Ghost Slayers
Chapter Thirty-one
By Relm
"Why me? Why me?" Lina muttered over and over again. "Zel! Why are you here? And why couldn't you have shown up after I cashed the cheques?" Lina hissed trying to not to directly look at Zelgadis.
"I'm sorry! It's all that Xellos' fault." Zelgadis grumbled.
"Well go hide."
Zelgadis looked around not sure of where he should go. Since he could go through walls he opted for hiding in one. Inside the wall he could still hear the screaming, however it seemed to die down a bit. It was quite strange to be inside a wall. He was pretty used to going through them by now but he had never thought to stay and linger inside one before. His eyes had trouble making sense of what he was seeing. It all seemed to be a big blur.
While everyone flailed around in panic Lina just stood there patiently waiting for the clerks to settle down so she could cash the cheques. "The ghost is gone people!" Lina yelled out. "Why don't you all stop running around like a bunch of headless chickens? It's embarrassing to watch! It's like you're all frightened children."
At first they didn't listen to Lina, but perhaps reason started to settle in and the hysteria subsided. Slowly the bank returned to normal.
It seemed to take the clerks a little longer to compose themselves enough to see clients which wasn't helping Lina's growing agitation. "Hello I'd like to do my banking sometime before next year!" Lina called out in an effort to get one of the clerks' attention.
"I can help you over here..." One of the clerks mumbled feebly.
"Thank god! I thought I was going to be stuck waiting forever!" Lina happily waltzed her way over to the clerk.
"How can you be so cheerful? There was a ghost that appeared in the bank! Right here!" The clerk exclaimed in disbelief.
"Well... um..." Lina looked over to see the clerk's name tag, "Sally I guess I just don't scare too easily. Anyway I'd like to cash these two cheques and deposit it into my business account." Lina handed Sally the two cheques.
"These are made out to Ghost Slayers..." Sally mumbled. "You're one of those ghost hunting people from a couple blocks over. That's why you weren't scared!"
"Yes I've dealt with many ghosts in my time, so one popping up out of the blue doesn't frighten me." Lina rubbed the back her neck nervously.
"I bet you brought that thing in here!" Sally accused Lina pointing a finger at.
"Okay I'm no banker, but something tells me making wild accusations instead of cashing cheques wasn't what you learned in banking school. And pointing is very rude." Lina crossed her arms across her chest and stared down the clerk.
Sally the clerk lowered her finger while thinking Lina's words over. "You're not denying you brought the ghost, you're just trying to change the subject."
Lina rolled her eyes. "Now why would I want to bring a ghost here for?"
"So the bank would be haunted. So that we'd have to hire you to get rid of it for an outrageous fee." Sally huffed in anger.
"Take a look at the amount of the cheques; you can plainly see what I get for jobs." Lina pointed out.
Sally ignored what Lina said and went on with her triad. "That's probably how you always do it. You get some innocent ghost to play along with your evil schemes and dump it at some local business. You charge the business 'get rid' of the ghost and take that same ghost to another business and do the same thing! How many companies have you hit with this con?"
Lina was going to defend herself until she actually stopped to think about Sally's suggestion. 'That actually would be an easy way to get some quick cash seeing how I have Zel and all... No stop it Lina focus!' She berated herself. "Are you going to cash my cheques or not?" Lina huffed.
"I'll need to talk to my manager. There seems to be a problem with some of the numbers." Sally smiled evilly at Lina before walking away leaving Lina standing in front of the wicket feeling a little more than peeved.
'If Xellos isn't already dead then I'm going to kill him.' Lina decided.
...
"I don't understand why you're so upset. You should relax, being tense all the time can't be good for you." Xellos spoke in a very soothing voice that didn't match well with his rather sinister looking grin. "It would explain all your wrinkles."
Filia screamed and threw some more random objects at Xellos. She was so frustrated and angry with Xellos that she wasn't thinking clearly. She knew that Xellos had frightened Zelgadis off but she didn't know where the ghostly librarian had gone off too. If she had been in a right frame of mind she would have figured that Zelgadis was probably with Lina and that calling Lina would have been the best course of action at that moment.
But of course Filia wasn't in the right frame of mind to do much more than scream bloody murder. "I hate you you piece of garbage! AND I DO NOT HAVE WRINKLES!" Filia screamed.
Perhaps one would have taken Filia and her anger seriously if it weren't for the green legless glob floating behind her mocking her every movement.
Xellos roared with laughter.
Filia was so mad that steam was almost literately coming out of her ears. It took her a moment to realize why Xellos was laughing at her. "SLIMER!" Filia screamed. "GET BACK TO THAT LAUNDRY!"
Slimer nodded his head sending droplets of green slime flying all other the place.
Filia flicked off some of the slime that hit her. "Great..."
"At least Slimer is doing your clothes, so you'll have something to change into." Xellos pointed out still smiling like an evil cat.
Filia glared at Xellos. She was going to say something when her phone started to ring. "Hello?" As she asked while answering it.
"Filia it's me Lina." Lina's voice didn't sound impressed.
"Hi Lina how are things at the bank?" Filia laughed nervously.
"Remember what I said about not wanting Xellos to pop up while I was at the bank? That I didn't want to cause a panic of a ghost showing up out of the blue?"
"Um... yes...?" She knew where Lina was going with this.
"Yeah Zel showing up isn't much better."
"So things aren't going well?"
"The bank clerk has my cheques hostage because she thinks I'm pulling a con. She's talking with the manager and all the other clerks are staring at me whispering."
"I'm sorry Lina. It's all Xellos' fault!"
"Yeah Zel kinda explained that. I guess I shouldn't be that surprised that Xellos would do that. He's already scared Zel once before." Lina let out a sigh.
"Where is he at the moment?"
"He's hiding in a wall."
"Is that okay for him to do that?"
"If it isn't I'm sure he'd just go into another room where there's no people. Anyway I'm probably going to be a while. I'll bring Zel back with me when I'm done. Please make sure Xellos doesn't do anything else."
"Lina I'm not a miracle worker." Filia reminded her boss.
"Just try okay? Bye."
"Bye." Filia hung up here phone and glared at Xellos.
...
"What sort of car does Mister Xellos drive?" Amelia wondered as she and Sylphiel made their way to the university parking lot.
"A black jaguar. Not your typical university professor car. Mister Xellos has particular tastes that's for sure." Sylphiel mused.
Amelia frowned. "It may not be typical, but what if there are more than one? How will know its' Mister Xellos'?"
"Well there's a dent in the back from when Miss Filia hit it with a baseball bat. Or the scratches on the left side from when Miss Filia keyed the door. But even if there are black jags there with those marks I'm sure we'd still be able to pick out Mister Xellos' car."
"How can you be sure?"
"Because Mister Xellos' car' license plate is 'Filia'."
"Oh." Amelia grimaced. "I'm guessing Miss Filia didn't like that."
"That's why she dented and keyed the car. Mister Xellos kept saying things like 'I rode Filia for a long time' or 'my little Filia purrs when I turn her on'. She wasn't impressed."
"It's a wonder Miss Filia hasn't killed him with all the stunts he pulls."
"I wouldn't be surprised if she hasn't already tried to at one point." Sylphiel joked while scanning the parking lot. "There's a black jaguar over there."
Both Amelia and Sylphiel sprinted over to see that the black jaguar had a license plate that read 'Filia'.
"We should call Miss Lina." Amelia suggested.
Sylphiel nodded and pulled out her cell to dial up Lina's cell.
...
Lina was still waiting for the clerk when her cell started to go off. She was about to answer when the clerk came back. 'It's only Sylphiel, I'll call her back.' "So Sally do I get my cheques cashed or are you having me arrested?"
Sally narrowed her eyes at Lina. "Apparently my manager doesn't believe in ghosts so he thinks it's nonsense for me not to serve you. So against my better judgement I'll deal with your business, but if there's ghost floating around after you've left I'm calling the cops." Sally warned her.
At that moment there was a loud slamming of a door as three masked men came busting into the bank toting guns.
"STOP NO ONE MOVE!" One of the men screamed waving his gun. "This is a stick up!"
One of the other two went around and spray painted all the cameras while the third man started pushing everyone to the ground.
Part of Lina was a little worried about the bank robbers, but the rest of her was actually annoyed. 'Just another thing to delay my banking.'
"Open the drawers and put all the money in the bag!" The first man screamed at Sally thrusting an empty bag into her face.
Sally didn't move she just stood there frozen like a statue.
"MOVE IT LADY!" He yelled at her actually hitting Sally with the bag.
"Just do it!" Lina hissed under her breath.
"You say something red?" The first bank yelled at Lina pointing his gun at Lina.
"Nothing..." Lina mumbled.
"You want to die?" He yelled even louder at Lina.
"No." Lina responded quietly.
Zelgadis couldn't see what was going on, but he could hear it. There was a robbery going on in the bank. His gut instinct told him to stay hidden and wait till was all over. But once he heard one of the bank robbers yell at someone he called 'red' Zelgadis knew he couldn't just stay hidden. Lina was out there and very close to at least one of the bank robbers.
So against his better judgement Zelgadis poked his head from the wall to take a look. He saw the three bank robbers pacing around. One was watching the people, another was watching the doors and the third one was getting the money from the teller. This third robber caught Zelgadis' attention most of all, as Lina was sitting on the ground just a few feet away from him. And that bank robber had his gun aimed right at her.
"If you don't shut up I will kill you!" The robber yelled at Lina. With his gun still on Lina the robber turned back to Sally. "Get the money or I'll kill the red head."
Sally still very much frightened couldn't move. She just stood there trembling.
"MOVE IT!" The robber screamed.
"I-I can't g-e-e-et mo-ney o-u-u-t of the drawer..." Sally eventually stuttered out.
"Alright we do this the hard way!"
Lina saw the robber's finger pull the trigger in slow motion. She didn't have time to react all she could do was close her eyes and wait for the shot that would surely kill her.
BANG! The shot was loud and it seemed like it echoed throughout the bank. The splatter of blood dripping onto the floor from the bullet wound.
When Lina opened her eyes she expected to be in extreme pain from a fatal wound. What she ended up seeing was Zelgadis standing between her and the robber. His body was flashing between solid and transparent and he was clutching the bullet wound in his stomach.