The scream continued for what felt like fucking hours. My head was throbbing in pain and my eyes burned with exhaustion, but we couldn’t escape. For some reason, I was frozen in place. The fact we could hear her meant she was powerful enough to break the normal barriers most ghosts faced. That alone was mind blowing… and a bit terrifying.
A woman formed from the fog, long dark hair and a shredded black dress adorning her ghoulish figure. Her skin was gray and waterlogged and I could smell the stench of fish on her.
The woman morphed then, changing to a small girl in white then back to the woman. It was the most bizarre thing I’d ever witnessed. After a few more flickers in and out the figure finally settled back on the woman.What the fuck is happening?!
“Stop!” I begged, shouting over her to be heard. The noise caught her attention and she glanced up slowly. Her eyes were inky black and her lips a pale blue as both her eyes and mouth widened slowly. Soon her mouth was unnaturally wide as the wail increased in volume. She screamed at us while her eyes rounded further until they were huge and pouring out black water.
“What the fuck is she?!” Ben yelled. Neither of us could do anything else but stare in horror at the ghastly figure standing with us. There was no pause in her vocal assault and I was ready to climb the walls or run straight through her to escape.
Just when I thought I couldn’t take another second—it stopped. She was suddenly gone, along with the fog. The only thing remaining was the stench of fish and the ringing in my ears. My body was no longer stuck in place, but my muscles were sore from being tense for so long.
“So, do we go crash with Ethan?” Ben questioned as he sniffed the air and tentatively scooted off of the bed. “I think she ran out of juice.”
“How the hell did no one hear us or that?” I asked as I tried to get my brain back online. “And yes, I’m definitely not sleeping in here; it smells awful.” My voice was muffled by my arm over my mouth and nose. I turned and walked out into the hall and walked quietly like maybe the ghosts wouldn’t hear me and would chill for a night. We’d been bugged in our sleep before, but this took the damn cake… hell, the whole bakery.
“Oh my god you guys smell fucking awful,” Ethan groaned as we cozied up in the bed. It was a tight fit but we were too exhausted to care.
“We had another ghost encounter,” Ben mumbled before a snore took over. I couldn’t even give Ethan more than that, passing out just as fast.
* * *
“So,do I get to know why I had to share a bed with two fishy friends?” Ethan asked. He was a bit sassy today from lack of beauty rest. But then again we all were a bit on edge. From me waking them all up with my screaming, to me and Ben barely sleeping, it was already a rough start to our day.
“Yeah,” I said as I glanced at Ben. He waited while I swallowed down a few bites of my bagel. We were all too tired to really utilize the breakroom for cooking yet. After I took a few sips of my coffee I launched into an explanation of our water-logged ghost and her never-ending wails.
“Okay, so I’m not exactly an expert,” Sully started as he put down his fork. “But should they be this powerful? Enough that Brea thought it was a living person? And then strong enough to make them stink like the ocean and to be heard without equipment?”
“I’ve never seen one that solid,” Ben answered. “The lady who came to us wasn’t as transparent as others I’ve seen. Honestly, we don’t usually see them at all. It sounds like footsteps, disembodied voices. We pick up clear words occasionally but not without the help of a Spirit Box or recorder.”
“Seeing ghosts isn’t really new for me, but to this magnitude, yes. Maybe the buildings being empty for all these years amped them up? They’ve built around the land but not messed with the boat yet, it seems. So maybe it’s pent up energy that they disturbed with the build.”
“Well, we all know water is a conduit, and we have plenty of that shit around,” Ethan pointed out. “I don’t think it fully explains this though.”
“Could be,” Lincoln agreed. “I’d say this is closer to what we encountered at the amusement park. It wasn’t just creepy moving animatronics, it was shadows and creepy ghost men that abducted Brea.”
“True. But that led back to demons. Do you think this is the same?” Ryker asked. “I don’t know if we can really do more than speculate anyway, but I’m not feeling that same darkness we did there after each encounter.”
“Agreed,” Lincoln said. “We need to focus on a few more tasks today before we do our first hunt and you have an intro to the Darklings to do. More cameras, make plans, the works. But I will tell you if they are going to fuck with us every night then we’re figuring something else out.”
Sully piped in again. “I saw an inn in town. If nothing else we can get rooms for the month and come and go from the property every day. Spend our days and evenings here and sleep at the inn when we need to.”
“That’s honestly not a bad idea,” I agreed. “I’m all for some creepy nighttime encounters. But I can’t run on sleep deprivation every night.”
“My heart can’t handle waking up to your terrified screams either,” Ryker added. “I nearly busted my ass getting out of bed so fast.”
“Okay, let’s table the inn idea for one more night. We can get a few rooms if they have the space, but I’m giving this place another shot. Maybe that was just the welcome party,” Ethan said. I had my doubts on that but we all easily agreed.
“So, about you hearing voices,” I said to Sully, not bothering to beat around the bush. “Has it been happening for long?”
He shook his head, the movement nervous and jerky. “No. Just since…” He didn't have to continue for us to put the pieces together. Lincoln put a reassuring hand on his shoulder. That seemed to ground Sully a bit. “But it’s hard to tell if what I’m hearing is a ghost or not, it’s just as clear as anyone else speaking most of the time. Like last night, it almost sounded like Lincoln which is why I answered in the first place. Seeing them is a bit different. They’re the only thing that stands out in the world.”
“That makes sense,” I said. “Their energy alone likely makes them shine like a glow stick.”
Sully snorted. “That’s an accurate description. So what about your ability?”
“Psychometry.” My mind flashed back to that mine, the sound of Mack’s screams as he fell to his death. It still was hard to process sometimes, but it wasn’t my fault, which I had to remind myself often. “That’s why I wear the gloves. If I touch something that’s got strong energy I can get sucked into random visions of the past. It’s dangerous if no one is around because we don’t know how deep it’s going to go.”
“It almost looks like an absent seizure,” Lincoln confirmed. “She sort of blacks out. We usually get her to sit.”