A few minutes ago…
Aiden carefully stepped inside the room, the windows were still closed, putting his mind at ease. Slowly and carefully, he first did a cursory scan of the room, then approached places which could potentially hide a corpse from his previous line of sight.
He thought, while moving through a closet, searching even between the clothes just to make sure.
Should I try out my ability?
There was no one nearby. The last few times they carried out their searches, Hellen and him had chosen different rooms. She also never cross checked on him, trusting him on doing his part well. But on second thought, he didn’t try it.
What if Hellen is a super too? If my earlier conjecture was right, about only supers sensing when other super was about to activate their power, Hellen could easily sense I am a super too if I am to activate my power. It’s not like I want to hide it from her, but… let’s just keep it as a personal trump card maybe? Sharing everything is always a bad move.
He kept thinking about it, and after a while thought about what Hellen had told him about supers being similar to ghosts. To activate their abilities they need to fulfill their own set of unique conditions as well, and deal with the side effects of the ability. What unique conditions and side effects did his ability have?
He thought deeply about it, and concentrated on the feeling when he got the ability. The fleeting unique sensation which pervaded in his mind after which he had felt the void within him filling up.
If that unique sensation corresponds to the ability. Would focusing on it give any reaction?
He had no way of replicating that sensation of course. For example you can’t replicate what happened when you dipped your hand into boiling water, you can’t magically make your fingers burn, but you can try to imagine what it felt like. He just kept trying to focus on what that unique sensation felt like, not try to recreate it.
He focused on imagining what it felt like, ultimately lowering his focus on what’s happening in the house. He had absentmindedly gone through everything, checked all the spots. He was approaching the closet when he felt a slight reaction as the unique sensation reappeared, and some information displayed itself in his mind,
/Ability - manifest a weapon using idle mental capacity of beings around you./
Conditions to use - No—
A decayed hand smashed through the door of the closet and punched him squarely in the chest, sending him back a few steps. It didn’t hurt as much as the shock of a decayed corpse opening the door. He wasn’t in the right state of mind, he had made a huge mistake of diverting his focus while dealing with a ghost.
The once human form was twisted and contorted, its flesh mottled and sunken, draped in tattered remnants of clothing. There were gruesome displays of decay all over its body, as some patches of leathery skin had peeled away to reveal the gnarled remains beneath. The stench of putrefaction hung heavy in the air, a nauseating blend of rot and decay that began permeating every inch of the room, evoking a puking sensation in Aiden. Hollow eye sockets, devoid of life or recognition gazed blindly into him as his mind struggled to think of a response.
The baseball bat in his hand had been dropped as soon as the ghost had punched him. It was laying next to the ghost’s limb as it walked towards him. Throwing caution out of the wind, before the ghost could do anything, he tried using his ability by conveying his intention to the unique sensation, almost immediately, immense pain ripped through his mind as an identical baseball bat was now gripped in his hands.
He felt like the pain had worsened, like a hammer hitting his head every second he kept the baseball bat manifested. His eyes blurred and stance faltered as he went a step back. The ghost had stopped.
Arghhh! Aiden screamed loudly, not able to hold it in. The pain was excruciating.
Clutching his head in the other hand, instead of doing anything, he ran backwards towards the door, holding up his baseball bat towards the ghost that had stopped. Quickly, he canceled the ability and opened the door, stumbling down as the pain stopped ripping through his head.
_________________
Hellen unlocked the trigger lock on her Beretta M9 while quickly sprinting towards where the scream originated. Footsteps echoed in the house as a heavy sound of door closing resounded followed by Aiden crashing right into her.
Had she not effortlessly redirected the weight, both of them might have been sent stumbling right down the stairs. But she couldn’t get mad at him after seeing his state, not to mention she wouldn’t have anyway, dealing with ghosts was not a field where they got mad at beginners.
She first looked around and noticed there weren't any traces of ghost nearby, Aiden had already put a distance and leaned against a wall nearby, breathing heavily. She noticed that his hands were empty, the bat she had lent him must’ve been left inside. There was a stain on his t-shirt, a stain she couldn’t be more familiar with.
Carefully, she approached the door and put a lock on it, then addressed Aiden,
“If the ghost hasn’t followed you out yet, I don’t think it will now. Take a seat somewhere, I’ll be back.”
Aiden simply slid down to sit in the hallway, and looked up at the ceiling while taking deep breaths. In the meanwhile, she went into the room where they were finding the useful equipment and took out a few they had kept aside. Returning to the hallway, she carefully placed the equipment on the door and sealed it.
“There, the chances of the door breaking open would be lower now. C’mon, take a seat somewhere else and have some water. We’ve got more information to work on.”
Silently, Aiden followed her into the room and settled himself into a chair. He took short sips of water as he gazed silently at aunt Hellen who had already resumed looking through the boxes. Judging from the number of objects kept in another corner, he guessed that the work was almost done after a little more than a couple hours of searching.
It was almost 10pm, the night had fully settled in. The street which had a sparse amount of people using it was now empty. The town was under strict curfew after 9pm, with each violator being sent to jail without warning. If someone had urgent matters, the police were to be notified who would then accompany you outside for your work after verifying if it was really important and urgent.
Without waiting for Hellen to prompt him, he spoke up,
Stolen content warning: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.
“It was my fault.”
Hellen continued doing her work without missing a beat, but Aiden continued anyway,
“I… began thinking about other things while searching for the ghost. They weren’t important, not more than searching for the ghost. It’s embarrassing that I could even think of other things when faced with such a serious situation. I am sorry. It was my mistake for thinking about insignificant things.”
He drove down the importance of his thoughts so as to not let Hellen question him regarding the matter. Even if she did, he would’ve told her a different thing, not about how he was thinking about his ability. He continued after seeing that she still hadn’t responded,
“The ghost was in the closet. The windows were locked, the room was locked from the outside too, I am sure the ghost couldn’t have entered like a normal human, could he have the ability of being phaseless? Anyway, when I got near the closet in my absentmindedness and was about to open it, it punched through the door of the closet.”
Hellen stopped what she was doing and looked up at him, “Did you see the distance at which it responded? Can you recollect it?”
To be honest, Aiden wasn’t completely sure. Like mentioned earlier, he truly was in a different state of mind, all his attention was focused on what was happening with his ability. But he and likely aunt Hellen too, could already take a guess based on what he said earlier, when I got near the closet in my absentmindedness and was about to open it, it punched through the door of the closet. They only had to guess the distance of a hand from inside the closet with a small error margin. But Hellen got her answer after a look on Aiden’s face still, he was absorbed enough in his thoughts to not notice even that.
With a sigh, she began closing all the boxes as she gestured for him to continue. Aiden knew he had lost a little brownie points as he saw the look on her face. Shoving those thoughts aside, he continued,
“That punch caused me to take a few steps back, causing me to lose my baseball bat. It left my grip quite easily since, yea, sorry, I wasn’t paying attention. Then the ghost left the closet, I screamed out of fear when I saw how it looked. It was scary, genuinely, and the smell almost made me puke on the spot. It was walking towards me but stopped when I picked up some random object nearby. I took a few steps back and ran towards the door. It didn’t even try to stop me or attack me all the way. I opened and stumbled out, crashing into you in haste.”
He heaved a sigh, as if talking to her about all of this lifted a weight off his chest. Hellen was in the middle of closing the boxes as Aiden approached her and helped her with it. He was done taking a break, a rest. He was sufficiently calmed down, and not to mention felt safe subconsciously around aunt Hellen.
Hellen didn’t say a word until they were done packing all the boxes. When all of the boxes were finally stashed back in the attic, she took a seat on the sofa of her living room, with Aiden doing the same opposite her and asked him,
“You said you only took a couple steps back when the ghost punched you through the door of the closet?”
Aiden nodded, not knowing why she had asked this. Hellen had a look of contemplation on her face as she continued after getting Aiden’s response.
“We… might have stumbled upon its side effect.”
She waited to get Aiden’s reaction, who furrowed his brows to think about what she meant. He knew she was taking this as a chance to teach him. To make him get used to the thought process of dealing with ghosts. She was guiding him into how every information counted and how to derive more information out of it.
There was a period of silence in the house, as Hellen ate some dry fruits while waiting for Aiden. It was after almost a minute that Aiden hesitantly replied,
“The ghost’s damage on me has been reduced. Right?”
Hellen smiled at him, making Aiden sigh in relief as she asked him to state his reasoning. With an embarrassed expression, he simply shrugged.
“It was a guess.”
Hellen shook her head at him. Putting another almond in her mouth, she explained, “You shouldn’t have only taken a few steps back when the ghost punched you. Don’t you find it weird? You didn’t say it hurt you, but only took a few steps back. And even if it had hurt you, you should’ve crashed into something behind, or fall down in the process of going back. You suffered very little damage.”
“But that doesn’t make it logical when you count the fact that it punched through the closet. It shouldn’t have much force left behind in the punch to cause that much damage to me. At least not to the point which you said.”
She put another couple of almonds in her mouth as she explained, “Ghosts have more physical prowess than humans. Supers are the same in that regard, albeit they rank a little lower than ghosts, but still higher than humans. If you measure it literally, you can say that supers have a minimum fitness, or hardness of the body you can consider, to be at the peak of human limits. Of course, there are supers who have even better physicality. Ghosts on the other have a higher minimum point than supers.
So yea, even counting that the helping ghost has a physique at the bottom of the barrel, it is still more than the physical limit of humans. In such a case, do you think that the energy left behind after going through the door of the closet wouldn’t be enough to deal plenty of damage to you? Not to mention the doors of my closets aren't that thick or of high quality, at least not the ones situated in that room.”
Aiden raised an eyebrow at her as he said in a dramatic tone, “You can’t fault me for not knowing the reason when there’s so much information I didn’t even know. How am I supposed to come up with a conclusion when there’s no information for me to work with?”
She smiled, “I was simply hoping you’d come up with something. But fair reasoning, it's unlikely for someone to come up with a reasoning based on no information.”
She then continued, “We at least now know that it has reduced physical damage on you. Let’s wait, we’ll soon know if hiding was a condition or a way to avoid side effects.”
This time Aiden promptly replied to her without letting her continue, “Let me guess. If hiding was a condition, its target should’ve been reset. We would straight away know if it targets you and attempts to help you. But in the off chance that it targets me again, there should be a total of three more helps before the day ends. If hiding is a way to avoid side effects, its target on me shouldn’t have been reset, in which case there should only be one more attempt of help for the day since it has already attempted to help me twice, one by giving me the cleaning equipment and second by flying over a napkin near me.”
Hellen had an impressed look on her face as she glanced at him, “You are really getting the hang of it aren’t you? Guess it really was information which held you back previously.”
Aiden shrugged with a proud look on his face as he waited for her instructions. She drank a glass of water and leaned back on the sofa.
“Ah, I was thirsty after all the work and talking. Didn’t realize it until my throat began drying up.”
With a look of recollection on her face, she asked Aiden suddenly, “Also, you said the windows were locked when you entered the room to search. Right?”
Without waiting for Aiden’s affirmation, she continued, “That means it is one which has the phaseless ability.”
Aiden asked her a doubt which had been brewing inside his mind, “But can’t it shut down the window by itself?”
“Ghosts can’t perform complicated tasks like that, they can’t even run. So you can imagine the extent of their cognitive prowess.”
“But the ghost helps me with things, how does it know how to do all of that then?”
Hellen had a serious look on her face as she replied to the question, “I don’t know. But the Bureau has a theory that ghosts have enhanced cognitive prowess in the domain of their ability. For example let’s just take the helping ghost, its ability is related to helping—”
“It’s the condition.”
“Same shit, at least it's a condition for activating its power, so it’s related to the ability still. So we can assume that the ghost has enhanced mental capability when it comes to helping. Running doesn’t come under help, probably also why it walked towards you instead of running. Likewise, closing the window for itself doesn’t count as helping you. Geddit?”
Aiden nodded his head as she got up and instructed him, “Let’s go, we need to set up all the equipment. Even if we now know that it has the phaseless ability, it doesn't hurt to keep track of it.”