Ghost Hunt
Ghost Hunt Mission Objectives:
1. Gather three pieces of evidence and correctly identify ghost type (Reward: $100)
2. Witness a haunting event (Reward: $10)
3. Capture a picture of the ghost (Reward: $25)
4. Find and cleanse the cursed item with a smudge stick (Reward: $50)
5. Successfully banish the ghost (Reward: $75)
In a military-size canvas tent outside an abandoned orphanage somewhere in Wisconsin, Dante Anderson scanned through the mission objectives on the whiteboard a second time. Although this was only his third mission with the team, he was starting to notice a pattern with the objectives. Eyeing the fifth objective, he chewed on his bottom lip in frustration. “Hey,” he spoke in a hushed voice to his friend, Damien, standing next to him. “Can you show me how to banish the ghost this time?”
Damien chuckled. “Do you hate being the newb that much?” His friendly Estuary English accent did nothing to ease the sting of hearing the truth. Dante pouted in response, causing Damien to backtrack. “Look, just stick with being the photographer for now... At least until you get more experience.”
Dante was about to complain when another one of his friends, Mikey, interrupted. “We could have Dante be in charge of the spirit box this time,” he offered. Aside from photographer duty, the spirit box was one of the easier tasks for new hunters and could be done without getting in the way of the others.
The fourth friend of the group, Andy, laughed. “Don’t listen to him, Dante! Using the spirit box tends to attract attention from the ghost. Mikey just doesn’t want to risk dying.”
“No one wants to die!” Mikey whined. Out of the group, Mikey and Andy had the most ghost-hunting experience, but that didn’t mean they agreed on hunting strategies. The two bickered about what would be the best task to assign to Dante.
“Whatever,” Dante finally decided for himself, picking up a device that looked like a handheld radio. “I’ll be spirit box guy this time.”
Damien grabbed a smudge stick and infrared thermometer. Andy picked up a crucifix and EMF reader. Finally, Mikey took a camera and a UV light.
Geared up, the four friends left the safety of their tent and walked out into the dark night. The group approached the iron fence in front of the orphanage. A weathered plaque barely hung on to the fence, reading, HOPECREST, FOUNDED 1908. The rusted gate opened with a long, loud groan that reminded Dante of the roar of a Japanese kaiju monster. The concrete stairs leading up to the two-story building were crumbling to the point that it was a wonder they could hold any weight without falling apart. At the top of the stairs was a multi-paneled wooden door that had splintered and cracked in one of the lower corners. The white paint that coated the door had faded to a dingy yellow that chipped as the door creaked open.
Inside the narrow lobby, ominous silence greeted the group. Even carrying flashlights, they could barely see anything that wasn’t right in front of their faces. Andy checked his map in the back of his instruction manual. “Okay, although this place is pretty large, it’s actually just a big square. In the middle is a courtyard with a playground. Although the ghost shouldn’t appear out there, you can use it as a shortcut to get across the building quicker on the ground floor.”
“And if the ghost is on the second floor?” Damien asked. This was his first mission at the orphanage.
“Either hide or try to lap it until you can get downstairs,” Andy answered. Putting his map away, he turned to the group. “But for now, Dante and Damien will take the ground floor, and Mikey and I will take the second floor. As soon as any of you come across anything suspicious, contact everyone on your radio.” He pressed the button on his radio and his voice came through with a crackle of static. “Understood?”
Dante, Damien, and Mikey pressed the buttons on their radios and replied in unison, “Understood!”
***
After checking around in the headmaster’s office off the right side of the entrance lobby, Dante and Damien found glass French doors that led to an overgrown courtyard. The outline of a dilapidated playground was barely visible in the cloud-covered moonlight. Just as they were about to split up, Mikey’s voice came over the radio: “Hey, guys! Come here. I think I’ve found something. Up the stairs and to the left at the back corner of the building.”
“We’ll be right there,” Damien replied into the radio. He and Dante trudged up the staircase to the second floor. As the two friends turned the corner upstairs, they saw a flashlight flicker on and off at the end of the hall.
“Down here, guys!” Mikey yelled, his voice echoing down the hallway. “It’s in this room.” Dante and Damien peeked into the room from the entrance. It was in a sad state, with only one twin-size metal spring bed in the corner and an old-fashioned oak wardrobe in another. Andy was already in the room, walking around with the EMF reader. “I found claw marks on the back of the door,” Mikey explained, and flashed his UV light at the door to reveal green scratches.
“Good job, mate,” Damien said with a smile. “Did you take a picture already?” “Yeah, it should be in the book now,” Mikey replied proudly.
“So we put that in the book as evidence, right?” Dante asked no one in particular. He opened his book to the page titled “Evidence” and looked at the list. Finding “claw marks,” he checked the box next to it. Immediately three of the twelve types of ghosts became grayed out on the next page.
“Yeah, I’m not getting any EMF readings.” In frustration, Andy tossed the machine onto the mold-stained, blue-striped mattress. “I’m going to head back to the tent and grab a journal.”
“Wait, I’ll come with you,” Damien told him. “I’m not getting any freezing temps either.” He was about to leave the room when he turned to Dante. “Hey, try using the spirit box to talk to it. The ghost’s name is Robert Thomas.”
Taking a deep breath, Dante pulled out the device and switched on the dial on top. A low hum came from the device, signaling it was on. “Robert Thomas, are you here?” Dante said in his clear, bass voice. There was no response. “Robert Thomas, give us a sign.” Still no response. Annoyed, Dante tried to speak to the ghost again. “Robert Thomas, are you an asshole?”
Mikey burst into laughter while picking up the thermometer Damien had left. Laughter came over the radio from Damien and Andy as well. Encouraged by his friends, Dante continued to taunt the ghost. “Robert Thomas, do you like to eat ass?”
The spirit box suddenly replied with a deep, hollow, disembodied voice: “Die.”
“What did it say? Did it tell me to die?” Dante asked. When Mikey nodded, Dante dramatically threw the spirit box onto the bed. “Shut up, Rob Thomas!” At that moment, a distorted crackle came over the group radio and the flashlights flickered on and off. “Are you doing that?” Dante asked Mikey.
“No...” Mikey replied with some uncertainty. Then he jumped. “It’s hunting! Hide!”
Dante was about to step outside the room when the door slammed shut in his face and locked. “What the hell?” he exclaimed. He tried to open the door, but it wouldn’t budge. “Why isn’t this opening?” he cried in panic. He looked back over his shoulder to ask his friend what he should do. It took him a moment to realize an invisible force was holding Mikey up by the neck.
“Oh, come on!” Mikey whined. “Dante was the one with the spirit box!” Then his head turned at an odd angle until his neck snapped. Dante covered his mouth in shock as Mikey’s body was tossed across the room like a ragdoll. The force of impact caused his head to become stuck in the wall, leaving the rest of his body hanging out in an awkward position.
The lights stopped flickering, and the door clicked open. Fuck this! Dante thought, immediately leaving the room. He wanted to run, but his body was moving extremely slowly. It reminded him of the nightmares he’d had as a kid when he was running in slow motion while trying to escape monsters. He reached the stairs and the group radio returned to normal.
Andy’s calm voice came over the radio. “Mikey, Dante, are you guys okay?”
Dante pressed the button on his radio. “Mikey’s dead!” Then he growled, “How the hell are you so calm?!”
“Hey, chill, man. It’ll be all right,” Andy’s voice echoed up from the bottom of the stairs. Neither his face nor his voice showed any emotion, despite their friend having just been killed by a ghost. “So we confirmed the spirit box as evidence. Did you get a picture of Mikey’s corpse?”
“No, he had the camera,” Dante replied as he checked off “spirit box” on the evidence page. Another three ghost types were grayed out on the other page. He shook his head. “Wait, why the hell would I want a picture of that?”
“It counts toward the ‘witness a haunting event’ objective,” Damien explained. He was following Andy up the stairs with a container of salt in his hand. “You should probably head back to the tent, Dante. Your heart rate is extremely high.”
“I’m fine! I can handle it,” Dante replied, still obviously shaken from Mikey’s death.
“Nah, man,” Andy replied over the radio while walking back toward the room. “If your heart rate gets too high, you die. Game over.”
Dante let out a frustrated sigh. Damien tried to calm him down by speaking in a hushed voice. “Come on, mate. I’ll show you where the heart pills are in the tent. You can help us by monitoring the cameras.”
***
Inside the tent, Dante watched the video monitor, switching back and forth between the feed from the night-vision cameras Andy had set up in the room. He glanced at the team heart-rate monitors displayed on the board next to the mission objectives. His own heart rate returned to normal after he took the heart medicine, but Mikey’s flatline seemed to be mocking him. “I’m still not seeing anything in the journal,” Andy said over the radio. “Dante, do you see anything on the cameras?”
Dante checked the cameras. The journal was blank. The salt pile Damien had poured remained untouched. Activity measurements were low. “That’s a negative,” Dante finally replied.
“While activity is down, I’m going to find the cursed item and smudge it,” Damien announced over the radio. “Maybe that’ll encourage it to come out again.”
“I think in the orphanage it’s a deck of tarot cards in the headmaster’s office,” Andy informed his teammates. “It should be marked on the map. Dante can you check the large map on the mission board?”
“Sure,” Dante replied, and turned around to face the map above the heart-rate monitors. Near the entrance on the first floor, he noticed a room marked with a black ink smudge to the right of where the lobby stood. “Hey, guys, there’s a black mark on the headmaster’s office. Does that mark where the cursed item is?” Instead of receiving a reply, he heard broken static. His own flashlight flickered on and off. Then he noticed the paranormal activity readings spike to the maximum level.
Spinning back around to the video monitor, Dante quickly flipped through the cameras. Damien had reached the lobby and was hiding underneath a bench. On the second floor, Andy was hiding in the wardrobe of the haunted room. Dante nervously bit his lip and looked back at the paranormal activity monitor; activity was still at the maximum level. When he turned back to the video monitor, he saw the wardrobe doors fly open. Andy was forcibly pulled from the cabinet. His body twisted before going limp and was tossed across the room.
“Fuck,” Dante muttered. The noise distortion on the group radio crackled and broke. Activity dropped to nothing. He pressed the button on his radio. “Damien! Damien, are you okay?”
A slightly anxious English voice came over the radio. “Yeah, I’m all right. I managed to hide. Andy, you all right, mate?”
“He’s dead,” Dante said solemnly, then rubbed his eyes. Two of his friends were now gone.
Recognizing the strain in his friend’s voice, Damien tried to remain positive. “Look, Dante,” he said gently, “I’m going to come back out to the tent instead of going for the cursed item. We need to decide a game plan before attempting to finish the objectives.”
Dante nodded. “All right. Hurry up...please.”
