Doc had stationed himself by one of the windows, irritably drumming his fingers on his crossed arms. He had already dried and reassembled his sword, and it waited on the fireplace hearth for him. Grey pre-dawn light lit the side of his face.

"I really think I'm well enough to leave now," he said for the third time. He was bored, to be honest: he'd eaten most of the available food. And it turned out that his hostess had a gluten allergy, so she didn't have any wheat or grain products at all. No bread, no muffins, nothing. And no hot water for tea, either.

"As a houseguest, you are a real pill, you know that?" Ann snarled from the couch; she was lying there with her eyes closed, denying his every effort to make her move. Her dog lay on the floor beside her, whining a little at the anger in her voice.

"I could just go."

"Don't expect me to go find you after you slip and break your leg. Or if you collapse and the ghosts get you."

"Come on, it's almost dawn. Sun up, storm over, ghosts gone, everything will be fine. Any time now…any minute now…"

There was a sudden hum, and the recessed lights above the fireplace came on.

"Finally!" she said, rolling to her feet. "Let's go outside and see if your phone works. Ghost, stay."

"WHAT ghost?" he half-shouted, diving over the couch and reaching for his sword.

"Okay, and can you stop jumping around like that too? The dog is named Ghost. Ghost, stay here." The dog yipped as they went outside.

Outside was a disaster zone. Every surface was covered with a thick fluff of blown pine needles, and under that fluff was ice, black and wet and gleaming. The ground was littered with small branches, and several trees were bowed over the fence in various places. There was a constant pattering and crackling, as ice melted off the trees. From under the green canopy of one fallen tree, the nose of a car poked out.

"Is your car wrecked?"

"No, just dented. But I can't move it until I get that tree off it." The woods around the property were just as bad; the white slashes of broken-off tree limbs were everywhere. "Good thing it's above freezing; if this ice stayed on the ground we'd really be in trouble. Is your phone working?"

"Oh yeah." Quickly, he dialed the office.

Judy answered. "Ugh?"

"Judy! Do we have power?"

"Ugh."

He couldn't hear the generator running in the background, so that must be a 'yes.' "I was stranded by the storm, I'll be there as soon as I can. Can you put Gordito on?"

"Ook," and a wordless shout, and then Gordito's voice in his ear, high and excited.

"Doc! Where are you?"

Ann was watching him, her head cocked as though listening.

"I'm all right, I just got," he looked at her, "sidetracked?"

"'I met a strange lady, she made me nervous'," Ann sang off-key. "'She took me in and gave me breakfast.'"

"Will you be hush," Doc hissed at her.

(Tell the truth, his inner voice prompted. He won't believe you anyway.)

He paid no attention to that voice, just reassured Gordito that he would be there as soon as he could, and extracting from him the information that there were two patients waiting for him.

"Your son?" Ann asked after he hung up.

"My sidekick," he said shortly.

"Ninja have sidekicks? Well, all right. Now, may I borrow your phone please?"

"Why?" Two could play the unhelpful game.

"Because my land line is still not connected, and my cell phone is busted, and I want to call Memorial Hospital."

"Why? Are you going to go have that arm looked at?"

"No, because I work there," she frowned.

"Oh." He handed the phone over, and she dialed quickly with one thumb.

"Hello, is your power on? Good, glad to hear it. Extension 1113, please." She waited, and then flashed a narrow grin at nothing. "Good morning, Francois, this is Ann. How's it going down there?"

Doc had no compunction about eavesdropping - why should he? She didn't. And he could hear Francois' voice quite clearly as he said, "Fine. When will you be in for the orientation interview? Everything's set up."

Ann swallowed, mouth suddenly twisted awry. She saw Doc listening, and mouthed to him, New job.

Doc sized her up: unwashed, bruised, her hair standing out around her head like a dandelion, dark circles under her eyes – not exactly a face to show to the world. From the sounds of it the storm had completely messed up her first day at work. And he hadn't helped. No wonder she was in such a foul mood.

"Ah, well. Francois, I'm afraid I'm going to have to reschedule…no, wait, tell them I'll phone in."

"Are you sure? That doesn't make for a very good first impression."

She sighed. "Believe me, if they saw me they'd be even less impressed. You know that house I was moving into? I arrived last night. Nothing – and I mean nothing – is set up. Not even Internet access!"

Francois audibly gasped.

"So nothing was ready. And I had a power outage, and my car's under a tree, and I really – look, I can't be there in person, OK? But if the power is on in most of Cumberland-"

"It is," he interrupted.

"Good. Then I'm going to find somewhere with wifi, dial in for the meeting with my laptop, and then call my lawyers. All of my lawyers."

"Was the storm really that bad? We just had the power out for a few hours."

"Up here it looks like someone dropped my property through a paper shredder. And I don't look much better, do I?" That to Doc, who winced and then nodded in agreement.

"After the meeting I'll find a hotel somewhere with Net access. I'll email you once I'm online and tell you where to reach me. Oh, and you can't call me back at this number; I'm borrowing Doctor McNinja's cell phone."

"You are? Why?"

"Well, mine got wrecked, and he was stranded at my place by the storm – what?" she asked, as Doc frantically gestured for her to be silent. He didn't think he wanted random strangers knowing where he had been.

"Oh, he was, was he?"

"Are you implying something, Francois?" Ann said in a low liquid tone that sounded dangerous. "You do realize that he's close enough that he can hear every word you say?"

"How close?"

She shot a sharp glance at her guest. "I could count the freckles on his eyelids for you, if you like, the next time he blinks. Which might not be any time soon," she added, meeting his furious glare with an innocent little smile. "He's not looking very blinky. In fact, he looks pretty mad to me. Ooh! Maybe he's so mad that he'll come over there and drop you on top of the back-up server!"

"Ann, don't say that!"

"It's the big silver box with Digital in red letters on the front of it, in the left-hand corner of the computer room; I've seen it on the webcam," she told Doc, and then said back to the phone, "Or maybe vice versa – he could drop the server on you! It's very heavy; I bet it would make a nice dent."

"Ann!"

"Francois," her voice dropped, "I have a watch with more storage capacity than that so-called backup server. I could emulate everything it does on a pocket calculator. The best thing that could happen is that it fails and be replaced with something more modern, and I've recommended that. So a little medically-approved euthanasia might be just the thing."

She glanced at Doc again, while Francois spluttered on the other end of the line.

"Uh-oh," she said ominously. "He just cocked an eyebrow at me. I'd better hang up before he fires an eyeball and blows my head off…I'll be online later. Bye!" She clicked the phone shut and offered it back to Doc, and he took it with a certain lack of good grace.

"Extension 1113, you said?"

She dipped her chin and looked up at him. "He is a good computer administrator," she said. "Maybe you could drop the server on him – lightly?"

He tucked his phone away without answering. Ann was looking over her property, frowning.

"I thought I had had enough trees taken out," she said, her eyes burning in the sunlight. "Another thing they screwed up. I wonder - never mind," she said, turning and looking up at the mountain behind them.

"Never mind what?" he said, and turned and looked as well. Then he swallowed, as a creeping sense of unease rose up from the pit of his stomach.

Ann's house was at the foot of a mountain. Not the mountain that concealed his parents' house; he thought this was one over from it. And there was a stripe slanting down the side of the mountain, a path of smashed branches and fallen trees, and it pointed straight to Ann's house.

"Tell me, Doctor," her voice was too soft, "is there some reason that ghosts would chase you down a mountain, dropping trees on you at every step? Or is it that you just don't like trees?"

"I, er," his collar suddenly seemed tighter than ever, "maybe it's just a coincidence?"

"Or maybe," she leaned closer to him, "just maybe - I live in the corner penthouse of Spook Central."

His heart made a little flip-flop in his chest.

"That's a quote from-"

"Ghostbusters, I know," he finished her sentence.

Without noticing his reaction, she turned and scowled at the woods. "Anyway. You seem to be standing up straight, Doctor, and someone knows that you're on your way and can come looking for you if you don't make it. So," she held up her little finger and ceremoniously curled it down, "you are free to go."

"What are you going to do?"

"Just like I said – take my laptop and start walking."

"I could call you a cab-" he offered.

"No, I'll be – oh, what am I saying? Yes, please. If you go down my driveway, go left past six driveways on your left, and through three gates, you'll be on Haunted Wood Drive. If you could tell a cab to meet me there in thirty minutes, that would be awesome."

He frowned, a little crease appearing between his eyebrows. "Six driveways – not six houses?"

"Nope. Unfinished gated community," Ann said, waving her arm to indicate the whole area. "This is the only house done."

He had to ask. "Do I – do I really have freckles on my eyelids?"

She leaned close, peering into his face. "They're very faint, but yes. If you got more sun they'd probably really show."

(I think she likes you, murmured his inner voice again, and Doc silently told it to shut up.)

"So, um, goodbye," he said awkwardly.

"Yes. I will sincerely do my best to come to your office about the arm today. Promise."

He almost told her not to bother, to get it done at the hospital, but she was still talking.

"And, Doctor?" She gave him a smile with no warmth in it at all. "The next time you feel the urge to drink yourself into a dangerous fury? Do the world a favor, and get yourself a brick."

He just looked at her. She hadn't mentioned him being drunk before. He had hoped that she hadn't noticed.

She went on, "A gold brick maybe, you can wrap it in a slice of lemon if you like, but definitely get a brick."

"A brick," he finally repeated.

"Yes, and then some more bricks, and some mortar, and a cask of Antomillado. Find yourself a nice niche, wall yourself in, drink the Antomillado, and don't come out until you're sober, OK? It'll save everyone involved a lot of trouble."

"I still want to see you at my office," he said as she turned away.

She glanced back at him. "I said I would, all right?" She went back into the house, shut the door firmly, and watched crossly through one of the narrow windows as he dashed out of sight.

"That man needs a pause button," she muttered to herself, and then said a nasty word. He'd left his sword! There it was, lying on her hearth.

She frowned hard enough to make her lips whiten. Now she'd have to go see him, after all.