“You never forget anything, do you?” said Happy, admiringly.
“The name rings a vague bell,” said JC, which was his way of saying he’d never heard of the man but was willing to admit that Melody had. “Still, a dead Victorian medium, and a missing Victorian train. Has to be a connection. But why is he here now?”
“Ask him,” said Happy.
“You ask him,” said JC. “You’re the team telepath. Look inside his mind and see what this is all about.”
“I can’t,” said Happy, frowning. “And not because there’s a whole bunch of fresh air where his grey matter used to be. This is a really powerful manifestation, and it’s very powerfully shielded. I wouldn’t even know this ghost was here if I couldn’t see it standing there scowling at me, and I do wish it would stop doing that.”
“You really think you can get answers out of that thing?” said Laurie.
“Why not?” said Melody. “It’s a ghost. Most of them only stick around because there’s something they need to say to someone. Even if it’s simply Look what you made me do, aren’t you sorry now?”
“You can leave now, if you wish, Mr. Laurie,” said JC. “You shouldn’t have to deal with things like this. Coping with ghosts is our business. We’re trained to deal with things that go Boo! in the night.”
“No,” said Laurie, after a moment, staring steadily at the ghost before him. “Now I’ve seen what it is, up close, it doesn’t seem that scary, after all. It’s a man, isn’t it?”
“Or what’s left of one,” said Happy. “That’s all ghosts ever are, really—people with unfinished business. If you weren’t scared of a man while he was alive, why be scared of him once he’s dead? Even when they walk through walls, or rip their own heads off, they’re only indulging a thwarted theatrical streak.”
“So why is this man running around with his head empty?” said Laurie.
“Because that was the last important thing that ever happened to him,” said Melody. “A ghost’s shape and aspect is determined by its most significant memories.”
“And that certainly made one hell of an impression on him,” said Happy.
“Is this figure what the other volunteers saw, Mr. Laurie?” asked JC.
“I don’t know,” said Laurie. “Maybe. I never saw anything like it before, and I’ve been around here longer than most.”
“Why isn’t he saying anything?” said Melody.
“He’s a Victorian gentleman,” said Happy. “Probably waiting to be properly introduced.”
The ghost of Dr. Todd stood very still, glaring at them all impartially. JC stepped forward again.
“What are you doing here, Dr. Todd?” he said carefully. “What holds your spirit here? Is there anything we can do to help?”
The ghost didn’t speak, didn’t move. His eyes didn’t blink; his mouth remained a flat grey line. He might have been alone in the room.
“This is like when we have an argument,” Happy said to Melody. “And you go stomping around the room, being mad at me but refusing to say what’s wrong because I’m supposed to know. And I never do.”
“There’s no blood on the doctor’s face,” JC said thoughtfully. “Which suggests that the…rather dramatic cranial damage occurred sometime after his death. Ghosts usually like to show off their death-wounds, especially if they’re a bit gory.”
“They do?” said Laurie.
“Oh sure,” said Happy. “Ghosts are all about the show. Bunch of drama queens. Look what happened to me! Aren’t you impressed?”
“It could be surgical,” said JC. “Given the neatness of the job. How did Dr. Todd die, Melody? Do we know?”
“According to the records I am accessing right now,” said Melody, from behind her bank of instruments again, “the files say…nobody knows. He disappeared. Body never found. Big mystery, back in the day.”
“Ah,” said Happy, wisely. “One of those…”
JC nodded to Happy, and they both moved in close, looking the ghost over carefully at point-blank range. He didn’t blink, or flinch, in the slightest. And then they both started shivering violently and quickly backed away. A thin layer of new frost covered both their faces. They wiped it away with their sleeves, looked respectfully at the ghost, and backed off some more.
“Damn, that was cold!” said Happy, beating his hands together to try to force some feeling back into them.
“I could feel the heat being sucked right out of me,” said JC, stamping his feet hard on the wooden floor. “Melody?”
“My short-range sensors are registering a major heat-sink,” said Melody, frowning. “Dr. Todd is still draining energy out of the room to maintain his presence in the material world. Get too close, and he could shut you right down.”
“But it’s not like he’s doing anything!” said JC. “What does he need all that energy for?”
“I think he’s used to scaring people off, simply by turning up,” said Happy. “He isn’t used to people who don’t go all to pieces the moment they see a ghost. I have to wonder: is this all he’s got, or does he have a second act?”
He didn’t have long to wait for an answer. The main-entrance door began to force itself closed. It pushed itself forward, pressing against the wooden wedge set in place to stop it, straining forward in sudden jumps and surges, determined to close. The wooden wedge squealed loudly as it scraped across the wooden floor, and smoke curled up from the contact point. JC moved forward, another wedge already in his hand, only to stop himself abruptly as the wedge under the door exploded, blown apart by the sheer pressure behind it. JC turned his face away as wooden splinters flew through the air like shrapnel. The door surged forward triumphantly. JC ran forward, grabbed the edge of the door with both hands, and threw his weight against it. He struggled for a moment, setting his merely human strength against the implacable unnatural force behind the door. Then JC ripped the door right off its hinges and threw it to one side.
The door hit the floor with an echoing crash, loud enough to wake the dead; and then it rocked briefly back and forth before lying still. But no-one was looking at the door. Everyone was looking at JC. He was looking at his hands, turning them back and forth as though he’d never seen them before.
“When did you turn into the Incredible Hulk, JC?” said Happy.
“Beats the hell out of me,” said JC. “I’m as mystified as you. It was as though the door suddenly didn’t weigh anything at all.” He looked at the shattered brass hinges, hanging loosely from the solid door-frame. “It would appear that the change started in me, by my contact with the Outside, is an ongoing process. That isn’t finished with me yet.”
He knelt beside the door, tried to lift it with one hand, and found he barely had the strength to raise it off the floor. Whatever more-than-human strength had moved in him moments before, it was clearly gone. JC stood up, turned his back on the fallen door, and smiled briefly at the others.
“As long as I’m not actually turning green and exhibiting a more-than-usually-surly disposition…I wouldn’t worry about it.”
The ghost of Dr. Todd advanced suddenly on Happy, striding forward with uncanny speed. The cold, grim expression on the ghost’s face didn’t change at all. Happy quickly backed away, but the ghost went after him, rapidly closing the gap.
“Don’t let him get too close!” said Melody. “He’s still sucking the heat out of everything!”
“I had worked that out for myself, thank you!” said Happy, back-pedalling fast. “I’m trying to hold him off telepathically, but I can’t find anything to lock onto. I’m not even convinced there’s anything there to reach, with his brain gone. All I’m picking up is his presence, a shape impressed on reality through sheer force of will. He shines so bright, JC! Looking at him is like being blinded by a spotlight!”
“Then stop looking at him!” said JC. “Put up your shields! Keep him out!”
“I’m trying! I’m trying! Damn, he’s strong!”
Happy’s back slammed up against the
far wall. There was nowhere left for him to go; and the ghost was still advancing. Melody came rushing out from behind her instruments and put herself between Happy and the ghost of Dr. Todd. His expression didn’t change; but he stopped dead, right in front of Melody. His hands came up from his sides and clutched her shoulders. She cried out, in shock as much as pain, as the terrible cold hit her. She shook and shuddered under his touch, the fierce cold stabbing through her like knives. A layer of frost formed on her face, covering her eyeballs like cataracts.
JC ran forward, grabbed Melody by one arm, and hauled her out of the way. The ghost had no physical strength to hang on to her. He didn’t even look aside as Melody disappeared from in front of him. His cold gaze remained fixed on Happy. Melody fell to one knee, shaking and shuddering. Happy moved quickly out from in front of the ghost to kneel beside her, throwing his arms around her, using the warmth of his own body to drive the cold out of hers. The ghost turned to glare at him. JC moved to put himself between the ghost and his partners, whipped off his very dark sunglasses, and showed what he had for eyes to the ghost of Dr. Todd. They glared brightly, fiercely, in the gloom, like the sun come down to touch the Earth; and Dr. Todd could not face the light. He backed away, slowly, seeming to glide as much as walk, until he came to a halt on the far side of the room.
Melody scrubbed roughly at her face with both hands, brushing the frost away. Her skin was blue-white, almost bruised, but already fierce spots of angry colour were returning. She moved restlessly inside Happy’s arms, and he immediately let her go and stood up, letting Melody get to her feet under her own strength. She could be funny about things like that. JC replaced his sunglasses.
“Dear God, man,” said Laurie. “What the hell happened to your eyes?”
“Work-related injury,” said JC. “I let some demons get too close to me during a haunting down in London’s Underground. They very nearly killed me; but something from Outside reached down and touched me, giving me the strength I needed to save myself. I’m more than I was; and you can see it in my eyes.”
“Something from where?” said Laurie. “From Heaven?”
“Undecided, as yet,” said JC.
“Don’t you think you should try to find out?” said Laurie. “You’ve been marked. But is it a sign of grace or a sign of ownership? I think you owe it to yourself to find out the true nature of your benefactor—if only for your own peace of mind.”
“Trust me,” said JC. “It is right there on my list of Things to Do.” He looked across at Melody and Happy, and they both nodded quickly to show that they were themselves again. “Happy, keep trying to read that ghost. Get something out of him. But don’t let him get inside your head. Melody, it’s research time. I need to know everything you can find about Dr. Emil Todd. What’s his story, and what connection does he have to Bradleigh Halt?”
“I’m on it,” said Melody, already back behind her rank of instruments, fingers stabbing stiffly at her keyboards as she accessed the relevant files on her computer. “The Institute still has an open file on Dr. Todd, as an unsolved case…But it is really heavily restricted, JC, for several pay grades above ours. This is the kind of information the likes of you and I aren’t supposed to even know exists.”
“You’ve been hacking the restricted files on your own time again, haven’t you?” said JC.
“Yes,” said Melody.
“Good girl,” said JC. “Now tell me things I need to know.”
“Dr. Todd disappeared, late in the year 1878,” said Melody. “Same year as the missing train…And according to this file, it’s all connected to something called the Ghost Caller. This is pretty obscure stuff, JC. Old-time information, much of it second hand; I’m not sure anyone at the Institute knew about this stuff before we were sent in.”
“Except we can’t be sure of anything where the Carnacki Institute’s concerned, these days,” Happy said darkly.
“The Ghost Caller,” said Melody, talking over Happy with the ease of long practice. “Also known as The Call For The Dead. No definite information here about what it was or how it worked. Presumably some kind of Victorian steampunk break-through, to produce a machine we have yet to duplicate.”
“Mostly because any sane person would have more sense than to build anything that calls ghosts,” said Happy. “Anyone with two working brain-cells to bang together knows it’s in everyone’s best interests to keep the dead at arm’s length.”
“Ah, but it wasn’t always like that,” said Melody. “The Ghost Caller, this incredible machine, was the brain-child of Dr. Emil Todd, (almost certainly not his real name,) one of the greatest and most popular mediums of Victorian times. When they were all going mad for Spiritualism, and raising the ghosts of the departed, so they could make contact with loved ones on the Other Side. Dr. Todd toured the country with his act, appearing in all the biggest theatres, putting on spectacular shows. He produced spirit voices, visions, ectoplasm, and extended conversations with the dearly departed of people in his audience. Charged a pretty price for admission but always gave the people their money’s worth. He was, briefly, a national sensation. But he’d barely been in the big time a year before he was exposed as a fake and a fraud. He really did do most of it with mirrors. And ventriloquism, conjuring tricks, and plants in the audience. All very obvious, in retrospect. A jumped-up showman, with delusions of grandeur. He was ruined, abandoned by the audiences who’d adored and believed in him. He was hounded from the stage and forced into early retirement. Had to go into hiding, for his own safety.
“And then he disappeared. As suddenly and completely as one of his own stage effects.
“With anyone else, the story might have ended there, but Dr. Todd was made of sterner stuff. He was determined to restore his reputation by presenting the public with something undeniably real. So he took the extensive fortune he’d amassed and spent pretty much all of it in having the Ghost Caller created for him. An apparently very impressive device, for which no contemporary description survives, but powerful enough to call ghosts to it, like moths to a bright light.
“However, before Dr. Todd could demonstrate the Call For The Dead on stage, he was shut down by the Queen’s champion of that time, the legendary Victorian Adventurer, Julien Advent. He confiscated the Ghost Caller because of the threat it posed. Not to the Nation, but all Humanity. Apparently, the machine was so powerful that once its Call began, anything, and by that I mean anything at all, could be summoned into our reality from any of the Outer Reaches. Ghosts, demons, abhuman monstrosities—you name it. An irresistible Call, a summons with no limit to its reach…Who knows what that might have let in. There are always things Out There, lurking on the threshold of our world, waiting for an invitation…”
“We’re talking about the Great Beasts, aren’t we?” said Happy. “The Abominations, the Entities from the Outer Reaches.”
“You might be,” said Laurie. “I haven’t a clue what you’re talking about.”
“Be grateful,” said Happy.
He moved away, to be on his own for a moment. One hand deep in his trouser pocket closed around a pill bottle. Melody had worked hard to keep Happy from depending on chemical supports, mostly by having lots of sex with him whenever he looked like weakening. But really, all she’d done was distract him. And she couldn’t be there all the time. The problem remained the same: that Happy saw, heard, and sensed far more of reality than was good for him. He needed his special medications to shut his telepathy down to bearable levels, to keep the hidden world and all its horrors outside his head. He’d hoped that sex, and maybe even love, might be enough; but they couldn’t give him the peace of mind the pills could. Or the strength. Happy was not a strong man. He never had been. And he knew it. He had done his best to keep off the pills because it meant so much to Melody; but at times like this, faced with imminent dangers from Awful Things from Beyond…Happy reached for the only real strength he’d ever known.
His hand closed tightly around the pill bottle; but h
e didn’t take it out. Not yet.
Happy didn’t know, but JC had already talked with Melody about providing Happy with some kind of experimental tech support. Some kind of machine, to keep the bad stuff outside Happy’s head. But Melody had been forced to admit she’d already tried everything she could think of, and she could think of some pretty extreme things. Not one of them had worked. She’d failed Happy and failed herself. She wasn’t used to that. JC and Melody hadn’t told Happy any of this. They didn’t want him to give up hope. Because Happy needed hope more than anything.
And Happy wasn’t the only one.
“This…Ghost Caller,” JC said to Melody. “Is it something I could use, to call Kim back to me?”
“Not a good idea, JC,” Melody said quietly. “The Ghost Caller was, by all accounts, anything but subtle. You can’t choose whom you want to call. There’s an On/Off switch, to open and close a Door. And God alone knows what might be waiting on the Other Side.”
“Hold everything,” said Happy, turning back to face them. “Didn’t I hear something recently about an Apocalypse Door? A Door to give you direct access to the Hereafter? Am I remembering that right? Could that be something like our Ghost Caller?”
“Not really,” JC said patiently. “The Apocalypse Door allowed you to open the Gates of Hell. It was destroyed by the Droods.”
“Why would anyone…?” said Laurie.
“Don’t go there,” said JC.
“The Ghost Caller doesn’t give you access to the Hereafter,” said Melody. “It sends out an open call to the restless dead. Of which there has never been any shortage…” She thought for a moment, then sniffed loudly. “What we could really use is a Ghost Repellent. Something to send ghosts away.”
“Some kind of spray, perhaps,” Happy said brightly. “Something in a can—Ghost Away! I’d pay good money for a can of that.”
JC gave Melody a look, and she resumed telling Dr. Todd’s story.