Fight scene time. You know we have to have one eventually. And you're in luck. It should be a good one. At least, I hope so. I really tried to come up with something reasonably entertaining.
Oh, and I think I should mention where I got the name "Sanduleak" from. Turns out script-writer Michael McDowell was impressed by how many people made the connection to Betelgeuse, the star in the Orion constellation. He added that they had received a suggestion the sequel be named "Sanduleak-69 202" after the former star of SN 1987A, a supernova in the outskirts of the Tarantula Nebula in the Large Magellanic Cloud (a nearby dwarf galaxy). The light from the new supernova reached Earth on February 23, 1987. Originally Sanduleak-69 202 was a magnitude 12 blue supergiant star, named after Romanian-American astronomer Nicholas Sanduleak.
So while Betelgeuse was named after a red supergiant, Sanduleak is named after a blue supergiant that exploded already into a supernova. I thought it would work out well for a naming strategy for the guy to further show how he's a darker version of Betelgeuse.
Anyway, I hope you enjoy the chapter.
Certain levels of interaction with the living are to be expected and tolerated during a typical haunting. Very few members of the living can be haunted without any encounters with the deceased performing the haunting.
Physical evidence of the deceased existence and presence, however, is less tolerated. The living must not receive undeniable proof. The living cannot be allowed to know for certain of existence after death. This only leads to more shared knowledge among the living of the precise methods of causing interference to the deceased in the forms of summoning, bindings, banishing, exorcisms, etc.
The deceased must not allow access of the living to their copy of "Handbook for the Recently Deceased." Penalties for violations may vary from case to case, depending on the exact situation.
The deceased must not cause excessive physical harm to the living. Mental and emotional harm have higher levels of tolerance before it becomes problematic. Any questions concerning specific actions towards the living being haunted that the deceased are uncertain of can be directed towards any caseworker. Penalties for violations may vary from case to case, depending on the exact situation.
The deceased must not cause the demise of the living. Penalties for violations will be among the most severe.
-Excerpt from "Handbook for the Recently Deceased"
His punch didn't go exactly as planned. As Danny closed the remaining distance between him and the poltergeist, the boy spotted a split second of surprise before impact. Or at least what should have been impact.
Instead, the poltergeist grabbed his fist in mid-throw and swung the halfa overhead, letting his momentum carry him through the toss. Danny found himself tumbling and flying past the Ghost With The Most. Once he managed to bring himself to a stop and look back, the poltergeist hadn't moved. He just smiled wryly at the angry teenage ghost.
"And we were having such a nice conversation," he commented casually. "But you did say you expected a more impressive show."
Danny's hand started to glow green as he prepared for a second try. He could do this. He could handle the poltergeist and keep him away from Danny's friends. He had to at least try.
"So you double as a flashlight," continued the Ghost With The Most. "Cute Trick. But if you really want to be wowed, I can certainly deliver."
He charged again, blasting ecto-rays towards the poltergeist. His target threw his hand up and all the blasts somehow melted away before they hit. And when Danny was once again in range, he grabbed the teen by the jumpsuit and flung him away again. Danny tumbled through the Ghost Zone wildly, vaguely thankful there were fewer things to crash into than there were in Amity Park.
As he managed to right himself, Danny saw a glint in his opponent's eyes that wasn't present before. He didn't look as harmless as he did when he first saw the ghost.
"All right, pal," said the poltergeist, a dangerous edge to his voice now. "It's showtime."
Sanduleak knew where she was, his door was ready to let him out, and no one suspected a thing. All he was doing now was counting down the time to when sunlight wouldn't be an issue. All poltergeists had their limits. Of course, the modern tall buildings of cities cast long shadows that could let him move around a little sooner. So the moment the girl was in deep enough and dark enough shadows that she wouldn't escape, he would make his move.
And even if she stayed away from the darker corners of the city, sunset wasn't too far away. He'd be meeting her very soon. The Mortal Bride would be gone and that smug poltergeist would have to find a new one if he wanted out. It wasn't easy finding someone alive willing to marry the dead, after all. Especially if he wanted someone semi-pretty to look at.
Actually, she was pretty. Sanduleak knew that from the moment he saw her picture in the file, the fashions of the recent era making it easier to appreciate her figure than the more concealing outfits from when he was alive. She was younger than his preferences and wasn't as full-figured as a more mature woman, but she was attractive enough. Maybe he just liked them young and naïve. There was certainly an appeal to it sometimes.
A tempting idea presented itself to Sanduleak. Maybe if there was time, he could enjoy twice the fun. Slitting her throat would be nice, but she was a pretty thing and probably was never even near a man since she was young and hadn't actually married the Ghost With The Most yet. He could play with her a little first if there was time. The idea certainly could be fun.
All needed to do was count the hours until he could slip out. When darkness fell, Sanduleak would come out to play.
Lydia stared at the building, waiting for her aunt and uncle to drive out again. The fence kept her at a distance from Axion Labs, but she could easily keep an eye on the situation from her bike. The place looked reasonably large and probably held plenty of employees, but she would recognize their car if they tried to leave.
A sharp ringing left her struggling to pull out the unfamiliar cell phone from her backpack. It took several seconds to get a hold of it. Lydia was almost afraid it would stop ringing before she could answer it, but she managed to grab it.
"Hello, you've reached Sam's phone. This is Lydia speaking," she greeted quickly.
"Hey, Lydia. This is Sam. We grabbed the stuff from the safe and we got out," responded Sam over the speaker. "You don't have to keep lookout anymore.
"Great," said Lydia with relief. "I can't tell you how happy I am to hear that."
"Listen, Tucker says we need to talk in person. Not to mention you probably want your stuff as soon as possible. We need to meet up."
"Well, I'm over at Axion Labs, which seems to be on the edge of town almost. Where do you think we should meet up? You know Amity Park better."
"Head down Elm Street and turn onto Craven Lane. There's an electronics store, a donut shop, and a furniture store. They don't get a lot of business and tend to close early, but they're easy to find and about midway between us at the moment. We can head to the library after we meet up if we need to without much backtracking. It'll just take too long to give you directions there."
"New town. Strange streets. Unfamiliar landmarks. Yeah, let's keep it simple. I'll meet you there."
Lydia hung up the phone and dropped it back into her backpack. She couldn't believe it. They had her journal. Which mean she could find his name. She would have written it down. She could read it and call him back. And once she did that, Aunt Melinda's actions so far would be completely fixable.
Turning her bike around, Lydia started pedaling. As long as she kept an eye on the street signs, it shouldn't be too hard to find the group of stores. Hopefully she could get everything sorted and get her friend back soon. That thought stayed with her as she rode off into the sunset like the main character in a Western.
"Well, this is more fun than when the last ghost crazy enough to attack me tried it, but I think we've wasted enough time for the moment," remarked the poltergeist as he perched on top of his opponent.
Danny would have shot off a witty response if his face wasn't being shoved firmly into the rock surface. The Ghost With The Most was pinning him in place, one hand wrenching Danny's arms back and the other forcing the teenager's head down. So far he didn't seem to be able to break free of the poltergeist's grip, but that didn't stop him from struggling.
"Now, I am a little curious why you decided to go for a sucker punch. Not that it isn't a smart strategy even if you didn't quite land a blow. But I usually have to do something before they start swinging," continued the Ghost With The Most. "Feel like sharing your feelings or should I tie your arms into knots?"
Danny ignored the ghost's words. He needed to break free. He couldn't let the creep win. He couldn't let the poltergeist near Sam.
Desperation gave rise to an insane idea. Ghosts could phase through solid objects in the human world, but were mostly solid within the Ghost Zone since it was their home dimension and made up of ectoplasm. But it could work the other way around too in regards to a human in the Ghost Zone. It took effort to remain solid in that environment. There were just some weird interactions between normal matter and ectoplasm. In the right circumstances, they simply phased through each other.
He wouldn't normally risk such a thing in a fight, but Danny let himself shift back into being human and fell straight through the rock, escaping the poltergeist's startled grasp. The instant he fell out the bottom of the floating island, the teenager changed back and flew up quickly enough to actually land a punch on the shocked ghost's face.
The Ghost With The Most tumbled back a few feet before steadying himself. With a shocked expression still locked in place, the poltergeist reached up to where Danny's punch hit. Then he abruptly threw his head back and laughed.
"EEEEEYYYYYYAAAAAAAAHAAAAAAHAAAAAHAAA!"
It wasn't a normal laugh. It was wild and insane. The sound was enough to send a chill up his spine; the noise definitely felt like one that belonged to a confident mad man.
"That wasn't half bad, kid. It's been a while since someone got the better of me with a sneaky move, outside of the sandworm through the ceiling thing," the poltergeist said as his chuckling slowed. "The switch to human to get loose was smart. I guess being both human and a ghost has advantages. It's a really nice trick."
"I'll pull a rabbit out of a hat for my next one," said Danny before launching himself back towards the ghost.
The teenager threw a flurry of punches at the poltergeist, but he blocked them with far more speed than seemed possible. His arms were just a flash of blurry stripes. Then the Ghost With The Most decided to strike back, the palm of his hand slamming into Danny's chest hard enough to knock him flying.
As Danny struggled to catch his breath, the poltergeist remarked, "If you keep this up, I might have to use something flashier on you. It is getting a little annoying and I have a girl to find a way to reach."
"Stay away from her," snapped Danny, firing a few blasts towards him.
The ecto-rays stopped in midair, collecting together in a glowing green orb. The poltergeist snapped his fingers and it twisted and morphed into something with fangs and wings. It looked like a radioactive bat monster as big as a car.
"Can't do that," the ghost said sharply. "She's mine. I'm not letting her go."
With a screech, the bat monster launched itself at the teenager. Danny managed to barely dodge the first bite, but it was a close one. As it flapped its wings to come around for another attack, he decided to break out the big guns.
Diving under the next bat attack, Danny turned towards the direction now occupied by both the monster and the poltergeist. Both opponents were now in the line of fire, just as he needed them to be. He took a deep breath, bracing himself as best he could. Then he wailed.
His Ghostly Wail was one of his strongest weapons, a powerful sonic attack. The force behind it could just about rip apart anything in front of him. The collateral damage was one of the reasons he didn't use it other than as a last resort.
The wail hit the monster bat hard, knocking it back and even tearing the creature apart into streaks of green goo. He spotted the poltergeist being hit, flying wildly away from the impact. Danny couldn't focus any further on events, though. All his concentration was on maintaining his sonic attack.
He finally ran out of breath and was forced to stop his Ghostly Wail, the second reason he rarely used it kicking in. The reason the attack was so powerful was because it took a lot of the halfa's strength to use it, leaving him drained and barely able to remain in his ghost form. Danny floated limply, trying to keep from reverting to human while looking to make sure it worked.
For just a brief moment, Danny thought it worked. He hoped it worked. But then he caught sight of the black and white stripes and his stomach dropped.
Granted, it at least looked like there was an effect this time. The poltergeist appeared winded, his hair and his suit ruffled, and wore a combination of annoyance and respect across his moldy face.
"Okay, that stung a little," said the poltergeist, massaging his shoulder briefly. "But it doesn't look like you can repeat it. You're running on empty, pal."
"I'll manage," Danny said tiredly, ignoring the fact he didn't have the strength to fight a kitten at the moment. "You're not getting near Sam."
The ghost blinked, "Who?"
"Sam. The girl you're after. I won't let you."
"Who's talking about Sam?" asked the poltergeist, apparently confused. "I'm looking for—"
Something weird happened as the ghost spoke. His mouth was open, but no sound emerged. The Ghost With The Most was clearly still trying to talk, but it wasn't working. He almost looked like he was gagging on the words. Danny could see a flash of rapidly shifting emotions. Surprise, confusion, and then fury. Far more terrifying fury and frustration than he'd seen from the poltergeist during the entire fight. And it didn't seem to be aimed at the halfa.
"That… That witch," snarled the poltergeist, raising his hands in front of him as if he wanted to strangle someone. "How dare she? When I find that woman—"
Danny was then treated to a very colorful and descriptive tirade that would've been censored heavily even to qualify for an R rated film. The Ghost With The Most seemed determined to use every curse in existence in the most creative manner possible. Danny thought he might have stopped speaking modern English at one point and either switched languages or started using something older. Or both. It was actually pretty educational.
When there was a brief pause in the rant, the teenager asked cautiously, "Uh… What exactly is wrong?"
Jerking his head back towards Danny with a look that made him wonder if the poltergeist forgot about his presence, he said, "I'm used to not being able to say my name. Haven't been able to since I died. That would make it too easy to get out, apparently. Annoying, but I can deal with it. But that ugly old broad told me not to say her name and now I can't. That's just beyond petty. As if I don't already have enough reason to hate her. That woman really doesn't know when to stop."
The fight felt like it was over for the moment. Somehow they'd shifted back to the awkward conversation moment. Since it would give Danny some time to recover from his exhaustion a little, he wasn't going to complain. Besides, the situation was turning strange again. It wasn't Sam he was after.
"So you can't say the name of your missing 'Mortal Bride'?" said Danny carefully, trying to straighten out his confused thoughts while recovering his strength.
"I wouldn't call her that. It was a misunderstanding. Marriage is completely off the table," he muttered. "But, yeah, I can't say her name."
"But if you didn't mean Sam," he said slowly, "then who…?"
Danny's eyes widened as he remembered there was another Goth girl who matched the description. A girl who was new to Amity Park and the school. A girl who claimed to have experience with ghosts.
"Give the boy a prize," remarked the poltergeist dryly, clearly spotting his moment of realization. "Now that you know I'm not after your girlfriend, want to try making a deal again?"
"She's not my girlfriend," he snapped automatically.
"Oh, touched a nerve there. I guess you're still at the denial phase, then. Not going to judge. She's all yours."
Trying to steer the quickly-derailing and uncomfortable conversation back towards safe topics, Danny hurriedly asked, "If you've been watching us all day, then why didn't you just sneak out the portal and go after her?"
"Can't," he grimaced. "Tried it. Won't work. Fun fact: I can't get out without someone using my name. Say it once, say it twice, say it thrice, and then I'm good to go," he said, throwing up fingers as he counted. "Otherwise, I'm stuck hanging out with a bunch of dead stiffs."
"And you can't say your name, right?"
"Exactly. The rules won't let me, which is so annoying sometimes. It used to be worse, though. Literacy wasn't really big when I was alive." He reached into his jacket pocket before gaining another look of intense frustrated anger and pulled his hand back out. "So that's how it's going to be. Adding yet another problem to blame that woman for."
"What?"
"Can't give you a card for some reason. Probably can't write my name or even manage charades anymore. That woman might be a vindictive, cold-hearted, foul harpy, but she's thorough. She doesn't want me anywhere near her and covered some of my usual loopholes. Evil old broad…"
"Who?" asked Danny as his confusion mounted.
"Her aunt and uncle, I think. But mostly the woman. I only met them the one time when they were trying to mess with me and her. She's playing with fire and I'll be happy to help her burn," growled the poltergeist. "After I get back to her, though. That witch doesn't deserve to be my first priority. She's not worth it. She's more important than revenge, no matter how much the woman deserves it or how much fun it would be."
While Danny worried about how the woman seemed to be tangled up in everything and obviously on the ghost's bad side, part of him focused on something else. As angry and frustrated as the poltergeist sounded when mentioning the woman who was causing so much trouble for him, his voice notably softened whenever he discussed the girl. And Danny doubted the ghost was a professional actor, so it was likely a real reaction. That told the teenager far more than the rumors.
"You really don't mean her any harm. Even when you sent the Ghost Zone into a panic about the Ghost With The Most searching for his missing 'Mortal Bride,' you weren't planning her any harm," Danny said slowly. "You just miss her. You miss her and maybe you're worried about her."
"I don't worry," he said stubbornly, crossing his arms.
"But you won't hurt her or kidnap her or elope or anything, right?"
"Not a chance," said the poltergeist firmly. "I wouldn't do anything to hurt my girl. No one is allowed to hurt her. I don't have a lot of friends since most of them are too awestruck by me," he said, causing Danny to roll his eyes, "and she's mine. She my friend and I'm getting her back, even if I have to get creative and a little destructive to reach her."
Possessive. Scary to deal with. Overboard with his reactions. He definitely matched a description Danny heard recently and remembered well. It added strength to the ghost's claims. The teenager felt himself reluctantly relaxing, a few answers starting to match up.
"How exactly have you been watching us?" he asked the poltergeist, cautiously accepting the fact that the fight was definitely over.
Grinning broadly, the Ghost With The Most said, "Mirrors and reflections. With practice and power, they make great windows. And I have both."
Remembering how Poindexter communicated using the locker mirrors, Danny nodded thoughtfully, "Is that what you were doing when I arrived?"
Landing back on the floating rock, he confirmed, "If I can't reach her yet, I can at least keep an eye on what's going on around her." Picking up one of the shiny chunks of metal that wasn't lost in the struggle, the poltergeist continued, "She and your friends have been plotting something in their spare time. It's actually pretty entertaining, even if I missed out on some of the details."
Before Danny could begin wondering what he meant, the poltergeist abruptly frowned in apparent confusion as he stared at the piece of metal. He peered closer, eyes narrowing as he focused on the reflective surface in his hands. Then there was an unexpected reaction that the teenager would have never predicted. The ghost's moldy features twisted into one of horrified recognition.
In a harsh, stunned, and desperate voice, he whispered, "No… Not him. Not with her."
Cliffhanger! Aren't I so evil?
So this turned out to be a rather quick update, though I actually expected them to slow down. The traditional "protagonist vs. protagonist" battle is now out of the way. Which means that they can hopefully focus more on the common enemy now than each other. The next update should involve bad things happening in the human world.
Also, a small reference to some other scary movies and such. The directions that Sam gives about Elm Street and Craven Lane are meant to refer to "Nightmare on Elm Street" and Wes Craven. Since they go to Casper High and the town gets its name from "The Amityville Horror," I thought it was appropriate.
Remember, reviews are always welcome and appreciated. I love feedback.