Ghouls Gone Wild

  “How big is it?”

  “Full-body size.”

  “Is there any clarity to the shape?”

  “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you,” Gil moaned.

  “Try me.”

  “It looks like a woman riding a broom,” Gopher said. “M. J., it looks like the ghost of a witch!”

  I closed my eyes and held my breath. That was the last thing I wanted to hear. “Rigella,” I whispered.

  Gilley said nothing, but I knew him well enough to know he was thinking the same thing. After taking a quick moment to gather my courage, I opened my eyes again and squatted down to rummage through my duffel. “Gil, tell me the moment she moves away from camera three,” I said urgently.

  “Roger,” Gil said.

  After digging through my bag, I located the map of the close we’d each been given, and inspected it. I had my grenade and fully intended to use it, but I couldn’t be sure it would buy us enough time to get out of the close. There was so much paranormal activity within the cavern we were in that I had a feeling the great bulk of it would reduce the impact of the grenade. Rigella was toying with us, and I also had Heath to worry about. I couldn’t risk an encounter with her when he was in no shape to help me.

  “What’s happening?” Heath asked me.

  “Trouble’s coming,” I told him honestly while my finger traced the path we’d come on the map. “And we need an exit, pronto.”

  “What’s coming?” he asked, and I glanced up to see him looking back down the cavern.

  As if in answer, Gilley shouted, “She’s on the move again!”

  I stood up and swung the strap of the duffel over my head before reaching under Heath’s good arm and gently lifting him to his feet. “Come on, guy,” I said urgently. “We gotta go!”

  Heath’s ragged breathing felt hot against my neck and he stumbled several times as I guided him forward. “What’d you see under my arm?” he asked.

  “A lump,” I told him, leaving out the gory details. I remembered my European History class from college well enough to recall that black boils that formed in the armpit and high-grade fever were two of the tell-tale symptoms of the bubonic plague that had run rampant all over Europe in the Middle Ages. I was pretty sure the disease had been eradicated in modern times, but what I’d seen under Heath’s arm and the heat coming off him were quite alarming.

  “Lump? What kind of lump?” he persisted.

  I didn’t answer him; instead I fought to push us both forward while keeping one eye on the map so we didn’t get lost.

  “It’s at camera four!” Gil shouted.

  “Keep me posted, Gilley!” I commanded.

  “Where are you?”

  “Heading toward the southeast exit.”

  “How far away are you from there?”

  I glanced down at the map, noting a fork in the cavern that we’d just passed. “I’d say about five hundred yards.”

  “Oh, my God!” Gopher shouted, and I had a feeling that things were about to go from really bad to extra awful. “M. J., the shadow’s got company!”

  “What kind of company?”

  “Two additional shadows have joined Rigella’s ghost, and they all have the silhouette of witches on brooms!”

  “And they’re moving!” Gil yelled urgently. “I think they’re heading to camera five!”

  Heath moaned next to me, as if he was in pain, but there was no way I was stopping. Instead I took hold of the map with my teeth and reached over to remove his grenade from the belt he was wearing. “Hold this,” I said through gritted teeth as I placed the canister in the hand draped across my shoulder. Heath gripped the canister and I tugged up on the cap; freeing the lid, I tossed it to the ground.

  “Three shadows at camera five!” Gopher shouted. “And they’re not stopping! M. J., I think they’re picking up speed!”

  I adjusted my hold on Heath’s middle and gripped his arm tightly while ordering, “Hold on to that canister, and don’t let it go until I tell you to!” Heath mumbled something unintelligible, but he held fast to the canister.

  We made it another two hundred yards when I heard Gilley say, “M. J., Gopher’s on his way to meet you at the exit and something just whizzed by camera six!”

  I was panting heavily as I struggled to bear Heath’s sagging weight and move us along as fast as possible. I’d left the seventh camera on the floor of the cavern after not being able to mount it, and that camera was a mere two hundred yards away from camera six. And that meant that Rigella and her crew were only about four hundred yards behind us, and closing in fast.

  “Gil!” I said, gasping for breath.

  “Yeah?”

  “Are you getting a reading from the meter on my belt?”

  “Yes.”

  “Tell me when it spikes,” I said.

  “It’s spiking now.”

  “Tell me when it really spikes!”

  Gilley made a small squeaky sound. “Jesus, M. J., hurry, okay?”

  I wanted to tell him I was doing my level best, but I was too focused on moving forward. Heath continued to stumble and lean heavily on me. “Almost there,” I told him, spying the exit just fifty yards away.

  “You’re spiking!” Gilley shouted.

  “Is it in the red zone?”

  “The needle’s at the top of the graph, honey! Get out of there!”

  “Heath!” I shouted as he tripped over something that crunched under his feet and nearly pulled us down. I groaned, stumbling over what looked like a small radio that we’d just crushed under our feet, but with Gilley yelling in my ear to run for it, I didn’t give it a second thought. Instead I shouted to Heath, “Drop the spike out of the canister!”

  I heard a loud ping on the ground next to us and with great relief I noticed that all that awful energy that seemed to constantly be pounding against us vanished.

  We moved forward several steps with ease, and even Heath’s footing felt more secure. In the back of my mind I was grateful that the somewhat constant noise level that had been assaulting us from grounded spirits everywhere was gone and we moved nearly twenty-five yards without incident. And then, just as the door to the exit opened and Gopher appeared in the doorway, something with tremendous force crashed right into us and sent Heath and me sprawling to the ground.

  Chapter 4

  I landed hard and smacked my bad shin on the ground. Heath tumbled just to my left, rolling over twice before coming to rest on the opposite side of the cavern. Near the exit I heard Gopher scream bloody murder, and then the slam of a door told me he’d run off for the second time that night.

  I’d lost my headset, but somewhere nearby I heard Gilley’s distant voice shout, “M. J.?! Come in! Come in! For the love of God, what’s happening?!”

  With a groan I tried to get to my feet, but the moment I rose, I felt a tremendous kick to my abdomen that literally lifted me off the ground and knocked the wind right out of me.

  For several panicky moments I couldn’t even breathe, and I crawled forward on hands and knees, trying to coax my diaphragm back to its normal rhythm. “Get away!” Heath moaned. “Get away!”

  The most sick and twisted cackle I’d ever heard sounded loudly about the cavern. “Sacrifice!” I heard someone say.

  I took a ragged breath and closed my eyes, willing myself not to pass out. My fingers fumbled at the canister tucked into my own belt while I struggled to take just one breath.

  Something sharp raked across my back and I winced in pain, but still I worked at getting the canister free. “Stop!” Heath begged. “Stop them!”

  With tremendous effort I finally managed to take a small breath, but it wasn’t enough air to revive me, and when I opened my eyes again, all I could see was stars and darkness closing in. With the last bit of strength I had, I tugged the canister free, and pushed the lid up with my thumb. A second sharp pain raked across my back, followed by another cackling laugh in my ear.

  The cap on the canister wouldn’t budge, and I knew I wasn’t going to have time to get it free before I passed out. “Breathe,” whispered a calm, soothing voice. “Just breathe, M. J.”

&nb
sp; Immediately I was able to suck in a full lungful of air and the stars and black edges vanished from my vision. “Good job,” said the voice. “Now twist the cap.” I gripped the top of the canister with renewed strength and tugged. There was a popping noise and the metal lid came off. With painful slowness I tipped the canister and slid the spike out. As it emerged, I heard a shriek, a curse, and the swish of skirts, and then everything went quiet.

  I sat still for the longest time, clutching the metal spike and focusing on getting oxygen into my lungs. I heard movement behind me and turned my head to see Heath, inching his way over to me. “You okay?” I asked.

  He nodded. “Think so.” He then patted himself tentatively to check for broken bones or other injuries. “Yeah, I’m good.”

  I crawled forward and felt his forehead. His body temp had gone back to normal. “That’s weird,” I said.

  “Fever’s gone,” Heath told me. “I felt almost immediately better the moment you dropped the spike back there. It’s as if I never felt sick at all.”

  In the next instant the door to the exit burst open and Gilley came dashing through, bearing about ten magnetic spikes and with crazy wide eyes. “I’m here!” he announced. “I’m here!”

  He looked so comically serious that I couldn’t help it—I started to giggle.

  Heath also began to laugh and pretty soon the both of us were slapping each other and whooping it up. Gilley frowned. “All right, chuckleheads,” he said as he bent down to reach under my arms and pick me up. “Let’s get you both out of here.”

  Once I was standing and trying to collect myself, I reached a hand down to help Heath up, but his laughter abruptly stopped and instead of taking my hand, he made an odd noise and pointed behind us.

  “What?” I asked him. But he just continued to point. Beside me I heard Gilley let out a little squeal and I slowly turned my head.

  About twenty feet away was the clear outline of a prone man lying on the floor of the cavern. “Why do I think that’s going to be really bad?” I whispered.

  Heath stood up. “Hello?” he called to the person on the ground.

  There was no response. Gilley shifted the metal spikes in one hand to under his arm and reached out for my hand. “Let’s just go,” he said softly.

  Heath and I exchanged a look. “We can’t just leave him here,” Heath said. “I think he’s hurt.”

  I squinted in the dim light of the close. My eyesight wasn’t as sharp as Heath’s, because I couldn’t tell if he was hurt or just sleeping. “Maybe one of us should go check on him?” I asked.

  “Rock, paper, scissors,” Heath called.

  “You two cannot be serious!” Gilley said, the quiver returning to his voice. “The guy’s probably just a drunk who wandered down here to sleep it off. I don’t think we should get too close.”

  “Gil,” I said as I shook out a rock and Heath formed scissors. “Heath’s right. We can’t just leave the guy down here with the kind of poltergeist activity we saw just a few minutes ago.”

  Heath sighed heavily, realizing that he was going to be the one to investigate the prone figure. “Wish me luck,” he said, but I grabbed his arm and pulled him back.

  “You’re positive you feel okay?” I asked him.

  He smiled. “I’m fine,” he assured me.

  “All right then,” I said. “Take these.” I took a few of Gilley’s spikes from under his arm and thrust them into Heath’s hands. “Just in case.”

  Heath nodded, then edged away from us. Gilley moved closer to me, and again he took my hand. “I don’t like this place one bit, M. J.”

  “You say that about every bust we do, Gil.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Well then, I don’t like this one the most.”

  “ ’Nough said,” I told him with a smile, then fell silent as Heath reached the figure and squatted down. We watched as he tapped the guy on the shoulder, and shook him a little when he got no response. The prone man rolled onto his back and Heath stood up immediately, then came running back toward us.

  “Out!” he shouted. “Get out!”

  Gilley and I didn’t waste time asking why—we simply bolted for the exit. Once we were through the door, we took the stairs two at a time, winding our way up to the surface again.

  At the top and back on the street, the three of us bent over and waited to catch our breath. “It’s about time you guys came back!” I heard Gopher say. I glanced sideways to see him standing next to the van looking nervous. “I was getting really scared there.”

  I stood tall again and narrowed my eyes at him. “Yeah, we saw you get really scared there, Gopher. Twice.”

  Gopher blushed uncomfortably. “About that . . . ,” he tried, but Heath cut him off.

  “Forget about that, you guys! We’ve got bigger issues.”

  “What did you see?” Gilley asked.

  “That guy down there?” Heath reminded us, motioning with his head toward the entrance to the close. “He was dead.”

  I sucked in a breath. “No!”

  “Yes.”

  “You’re sure?”

  “Positive,” he said grimly. “He was stone cold, totally blue, and his eyes were all buggy.”

  Gilley looked around at us and asked, “What do we do?”

  “Call the police, I guess,” I said.

  Gopher already had his phone out. “Does nine-one-one work in Scotland?”

  The local police arrived very shortly after Gopher figured out how to call them (and for the record, 911 does not work in Scotland . . .), and after Heath, Gilley, and I had all been individually questioned and the body was brought up in a black bag on a gurney, we had a chance to regroup by the van.

  “Did they say what killed him?” Gopher wanted to know.

  Gilley looked over his shoulder as a couple of men pushing a stretcher were making their way down the street to an ambulance. “They think it was a heart attack,” he said. “I overheard one of the techs tell the policeman who was talking to me that there were no obvious signs of trauma. They also found some ID and paperwork on him. He’s a maintenance worker for the village, and his shift ended hours ago. They think he was down in the close replacing a lightbulb and that he had a heart attack and died.”

  Heath looked unsettled. “What’s up?” I asked.

  He shook his head. “You didn’t see his expression, M. J. He had the most terrified look on his face.”

  “Well, yeah,” I said. “I mean, if he knew he was having a heart attack down in an underground tunnel with no one around to help him, he’d probably be scared witless.” I remembered the small radio Heath and I had trampled and wondered if it had belonged to the maintenance worker. I imagined him dropping it and stumbling down the close in a panic as his chest filled with pain.

  “Or,” said Heath, “something else scared him to death.”

  Gilley made another little squeaking sound and put his hand up to his mouth. “You think maybe the witches weren’t just chasing you guys?”

  Something cool and wet hit the top of my head and I glanced skyward as another raindrop landed on my nose. “It’s starting to rain,” I said. “Let’s ask them if we’re clear to leave and find someplace to eat so we can talk about what happened tonight.”

  “Sounds good,” Heath said, and he was about to turn away when I caught him.

  “Hey, are you feeling okay?”

  “I’m fine.”

  “Can I see under your arm?”

  Gilley laughed. “Why do you want to see under his arm?”

  “He had a lump there earlier,” I said. “A big lump.”

  Heath moved his shoulder in a shrugging motion. “It’s gone,” he said. “And so is my fever.”

  “Still,” I insisted, “mind if I take a quick peek?”

  Heath raised his sweater and T-shirt for me, and sure enough, there was no sign of the large black boil I had seen down in the close. “Okay,” I told him. “You can lower your shirt. You’re right. You are fine.”

  Both Gilley and Gopher were looking at me funny, but two policemen were walking past us so I discreetly held up a finger and mouthed, “Wait.”


  Once the men had passed us, Gopher asked, “Want to explain what that was all about?”

  I sighed and motioned for us to all get in the van. Once we were settled, I explained, “Down in the close Heath began to take on all the symptoms of the bubonic plague. He was running a fever, his complexion was pale, and he had this huge black boil form right under his left armpit.”

  “No way!” Gopher said.

  Gilley stared at me in horror. I knew he was about to freak out, because my partner is a gigantic germaphobe, so I quickly laid a hand on his shoulder and added, “Gil, he doesn’t have the plague.”

  “How do you know?” Gilley asked, his voice high and squeaky again.

  “Because I know,” I said firmly. “Really, he’s fine.”

  Heath nodded his head vigorously. “Phantom symptoms,” he agreed. “Really, Gil. It was just my body’s way of reacting to all that residual energy of those grounded spirits who died from the plague.”

  Gilley still looked unsure, and I saw him reach into his pocket and pull out a small bottle of hand sanitizer. “Did M. J. have symptoms?” he asked.

  That caught me by surprise; then I remembered the ibuprofen I’d taken earlier. I knew that certain pain meds actually worked to lower my antennae a little. I told Gil about taking the pain reliever and said, “It had to have been the meds, Gil. It lowered my sixth sense just enough where the energy of the plague only affected Heath.”

  Gilley didn’t look convinced and continued to squirt hand sanitizer all over his hands, arms, neck, and face. Heath merely chuckled, Gopher started the van, and we pulled away from the scene.

  We found an all-night café a bit later and once we’d been seated and placed our order, we got back to the discussion of Heath’s phantom illness. “I think M. J.’s right,” Heath said. “I think that there were so many grounded spirits down there who died of the plague that their symptoms manifested physically on me.”

  “Can that actually happen?” Gopher asked.

  “It can,” I told him. “For example, when I’m reading for a private client, the way many of their loved ones identify themselves to me is by causing a physical reaction.”