After she finishes getting dressed up, Anea stands beside Touch while he is typing away at his workstation in the mayor’s house. Tablet, laptop, notebooks, computer stands, monitors, cords, mouse, split keyboard, all strung out and arranged across a standing desk like some hacker from a movie. Only the laptop, tablet, special keyboard, and notebooks were his.

Anea waits patiently.

Then she starts humming. Loudly.

The stone man sighs as his skin lightens up a shade, which had been averaging to a lighter shade of gray over the past few weeks.

“What do you want?” He asks, slowly turning to her with mock annoyance and boredom. Both his aura and the slightest ghost of a smile on the corner of his lips betray him.

“I want to go to the big Halloween party—” she says quickly,

“Okay—”

“since you’re in here all the time, I figure that frees up Arch to take with and it’ll be good training and… Okay?”

“Yeah, I can stay here, take Arch and Dill with you. Also, take this.” Touch hands her a small black phone.

“It came in!”

“I just finished downloading the basics on it. I’ll show you how to download your own stuff when you get back.”

Touch spends the next ten minutes showing Anea how to use the phone’s check-in app, how to message and call and use a few digital tools. He then spends the next thirty minutes making her practice with all the tools and apps to make sure she can use them without assistance. And a how to turn everything off to avoid being tracked.

“If you go dark, or miss a check-in, I’m coming for you immediately. If you want to call me off, the code word is giraffe. Anything else, and I go dark and come get you.”

“Okay.” Rachel feels his almost mind numbing fear contained by assurance on top of assurance, contingency plan within contingency plan. She was used to it by this point, or thought she was. There was always something new to find in his aura.

“I’m going to be late, bye.”

“Bye. Stay safe.”

With Dill snug in her little day pack, and Arch trailing out of sight, Anea makes her way to the costume party hosted in the gym of the local school.

Anea stands under a tree, in the shadows of the dim quarter moon, watching the herds of kids and teens and adult chaperons conjugate around the looming gymnasium wing.

The school—and the party—were for all ages, but Anea immediately feels like an intruder. She didn’t know anyone here. She didn’t come with anyone she knows. She literally has no idea what she was supposed to do at a party. She only ever hung out with Richy at the orphanage, and maybe a few others on occasion.

It was suddenly a stupid idea to drag Arch and Dill out here so late. Just as suddenly, she notices her friends are excited about coming out with her and explore.

She needs the training. This was the biggest crowd yet. She needs to learn to handle it. And she needs to learn to talk to people her own age again. Socialize, blend in, gather information—

Stop. Just enjoy the party. This isn’t a job. You’re safe here. You’ll end up like Touch if you don’t learn to relax.

Just as she lets out a long breath and leans against the tree. Then she suddenly jerks a little as her new phone chimes in her pocket.

So much for relax.

She checks in and sets the phone to vibrate. Then, immersing herself in the festive aura of the crowd and her two friends, she makes her way inside.

“Thank you!” Anea shines a bright smile at the older girl, who complements her dress. She merges into the inviting flock of girls. She had started to feel sick and overwhelmed by the crowd. The closer she got, the more mixed and conflicted all the auras became.

Then her attention was wrenched by a group of older kids crowding around a snack table, basically using passive-aggressive bullying to harass anyone away they didn’t want hanging around. It helped to stay anchored to Dill, and this group of girls. Their emotional energy was just what she needed.

“Where’d you get it?”

“I went shopping with my dad when I got into town.”

“It’s really good. Not quiet like the actual geisha ladies I’ve seen walking around.”

“No, I went for more of a princess vibe.” Anea twirls around and two of the other girls clap and one cheers. Anea gets lost in the conversation as everyone else breaks off and starts talking about their own costumes.

One girl rambles just to fill the conversation while she waits and scans around the larger crowd for someone in particular. The other chimes in half-hearted complaints about how her parents wouldn’t buy her the slightly more expensive things she wanted, too scared to go off into the unfamiliar crowd alone, and too set in her ways of complaining-by-default to lead the conversation with anything else.

Then there was Jess. Her bright aura loves keeping this little group together and sticking with her island of familiar friends. Using them as a springboard to reach out to introduce others who came and went while Anea mostly stands by and feels out everyone’s auras.

Jess was the one who originally complemented Anea and practically invited her over.

Eventually, the more Anea habitually looks around to stay aware of her surroundings, she notices a small, curious aura lighting up whenever she turns, before trying to look small, only to broaden up again when her back is turned. She quickly matches it to a small, dark-haired boy with black plastic-rimmed glasses, about her age, standing off to the side with his chubby friend.

“Well, it’s been fun hanging out with you. Bye!” After the girls get their round of goodbyes in, she makes her way straight to this strange boy. Much to his exasperation and anxiety.

“Hi.” She says. The two boys backing away like frightened animals.

“Hi.” The boy says.

“I’m Anea, and you were staring.” She smiles.

“I’m Jacob. This is…” he waves a hand at his friend.

“A-Arman.” The kid stutters.

Jacob continues “I’m sorry it’s… You’re the one who helped out the militia, right? The psychic?”

“Right. But my friend here is the real psychic, my secret weapon.” She throws her pack around and opens it up for Dill to poke his little head out. Which has the desired effect of setting her new friends at ease as they pet the chicken sized chick, and including Dill in on the socialization he craves.

They continue giving Dill a healthy amount of affection and show no signs of stopping.

“My friend tells me you have something on your mind?” She smiles.

Jacob and Arman look up, then look at each other, then Jacob speaks up.

“I was wondering if you wanted to… There’s this haunted house I’ve been wanting to check out… So if you wanted to- if you wanted to come with-”

“Sounds fun.” Anea interrupts. His awkwardness was adorable to watch, but painful and slow to listen to. Their innocent and genuine auras tell her all she needs to know.

A sharp and slightly malicious psyche peels off from that darker group by the snack table. Flaring up as it passes behind them. Rachel watches the older boy in the sharp suit and hat closely. Jacob and Arman follow her eyes, then they both quickly look down. He shoulders his way past the two boys, nearly knocking them into Anea and squishing Dill between them, despite having adequate room to pass.

“Look at that,” the asshole mutters loudly for the crowd—conspicuously absent from adults at the moment—to hear. “Slimy and the fat-ass actually got a girl.” A few kids over at the table chitter as they watch, and most of their aura’s light up with malicious pleasure, except for one or two who didn’t enjoy the spectacle.

“Man, piss off!” Arman mutters loudly to match, sending a small shock through the immediate crowd. The asshole turns back around, eyes wide in a hateful stare. Then his eyes fall to Dill and he smiles again.

“Excuse me. You can’t have animals in here.”

Anea is torn between her mind flashing through her hand-to-hand lessons from Shrike and Rachel, and the cesspool of mixed emotions from the bystanders. Malicious glee, excitement, skiddish uncertainty, fear and discomfort, disgust and disappointment.

The asshole kid is now looking out over the crowd.

“Sir! Sir! This girl brought in a live animal!” A fat, middle-aged, bald man is a collared shirt makes his way over and looks at Anea.

“Miss, you’re going to need to leave. You know school policy.”

“No problem. We were on our way out, anyway.” Anea whips around and steps as the adult makes a motion to grab her and escort her out. Followed closely by her two friends, she peers down at Dill and looks over to the snack table.

“Dill,” she whispers, brushing her lips against his soft warm head, “I desire chaos.”

Then she unzips the bag fully and throws it over her shoulder as the giant chick flutters out and rushes the snack table.

“Oh nooo…” Anea rolls her eyes and slowly chases after Dill.

People panic and fumble over each other, food, sugary punch, and chicken shit fly as Anea makes her way over, flanked by her new comrades. Arman grabs a handful a cake and hurls it across the room, hitting the asshole that started it all in the cheek as he turns and flinches, only to have it fall down all over his suit.

Anea scoops up Dill as the three kids start running.

Jess’s group, and quite a few others, laugh as the kids make a break for the exit. Fat man in the collared shirt jogging and shouting after them. Before she leaves, Anea spins on her heel and gives a quick bow.

She hears a few shouts and applause as she spins back around, pushes past the heavy doors, and runs off into the night.

They run, then walk, through the well lit neighborhood of trick-or-treaters.

When they were sure they weren’t being followed, they made their way to Arman’s house.

“Tonight’s fiasco won’t cause any trouble for you, will it?” Anea asks. Even though she already knows the answer, she needs to confirm.

“Nah, those guys are jerks. We know how to deal with them. Half of them are from the other towns anyway, so they’ll be gone soon.”

“You made sure no one made it out clean.” Jacob high fives his friend with a loud clap. “Nailed him. Bet none of those losers are coming back after they change.” Jacob smiles and looks at his friend again. “Last chance?”

“I’m good. I’d rather not stay up late looking for ghosts again. You guys have fun.” His tone was polite, but his aura shot with a sharp orange streak.

Apparently, he didn’t like having his time wasted last time.

Arman squeezed her, then Jacob, into a big hug and they made their way to the house, Arch still tailing from afar.

“So,” she says as they circumvent a herd of costumed toddlers corralled by a few towering adults. “tell me about the ghosts.”

He smiles. “Hopefully, you’ll see when we get there.”

“A good detective always familiarizes themselves with the case before arriving at the scene. You want my help? Information is the price.”

“Fine, fine. Some of the older kids used to hang out in one of the old abandoned houses, Fin’s place. It’s one of the only abandoned houses around that’s not all dirty and nasty and falling apart. A couple of months ago, the guys stopped going there when a bunch of weird stuff started happening:

Noises, stuff moving around, shadow people. My sister got scratched, which is what got me interested.”

Unauthorized content usage: if you discover this narrative on Amazon, report the violation.

“You want revenge?”

“I want to know what’s going on. Everything else can be dismissed as pranks and rumors and people being stupid. Not my sister.”

Again, Anea didn’t really need a response. The idea of revenge didn’t evoke a strong personal reaction in him or his aura. Good. Judging by the deep and bright blues of his psyche, he actually seems to want to solve this for the sake of curiosity.

“What kind of investigation have you already done?”

“At first I left it alone. But it was always on my mind, so I spent a week doing research. While I was doing that, a few people kept screwing around in the house, and they all got scared off—from nightmares this time. Shook them up a little.

So Arman tagged along with me when I went in, but nothing happened. Nothing at all. I spent the night there three times, and nothing. Arman was getting bored—he only came so I wouldn’t be alone. So we stopped until I could figure something else out.”

“And here I am.” Anea beams.

“So, this is it?” Anea looks up at the big, dark, brooding house. She puts her phone away after checking-in and checking the time. It’s about seven-thirty and the wifi is spotty around this dimly lit neighborhood of old houses on this side of town.

The floor board squeaks as Anea steps into the dusty old house. She waves her phone light around the cavernous living room. Dirty carpet, stained couch, empty chip bags, bottles, cans, and some funky smelling cigarettes litter the floor.

Anea stops.

“There is definitely another presence here.” She says, turning to Jacob. He tenses up and his eyes widen as he scans around.

“Where?”

Anea nods toward the closet under the stairwell.

Jacob crouches and carefully makes his way over while Anea frees Dill from her pack.

Anea relaxes and rolls her eyes as Jacob places his hand on the doorknob, and turns it with a click.

“Boo!” a girl in a rubbery demon mask shouts from the closet, lunging at the kid.

“Ah!”

“Dammit, Becca!” Jacob shoves the taller girl back into the closet as she laughs. Then she lunges back and scoops the smaller boy up in a bear hug and showers him in demon kisses.

“Stooop! Why are you here?”

Becca plops him to the ground. “I was bored. Seeing what y’all did at the party was way more fun, so I invited myself to the after party.”

“So you ran here? How’d you even know this is where we were going?”

“Where else would you go? This is the part where you introduce me to your friend.”

Anea walks around the couch as she rips off the mask, waving her straight, silvery hair around. She looks down at her with blue eyes and a relaxed smile as she and Anea shake hands.

“Anea.” She smiles back.

“Becca.”

“And that’s her chicken. It’s psychic.” Jacob points to Dill, who looks up at the two and lets out a chirp as he bounces into the air.

“It’s dangerous for animal mutes around this time.” Becca says, “When it’s just us, it’s no big deal. But when you don’t know all the people roaming around…”

“I know. I brought protection.” Anea lets out two short whistles, and Arch comes in a few seconds later. Probably through an open window in the other room. The fox tilts his head to the side, eyeing the group with his tongue out.

“And by the way,” she continues, “I was messing with you. I’m the psychic. This is Arch, my bodyguard and my friend. Same with Dill. They aren’t pets.”

“Heyyy…” Becca whispers and crouches down to pet both divs. “Ow!” she jolts back up just as quickly. Anea offers up a mischievous grin.

“Shocking, isn’t it?” She could have warned the older girl. But Anea couldn’t pass up the chance.

“So, what does Dill do then?” Jacob asks. Anea scoops up Dill.

“Emotional Support Chicken and Designated Agent of Chaos.” Anea hands the purring Dill off to Becca.

“You’re the one who got scratched?”

The older girl holds out her hand.

“You can still see it a little. It’s been over a month.”

Anea inspects her soft hand under her phone light. Three light pink scars, each as thick as a needle, slightly uneven spacing. She runs her fingers over it. No indentation. Just as smooth as the rest of her hand, she could feel no difference in texture. Something about this made her uneasy.

“Does it hurt at all?”

“No. And it wasn’t deep. Barely hurt. But there was a bit of blood. Now, I just kind of have this scar.”

“Hmm… Tell me everything you know.”

Becca essentially confirms everything Jacob already said, adding nothing new. Slowly, that intrusive thought of unease from before grows as Becca talks.

“Something feels off. It wasn’t like this before.” Anea says, looking around. “You guys feel that?”

“No. Not really.” Jacob says.

“What does it feel like?”

“I don’t know…” Anea looks around. There was nothing out of the ordinary. Still smells dusty and dirty. Everything looked the same. She shuts off her phone light and walks around. Nothing but shadows and silhouettes illuminated by dim moonlight from the windows, a hazy orange spilling into the laundry room from the lamp outside. She listens, nothing. Yet the feeling doesn’t escape her.

“This house has that effect. But it usually comes after a while. Are you fucking with us?”

“No! I feel something… It’s not too important.”

“Wait.” Anea’s attention is pulled up through the ceiling. Just under the roof. There’s a presence… forming… right before her eyes. She can’t describe it any better than that. It was coalescing into muddled, pale static.

“The attic!” She says, thundering up the stairs, “Hurry!”

“There was something here. I know it!” Anea booms.

“I believe you. Tell us what you saw.” Jacob says.

“Every animal and person has an aura surrounding them. It lets me see their emotional state. I can use that to predict intentions and motivations. An aura was forming, right here, then it just disappeared. I’ve never seen anything like it. Never felt it before.”

“What does my aura look like?” Becca asks.

“Like a swirling cloud of different colors radiating off of you, every color representing an emotion you’re currently feeling. Even repressed or ever present ones. We can do a mind reading session later. Spread out and look for clues.”

The five of them disperse about the room. The attic is dirty and neglected. A thick layer of dust coats the old floorboards. Moonlight shines through a small broken window on top. The edges of the rafters are scratched up and worn by the birds coming here to shelter from the cold over the years.

There are two or three nests tucked into the corners and joints of the supports, and another one or two sheltered in overturned boxes on the floor. They find some small holes chewed into the bottom the walls, the wood grains and shards adding to the dust on the floor.

“Damn, nothing but rats and birds. No other foot prints but our own.” Becca says.

“Yeah. Let’s get back down before the dust kills us.” Jacob says.

“I need to meditate.” Anea says.

“Will that help with your powers? Are you going to try to communicate with whatever you saw?” Jacob asks, wide eyed.

“There’s so much to auras, that my mind blocks out everything that doesn’t seem necessary, or gets overwhelming. Things like random intrusive thoughts that don’t actually tell me anything about you, or seeing large groups as one big aura. But if I meditate, I become more sensitive to everything around me. So maybe I’ll be able to see what caused whatever I saw.”

“Okay, what do you need us to do?” Becca asks.

“Just keep an eye out, and be ready. If I see something, I’ll send you to it.”

Anea finds the cleanest corner of the living room she can, and cleans it up further so she can meditate in peace. She closes her eyes, sits up straight, and focuses on her breathing. When she inhales, she straightens up and makes sure her body is in proper alignment. On the exhale, she relaxes every muscle she has and lets her body fall into its natural place, her spine feeling like a rod propping her up straight.

She does this for several minutes. Then she allows her awareness to wander. She can feel all her companion’s psyches, tell their colors from the feelings and texture alone. She moves past all that and treats the house like she was just treating her body; starting from up top, she runs her awareness through the attic, then to the top rooms, then back down to this ground floor—

Her heart skips a beat. Some kind of smudge forming down by the floor in the hallway, leading to the kitchen and the laundry room in the back of the house.

Trying to maintain this meditative state, she slowly raises her hand, everything done to the rhythm of her steady breath.

“There…” She points to the hallway. She watches through her mind’s eyes as Becca’s and Jacob’s aura slowly cross the living room.

“Nothing here.” Jacob whispers.

“… Watch…” Anea says.

The two stay put, peering around the corner of the hallway. Soon, that same feeling of unease grips Anea. Instead of fighting it, she embraces it, studies it. She can feel it as this separate thing in her mind. A feeling of dread brought on by a switch flipping in her brain. This wasn’t her. There was no reason for her to feel this way. Something was doing this to her.

She draws her attention back to her friends. The feeling grows slightly more intense to match the aura growing in size. Again, she embraces the feeling rather than fighting it down.

Anea feels the dread register with her friends.

“I’m feeling it.” Jacob says after less than thirty seconds.

“Yeah.” Becca agrees.

Anea casts her awareness to Arch and Dill. Their psyches perked with curiosity, seemingly unaffected by this strange entity.

Anea does a quick scan of the house and the surrounding area. There’s some extremely weak presence all throughout the house, spread like capillaries-

“Ah!” Jacob screams.

“Shit, what!?” Becca says as Anea whispers a curse under her breath and opens her eyes.

“It was right there! You didn’t see it?”

“What was?” Anea demands as she crosses over to join her friends.

“A ghost, a shadow down the hall. Clear as day!”

“Bullshit.” Becca says. “I didn’t see it.”

“You’re both telling the truth.”

“How can that be?” Jacob says.

Anea shrugs. “I’m no expert. I have no idea what’s going on. But the facts are the facts.”

Anea’s gaze darts down the hall. “It’s still there.” She slowly makes her way down the hall.

The two siblings look at each other. They both want to follow, but there wasn’t really enough room.

Becca shoves her little brother down the hall. He wanted this more than she did, after all.

Jacob nearly screams when Becca shoves him. He was used to it, so why suddenly so jumpy? As he peers over Anea’s shoulder, he notices his skin is cold and clammy. A feeling of being watched creeps up on him, and it's not coming from his friends. He has to focus more on keeping his breathing under control than on what’s in front of him. He wants to turn back, to run out of the house and get some air.

Both Jacob and Anea scream as they’re surrounded by an avalanche of skittering scratches. They both turn and bound down the hall. Jacob runs straight for the door, but stops as his hand touches the doorknob. Panting, he turns and presses his back against the door while he catches his breath.

“What was that?” He asks.

“We all heard the same thing, right? Those scratches?” Anea says, pressing her hands to her knees.

“Yeah,” Becca says as Jacob nods.

Anea looks to Arch and Dill, Arch nods, and Dill jumps and chirps.

“So,” Anea says, standing up straight again, “let’s review. We all heard the scratches.”

“But only I saw the shadow.”

“We all had that weird feeling.” Becca says.

“Not all of us. Arch and Dill don’t seem affected.”

“But you seem to be more sensitive to it.” Becca continues, “And you see that thing forming right before anything happens.”

“So, there is definitely something happening, something real causing it. But what could it be?” Jacob says.

“I don’t know,” Anea says, looking at her phone, “but this is about the time my parents would start doing their homework.”

“What the hell are we even looking up?” Becca asks.

“You look up what could cause this feeling. Jacob, you look up what could cause scratching in the walls. And I’ll… I’ll see what could cause that scratch of yours.”

“Aha! Infra-sound!” Becca shouts triumphantly.

“Ah, yes, infra-sound, my old enemy. I should have known.” Jacob scooches away as Becca leans over to hit him.

“What is it?” Anea asks.

“Apparently, everything has something called a resonant frequency, which is a sound that makes an object vibrate the most violent when it’s played loud enough. It’s how people can shatter glass with their voice, by matching the glass’s resonant frequency. Our resonant frequency is lower than our twenty to twenty-thousand hertz range of hearing, so it makes our brain and our blood and our organs vibrate like a wineglass, and we can’t hear it.

It can cause that feeling of anxiety and paranoia, hallucinations, and even make us sick if it’s loud enough.”

“Okay. The only thing I found about noises in the wall is rats- rats! There were rat holes in the attic! So there might be rats in the walls!”

“Hmm… but that still doesn’t explain what I saw. I usually tune out small animals and bugs. All but the smartest ones don’t have enough personality to make an aura. And these presences I see are too big to be a rat, even though it was inside the wall. And I couldn’t find anything about your scar. It’s too thick and long to be a rat… And can they even make that noise? The infra-sound?”

“What about divs? We could be dealing with super powered pests.”

“I can’t imagine what kind of power can cause what I’m seeing.” Anea says, looking down. “Speaking of which, there’s something going on in the basement. Something big. Let’s go.” Anea says, rising from the ground.

“No! We can’t!” Jacob says. “That’s where the effects are the strongest. It might actually be dangerous.”

“That might have been good to know before.” Anea glares at the boy.

“Well, I was planning on checking out the basement when we first got here. But, Anea… I think you’re doing something. I think this ghost is responding more strongly now that you’re here.”

“Yeah,” Becca says. “These things usually build up over hours and hours throughout the night. Small things that just slowly drive people out. I think us going around and being able to chase this thing is causing it to lash out.”

Everyone turns as Dill chirps. They see the fox and the huge chick sitting tall, chests sticking out.

“You’re right.” Anea says. “You guys don’t seem to be affected, so you guys could probably check things out.

“But!” she continues. “If things get dangerous, I want y’all to come out right away! I don’t want you getting hurt, understand!”