Ghost Slayers

Chapter Twenty-two

By Relm

Zelgadis tapped his fingers against the car window nervously as he waited. Or rather he would have been tapping it had his fingers not go right through the window. Anyone passing by might have been frightened by the fingers that went in and out of the glass.

Though not a lot of time had passed since Lina, Sylphiel ad Filia went into the house to Zelgadis it felt like it was a lifetime. He was getting progressively more nervous the more time ticked away. 'I need to keep my mind occupied.' He decided and causally looked to his other side. All he saw was cold grey eyes before everything went black.

...

"Is there anything in the bathroom?" Lina called out to the hall. "Because I'm getting nothing from the spare bedroom.

"Nothing in here either." Sylphiel responded from the bathroom doorway. "What about you Miss Filia? Anything in the master bedroom?"

"Nope. Clean as a whistle." Filia came out of the master bedroom and into the hall to meet the others. "Looks like this floor is clean."

"Well we didn't get much from the main floor so that leaves only two areas." Lina observed with a grin. The two areas in question where Lina's favourite two places to check in any residential hunting jobs she did. And that was the attic and the basement.

Typically speaking the smaller and/or darker areas of a home were the most likely to be haunted unless kids were involved. Ghosts were always more attracted to the energy of children, but otherwise they liked the dark out of the way places. And so far they had 'slayed' a regular spectre and a poltergeist which was a decent job on its' own. If they could get a few more ghosts then they could get more money.

When it came to every slaying job Lina had a specific pay rate. There was always the base investigation charge where the Ghost Slayers just checked the building for ghosts. Because no matter if there were ghosts or not Lina had to charge for the labour of checking. Some clients weren't happy to find out their homes weren't haunted and refused to pay. While others were more than happy to learn their homes were ghost free.

Next was the basic ghost slaying. This is where the Ghost Slayers would deal with any or all the standard ghosts in the building. The cost was on a per ghost basis. If the ghost or ghosts were all low level threats then this is what the customer would expect to pay for each ghost. Usually these were the ghosts that were heard but not seen. They might have the ability to move things, but those events would be few and far between.

Thirdly was the mid-level ghost slaying. Again this was on a per ghost pay rate, but this entailed ghosts that are more resistant to 'Slaying'. These kinds of ghosts were visuals, quite nosy and were more likely to move things around. Because these ghosts were more dangerous to deal with Lina naturally charged more.

Lastly was the high-level ghost slaying or poltergeists. These ones were the most dangerous as they were visual, nosy and extremely likely to move things around. And it wasn't usually in a playful fashion. These ghosts were usually very angry and very likely to take those objects they move and throw it at nearby people. Especially if said people were trying to trap them into a portable ghost containment box. Ghosts can't directly hurt you, but if they were say throwing around something sharp or heavy if those objects were to hit you you could get hurt or killed. These ghosts were the hardest to deal with and wasn't something a single Ghost Slayer could deal with on their own. Again due to the danger factor Lina charged the most for these.

Of course dealing with poltergeist wasn't something Lina really loved dealing with. She'd take five regular ghosts over one poltergeist. But given their financial status Lina was happy to get anything.

...

Once Amelia had located her scanner (which unfortunately was in her car all the way downstairs) she raced back to the break room. When she finally got back Xellos was exactly where had been. Sitting in the chair appearing to be staring off into space. The only difference was that he had a fine film of green slime covering his nicely tailor purple suit. But this failed to annoy the ghostly professor.

Slimer floated around the room looking quite distressed.

"You couldn't touch him could you?" Amelia questioned the green ghost.

Slimer nodded while still looking quite upset.

When turned on her scanner she got ghostly readings. But they were coming from Slimer, not Xellos. "According to my scanner... Slimer you are the only ghost in the room. That means you Mister Xellos," Amelia knelt down to look the purple haired man in the eyes, "are just like Mister Zelgadis."

Xellos didn't respond to this he just continued to stare forward as though he could look straight through Amelia's head. Strangely a pen and a pad paper appeared on the table with Xellos and he was absentmindedly scribbling on the pad.

"What are you scribbling?" Amelia went around to the other side of the table to see the paper more clearly. She almost laughed when she saw what it was.

It was one word written over and over again.

Filia.

"That's surprising." Amelia mused with a frown.

...

Since they were already upstairs Lina, Sylphiel and Filia decided to try the attic. It would have probably made more sense to have one or more of them check the attic while the remaining people check the basement. But Lina didn't want to chance it; there could be a poltergeist or more than one ghost to handle. Better to be safe than sorry.

Usually when it came to attics there were two kinds. The ones that have staircases leading up to it or those ceiling trap door ladder entrances. The staircase style attics were typically pretty big thus warranting the staircase. But the attics with the trap door ladders were usually small, cramped and hard to get into.

Obviously the bigger attic was the easier it was to deal with. Unfortunately for Lina it wasn't one of those kinds of attics.

Lina stared at the trap door ceiling handle. She had hoped that it was going to be a bigger attic. This was going to be problematic. Ordinarily this wouldn't be such a problem. But given the unknown situation because of the house next door Lina didn't have any clue what could be in the attic. And when you have to climb a ladder type stairway it left you extremely vulnerable. If there was a poltergeist up there throwing things about sticking your head in the middle of it was just as bad as walking around with a kick me sign. "Sylphiel are you getting any readings?"

"I'm sorry Miss Lina; I can't properly scan it because of the house next door. Or at least until I get closer to the opening." Sylphiel explained.

"No you're staying down here. I'm going up there first." Lina declared.

"Are you sure that's a good idea Lina?" Filia second guessed Lina's decision.

"No it's not, but we can only go up there one at a time. And it should be me. This is my company and one thing I promised all of you when you came to work for me was that I would try and keep you guys out of danger. Besides at least if I die you'll guys will know what to do with my ghost." Lina joked darkly.

"Miss Lina that's not funny!" Sylphiel protested.

"Oh well here goes nothing." Lina pulled down the trap door and when she was just about to set her foot down on the first step her phone rang. "AHHH!" Lina yelped not expecting the ringing. "Okay whoever did that is going to get my wraith later!" Lina yelled fishing out her phone. "WHAT THE HECK DO YOU WANT?" She yelled rather rudely answered the call.

"Um... Miss Lina...?"

Lina rolled her eyes. "Hi Amelia."

"Is everything okay?"

"We're still in the middle of ghost slaying so there had better be a good reason why you're calling me."

"Well it's Mister Xellos... I did the scan..."

"And what did it say?"

"Mister Xellos isn't dead. He's just like Mister Zelgadis."

Lina let out a tired sigh. It's not that she wished death on the university professor or anything but this wasn't exactly a welcome situation either. That meant the book was out there doing the same thing to other victims as it did to Zelgadis.

"What did she say?" Filia demanded again trying to get the phone from Lina.

"Filia stop that! It was the book again. He's an unghostly ghost like Zel." Lina explained to Filia.

"Miss Lina what should I do now?"

"Did you contact the school?"

"I didn't see the point. He's not dead; his body has just been stolen. And what would I tell them anyway? I'm sorry did you have an evil book at your school that steals bodies turning their victims into ghosts? That would just cause panic."

"Or they would think you're nuts. It would be best just to check the school out."

"It's too late to do that now, we'd have to check in the morning."

"Probably wouldn't matter anyway. I doubt the book would still be there. If it's like what happened to Zel it vanished once it got what it wanted."

"So what do I do? Do you want me to shock him like Mister Zelgadis?"

"No. Just keep watching him. Don't do anything till we get back. And don't call again. You damn near gave me a heart attack!"

"Okay Miss Lina, sorry."

"What are we going to do when we get back?" Sylphiel asked once Lina was off the phone.

"If we're going to shock him I want to do it!" Filia declared.

"We'll decide that afterwards. We're still in the middle of a job here!" Lina muttered before going to cautiously climb the stairs. The higher she ascended the stairs the colder it got. 'Damn either there's a ghost in there or there's a serious insulation problem.'

Instead of poking her head through the open doorway Lina poked the back part of her ray gun through.

Right away something went flying at hit the gun. It was so sudden and with so much force that it almost knocked Lina off the ladder stairs.

With stealthy speed Lina turned the gun around and started shooting randomly up going around in circles as she went through the doorway. The ghost was in the left corner of the attic and even though Lina's gun was stunning him the ghost still thrashing about.

Up the stairs Filia and Sylphiel followed with their guns ready.

The ghost threw books and chairs trying to hit Lina. "Watch yourselves it's another poltergeist!" Lina called to Filia and Sylphiel before they got up to the attic.

Sylphiel joined Lina stunning the ghost while Filia got another containment box ready.

"Filia hurry up!" Lina yelled dodging another book.

With the box down Filia got her gun and also started shooting the ghost leading it down.

The box sucked it up shutting close.

"I hope that's the last poltergeist we deal with." Lina said with a huff.

"But poltergeists mean more money." Filia protested.

"My gun is almost at empty." Lina pointed to her battery gage which was blinking its' low battery warning. "If we need all three of us to get one down then I might not be much help."

"Hmmm... I need to see if I can up the battery capacity on them." Filia mused looking at her own gun's battery level.

"Miss Lina you scan and I'll lead." Sylphiel suggested pointing to Lina's scanner on her belt.

"I don't feel comfortable with that. Couldn't we just switch packs?" Lina suggested with a frown. "Alright let's go to the basement."

...

Zelgadis found himself walking around a dark room. It was cold, so frightfully cold there was little or no light no matter which direction he went. "Hello?" He called out timidly. "Is anyone there?" His voice echoed in the darkness but no other voice responded back. "I don't know where I am or how I got here. Can anyone help me?" Zelgadis shivered trying to warm himself by rubbing his arms. But of course due to his current physical state that didn't help and he still felt the cold.

Zelgadis tried to remember how he got to where he was, wherever it was. The last thing he remembered was sitting in the Ghost Slayers mobile looking at the house Lina, Sylphiel and Filia were working at. He turned his head came face to face with some of the coldest greyest eyes he had ever seen.

'I must have gotten spooked and ended up teleporting again. But the last two times I ended up near Lina. But Lina's not here...' Or at least Zelgadis didn't think so. "Lina? Are you there? Lina I think I did it again. I got scared and ended up in a strange place. Lina I don't know where I am. Can you hear me?" The silence confirmed what Zelgadis feared. Not only did he not know where he was, but he was alone to boot.

A gust of wind blew by and Zelgadis could have sworn he heard something that sounded like dark laughter on the dying breeze.