by JL Bryan
“Thanks. I'm not sure we technically have a relationship, though,” I said.
“You will soon be part of our family. You, as well.” He nodded at Stacey.
“I feel like I'm three steps behind here,” Stacey said.
“We both are,” I said. “Come on, Nicky. Just tell us what's happening here. Is this a trap?”
“Yes,” Nicholas said. “A cleverly laid trap in which you broke into our facility.”
“You don't think 'facility' is a pretty generous word?” I gestured around at the scattered junk of the warehouse. “And this doesn't strike me as a prime location for a yoga-and-smoothie place.”
“This is not intended to be a Higher Self Center,” he said. “It's a facility for research that would be of great interest to you, I think. We are developing the next generation of tools for paranormal investigation, communication, capture, and containment.”
“If it involves getting inside that thing, I'm out.” Stacey pointed back at the ruined heap of a tractor truck I'd been investigating.
“The lorry is actually original to the building,” he said. “We left it there for a touch of authentic décor.”
“I assume you have more to show us?” I pointed at the pair of steel double doors just behind them.
“Does this mean you're willing to reconsider your reluctance to join our family?” Nicholas asked, with a quick smile that struck me as unnecessarily arrogant.
“Step one would be to stop calling your big corporate company a 'family,' because I hate when people do that,” I said. “Step two would involve you explaining why you were at the Lathrop Grand and whether you did anything that might affect my case.”
“What case is that?”
“I'm not free to disclose.”
“The new owners hired you to snuff out troublesome ghosts.”
“What exactly did you people do at the hotel?” I asked. I'm pretty sure I'd been asking it again and again, but you wouldn't know it by Nicholas's replies.
“We could stand out here chatting, or I could take you inside and show you,” he said. “I have clearance to do that. Would you like to see?”
“Please. Make our drive worthwhile,” I said.
Nicholas nodded at the silent security guy, who turned and waved toward a dark upper corner of the enormous room. There was a heavy metallic clunk, just like the one we'd heard earlier. Then the metal doors swung inward. Though they looked old and worn, they moved silently.
We passed through a short cinderblock corridor and reached another pair of doors. Stacey and I followed him inside. I had no idea what to expect.
Chapter Sixteen
“This is the best way to gain an overview of our work here,” Nicholas said, climbing a steep, narrow set of aluminum stairs up to a high catwalk. “Figuratively and literally.”
“Yeah, I picked up on that,” I muttered under my breath, too low for anyone to really hear. I climbed up after him, Stacey close behind me. The quiet, hulking security guy had ditched us once we were inside, which I didn't mind at all.
We looked down into rooms separated by high metal dividers, roofed with mesh, probably to create electromagnetic barriers between them. Lighting was low throughout the place. Each room centered on a large clear cube—probably made of leaded glass, I was guessing, unless they'd come up with something better—surrounded by an array of strange technical gear that might have been at home at some experimental laser-weapons lab in Los Alamos. Many of the rooms were otherwise empty, but small groups stood in a few of them, operating the gear.
I saw a flickering apparition at the center of one cube, which was followed by a murmur among the technicians around it. The entity looked tall and thin, misty and transparent, shifting in and out of visibility. A howling scream emitted from a speaker nearby, until somebody turned down the volume.
In another cube, I saw a stack of three large granite blocks, each one probably fifty or sixty pounds. The top block was moving so slowly that I barely realized it at first, but Nicholas insisted we stop and watch.
The top block slid slowly, slowly, farther and farther over the edge of the block beneath it, until gravity took over and it toppled to the padded floor with a thud.
The technicians in the room seemed happy about this, and one of them even applauded.
Then the fallen rock levitated from the floor, which seemed to take them by surprise. It hurtled toward the clear wall of the cube closest to the researchers, and they took cover just before it smashed into it. The wall shuddered but held, though a huge circle of crushed glass was visible on the inside. The outer layer of the cube must have been plastic, or something tougher than leaded glass, anyway.
“He's a bit rebellious,” Nicholas said. “We found him in a defunct coal mine in Pennsylvania. Local legend, that one. Destructive and loud.”
I watched the remaining stones shatter. The unseen entity flung the shards against the interior of the cube, still trying to smash its way out. I thought of the Testament of Solomon referenced by Katherine Moore and studied by Gregor Zagan, the idea of enslaving demons to help with major construction projects. It sounded a little quaint in the modern world, though. Would demons know how to install central heating and air? Fiber optics? A lawn sprinkler system?
“You're bringing captured ghosts here,” I said. “And doing what? Trying to control them? Train them?”
“In that fellow's case, yes,” he said, shaking his head. “So much psychokinetic energy at his disposal, so little intelligence or purpose with which to guide it. Our destination lies this way.”
Stacey and I shared a look that told me we were both feeling the same kind of horror and apprehension about what we'd stumbled into here. Trucker ghosts might have been a more pleasant alternative.
“How do you pay for all this?” I asked as we passed over more labs. “Popping ghosts isn't really a high-margin line of work.”
“Not if one insists on using a means-based sliding scale for calculating client fees,” he said. “That tends to attract the low-paying riffraff.”
“Are you kidding? You don't do that?” I asked. “So you only work for people who can pay big? Just let everyone else suffer?”
“I suppose we could maintain the sliding-scale philosophy at your branch, if you're so passionate about it,” he said. “Provided you stay on after we complete the purchase of the agency.”
“And me, too,” Stacey said.
“And Miss Tolbert as well,” he agreed.
“Don't add to his terms, Stacey!” I shook my head. “I'm not sure I agree with your whole philosophy there, Nick.”
“I wasn't being entirely serious with you. All you see before you is funded by Bridgeport housewives paying nine dollars for a cup of pureed strawberries and yogurt.”
“That's why y'all developed the wacky commercial side of your business,” I said. “The Higher Self Centers are a cash cow.”
“Among other things. They're also useful for identifying psychically talented individuals. Occasionally, one of those Bridgeport housewives also has precognitive dreams or similar talents.”
Nicholas led us down another steep staircase, away from the catwalk and toward something that looked like a bizarre museum exhibit from the early Industrial Age.
The elements of the machine, mounted on scaffolding and wires, occupied a spherical area. Curving metal arms larger than my waist, mounted on gears, were surrounded by huge copper electrical coils that looked dangerous and primitive. A variety of glass lenses hung here and there, suspended by more thin wires, and a number of overlapping circular gears formed a kind of floor near the bottom, with more colored lenses and mirrors mounted on their surface. Most of these glass elements were cracked, and some had only a shard or two left to indicate where they'd been.
The apparatus was supported entirely by the scaffolding around it, but I could see the eight heavy steel legs on which the base had originally sat. These, too, were suspended, not bearing any weight.
“Is that...
?” Stacey began, pointing at the legs. By their size and spacing, they could easily have slid into the holes in the floor at the center of the necromantium.
“The Mortis Ocularum. Seriously?” I looked at Nicholas. “Did this thing work?”
“Not nearly so reliably as desired, but progress was made,” he said. “A bit of the veil was torn open, spirits were summoned, but the desired stable bridge of communication between worlds was never formed.”
I moved closer to it. At the front of the machine was a viewing station that looked like a coin-operated telescope you might see at Niagara Falls. I leaned down and peered into it, and saw a heavily distended view of the center of the machine.
“The tools and technology were not available in those days,” another voice said. Female.
The young woman who'd joined us was pale, with bright blue eyes, thin and incredibly pretty. Like a fashion model. Gary, the former owner of the hotel, had described his contact at Metascience Productions that way.
“Kara Smith?” I asked. “Or that wouldn't be a real name, would it?”
She looked at me, seemed to decide I was unimportant, and turned to Nicholas. “Who are these people, Nicholas? Why are they in my area without my permission?”
“We're just looking for the people who were involved in the Lathrop Grand Hotel investigation one month ago,” I said. “If that isn't you, just tell us where to find them and we'll be on our way. Nicholas is being coy.”
“That does not sound like Nicholas,” she said. “Why are you interested in that hotel?”
“We think whatever you did on the fourth floor may have unleashed some serious problems,” I said. “What were you doing?”
“That's absurd. Every spirit in that hotel knows its place, and it is well-protected against outside interference,” she said.
“You might want to check your math on that, because several people have been attacked and one man was killed,” I said.
“Impossible. We do not resort to violence. We have tricks of the mind. If the living interfere with us or our work, we can send them away in fear. We do not seek to harm the living.”
“Why do you keep saying 'we'?” I asked.
“Eleanor Jordan, Stacey Ray Tolbert,” Nicholas said, making me wince a little at the sound of my full first name. That's what my personal demon, Anton Clay, loves to call me. So did my mom, before he killed her. “I present you to Mrs. Ithaca Galloway.”
Stacey gaped. I looked the girl over and shook my head.
“That would be an amazing apparition,” I said. “The most detailed I've ever encountered. But I've seen Ithaca's portrait up in her old dining room on the fourth floor. She was a square-faced, mannish-looking woman—”
When the girl's hand smacked into my face, I was not the least bit prepared. It stung, too. She didn't hold back at all.
“How dare you speak that way,” she hissed.
“How dare you freaking slap me?” I snapped back, balling my hands into fists, ready to bash my knuckles into her pert little nose.
“Uh, point of fact here, Ithaca's been dead for almost a century,” Stacey said.
“Certain decision-makers in our organization took an interest in Mrs. Galloway's work,” Nicholas said. “We were sent to the Lathrop Grand to find any remaining notes or designs related to the Mortis Ocularum—which is a bit of Latin-sounding nonsense, I might add.”
“It's a neologism,” the girl who claimed to be Ithaca said, with a little scowl.
“We did recover such information,” Nicholas continued. “Along the way, we encountered the opportunity to bring back Ithaca herself. She was eager to combine her work and ideas, from both before and after her death, with the technical resources at our disposal. An agreement was made. Our investigator Kara Volkova was generous enough to lend her physical form to Mrs. Galloway.”
“You're possessing this girl,” I said to Ithaca.
“With permission,” Nicholas reminded me.
I supposed it was possible. I've let a ghost possess me before. I can't say it's a pleasant experience.
“Shall we show them?” Nicholas asked Ithaca. “Both of these ladies will soon be part of the fam—ah, the company. We're in the process of acquiring their detective agency in Savannah.”
“As long as they don't touch anything.” Ithaca turned on her heel. Her voice was brassy, the voice of an imposing, even imperious woman with a strong hint of a Boston accent, which didn't quite fit the petite Eastern European frame that belted it out.
We moved into another room centered on a giant glass cube, with more of that futuristic Los Alamos machinery whirling around it. A gyroscope of concentric rings had been erected inside the cube.
Two technicians gave us curious glances as we entered, but they asked no questions. At Nicholas's urging, Stacey and I put on eyeshades. Ithaca drew on a pair of her own before activating the device.
The metal rings of the gyroscope began to rotate through each other.
“What are we looking at here?” I asked.
“Negative ion pumps, rotating electromagnetic fields...” Nicholas gestured at Ithaca as though he expected her to take it from there, but she didn't.
“You're trying to make it easier for ghosts to manifest,” I guessed.
“Not just easier,” Ithaca said. “We can force them to manifest.”
A flash of light filled the room, followed by an awful cry that sounded female.
Inside the cube, within the rings, a glowing transparent form appeared. I honestly didn't know what to make of it. The figure looked like a large woman, but her hair was in pigtails and ribbons, her dress pink and little-girlish. Her rows of shark-like teeth were real attention-grabbers, and so big she couldn't possibly have closed her candy-pink lips around them.
“We found her in a rundown highway motel in Massachusetts,” Nicholas said. “She would bite the hotel guests, especially babies and small boys. We call her Polly.”
Inside the cube, the apparition vanished. She reappeared again at the glass, only a few feet from me, and it seemed like she wanted to attack me. She pressed her mouth against the glass in a smear of pink lipstick and shark teeth. Another angry, wordless shriek sounded from the speakers. Then she vanished again, reappearing at the far corner of the cube.
“This is all great, but we're trying to clean up the mess you left at home,” I told Ithaca. It was still hard to imagine the century-old ghost of the Boston widow inhabiting the living young woman in front of me. “The ghosts on the fourth floor have turned violent.”
“That's not possible. Those are my people,” Ithaca said. “If anything, you should look at Abigail and her soldiers. I never trusted them.”
“Interesting. That's exactly what Zagan told us.”
“Zagan? You've been in consultation with the spirit of Gregor Zagan?” She looked offended, as though I'd just spat on her grave.
“You might call it a consultation,” I said.
“Yeah, in a kicking-our-keesters, setting-our-boyfriends-on-fire kind of way,” Stacey said.
“You should stay away from him,” Ithaca advised.
“That would be much easier if he weren't throwing us like rag dolls all over your necromantium,” I said. “Great job with the columns, by the way. You almost can't not bash your head into one.”
“No. Gregor Zagan is forbidden to enter my home. I've taken every measure. He betrayed me, and led my people astray.”
“I had the impression you kicked them out,” I said.
“I never meant for them to leave. I may have been withdrawn for a time, but I never intended him to lead the flock into the wilderness for his abominable rites. They left me to die alone and destitute. For a time after my death, I existed in my house alone, just a sad memory of myself. Then they began to return to me, my people. They honored their oaths to join me after death. I forbade Gregor's spirit to return, and I forbade that dirty Irish maid that he chose over me. Neither of their spirits is allowed.”
“I've se
en them both,” I said. “Zagan's ghost is powerful, maybe from dying the way he did. I think he's controlling all the spirits in the house. He's feeding them on his own energy.”
“This is unacceptable.” She turned to Nicholas, drawing herself up, and again seemed much larger than the waifish body she inhabited. “You assured me.”
“All possible steps were taken—” he began.
“They weren't enough. More incompetence from you! I should not be surprised.”
“Mrs. Galloway,” I said, “We need you to come home with us and resolve this situation. We can remove Zagan from your house permanently if you can help us.”
“I'm afraid she's much too busy with her research to return to Savannah with you,” Nicholas said. “You'll have to do your jobs yourselves, unfortunately.”
“I will go with them,” she said. “I will destroy the betrayer's soul and devour it myself, if need be.” Her sky-blue eyes had darkened almost to black, and fury twisted her delicate features.
“So that's settled,” Stacey said. “One car or two?”
Chapter Seventeen
We took two cars, it turned out. Ithaca Galloway, with her borrowed body, and Nicholas drove separately, mostly so they could return on their own, but also to haul some of their ghost-trapping gear with them. I couldn't complain—the ghosts in the Lathrop Grand were so numerous and dangerous that I wasn't going to turn down any help, even if it did grate on me that I'd had to ask the Paranormal Solutions people for it.
“It sounds like things went wild after they took Ithaca out of the house,” Stacey said. She was riding shotgun while I drove, since she'd driven on the way up to North Carolina. “You think it'll be an easy fix when she comes back?”
“We'll see. Maybe she can convince her psychic pals to stop cooperating with Zagan, at least. If she can win them over to our side, we can all work together to push him out. That might be a temporary solution, though, if she plans to leave the hotel again.”
