The Enigma of the Spirits

by Hector, Jr

  “The Saxon Hotel,” Detective Ariel finishes. Hector just nods.

  “My experience was different,” Javana says. “I also came upon an old apartment complex, but it was not close to the city. It was located in its outskirts, in the middle of nowhere.”

  “I can say I had a similar experience,” Detective Ariel says, before looking at Javana. “Yet, how can you say you had a different experience than me or Hector, when you and I both were at the same apartment complex at the same time?”

  “Because we all being psychics, does not mean we all will experience the same thing at the same time,” Hector says. “Our own perception of our abilities will affect what we experience and when. Yet, there is one common thing we all experienced: Slenderman.”

  “Okay, but if our perception of our abilities affect what we experience, does that also include how it appears to us?” Detective Ariel asks.

  Hector nods.

  “But, that is how psychics can help each other and even gather strength from each other,” he says. “By working together, and also how we individually perceive our abilities can grant us the unforeseen advantage of seeing what Slenderman does not want us to see in this particular sense.”

  “What do you mean?” Javana asks.

  Hector looks at her with a faint smile. “I have been aware of my abilities since I was very young. Honed over a very particularly long time, when I arrived to that apartment complex and entered, the moment I went to the help desk in that lobby, I knew what that place was…”

  “What?” Me, Detective Ariel, and Javana ask at the same time.

  “It is fueled by so much spiritual energy, that our reality is actually affected to the point that once someone enters, it begins to kill them in a sense.”

  “What do you mean?” I ask, intrigued by all of these. I knew Hector was more experienced and knowledgeable, but never to this extent. Here we are talking about ghosts, demons, spirits, and even the concept of reality like one of my fiction books. Here I thought of leaving.

  Hector looks at me.

  “Within computer security, there is something called a honeypot, which is basically a stash of fake information that administrators put out into the web for someone to hack into. That is what this place is: a spiritual honeypot.”

  “Okay, but what does that have to do with Slenderman, The Hotel Saxon, and your reluctance to answer my question from earlier,” Detective Ariel counters.

  “Some honeypots is just one computer, or router, or even a server with information. Yet in some cases, there is something called a honeynet: a group of computers, routers, or servers that are stashes of fake information that is meant to be hacked. The same logic can be applied to this place, The Saxon Hotel,” he says. He then stares at Detective Ariel. “And to answer your question detective, like I said, I did not bring it here nor did I know it was going to be here. You see, this place The Saxon Hotel is not something that just appeared. It has existed for a very long time. Slenderman did not just appear, it was brought to existence. As it has gone throughout the years killing and taking people, it has gotten stronger. The murders and disappearances in turn fuel that place with negative and dark energy. Now, everything about the honeynet and honeypots, it helps understand one key thing: all of this negative and dark energy, along with Slenderman, has created one gigantic spiritual honeypot.”

  “But a honeypot is a stash of fake information? How does that apply to us? Are you saying that what we are experiencing is some sort of illusion?” I ask.

  “No,” says Javana. We all look at her. “What he is saying is that, because how we perceive our abilities and that in turn affects how we experienced psychic phenomena. That will affect how all of us will slowly assimilate to that place. It also explains why we each experience Slenderman, but in a different depth and form.”

  “If that is the case, how can we hope to defeat this?” Detective Ariel asks.

  “We do not,” Javana responds. “If everything Hector just told us is correct, and Slenderman appears and attacks at random, all the while our own psychic abilities at some point working against us. We can only hope to survive long enough to find out why it appears in the first place. Something like this, with no purpose of any kind but to just exist? This is not a thing or a being. It is a class all in its own.”

  “Wait?” They all look at me. “I understand the psychic abilities, Slenderman, and the random attacks. Yet, how can Slenderman who is something of a class all in its own be in two places at onces?”

  “It is not,” Detective Ariel responds. Javana shakes her head. Yet, Hector lightly smiles and his eyes twinkle with a devilish glint.

  “It seems you noticed,” he says.

  We all are looking at him now.

  “The one thing that I noticed in all the articles and the few investigations that I looked into, was that Slenderman was responsible for a certain disappearance in a particular place, but also responsible for a murder in another. Its attacks and choices are random, but where it appears it seems is not… Like the gods of old, it appears where it is summoned or where a great deal of death and evil is.”

  “Evil, death, and other human induced concepts is part of the world. You cannot possibly be saying it exists everywhere at once?” Detective Ariel asks.

  “Not the entire world, but it can exist in several places at once,” Hector responds.

  “How in the hell are we supposed to stop something that can exist in several places at once?” Detective Ariel asks.

  We are all looking at Hector. No emotion or any sense of forbidding shows on his face. What is he, a robot?

  “I am not looking to stop Slenderman. I am looking to save people from it,” he answers.

  “Excuse me?”

  We all turn to see a doctor standing at the entrance, his dark toned skin and curly hair an obvious contrast to the colors of the room. His accent places him somewhere in the east, but which part I do not know.

  “Visiting hours are over for my patient. Please excuse yourselfs,” he says, leaving no room for argument. Detective Ariel begins to walk out of the room, with Hector following closely behind.

  “Nurse?” he says with a raised eyebrow.

  His brown eyes hold no compassion or understanding for me being here. I walk towards him and hand him her files. He nods. As I head out the room, I can hear the doctor begin to talk to Javana, his tone conveying worry and disappointment.

  -Ding-

  The elevator doors slide open just in time. I step in and press the button to go to the first floor. It is time I went home and finally got some damn sleep!

  Chapter 12

  -Erick-

  I groan as I snooze my alarm. I have the day off today, but I forgot to turn off my alarm earlier today when I got home from the hospital. Even then, I had a hard time falling asleep. I kept returning to the conversation Hector, Javana, Detective Ariel, and I had. I thought I had experienced it all, but it seems my freakish abilities still are going to surprise me.

  I groan as I sit at the edge of the bed, and run my hands over my face. I inhale and then exhale. I get up and walk to the bathroom. I stand before the mirror, my hazel eyes staring back at me. My skin is a little pale, but even more concerning is the facial growing on my face-- a slight five o'clock shadow. Yet, in all honesty, I really did not feel like shaving and from what I hear from others, I do not look that bad. I have actually been called handsome with it.

  I prop the mirror, its hinges creaking with age as I fish for my toothpaste from the cabinet. I turn on the hot water, squeeze some toothpaste onto my toothbrush and begin brushing my teeth. About a minute passes before I spit out the toothpaste and then wash my mouth.

  “Can I help you again, young man?”

  This cannot be happening again.

  I am at the Hotel Saxon lobby, with only a pajama and no shirt, I have a toothbrush sticking out from my mouth, and I can even feel toothpaste stuck my chin. Hector said that depending on how we perceive our abilities, that will
affect how we experience psychic phenomena. But, why do I keep seeing this place? What is that my own abilities perceive that I am not understanding?

  “Young man? Sir?”

  I take out the toothbrush from my mouth and turn to look at the old lady. She raises one eyebrow while looking at me from top to bottom. Oh...that is right, I have no shirt on. I look around me, everyone embroiled in their inner workings of their mind. It is like I just appeared here, but I can feel that familiar tug in the middle of my chest. I can sense that de-ja-vu feeling within my mind. This is only real to some extent, but everything else is some sort of illusion. I am at my apartment, but I am not.

  I look at the lady. Alright, I will bite. Let us see what Slenderman wants with me, I mean, it is obvious it is orchestrating this. Like Hector said, Slenderman can exist in more places that one, but it appears within the concept of how we perceive our own abilities. I always did like the Matrix.

  “Can I have one room please?” I ask. “Right this way, please,” the old lady says as she walks around her desk, rummages through a small cabinet she pulled, before she presents a key card to me.

  “Do you not want my credit card? My I.D.?” I ask.

  She nods, and insists on the key card. I take the key.

  “What room is this?” I ask.

  “Just go to the third floor, your room is the last to your right,” she responds.

  I nod. I head for the elevator that is at the end of the hallway, a turn to anyone's right.

  -Ding-

  The elevator doors slide open. I step in and press the button to go to the third floor. For a moment I lurch forward before the elevator doors slide open again. Before is a semi-dark hallway, with a very clean carpet.

  -Ding-

  I look behind me as the elevator doors close, and slowly the elevator begins its way down. The cabling and the machine working are the only noises, which is weird. This is a hotel. Where are the distant conversations? Where are the moans and groans of a couple having sex? Where is that stranger that you can hear talking to itself, the stranger thinking no one can hear? It is so quiet.

  Door after door, I still cannot hear any sort of life beyond them. It is seriously making me doubt the time, or whether how long I have been here stuck in this illusion.

  I step in front of the door, the last room at the end of the hallway to my right. I insert the keycard. A few bips and bops before the door opens. I walk in, a shirt on the stand that lies to your right as you come in. It is a gray shirt, soft to the touch as I maneuver my head and gently plaster it over my chest. I got to see the kitchen, but now I am standing before the living room. Couches of leather squarely surround a small, low to the ground, table. Two lamps rest in the two corners, while a window lies to my left. It is open, and the curtains flap gently with the wind. What really caught my interest, was the painting. I walk across the living room and stand before it. I marvel at the detail. A lady who was watering her plants that sat on the edge her window. Whoever painted the painting, it is like they waited for this exact moment. A rainy day in which a lady with red hair would water the plants that sat on her window's edge. I gasp when I touch the painting, visions crowding my thoughts. A detective of sorts? A police officer? Yet the most intriguing part was that I saw Hector as he went into a room at the end of the hall, or more like ran into it. I also saw another man.

  I look around me, back again at my restroom with my toothbrush in my mouth and half naked. I close my eyes and open them, and I even pinch myself. Yes, I am really back here. I prop the mirror as I put my toothbrush inside the cabinet. The hinges creak as I close prop the window back, closing the cabinet. I freeze at what I see reflected in the mirror. A man, the same man I saw briefly within the visions I had within the vision. He had long hair and a narrow slim face. His skin was pale, much more pale than someone who has not seen the sun a long while. I recognize this paleness. He is dead. I stumble back as this appearance begins to literally morph from the mirror. Its hands grasp the edges of my sink, as blood pools into it, blood that seemed to be falling from his chest. I hit the wall.

  “Help them…”

  “Wh-a-a-t?” I hear myself studder. It falls onto the floor, before slowly getting up. Standing before me, I can clearly see a hole through his chest. I cannot move and I can barely breathe.

  “Help them Erick… Help them!!!”

  Suddenly I am alone in my bathroom again. I can breathe. Blood no longer tainted my sink or my floor. The air did not smell of rotten meat and death. I flinch as my phones ringing breaks the morbid silence. It is work, it has to be in which case I do not mind. I practically run. My coworker’s face, Gabriel, is displayed on my Iphone’s screen as I pick it up and answer.

  “What’s up Gabriel?”

  “Hey Erick. I am just calling to ask if you can cover my shift today.” he asks. I sigh, my day off ruined. Yet, from what I experienced just a few seconds ago, I really do not want to be at my apartment alone. No friends live near me and I will not invite a stranger over, not from this neighborhood. None the less, I really did not want to go to work. Yesterday was brutal, and I really wanted a break from all the supernatural stuff, which is not working at the moment.

  “Gabriel, I am sorry, but I really cannot go in today. Why do you not ask Barb? He is always eager for more hours?”

  “Barb? The guy who usually works pediatrics?” he responds.

  “Yeah.” I say.

  “Fine,” he says, a hint of disappointed in his voice.

  “Bye Erick.”

  “Bye Gabriel,” I respond.

  I put down the phone. I will just have to find something to do today, anything that does not involve me being here at my house.

  Chapter 13

  -Erick-

  “Here you go, sir,” the young lady tells me as she brings me my pancakes and eggs with a side of sausage. I look down at my plate, my mouth watering at the sight of the spongy cakes, the well done eggs, and the greasy looking sausages. I pick up my knife and fork. This will be delicious!

  “Is this seat taken?”

  I look up as I was just about to insert three pieces of pancake.

  “Detective? What brings you here?” I ask, setting down my utensils.

  “I come here for my daily caffeine,” she responds. “May I sit?”

  I nod, gesturing my hand towards the cushioned seat.

  “Do you work today?” she asks.

  I shake my head, unable to speak as I focus on chewing my pancakes. I watch her take sip of her coffee, and in turn she watches me take bite after bite. “What is matter?” she asks, an evil glint in her eyes. I smile sheepishly. She does too. I set down my utensils again. “What really brings you here?” I ask as I clean my hands with the feeble cloth they gave me. She sets down her coffee, that evil glint in her eyes shining brighter. For a moment she just stares at me, the steam rising from her coffee tainting the air with a sweet/sour smell. Her red hair is up in a bun. She is wearing a little bit of make-up, some eyeliner, and among the sweet/sour smell of coffee I catch a hint of perfume. She is not slim but neither overweight-- she has her curves.

  “I want you to accompany me to The Saxon Hotel,” she says. My smile fades, and all things aside, I no longer am hungry as that faint smell of rotten meat perfumes the air again. It has been following me since that apparition appeared in my apartment.

  “Why do you want to go there?” I ask. “With this thing called Slenderman pulling the strings, I would have thought that is the last place we would have wanted to be.”

  “I am still a cop,” she responds. “This thing is taking lives, and has taken lives. My co-worker Detective Knox for starters. Hector’s acquaintance Charles. It massacred an entire SCU unit, killed a cop, and tried to kill me and Javana.”

  She inhales and exhales.

  “I, Erick, would like to know why.”

  I exhale, suddenly the ghost in my apartment very inviting. I pick up my utensils and continue eating, allowing myself an excuse to think.
Going into that hotel frightens me, not only because of Slenderman, but because of those visions. It is clear to me that Slenderman is responsible, but several people have died there. Why do the people in my vision not include those that have recently died? It is always a lady typing away in her PDA, an old woman and man at the front desk, and several other people that seem to linger in the lobby. Also, I am assuming this Charles is the ghost that has been appearing to me.

  “Ariel, can I ask you something about Charles?”

  “What?” she responds.

  “What did he look like?”

  She sets down her mug of coffee, rummages through her pants pockets, before taking out a phone. She shows me the screen, the photo of a guy close to my age. He had long slender hair, a slim face with brown eyes, and you could tell he was worked out by the way his chest hugged his black shirt.

  “How did he die?”

  “He was found dead on the emergency stairs, his heart literally ripped out from his chest. CSU never found the heart,” she responds.

  “Everything alright?” she asks. I nod, trying very hard to keep my breakfast in my stomach. So the apparition's name is Charles, and he died by Slenderman’s hand. Her explanations also gives light to the hole in his chest.

  “So, are you coming or not?”

  There is so much about this that I still do not understand, and I have this feeling in my gut that this visions are something else. From what I have heard from Ariel and Hector, Slenderman has no reason to be doing this. Like they said, it has no purpose or reason, but why orchestrate something like this. Why use that particle vision to reach out to me? Also, why is Charles asking me to help them? Who? Ariel, Javana, and Hector? From what I have seen and heard, they can handle themselves. I do not understand, because there is something else pulling our strings other than Slenderman. I really do not want to get involved further, but if I want to find out I will have to play the game.