Devorah allowed herself a moment to be impressed with Kefilwe and Georgie before she shook off any thoughts about flowers. Why had some stupid flowers triggered her weird, new headache disorder? Even having headaches in the first place didn’t make sense. Devorah didn’t even have a brain anymore! There wasn’t anything left to feel pain. Just a bunch of nanobots. No flesh, no blood.
Even through the pain, Devorah could acknowledge that this was a new way of looking at possible clues. Every little thing is important, yes, but so is the wisdom to know to focus on avenues that could actually give you results. Devorah never would have looked at a flower and said oh yes! This flower is the weird thing. Who knows! Maybe it would help them reach some sort of conclusion.
But then Devorah remembered it wasn’t really her problem any more. What should the dead care for the mysteries of the living?
Her headache abated as she sunk down to the floor.
By the window, they were still talking about the pseudo-roses. Devorah’s grandmother had always loved flowers. It was a waste of water to grow most flowers on Samaria, so on special occasions Bubbe would buy dried leaves from other planets and press them into little trinkets. Bubbe said their ancestors used to plant trees on holidays and for special occasions. Earth trees wouldn’t grow well at home.
When Devorah went to school in the University of Aeble on Earth, there were a few trees planted in special parks around the city. A few even had special plaques, noting that they had been grown from seeds taken from trees in the park that had dominated the center of the city Aeble had grown atop of.
Even in the harshest desert there was life. Even in the deepest ocean there was life.
There was nothing left alive about Devorah.
Hands shaking, she pushed herself up from the floor.
Screw it. Devorah hadn’t wanted to use one of her charges so early, but she was desperate to find a way to take her mind off this hell. Anything to get those three to stop talking about flowers.
She marched herself up to the bookshelf. Not even looking down, she focused on her hand and grabbed the spine of one of the books.
Her hand passed through.
Devorah cursed. She had hoped intention would be enough to activate the charge. Did she have to say what she wanted to do out loud, as if she was in an anime?
“Charge!” Her hand passed through again. “Charge!” She cried at a higher pitch. Still nothing.
Frustrated, Devorah grit her teeth. “Fuck!” She slammed her hand against the side of the bookcase.
The sound of a hard smack resounded through the room.
In the corner of her eye, Devorah could see a countdown begin, starting from thirty and going down.
There wasn’t time to think. She smacked the bookshelf again, this time throwing her whole self into it.
“What was that?” Georgie said, her brow furrowed. She coughed.
“I hope Gabe isn’t having trouble…” Jacob added. He extracted himself from the window and made to go towards the double doors.
Devorah groaned in frustration. “No!” Finally, she was able to grab a book. With five seconds left behind this charge, Devorah pulled her arm back and launched the book at Jacob.
Devorah had never been much of an athlete, and it seemed that death did not remedy this flaw. The book fell short of Jacob by several feet.
“Huh?” Jacob swung his head around, looking from the doors to the book. “How did this book get over here?”
Damn it. He didn’t look like someone who had just been spooked by a ghost. And a big goose egg of a zero flashed in the corner of Devorah’s eye before disappearing.
Despite the fact that she could no longer cry, Devorah felt choked up in the back of her throat. Her first charge, wasted. Her chance to start out this new life with a true bang, gone.
But then Georgie spoke. Her eyes were wide, and her already pale skin was just a touch whiter. “Jacob,” she said, haltingly, “that book flew off the shelf.”
If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. Please report it.
“What?”
“It’s true!” Kefilwe said, looking back and forth between the book and the shelf. “It was like magic!”
“Magic isn’t real,” Jacob shook his head.
Kefilwe’s lip curled up in an uneasy smile. “I wasn’t so sure myself, but this morning I had lunch with a Prussian nun and a plague doctor.”
“Good point,” Jacob said.
There was a moment of quiet.
“What if it was a ghost?” Georgie asked, voice quivering.
Devorah fist pumped. Success!
“Ghosts aren’t…” Jacob paused. “Okay, yeah, I don’t want to fall into that trap either. Especially after last night.”
“What happened last night? Did you see a ghost?” Kefilwe asked.
Georgie released her grip on the windowsill. “Jacob and some of the others attempted a seance last night.”
“We used a ouija board,” Jacob clarified. “That girl, you know, the one with the…” Jacob made weird little triangle symbols over his head, then stretched an arm behind him. Devorah thought he was probably trying to pantomime a representation of the catgirl.
“Ah.” Kefilwe nodded in recognition. “Poor thing… She really imprinted on Jacqueline.”
Jacqueline was probably one of the recent dead. Devorah hoped if Jacqueline was murdered, the catgirl wasn’t the one who found the body.
She wondered who found her own body.
“Yeah. So when she found a ouija board in like, one of the other rooms, she asked a few of us if we wanted to see if we could talk to Jacqueline.” Jacob said.
“I said no, obviously.” Georgie grimaced, then coughed. “I’m no coward but I’m not messing around with the dead.”
Too late. Devorah laughed to herself. What if the dead want to mess with you?
“But I thought hey. We’re in a haunted house, might as well, right?” Jacob said. “See what would happen. The ouija board’s gotta be there for a reason.”
“So what happened?” Kefilwe asked.
“A couple of us got together. Me, Brad, Xoco, her. Brad was pretty enthusiastic about it. Said he used them once or twice before with his frat.” Jacob said, then turned to Georgie to explain what a frat was. “A frat is like a university party club.”
“Doesn’t sound too different from what the little lord of the manor got up to in his uni days.” Georgie commented.
“So anyway, we all get together around the board. She was trying to contact Jacqueline, and then we heard a weird thumping sound. Then all the lights blew out in the room!” Jacob said.
Those all seemed to be things that could be controlled pretty easily. And it made sense, the people who ran these games loved a dramatic moment.
“Brad shrieked like a little girl.” Jacob laughed.
Kefilwe nodded, and stroked her chin. “Did anything happen to cause those occurrences?”
“Right, yeah. The uh, catgirl, kept asking if it was Jacqueline we were speaking to. The board was shooting out all kinds of weird words, but after like, the third time the catgirl asked, everything went weird.”
Georgie’s eyes pinched shut. “Three times… That feels important. Isn’t that important to Christians?”
“Catholics,” Kefilwe corrected. “They believe in the Holy Trinity. After three times, the ghost could have been making a mockery of it.”
“Are you not Christian, Georgie?” Jacob asked.
“Not really. I don’t go to church or nothing.” Georgie shrugged. “Kind of hard to believe in Jesus after everything I’ve been through.”
“Even though you’re from Victorian times?” Jacob frowned.
Georgie gave him a confused look. “Why should the queen have anything to do with that?”
“I think Jacob meant to say that, in our understanding of history, people from your time and place tend to be religious,” Kefilwe stepped in to explain.
Georgie crossed her arms. “Rude to assume like that. You want religious, go look for Gabe.”
Based on what Devorah knew about history, if Jacob was truly from the 2020’s in America, his own zeitgeist was likely to be much more concerned about religion. That was a bit past Devorah’s historical expertise, as she was more concerned with periods of industrialization than periods of digitization, but the two often went hand in hand.
The three continued their conversation about religion as Devorah let her mind drift back to the charge she just used. It wasn’t a complete waste.
The charge was a bit unpredictable, it seemed. The charge didn’t react to any words as far as Devorah knew. It seemed to activate in response to intense emotion. Which, oof. Since she woke up in the manor, intense emotions weren’t really Dev’s strong suit.
Maybe that was done on purpose? To make it harder to activate charges? That had to be it.
Either way, while Devorah had trouble activating the charge at a precise moment, she was able to control how it manifested. Devorah wasn’t sure if this was merely a coincidence, but it seemed to be that just focusing on a specific type of manifestation while charged would make it work.
Devorah would have to do more testing to be sure.