Ghost Slayers
Chapter Sixty
By Relm
Bomb threats, ghost running rampant in the streets and now swirling masses of dark black ominous clouds... To those that were religious they might have assumed this was a coming apocalypse. The more cynical ones would just assume it was a sign of the times, things were going to shit because the world was already heading in that direction.
Lina couldn't say for certain if this would be the end of the world but the chances were getting higher of it being so with each passing moment. She had no idea what sort of things were already happening in that neighborhood. The only things she could guess where from what she could see from the skies above.
The clouds were larger now and much darker. They threatened to expand and swallow the sky whole. Never in Lina's life had she seen clouds that dark even on the stormiest of days. It made Lina think of those natural disaster movies where ferocious hurricanes and mountain sized tornados destroying whole cities in a matter of minutes. It could have been the potential horror that made her shiver but the temperature could also be to blame for that one.
Even though spring wasn't always the warmest of seasons it was far colder than it should have been and it got colder still as Lina and company raced to their destination. With each exhale of breath more plumes of white became evident. It felt like they were driving out of spring and right back into the winter they had previously left behind. There was even little bits of white starting to fall on the ground outside the car.
"Is that snow?" Amelia wondered looking outside the car's window.
Lina shook her head. "No it's coming down too fast and hard. It's hail."
"Doesn't that usually come during a thunder storm?"
A large flash of light and a loud boom answered Amelia's question.
"I'm going to have to slow down." Zangulus warned them. "With this crazy weather the visibility is getting worse. If I keep driving like this I might get us into an accident."
"No you can't slow down!" Lina protested. "We need to get to that house quickly!"
Zangulus gritted his teeth. His better judgement said to just ignore Lina and do what he thought was best. But the nagging voice in the back of his head reminded him of the seriousness of the situation and all the high speed driving courses he had to take. He was already trained to drive fast in erratic situations. As long as he remembered the things he was taught he should be fine.
That would have been the case except that was when they hit that patch of black ice on the road and started to swerve around.
"HOLD ON!" Zangulus cried out as he tried to take back control of the car.
Zangulus' police car swerved around in circles threatening to overturn with each spin around. It was scary but somehow Zangulus regained control and got the car to a safe stop.
"Damn..." Lina muttered under breath. "That was close."
"What caused the car to go out of control like that?" Sylphiel wondered while trying to calm her racing heart.
"The road is icy." Zangulus explained.
"How can the road be icy?! It's April for crying out loud!" Filia exclaimed.
"Look outside Filia! Does this look like typical April weather?!" Lina muttered sarcastically.
Looking outside proved Lina's point. Besides the dark clouds, thunder and lightning, hail, and icy roads there were now gale force winds threatening to knock over trees and snow to contend with. This wasn't your typical April weather. But this winter dusted area wasn't the whole of Sailune. Much of the city was still warm with the sun beating down in full force. However this infection of dark coldness was starting to spread further than the neighborhood it was circling.
"What the hell is going on out there?!"
"It has to be the ghost magnate house. With the magic square the thing from the book created I'll bet its opened a portal to the afterlife with all kinds of ghosts spewing out of it. Ghosts tend to make their surroundings colder. Well try and imagine that times a thousand. It's no wonder the weather has regressed back to winter." Lina explained.
"Can a ghost really do that...?"
"I'd say so." Lina looked to Zangulus with a look of impatience. "Well are you doing to drive or are we going to just sit around here and do nothing all day?!"
"The car almost flipped over!" Zangulus protested.
"So?! We still need to get to that house Zangulus! You should have never offered to drive us if you weren't willing to take risks. Now get moving! We need to get to that house as soon as possible!"
...
Naga hadn't driven her own car to Ghost Slayers HQ to start off with. Sylphiel had been the one that picked her, Val and Amelia up and brought them there. So as such Naga had no wheels of her own to drive to the ghost magnate house. Of course Naga wasn't one to shy away from 'borrowing' things that didn't belong to her.
There were three sets of keys available for Naga to take. Rather than take all three and deciding which car she wanted when she got to the parking lot Naga opted for only one set. She knew once she saw the iconic symbol on the key chain of one of the sets of keys that that was the one.
The car in question was of course Xellos' sleek black jaguar. Naga had no idea what colour the car was when she saw the keys so it was a delightful surprise to see that it was black.
Naga had scoffed at the licence plate but otherwise the car suited her needs just nicely. It purred for her when she turned the keys in the ignition and roared when she put it in drive.
Slimer know normally didn't leave the comforts of the Ghost Slayers HQ decided for once to tag along. The gooey green ghost got all kinds of goop all over the interior of Xellos' car but Naga didn't care. It wasn't her car anyway so would she care if it got messy? As long as Slimer kept his slime away from her then Naga was fine with her little green co-pilot.
With all the craziness going on the roads were a mess with all kinds of traffic and strange weather spots. It should make one want to drive more cautiously so as to avoid getting into a needless car accident. However when you were Naga the White Serpent diving a luxuriously fast and sleek jaguar driving slowly and cautiously was out of the question.
Naga took each turn dangerously fast and weaved in and out of traffic. She wasn't going to be held back by Sunday drivers. Naga even let out crazy laugh as she almost hit a car. Something about the rush she got when she tempted death just made her all tingly inside. She just loved it.
Slimer on the other hand wasn't quite so pleased. The little green ghost held onto his seat terrified for his life. Strange as Slimer was already dead but still that didn't matter as the green thing was still frightened.
"WEEEEEEE!" Naga giggled as she took another turn far too sharply. "This car is much nicer tan that crap car I got as a loner." Within her first week back in Sailune Naga had crashed her car. This was not a rare occurrence when it came to the Mayor's eldest daughter. In fact if it weren't for the fact that she was Philonel's daughter they might have taken away her licence all together. "OHOHOHOHOHOHOH! Are you having as much fun as I am Slimer?"
Slimer shook his head nervously while frightfully closing his eyes. He was never going to leave Ghost Slayers HQ ever again!
...
"Damn I wish I had brought my jacket..." Lina mumbled to herself and Zangulus drove up to the street where the ghost magnate house was. It was snowing down harder than Lina had ever seen. The snow was the pleasant light fluffy variety that brought up happy memories of white Christmases but the cold unrelenting kind that came with razor sharp icy winds.
"Forget the jacket. On its own it still wouldn't be enough. Try thermal underwear, wool socks, gloves, fleece lined boots and a toque. That with the jacket maybe just maybe we'd be warm." Filia added.
"Girls I'm sorry I'm not going to be able to get any closer to the house. The weather is just too wicked." Zangulus apologized while putting the car into park.
"But I don't want to walk the rest of the way! It's cold!" Lina whined. She was used to warmer climates so Lina never did well in the cold.
"C'mon Miss Lina! We need to press on in the name of truth and justice! For if we don't persevere on our mission will never be completed and all of Sailune and possibly the world will fall into devastation!" Amelia declared pointing her finger up into the air. Or rather to the ceiling of Zangulus car. Sadly the youngest Sailune daughter couldn't get the impact she wanted while still being inside the vehicle. She could have gotten outside and stood on top of the car but the gesture would be moot as Lina would be loathe to get out of the car herself to hear Amelia anyway.
"Think of the others Miss Lina!" Sylphiel pleaded. "Gourry, Mister Xellos, Amelia's father, Mister Zelgadis... How are we to save any of them hiding away in the car?"
"Shut up both of you!" Lina growled. "I was going to get out of the damned car regardless!"
"Then why did you have to whine for?" Filia wondered with a quizzical yet judgemental eyebrow raised.
"Well maybe I just needed to whine to work myself up into going outside!" Lina snapped.
"Wouldn't that make you less likely to want to go outside?"
"I SAID SHUT UP!" Lina screamed. "Now let's go!"
Outside the comfortable confines of Zangulus' car the environment was not a happy place. It took only seconds for Lina and company to be shivering uncontrollably. All four of them zipped up their jumpsuits all the way and donned their gloves. Usually they only wore those gloves when they were handling one of their containment boxes but in this case they were pretty handy. At the very least they could hold onto their ray guns without their fingers freezing off.
Sitting in the car Lina and company didn't see the other things flying around the air with the falling snow. It had been too hard to see them with all the snow falling on the windows. But now that they were outside they saw something that was far more frightening than freakish storm. In the air circling around in a vortex above the cursed house was thousands of spirits. The ones that the Ghost Slayers could see looked tortured and angry. Like they were stuck flying around in circles just waiting to get free.
"Is that a ghost tornado...?" Filia wondered looked up in complete horror.
Lina only deftly nodded. All four of them were just too stunned to move all they could do was stand there and look up at the horror. If whatever it was that had been trapped in the book wasn't planning on absorbing all these ghosts then Lina and company might be stuck dealing with all these ghosts. Suddenly their four ray guns and their few containment boxes just didn't seem to be enough. This was far more than Lina had ever faced times a million. This was really bad. The hope was if they dealt with the demonic spirit then all the ghosts would be sucked back into where they were coming from.
Even as they stood there more ghosts appeared and joined the swirling vortex of disembodied spirits. There was no telling just how many ghosts there were and just how many would come. It was getting clearer and clearer that they needed to stop this demonic thing quickly. This could very well be the end of the world.
Standing right in front the ghost magnate house and right in the middle of all the chaos was possessed form of Mayor Philonel Sailune staring right at them. This was not the normally burly and jolly man they all knew. No this man looked frightening like he could crush you with his one of his hands.
Lina swallowed nervously. In one hand she held her ray gun, in the other she had the book. Despite the fact that the gun was made of metal and quite heavy to hold in one hand it seemed to be miles lighter than the burden of the previously red stained pages of the book.