Chapter Ten - Ghost in the Tower

Gastly had been haunting the Sprout Tower for... he wasn't sure. Many a season. He remembered summers like this one passing, followed by quiet falls and long winters, then spring came again.

He liked spring the most. It was when the tower became the most lively. He suspected that once, when he was still a living being, he had enjoyed spring the most as well.

The ghost materialised out of the Dark Place with a bit of effort and a dark, knowing chuckle. He had transitioned from nowhere back into the mortal realm, to feast and wander and see the world for what it was once more.

"Gassssly," someone hissed from nearby. We have guests.

Gastly looked to the side. There was a man standing there, an old one, in the black and yellow robes of a sage of the Sprout Tower. The man looked to gastly, then wavered, his form shifting as a faint breeze slipped through the attic.

"Gastly," he replied. Do we, now? Gastly asked.

The sage nodded, then turned into wisps of gas. Soon, there was a second gastly in the room. He grinned, eyes lighting up with mischief. "Gastly?" Shall we greet them?

Gastly considered it. He had been haunting this place for some time now, coming out at night when the sun was down and the tower was mostly empty. It was part of a bargain... one that he was not part of.

Strange, but still acceptable.

Gastly could not recall anything of his life, but he knew that once he must have been one of the sages in this tower. Why else would he have been born here? He knew, from talking to the others haunting this place, that centuries ago an accord had been struck between the sages and the first ghosts.

The tower would be their home, as it was the home of the sages, and in return, they were to only haunt it by night.

Gastly had yet to rise when that accord was struck, but he listened to it still. Such things were important. He was no faerie, of course, and while he was supposed to be peaceful... well, a bit of fright never hurt the old sages.

He particularly enjoys leaving the tower and floating down to the dormitories. There was always some new blood there, young men and women, not yet sages, who were still to learn their place in the Tower.

They always screamed the loudest when a gastly roared at them from within an outhouse's hole.

Ah, but it wasn't the season for that just yet.

"Gastly, gas gas," he said. I don't know. I think I might just wisp about.

The other gastly turned large eyes towards him. In their normal, less ghostly forms, gastly appeared as a haze of purplish smoke. Ghost-type energy loosely held in place around a small dark sphere of ghostly matter. They had eyes, of course, large ones to see the world through, and a mouth to better speak and spook.

"Gastly," his... companion admonished. Again?

The truth was that undeath did not become him. His memories of life were as fleeting as the wind he was made of. He didn't know which passed sage he was, but he suspected he was one of those few who had to fight wanderlust.

The Sprout Tower had a small graveyard on its compound, rows of bellsprout-tombstones where sages were buried. He sometimes haunted that space too, though never when the sun was out.

He expected another argument from his friend, putting him in his place, reminding him that his role in unlife was to haunt this darkened tower because it was a safe space for them, but there were footsteps and the familiar creek of wood.

Then, voices.

"Oh, it's properly spooky up here!" a girl said, her voice bright and cheerful.

"Y-yeah, I guess so," another replied.

Light flashed across the room, a handheld light moving left and right and casting long shadows from the support pillars holding up the roof. "So, how does one make friends with a ghost? Do we use the normal way?"

"You don't need to befriend a pokemon to catch it," the other girl said. "Just fight it a little, then toss a pokeball when it's too weak to fight."

"Bun, buneary," said an unfamiliar pokemon's voice. That seems mean.

"Buneary is right, that's not a good way to make friends. You do know that Stockholm syndrome is a myth, right?"

"What even is a Stockholm?"

Gastly hovered up and closer to the ceiling. He couldn't make himself invisible... but he could come pretty close if he spread himself out a little. What he found as he looked at the space near the stairwell was a young woman and a pokemon and a person-shaped thing.

Oh, his eyes could see a young woman in her teens. His vision always had difficulty making out colours, but he was used to living in the dark. This young woman was pale skinned, with a blue outfit and armour.

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But his senses danced off of her. The ambient gases in the room, left here by centuries of gastly hauntings, were fizzing away from her, as if the ghostly energy was allergic to her very presence.

"Gastly," his companion whispered. She is strange.

He could only nod in agreement. The other girl, by contrast, was the typical young trainer, though fashions had changed much in his time. Her shirt was far too loose and exposed an indecent amount of skin. Goodness, he could see some of her waist. Children these days.

The pokemon in their group was a small rabbit-eared pokemon, hopping along the ground between the two.

"I think you should just ask," the strange girl said.

"Just... ask? You think that would work, really?" the normal one replied.

"You could at least try?"

The girl sighed. "Fine, Broccoli, we'll do it your way, if only to prove that you don't know anything when it comes to catching pokemon." The girl stepped up then cleared her throat. "Hello? Gastly?"

Her voice echoed through the floor and was answered only by the creak of old wood and the wind howling through the rafters.

The girl swallowed. "My name is Jazz. I'm going to be a Poison-type master, and I want... need a gastly on my team to kick Falkner's stupid bird-loving butt."

The two gastly looked at one another. This was... strange. Though not entirely unheard of. Some of their number had been captured before, becoming companions to trainers. They had even had a haunter for some time who had left the tower and travelled with a trainer for over a decade before returning on his own, evolved and more powerful than all of them. He had been captured a second time by a mysterious young woman a few decades ago.

"See, it's not working," Jazz said to her companion.

The other shook her head. "Come on, you need to be a bit more convincing. Maybe they're shy?"

Gastly had had enough. With a roll of his eyes he spread himself thin across the room and started to make things shake and tremble. He hummed a deep, sibilant "Gasssss" sound which his companions emulated.

The Jazz girl took a step back in fright, the little buneary squeaked and bounced up into the Broccoli girl's arms, and Broccoli... giggled. "Oh, that's spooky!" she cheered. "See, they're here."

"They're here and don't sound happy," Jazz said.

"Don't be so scared, they're trying to spook us. It's cute! Besides, I won't let them hurt you. I've fought plenty of ghosts before." She looked down at the buneary currently cowering in her arms. His little face was squished up into her armpit as if he was trying to burrow into safety. "I should teach you some Cleaning magic, then you won't have to be afraid of ghosts anymore."

The Jazz girl closed her fists, then glared at the ceiling. Her friend's lack of concern seemed to bolster her. "H-hey! I'm looking for someone brave here. Someone who wants to help me fight, and who would be willing to help me with my dream."

"And in exchange?" the Broccoli girl prompted.

"And in exchange... I'll treat you well. And we'll travel together, win gym badges, and become the stuff of nightmares. People will rue the day they have to fight us. Our names will spread across Johto... no, across the continent in terrified whispers. We will be the poison that takes down kings and the toxin that empties villages. We will mark our place in history as those whom no one ever wants to fight. We will be impossible to underestimate, because no matter the challenge, we'll overcome it, even if the only way to do so is with a knife in the dark!"

"Uh, that sounded a little... villainous," Broccoli said.

Gastly hovered closer.

"Gastly?" his companion said. You can't be tempted.

"Gas," he replied. A little. "Gas... gastly." I... want to travel.

His friend eyed him, then hovered back. "Gastly." Then do so.

They could always meet again. After all, he'd been here for centuries, and a little jaunt out in the world wouldn't be all that long comparatively, would it? In a few decades, maybe half a century or so, the girl below would expire of old age, and then he could return here once more. A ghost was too dead to die, but maybe that didn't mean that he was too dead to be bored?

"Gastly!" he hissed as loud as he could as he plummeted from the ceiling and pooled in front of the girl.

Her terrified shriek and the other's laughter was a fantastic start to their relationship, he thought.

***