibilities of ghosts and UFOs and all the rest of it, but we can’t go half cocked because Kevin reckons he’s seen the ghost of Johnny Cash on the upstairs landing.”

  “Oh, you’re impossible.” Sceptre dismissed him with a downward wave. “Kevin, run the footage from the corridor.”

  Kevin obeyed, moving the cursor around the control screen, clicking the relevant links, opening up the footage and expanding it to fill the screen.

  It was blank, the timer reading 0:00:00. It flickered into life, the camera switching on, panning right, focus coming in. There at the end of the corridor stood the man in black. The camera jolted slightly.

  “I think that was me,” Kevin said.

  As they watched and the timer passed 30 seconds, the figure began to move in, coming on remorselessly, until its black garb filled the screen. They heard Kevin’s cry as he tumbled away, and then the recording stopped.

  “Kevin, can you re-run it, and zoom in on the figure’s face?” Sceptre asked.

  Nothing happened and when she looked at Kevin, he had turned away, unable to watch the footage.

  She took his hand. “Kevin, it’s over. Whatever happened is finished. It can’t harm you because all it is now is a video recording. Pete and I are with you and there’s nothing to be afraid of.”

  When he looked up there was the sparkle of tears in his eyes. “It’s already harmed me. I was with that poor sod when that High Master chava sliced through Swede’s throat.”

  Pete sighed. “For God’s sake stop letting your imagination run away with you, Kev.”

  His best friend rounded on him. “I know what I saw, I know what I heard and I know what I felt.”

  Sceptre held his hand. “Run it for me.”

  In the background, Pete tutted. “I’ve spent six months offering to do everything for you, and all the time you’re willing to …”

  “Shut up, Pete.”

  Slowly Kevin turned back to the machine, and ran the clip again. When the figure began to move, he froze it, and jiggled the zoom control, moving in, moving up, in, up, until the face almost filled the screen.

  But it was not a face. It had the right kind of pear drop shape, but where the eyes and mouth should have been were spaces as dark as the blackest black hole. The ragged edges around the eye sockets suggested the eyes had been eaten away and the open orifice of the mouth lent it the appearance of someone or something appealing for an end to its torment. Kevin shuddered.

  Revolted but satisfied, Sceptre sat back and glared a challenge at Pete. “What do you make of that, Mr logic?”

  Hands clasped in front of him like a preacher, Pete said, “Nothing. I said before that it’s probably the same image the movie people have been getting. And if you notice, when it did move, its legs didn’t. It glided towards the camera.”

  “Meaning what?” Sceptre demanded.

  “Meaning, someone beamed a transmission in here and panned his camera in close up.” Once again, Pete was perfectly calm. “It’s the same stunt they’re pulling on the movie crew and if the Wicked Witches have struggled to get rid of it, what chance do we have? Kev, you’re the electronics genius, so correct me if I’m wrong, but don’t these cameras all work on electromagnetic frequencies and because they’re digital, can’t people pick those frequencies up?”

  Kevin stroked his chin. “Yes.” He tapped the side of the computer, where the wireless pickup was plugged in. “One of the problems with wi-fi connections is that any bod with the right kind of receiving equipment can sit outside your house and monitor your surfing habits. That’s why we build so much security into them.”

  “So theoretically, if they can receive, they can also transmit?” Pete insisted.

  “Well, sure,” Kevin agreed, “but you’d need some serious tackle to do it, and the movie bods would have tracked it down. By now, the geek would be behind bars and have his gear impounded.”

  “Well I don’t believe it,” said Sceptre.

  Pete pressed his hands down on thin air, a silent appeal to her to calm down. “How else would you explain the camera picking it up but Kevin not being able to see it? Kev, can you track incoming signals?”

  Kevin shook his head. “I don’t have the gear. I’d need a receiver and even then it would get so mixed up with our own signals that we’d never sort them out.” He looked up at Pete and shuddered again. “I don’t know what this is, but I’m practically certain it’s not someone beaming in on our signals. My wi-fi connections are well-shielded, and it’s not a computer virus. I’ll guarantee my equipment against any and every virus.”

  “Except BSE?”

  Sceptre scowled, Kevin frowned. “BSE?�
��

  “Yeah. It rots your brain.”

  “So does syphilis,” said Sceptre, “and you must be a candidate for that.”

  Pete smiled and took a pack of condoms from his pocket. “Like my Amex card, I never leave home without them? Fancying running the stocks down by one?”

  Sceptre pulled out her tongue and for the first time since their return to the dining hall, they all laughed.

  “There’s a couple of gaping holes in your theory, Pete,” Kevin said. “First off, it appeared on the camera, and that isn’t wired into any system.”

  “Yes, but you can still get interference on them, can’t you?”

  Kevin shrugged. “Moot point. Over and above that, how do you account for what I saw after I touched the camera?”

  “Yes, Kev, and you know what crossed my mind the moment you told me about the two-shilling piece earlier on? Another Kevin Keeley scam.”

  The humour disappeared from Kevin’s face. “Sod off.”

  Sceptre felt compelled to defend Kevin’s gift. “Fishwick has confirmed some of what we’ve experienced,” Sceptre pointed out.

  “And after twelve months of sharing the flat, if you don’t know what I think about Fishwick, then you’ve obviously not been listening to me.” Pete sat down and took them in with his gaze. “Look, I know that you two believe in all this stuff, and I know about the paranormal. I know there are things we can’t always explain, but let’s keep our feet on the ground, huh? Let’s eliminate the possible before we start talking about the improbable. Kev, you said you heard something.”

  “Yeah. The thing was talking to me. Something about Wales.”

  “Wales?” objected Sceptre. “That’s not what you said upstairs.”

  “I mean valleys — I mean Vali.” Kevin smiled thinly. “There’s lots of valleys in Wales, and it reminded me of them.”

  “Never mind what it said,” Pete interrupted before a proper argument could break out, “how come we didn’t hear it on the playback? We heard you screaming when you fell.”