Chapter 14

It didn’t take long for Andrew to explain the situation. The odd events at the hospital had been noticed by one of the older janitors. He’d been working the job long enough to recognize the signs for what they were, so he’d called an exorcist. That exorcist had been Lady Gray, Beth’s mentor and the one who’d spent the last few days working the case.

And now the five of them were packed into Andrew’s car and driving to the hospital.

“So why am I the only one wearing this?” Zach complained as he motioned towards the hospital gown he’d been handed earlier.

“You’re too young to work at the hospital and the rest of us are too old to be patients,” Beth answered in the nurse scrubs she wore. Andrew and Lady Gray were wearing identical sets.

“Plus unlike the rest of us, your part of the plan involves moving around the hospital,” Andrew added as Lady Gray drove in silence.

“And what’s my job?” Zach narrowed his eyes at his not-mentor.

“Once we get there, your job is to find your friend and get her to the roof. We’ll be waiting there for an ambush. If we’re right about this ghost consuming others to make himself stronger, then we don’t have the number or firepower to win a straight fight. The faster can isolate this thing, the faster we can get to exorcising it via ritual. You have the file right?”

“Read through it on the way here,” Zach took out the small folder he’d been handed earlier in the day, “it’s a pretty brutal story…”

“All ghost stories are,” Andrew added before carefully eyeing Blue. The girl was too busy looking at contents of the open folder to notice.

Ghostly theater

Tonight’s show: Jackson Smile’s last show.

Jackson Smile was a contradiction, a man with a happy name who worked as a clown, while living a miserable home life. Any joy he had for his job had long since died under the weight of his parents, his three siblings and his wife, all of them deceased before him.

So he kept going, a walking corpse, dragging himself from carnival to children’s party to anything that would take him. All of it to make enough to pay his rent and the few comforts he still had.

And then tragedy came for Jackson Smiles once more, with the reaper following soon after. It should have been a simple trick, performed at a normal child’s birthday party. A can of peanut brittle set up to explode into a shower of paper snakes.

And that was when he noticed one of the children running away from his truck carrying cans of silly string. He sighed as he kept the trick going as the kid started passing out the silly string among his friends who started firing it at each other.

Chaos erupted as children and adults soon looked onto a yard and party decoration covered in silly string. The birthday girl was crying and the parents were all blaming him. Despite his sound argument of ‘your brat stole those out of my van’, the parents weren’t hearing it.

He was asked to leave the party, which he did. He got into the van, and drove away hoping to go home and deal with his unhappiness the way he always did.

And then a truck ran a red light and hit him straight on.

Trevor spent the rest of his life drifting in and out of consciousness. An ambulance arrived shortly after, and from there everything went wrong.

The ambulance driver took them to the closest hospital, which just so happened to be South Palm Memorial Pediatric Center. They got him through the door only for the receptionist to stop them.

This poor woman, this was her first day. She understood this was a children’s hospital, why were they bringing a fully grown man here. She kept them in the lobby for a few minutes until someone came to force the paramedics through.

If those few minutes made the difference, no one knew, but Jackson died later that day, cursing the children who had led him to his fate.

“Wait you can treat adults in a children’s hospital?” Blue asked.

“Yeah I thought that was weird too,” Beth answered for her, “apparently if it’s a major emergency like a car crash, you’re just supposed to the closet hospital that can take you.”

“Never knew that… I think,” Blue stretched her arms out, “So what’s my job?”

“What do you mean?” Beth glanced towards Andrew and Lady Gray who both stayed silent.

“What am I going to be doing during all of this?” Blue asked again only to be met with a deafening silence within the car. Zach coughed one before Blue let out a low growl.

“I don’t think you have a part in the plan Blue,” Zach slowly told her as he looked over at Andrew, who was staring at the road up ahead.

Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on the original website.

“What so I’m just supposed to float around doing nothing while the rest of you deal with the ghost clown?” She demanded only to be cut off by an unlikely source.

“Yes,” Lady Gray broke her silence for the first time. While she didn’t look back, Blue could still feel the older woman’s gaze on her. “You are an unproven factor, as is Gestalt. You are here to prove you can be counted on to follow orders and not rampage like most ghost would in your position. Prove you can control yourself, and you might be given a grander role in the next operation.”

“Of course, if something goes wrong and we end up in an emergency, feel free to form Gestalt if you two think you need to.” Andrew quickly turned around held his hand out. “It’s not some sort of school test. You won’t fail if you form Gestalt.”

“The most important goal for Zach and Beth tonight is to survive.” Lady Gray turned the corner into the hospital’s parking lot. She drove through it and approached its loading dock. “Normally that would be our objective as well, but this ghost going after children changes things.”

“We’ve spent the last few days gathering everything we need to exorcise Jackson,” Andrew grumbled as the ramp to the loading dock came down, “If we fail now, we’d have to wait for reinforcements, and there’s no way they’d get here fast enough to prevent any more deaths. If we can’t finish things tonight, what good are we as exorcist?”

They pulled into the loading dock as the five of them poured out of the car into a large room where an older man was waiting for them.

“Hmm, more of you than I expected,” his eyes fell onto the four of them, “since when do ride with youngsters Lady Gray?”

“These two are new bloods. I’m not immortal, there always needs to be new saplings ready to take the place of fallen titans,” she gestured towards Beth and Zach before pointing at Andrew and smirking, “and this one is here too.”

“Very funny,” he grumbled before popping open the trunk of the car and taking out a large bag. He quickly zipped it open and made a quick check through the contents before zipping it back up. “Okay, so we need to get that kid up to the third floor while the rest of us head up to the roof. Is everything set on your end?”

The old man nodded and motioned for them to follow him before walking towards a large elevator.

“Blue, can you go on ahead and keep an eye on Tyler?” Zach whispered. Blue nodded in agreement before rising up through the ceiling. The rest of the ghost hunters raised an eyebrow at him but none said anything. He knew he was taking a risk sending her out like this, but his first priority was keeping Tyler safe. And if that meant sending Blue on ahead, then so be it.

“This freight elevator is usually only used for large deliveries,” the old man explained as the elevator made its way downwards. He either hadn’t heard Zach instruction to Blue, or hadn’t cared. “No one will notice or care if you use it. The route from the door to the roof will be easy, but the third floor will be a smidge trickier. Try to stay out of sight, and if anyone asks you what you’re doing, just tell them you’re going back to your room.”

Zach nodded just as the elevator arrived. The group of five stepped in. They stood in silence as the air grew tense. All three of the exorcists could feel it. The exorcism had begun, and when dawn broke, they may not all still be here.

The doors opened on the third floor and Zach took a deep breath.

“Here it is kid, your stop,” Andrew chuckled as Zach took a single step out and heard the door close behind him. This was it, time to look for Tyler.

He emerged into the hallway of the third floor and took a second to get his bearings. He was in the north hallway, which meant Tyler’s room was close by. All he had to do was walk down the hall make a left, get past the reception…

Okay so slight change of plans. He needed to limit his chances of getting seen. He made a right and kept his eyes and ears open as he carefully walked his way through the hospital. He passed a stairway which he made sure to remember for later. The soft slippers he’d been given muffled his steps, leaving him along with nothing but his thoughts and the slight sounds of movement from far in the distance.

He turned the corner again when he spotted Blue standing next to Tyler door. She was franticly pointing inside. Zach took a single step forward and immediately sped up.

The hairs on the back of his neck started rising up on their own.

He reached the door before Tyler’s when Blue came back to his side. Her face had a worried gaze, and her hands were twitching.

“What’s…” Zach started to ask only for Blue to lunge forward and get into his face. An act which probably would have gotten a scream out of him if he wasn’t so used to Blue by now.

“Jackson Smiles is here, right here in Tyler room, right now!” She unleashed a harsh whisper before looking back at the door.

“Okay, then we just have to get her out of there right now without anyone…”

“We can’t do that either because there’s a doctor in there with her too!”

Zach froze as hi grip tightened. This exorcism had just started and they were already in a worst case scenario. How was he supposed to get Tyler out of her room and onto the roof with a doctor in the way?

A scream of pain broke through his thoughts as he burst into the room.

Tyler was on the bed, sitting up with her head tilted downwards. The doctor, an older man with a bald head standing next to her, jumped at his sudden intrusion. And behind both of them was Jackson Smiles, smiling wildly as he dug his ghostly hook into Tyler’s shoulder. He pulled as bits of something blue started coming out of her.

“Blue, it’s time,” Zach stated as he felt something enter his back as a Marble and Blue Flame Heart formed in his mind.

Gestalt narrowed their eyes as Jackson raised his gaze to meet theirs. He froze for a few seconds before choosing to ignore them and went back to pulling on Tyler. She let out another cry of pain before tilting her head back up.

“Zach what are you…?”

“Young man, what are you doing here?” The doctor said just as Gestalt dashed forward.

“Get away from her!” They [growled/said] before reaching Tyler’s bed. They went onto the side opposite the doctor and gripped Jackson’s hand. The clown’s empty eyes widened and let go of his hook just as Zach pulled Jackson forward and punched the ghost in the face.

“You normally go after kids who can’t fight back right? Let’s see how you like it when it’s a fair fight,” Gestalt grabbed the hook and turned to [his friend/the girl], “you may want to brace yourself.”

“Zach what’s wrong with your…” She trailed off as Gestalt pulled the hook out of her. She winced in pain just as the doctor reached out to grab Gestalt.

“Young man get back to your room and…” his scowl was broken as a flying hook latched onto his arm. He hissed and reached for his arm, looking bewildered at the sight of nothing.

Gestalt turned back to Jackson who stared at them while producing another hook in his hand. He raised it high and got ready to throw it.

“Tyler, I’ll explain everything…” She screamed as Jackson reached for one part of the bed and threw it to the side. The wheels under the bed screeched as Gestalt reached out and willed the bed to come to a stop.

“What is happening?” She demanded as Jackson started madly swinging his hook at Gestalt. They backed up, making sure to keep their back to the door.

“Hey Tyler, you know how [I/Zach] like ghost stories?” Sammy flinched when the two voices coming out of her friend spoke out of synch. “Well we managed to get you dragged into one.”