A/N:
Apologies for the long delay. I was experiencing writers block. Then I was busy with my studies.
This chapter mainly focuses on advancing the plot, so it might be a bit boring as it lacks in SoEul interactions. But don't worry, they'll meet in the next one and will have a lot of interactions. :)
P.s: The temperatures stated in this chapter are measured in Celsius.
Chapter eleven: The Boy
Children.
The bright air they carried everywhere well contrasted with the shadows that lingered to her. Unlike ghosts, their giggles were a pleasant reminder of good old days—the times before she came to know about anything dead. When life was simpler, and when it was only her and her father. Ga Eul found herself stepping out from a storm, in to a sunny day, whenever she was in the company of the little creatures. Nevertheless how brief the encounters were, she had always enjoyed them.
Which was the main reason she always hesitated when accepting a case involving children. Or worse, ghost children. She knew she was too sensitive for them, and such cases would most likely end up wounding her emotionally.
But on that winter night, when that barely-a-shape-of-a-man stood in the cold dark alley, staring into her with his hollow eyes, she felt sorrow, despair and longing ness radiating from him. As if he was too weak to hold the emotions anymore that they leaked and poured out from his soul. He wanted to meet his child for one last time. He had probably waited for too long. Long enough that perhaps...
perhaps his child was...
...
Ga Eul felt sorry for him, and selfish of her, if she had rejected his request. In other words she had advised herself not to regret on before hand, for she knew for what she was stepping into.
'Mm... may be.' A hoarse whisper stirred in her ears. 'But I've got a feeling that this particular situation is slightly different from what you've imagined...'
Ga Eul threw a glare at him. The demon did have a point. But it was clearly not the time to mention it.
The ground beneath her trembled. The tube lights that suspended from the ceiling, oscillated like age old swings swaying in monsoon winds. Downstairs, near the entrance, Ga Eul caught a glimpse of her candle, rocking back and forth with its stand, before collapsing onto her backpack. A current of air blew through the long racks of porcelain jars sweeping them out one after another, as if they were some trained sea mammals in a circus, jumping into water. Ga Eul dangled on the upmost step, struggling for her balance. Cold wind gusted on her face. Smoke arose from behind. The fire alarms cried. Water sprinkled from the ceiling. The droplets crystallized and rained in tiny hailstones. Ga Eul looked ahead. At the far end, there was a single boy, about four feet in height. Dim lines of other light marked his silhouette. His big hollow eyes stared into hers, un-amusedly...
Four hours earlier. There she was standing at the entrance to the recently opened Yul's Mart, awaiting for a black Mercedes Benz to pull over at its park. A translucent figure leaned on the automatic glass doors behind her. At their right, stood a large billboard of discounts and offers, featuring a purple teddy bear with a shopping cart, waving at them. The lights on the advertisement were switched off for the day. From a considerable distance, another cloud-like form of a man floated in air. Ga Eul glanced at her wrist watch. Which read six o'clock sharp, when at last her client stepped out from her car.
It was a Miss Choi Eun Hye, a short but thin—rather small build—lady in her late fifties. She wore a black fur coat running till her waist, and a plain midnight blue dress beneath. Her hair was swooped up, tied in a bun in a no-nonsense manner. Where a few grey strands appeared here and there. She gave quick orders to her chauffeur and hurried her way upwards the steps. Ga Eul pulled out her gloved hands from her coat pockets, and adjusted her dress.
The lady paused midway up the stairs, and regarded Ga Eul from head to toe. "Chu Ga Eul?" She asked.
"Neh." Ga Eul smiled, and reminded of her manners, quickly bowed. "Anyeongsaeyo."
The lady nodded and continued her way upwards.
"I suppose Park ssi has given you all the necessary details, the other day."
"Neh."
"Well, my nephew insisted on calling for your help. Otherwise I have no trust on such absurd things. " She paused, and spared an annoyed glance at the old security guard, who ran off for the keys.
"We're new to this area. Of course, in such a place the only perk for a business is the crowd. But most of them are lower than our standards." A quick glance at Ga Eul, who was grinning like an idiot. "Most of our usual items will be unaffordable —or actually, completely unreachable —for them. Hence_" She paused for breath, as the doors slid open. "_We had to maximize our working hours. Had to run the place twenty four seven. Our staff was not happy with it. So they made stories. Absurd ones. I'll call them. To chase our customers away." She waved her head disapprovingly.
'They sure wanted her dead.' Baekga spoke up. 'But at least they didn't lie. She must have damaged her olfactory nerve, if she couldn't sense the miasma...'
The demon was right. As soon as the doors opened, Ga Eul caught a strong odour of rotting meat and occasional hints of burning flesh, all poorly coated under jasmine scented air fresheners.
"They call it phantosmia, don't they?"
"Eh?"
"Smelling something that's actually not there."
"Ah." Ga Eul smiled again. "Probably."
"Whatever." She sighed. "I hope at least your visit be able to convince those punks back to work. Otherwise I'll have to call some crazy shaman to do that."
"I believe that'd be unnecessary, ma'am." Ga Eul said.
The woman stared at her confident face for a moment. "Okay then. I'll leave you with it." She turned around, nodding dismissingly. "Just ask Mr. Lee here if you would need anything."
"I will." Ga Eul said.
Miss Choi hurried down the steps just as she climbed them up. Ga Eul watched as the security guard ran to send her off. The car purred back to life and disappeared down the street. A few handouts containing the same purple bear followed after its trail.
Ga Eul looked up, as the building stood soulless. A wintry breeze snapped and ruffled the purple pennants above her.
...
...
Yul's Mart was a four storeyed box-like building, prominently rising amongst the smaller grocery shops of its lower-middle class neighbourhood. The ground floor held grocery items, pharmaceuticals, a bakery and a whole section for packaged kimchi, while the first floor consisted of home decors—ornaments, sculptures and wall paintings. The second was dedicated for clothing and the third for furniture. It's collection wasn't vast. It's architecture was unexceptional, unattractive and sternly focused on business. Much to remind Ga Eul of its owner. A group of trees, skinny and leaf less, resembled the depressed sales staff, while standing at the each side of the car park, as the only hint of greenery on the deserted land. Dusk light glittered along the etched lines of the cheery bear as the doors stayed opened, welcoming them in.
Without further hesitations Ga Eul went on with the essentials.
First, the iron circles.
Of course the chains were too much of a burden to carry around and a handful of work to maintain their usability. Though it wasn't an issue back when working with Yi Jeong (Mostly because Master did all the carrying and oiling) but now, as a solo paranormal researcher, Ga Eul had to switch to a lighter and a cheaper material. Hence she chose iron fillings. Ga Eul poured a neat circle of iron fillings in each of the floors and one extra semi circle at the very entrance to the store. It was advised to do so in the research papers she had recently read, as to prevent getting locked up in a haunted space. She then replaced the batteries in her flashlight to a brand new set and lighted up a few candles for back-up lights. (Another advice—it is better to keep more than one source of light.)
She then went on with the temperature check-ups. Just as she had assumed, the rear end of ground floor held the lowest record of minus twelve degrees. And as the floors ascended the temperature grew gradually warmer with only minus six degrees—a little lower than the temperature outside—on the fourth floor. Ga Eul checked the luminous dial of her wrist watch. It was barely eight. Time to switch on her psychic senses.
She listened.
Nothing. The odour came in and out but the night remained silent.
After following all the methodical procedures Ga Eul retreated back to her main circle, where she had left all her things. It was only a few feet away from the entrance. (Another safety measure, if she would ever need a quick escape.) She took out her bundled set of research papers and finally ran her eyes around the hall searching for her supposed "colleague".
A familiar figure with bluish other light stood at the animal food section strangely interested in the price tags.
Ga Eul knitted her eyebrows. "What are you doing?" She asked.
The demon kept to his musings for a moment and then turned around. 'Would you think it's cheaper? Twenty percent off for chosen credit cards.' He pointed at a sack of cat food. ' oh. Sorry. I almost forgot you don't have that credit card anymore.'
Ga Eul sighed. "Now, are we here for shopping? " She asked. The least he could do was to focus on the case. But again, this was Baekga.
'Aren't we? Remind me again.' The demon snapped back. 'Didn't I tell you this is a useless plan?' He pulled out an annoyed face. 'We both know what happened here. You should have given them the necessary instructions and dusted your hands. But no. You and your stupid pride!' He crossed his arms.
True. She would thoroughly investigate everything about a case before accepting it. Even more so, now that she works alone. And when investigating about the history of this particular haunting, Ga Eul had found out about an orphanage built in the early 20th century and burned to the ground during the Korean war. The officials were delayed and many children who hadn't died from the fire, died buried under debris. It was a horrible incident that could have left a huge psychic residual, but the land has been unoccupied ever since then and there was little -to-no record of anything happened thereafter which could point to a possible haunting.
On the other hand, for Ga Eul it wasn't the orphanage that triggered most of her attention towards the case.(True, it was horrifying, even to imagine, but then again.) While investigating, she had found out the list of kids who had died in there. And among all the names there was that one familiar one.
Lee Beom Seok
The same three characters that were imprinted on the little puzzle piece she had found on the road the other day. It was more because of empathy than pride she had volunteered to investigate this case. But empathy? Is there anything further from a demon's reach?
...
'What's with that look?'
"What?" Ga Eul woke up from her musings.
'By any chance, you are not belittling my generosity, are you?'
Ga Eul couldn't hold the smirk any longer. "Mwo? Generosity?" She scoffed.
'Gurae.' He nodded. 'I am asking you to buy this. Other than this. Which would come in handy for strangling that devil.' His finger tip went from the sack of cat food to a leash. 'Isn't that what's called generosity?'
For the first time in her life, Ga Eul thought the demon smiled benevolently. But that thought quickly vaporised once the idea hit her head.
"You are planning to strangle Mr. Paws?!" she was alarmed.
The demon grinned. 'Neh. I hate him.' He said. 'He always drops things onto my head.'
"So what? They don't hurt you."
'Worse. They pass through me.' The demon pouted. 'And I don't like objects passing through me. That was how I died.'
For the better or for the worse, a rattling noise distracted Ga Eul from his sinister grin.
Ga Eul looked up. The noise seemed to come from the first floor.
'Ooh... looks like someone's awake...' The demon whispered.
Ga Eul narrowed her eyes. At the far end, stood another figure with dim lines of other light. The boy stared at her for a while, then ran upstairs. Ga Eul grabbed her flashlight and stepped out from her circle.
...
For a moment there, all was right. Then the weight sunk in. The temperature dropped abruptly. Ga Eul froze on the spot. For a tightly packed string of heart beats, she couldn't stir a muscle. She couldn't breath nor could she think. Her functions went blank. And her body paralyzed.
Is she the one? ... Where's the boy?...
She heard delicate voices from behind.
Chahjasseo...
They whispered.
...
Need not to say, the events followed went drastically wrong. Ga Eul had run after the ghost boy and was swept down the stairs by the ghost wind. And that was perhaps her last memory of that night. The next time she woke up, she was lying on a hospital bed with a bandaged forehead.
Ga Eul struggled to a seat. It was probably around noon, but the curtains were drawn and the room was dark enough to spot faint lines of other light.
"B-Baekga?" Ga Eul strained her eyes.
The demon turned around. 'You had visitors...' He said. 'That guy from the HK group...' And pointed at the bouquet of carnations resting on her bedside cabinet. Ga Eul struggled to get a look. But her head felt dizzy. She dropped back to the bed.
The chairman of the HK group had visited her. It was his aunt who owned Yul's Mart. Are they going to sue her for the damages? He wouldn't bring flowers if that was the case, would he? Why would he bring flowers to her any way? Millions of questions flooded to her brain, enough to make her pass out again. So it was best to ask from someone else.
"Did the chairman tell anything?"
'No.' Baekga said. 'You were asleep. It'd be useless.'
"Miss Choi_"
'No. She didn't.'
"Will she_"
'I don't know.'
"But you said_"
'_Gongjunim.' The demon cut her off. Ga Eul paused. It was a long time since he had last addressed her that way.
'Back in the store, what did that boy tell you?' He asked.
Ga Eul closed her eyes in an attempt to recall. But of course it didn't need much effort. Everything was so vivid and detailed in her memory. From how tiny crystals of ice formed on the tip of her eyelashes, to how everything, from above and beneath shattered and fell into pieces. But above them all, there was the image of the boy, un-amusedly staring into her eyes. The wind was howling in her ears alright, but she could make out what he was saying, just before he had pushed her away.
"Go back to the forest." Ga Eul said.
Baekga went silent. His face was clouded with a serious look for reasons Ga Eul was unable to understand.
...
...
...
... Meanwhile, this is the third reported case regarding suicidal attempts in Shinhwa High. Many people view this as due to the lack of management of the institute. Some regard this as a sign to reform. 'Abolish the special education system' , they say...
The television was switched off, and the remote was tossed away.
"Don't tell me. The witch suspects us?!" Woo Bin asked.
"Tsk. She's clueless."
"So that was why you returned?" It was Yoon JiHu
"What else."
"Stop glaring at me. I've warned you." Said So Yi Jeong at last.
Junpyo looked away. He was tired. And annoyed. And grumpy, and irritated, and everything.
...
Who would believe in ghosts?...
And one at Shinhwa? What could be more absurd?
–to be continued.