Ghost Guard 2: Agents of Injustice (21 page)

Hatman wasn’t pleased.

“How dare you challenge my authority! With the Controller I will send you all back to from where you came!”

The beasts only laughed while advancing on Hatman. Beset from every side, surrounded and surmounted, Hatman banged his fits on the Controller.

“What’s happening?” he flashed a frenzied glower at Morris and Emile. “What did you do to this thing!”

In a sudden flash of blackness, Hatman disappeared into the ether, leaving his human followers to pay the price for his mistake.

That was the cue for Morris and Emile. As if communicating on a subatomic level, they both coordinated their attack against the Nazi scientist. As Morris pushed the doctor backwards, knocking him off balance, and as Brutus laid the robed thugs to waste with a series of concussive blows to their heads, Emile scooped up the Controller and reversed its output, forcing the chasm to close and bringing with it, like a vacuum, the hordes of wicked beasts. It all happened so fast they became a blur, countless creatures crying in agony, holding their ears as if a piercing sound was damaging their hearing, and racing into the hole in the ground.

“It’s working!” Morris watched wide-eyed as the last of the multitudes of dark and demented beings were drawn down into the ever shrinking chasm. The shrieks and cries for mercy almost got to him. Then he remembered how very conniving and deceptive they were.

“Of course it’s working,” Emile nodded.

Alexandra stayed near her husband. She felt joy for the first time in as long as she could remember. Finally, she recognized, Hatman’s demented campaign to unleash and rule over the proverbial hounds of Hell had been ended.

Finally, and thankfully, Abby was fully sober. And, for the first time since they had arrived at this unholy place, the disturbance in her sixth sense began to subside. Hatman had fled, along with his sycophantically wicked German scientist. The threat to the supernatural realm was over. The spirits were beginning to find their peace. But it wasn’t over yet. Abby knew there was one final task.

“I’m coming!” she sprinted to the orchestra pit, where the spirit snares were still all in place despite the chaos that had reigned in the grotto. Abby descended the staircase and instantly began ripping snares from their holding places one by one, crushing their gnarled and electrically active crowns by swinging them against the wall like she was wielding Thor’s Hammer. Morris hurried down to help her, which was useful since there were so many.

With each soul snare demolished, with each spirit liberated, Abby felt the misery and torment subside that much more. Also, with each spirit liberated, she received a message of gratitude. They were free now, free to move on, free to find the peace they had yet to find as a resident of the spirit plain. Her mental symptoms subsided along with the physical ones, her headache and shortness of breath and general feeling of dread all dissipated, evaporated like dew from the grass on a sunny summer morning. And when she destroyed the final snare, when she had emancipated the final soul, Abby felt everything go back to normal.

The mood in the grotto was a mixed bag of emotions. Abby made eye contact with Rev, who had begun the tiresome process of helping The Singulate members back to some semblance of normalcy. She wanted to be mad at him, but couldn’t bring herself to that point. And then she saw Katherine run to him and throw her arms around him and that was that. She scowled at him. He shrugged at her with a coy smile that told her everything she needed to know. He was apologetic, but he was always apologetic whenever this sort of thing happened. She just counted her blessings, relieved that this whole episode was over.

Chapter 27

“Freeze!”

“Nobody move!”

“Everybody’s under arrest!”

Caustic and commanding voices roared from the entrances of the secret outdoor venue. A cavalcade of special agents wearing black tactical gear streamed in, forcing the fleeing people back to the seating area. In the forefront of the action, taking charge of it all, was a quick-stepping man in a black ball cap. Abby did a double take. She was floored by the notion that she might have been staring at none other than Thomas Riley.

“Riley?” she asked tentatively, her senses still on high alert.

He halted and stood motionless, his full auto MP5, aimed at the nervous crowd, keeping the opulently dressed people in his sights. The brim of his cap was pointed down, showing off the DELTA X insignia. He raised his head and she saw his face.

It
was
Riley.

“Hello, Abby.”

“Riley. I thought you guys were going to help us.”

“We’re here, aren’t we?”

“Only after we do the dirty work,” Abby grumbled, but it was Rev who had the real complaints.

“Riley! What are you doing here?” he stared at the Delta X operators as they processed their Singulate prisoners by zip tying wrists and ushering them away quickly. “Was this a setup the whole time?”

“Setup? No, not a setup,” Riley flashed a grin. He had every reason to celebrate. His mission was a success. “But you can say we were watching the whole time. Good job, Rev. Above and beyond the call of duty. Above and beyond.”

“You son of a…” Rev was fed up the secretiveness, the smugness, the way Riley acted like Delta X was in charge of Ghost Guard. He would have thrown Riley into a wall with a supernatural shockwave if it weren’t for Brutus getting in the way. “You can’t treat us like toys!”

“Rev!” Brutus was a solid brick, giving him no choice but to back down.

Ruby joined Rev in open defiance, screeching her anger, her frustration, her contempt for Delta X’s self-righteous tardiness. They were just in time to mop up and steal all the glory.

“We’re just doing our jobs,” Riley answered her as if he actually could decipher her language.

“You-you understand her?” Abby was more intrigued with Riley the more she saw of him. The old memories were coming back as well. She was uncomfortable all of a sudden. So was Rev.

“We’ve been monitoring you guys for a while. It was just a matter of time before we learned Ruby’s language,” another voice from the throng of special agents stood out. A feminine beauty with gorgeous blonde hair that cascaded from beneath her black helmet when she pulled it off. Captain Zina Laird, strategic specialist for Delta X. She had a brain and she wasn’t afraid to use it. And she had a body. That was her biggest asset to the higher ups, though she knew it was her intellect that would keep her in the force. Right now she had one thing on her mind—Riley. He had a little too much of an eye for Abby Rhodes.

“Who the hell are you?” Abby looked at the newcomer sideways.

“Never mind who I am,” Zina squinted at Riley suspiciously. “And never mind her. We have a job to do, and so do they.”

Abby felt her anger simmering. “I don’t like being spied on, and I sure the hell don’t like it when someone thinks they know more about me and my business than I do.”

“And we don’t like you sneaking around behind our backs,” Rev added. Morris, Brutus, and Ruby gathered with him, forming a united front. “You can tell that to ParaIntell.”

“Tell them yourselves,” Zina placed her helmet on her head again and helped an agent fetter a man from The Singulate. “We have jobs to do.”

Abby glared at Zina. She didn’t care who this woman was. She only cared about the mission. They’d just saved countless souls from incalculable pain. “Doctor Petrovic, I just want you to know how much we appreciate the help. Without it, this mission would have been doomed.”

“The least I could do,” he smiled, holding his adoring wife close to his side. “I’m delighted a resourceful group like Ghost Guard finally came along to take care of Hatman.”

“We’re taking you in for briefing, Doctor Petrovic.” Riley strafed past cold stares. “I’m sure you all understand. Doctor, if you will…”

He motioned to a pair of soldiers carrying something strangely familiar to everyone. It looked much the same as a spirit snare, only it had a slightly less offensive design.

“You have technology like Hatman’s?” Doctor Petrovic said. “Interesting. Quite interesting.”

“What are you doing with that?” Abby demanded. “It’s a spirit snare, isn’t it? The same shit we just got done fighting, and now we’re supposed to stand by and let you use one on Doctor Petrovic?”

Ruby squawked in a most dreadful and disagreeable tone. Then there was Brutus. He had seen his share of those accursed devices, whether in the hands of friends or foe, it didn’t matter. When it came to a spirit snare, no good would ever come from it.

“No, no,” Doctor Petrovic repudiated his support with a good-natured wave of his hand, leaving tracers of ethereal luminance where his arm passed. “I’ll go with them. After all, they are the good guys, are they not?”

“Emile, wait,” Alexandra didn’t stray from her husband’s side. “You mustn’t let them take you in one of those machines. You mustn’t!”

“I’m sure the good gentleman’s machine isn’t the sadistic torture device that The Singulate’s was…is it?”

The answer was slow in coming. Riley pursed his lips and stared at the ground.

“Is it?” Rev and Abby posed the repeat question in unison.

“Our transference device is perfectly safe.” Riley lifted his chin. He stood by his word and believed in it.

“Safe?” Rev strode up to Riley so the two were eye to eye. “It better be safe, Riley. It better be.”

Riley flexed his jaw, not backing down from Rev an inch. “You act like we’re on opposite sides, Rev.”

“Are we?”

Riley didn’t answer. Given a spirit snare, he handled it with confidence, approaching Doctor Petrovic and administering the process quickly.

“Wait!” Alexandra wanted to stop the proceedings. Her husband’s principal energy oscillated, fading to a misty funnel cloud and folding into the device like paper. However, before all of that she’d managed to rush toward him and plant a vigorous kiss on his lips.

When they parted, an agent stepped forward with another spirit snare, aiming at the doctor’s wife, and energized the mechanism. The result was instant and unpleasant. At least Abby thought so. She cringed at the sound of Alexandra’s sullen cries, her vacant and vain attempts at getting free from that repulsive machine’s relentless grip. The machine her husband’s mind inspired. She had to give up finally, and flash a glance at Abby as she disappeared into her holding pen.

Chapter 28

Abby was beginning to believe she wouldn’t see Rev again that night. A part of her understood. Another part of her was even a little relieved. But most of all she was intrigued by his absence.

The first thing she did after retreating to her Pearl District apartment was melt into her sixties retro plush recliner. The fluffy headrest soothed her bones, weary and weak from the mission. However, it didn’t soothe her soul or take any weight from her heart. What went down with The Singulate was one of the strangest missions she could remember. One for the books. She raised her glass and drank to the memory, then drank again to forgetting it. She gulped the stiff screwdriver. The whole time at the lodge she’d abstained. Never drank on a mission.
After
missions, now that was a different story. Tonight she needed a special dose of liquid comfort. It was that kind of mission.

Worst of all, she was left with the strangest taste in her mouth, and it wasn’t the Grey Goose. She couldn’t shake the feeling that there was some esoteric secret swirling around her. It was more than a feeling. She had proof. Hatman had said some strange things, and it made her wonder.

She finished off the glass, then, tipping the bottle over, realized she’d finished off the fifth. It slipped out of her hand and clanked on the hardwood. Her apartment was trashed. She simply had no time for cleaning house, or her life, for that matter. No time for mysterious, abusive, power mad or insincere men who only saw her as some
thing
to possess and control.

She didn’t have the time or the energy. All she had time for was sleep, and then the dreaded debriefing with Mahoney. They were supposed to have it as soon as they’d returned, but she’d insisted on getting some rest. She hadn’t gotten any on the mission. Not one second. And she was totally exhausted.

That was why she didn’t remember going to sleep. She didn’t remember waking up, either. She looked at her watch but the dials weren’t there. That was strange. She knew right then to be skeptical of what was coming next. Still, curiosity had a hold on her. The ticking of a clock made her sit up at attention. She didn’t have that kind of clock in her apartment. Everything was digital and silent, so what was ticking? Then it changed, slowing down and doubling every other tick, becoming like the beats of a heart.

Bumpbump…bumpbump…bumpbump

Right away she thought of Poe’s
The Telltale Heart
. The murdered man’s still beating aorta buried underneath the floorboards. She swallowed her fear but the sensory perception was there, getting stronger. This was a haunting, for certain. She had been in this position before. The sounds and feelings of an impending supernatural attack.

After what had gone down with The Singulate, she wouldn’t have been surprised if something or someone had followed her here. Possibly Hatman himself.

She shuddered at the thought. Did Hatman really find her? Any way it could be measured, it wasn’t good. The reality in front of her was this: she had a visitor cunning enough to stay out of her highly-tuned sight.

Though she wanted nothing more than to run and hide, her feet took her into the heart of danger. She went right for the sound of the heartbeat, and when she got closer, when it sounded like the beating couldn’t have gotten louder, it stopped.

She went toward her front door, past the guest bath to the closet where she kept her ready bag. She grabbed the bag. Never knew when she would need it. As she strapped on the harness, she saw something out of the corner of her vision. When she turned her head, she saw the thing disappear through her front door.

The thing was on the move, and Abby followed, down the hall toward the elevator. She rounded the corner. The elevator doors were closing with an electronic
ding!
She saw from the last bit of light from inside the car that it was empty. Nobody or nothing inside. She was sure because her normal ability to spot ghosts had never been sharper. If a ghost was in that elevator, she would have seen it. There was nothing.

She felt an icy hand on her shoulder and nearly jumped out of her skin. Then she saw a familiar face.

“Alexandra!” Abby clutched her chest to keep her heart from jumping through her sternum. “What are you doing here?”

“It’s Emile,” Alexandra was inconsolable. “Your friends…they’re keeping him locked away just like The Singulate did.”

“What?” Abby wouldn’t believe it. “That’s not right. There must be some kind of misunderstanding. ParaIntell isn’t like The Singulate.”

“That’s what they told me, but I know better. They’re doing the same thing as The Singulate, but worse. They’re holding him against his will and forcing him to work on an even
more
powerful Controller!”

“How could it be? How could they do this? There must be some explanation. Some kind of reasonable answer for all of this.”

“Yes, there’s an explanation. ParaIntell is power hungry. They don’t care who or what they hurt.”

“It can’t be,” Abby shook her head. “I can’t believe it. Mahoney is an arrogant jerk, yes. But he wouldn’t go so far as to keep Emile locked up to use him for this.”

“It’s true. The agency you’ve been working for is a criminal enterprise. The sooner you realize that the better.”

Abby simply couldn’t let her brain go there. ParaIntell was doing good for the supernatural world. They were a force for the light, not the dark. If she could only get Alexandra to understand that.

“I’m sure they’re going to let him go soon. It’s just a debriefing, remember. Just be patient. They’ll let him go.”

“They won’t let him go until he completes the Controller!” there was desperation in Alexandra’s voice. She rushed toward Abby. It wasn’t violent or aggressive, just desperate. “Listen to me. One woman to another. You have to believe me when I tell you I know what these people are up to, and it’s absolutely no good. They’re keeping Emile captive and forcing him to work. They were going to get away with it if he hadn’t found a way for me to escape. I came straight here because you are the only one who can help us. Please, Abby. You know what it’s like to be in love, and you know what torture it is to be kept apart. Please, Abby. You must help us.”

“If you escaped, then why can’t he?” Abby asked.

“Because they’re watching him like a hawk. Their security was lax with me, not with him. Now they’ve gotten him engrossed in working on the Controller again, and he’s nearly finished.”

“I can’t believe this,” Abby felt her blood pressure rise. “I knew those bastards were up to no good. Mahoney can’t get away with this, dammit!”

“What are you going to do?”

“I don’t know…something.”

At that moment another presence caused both Abby and Alexandra to take notice. Alexandra held her own shoulders like she was shivering with fear.

“I have to go back to my husband,” she twirled into a spinning illuminant. “If ParaIntell discovers I’m gone, I’m afraid of what they’ll do to Emile.”

Mist and flecks of light and tiny specks of what was once her ethereal body became air, then became nothing at all as she disappeared into the dimensional framework of time and space. Abby couldn’t see her anymore with her sensitive supernatural sight. Alexandra had gone.

Abby did see something with her extraordinary vision. It was like watching what Alexandra had just done, but in reverse. The air seemed to solidify into shapes. An arm. A torso. Another arm. Two legs. Finally a face. And then, just like that, he was there.

“I didn’t plan on coming here tonight,” Rev said. “Something won’t let me stay away from you

She looked at him and sighed in defeat. No matter how much she wanted to yell at him, she just couldn’t. Not at this moment, not when all she wanted was him. Theirs was a mutual connection, a symbiotic attraction. Their kiss was electric, and sent shivers of excitement down her spine. Rev didn’t have a spine, but felt it just the same.

When the embrace was over, she turned away.

“What’s the matter?” he was confused and more than a little hurt by her sudden distaste for him. “Still angry with me?”

“Yes, but that’s not it. I had a visitor just now, right before you came.”

“Hatman?” Rev searched for signs of the scheming sorcerer. “Was Hatman here with you?”

“Of course not,” she had nothing to hide, still he was skeptical. Insane with jealousy was more like it. “I don’t think he’s going to come around for quite a while.”

“Don’t be too sure.”

“Why?” her question had the tone of demand in it. “What is it? What do you know that I don’t?”

His silence was more telling than anything he could have said. So he didn’t want to talk about it. Abby wasn’t okay with it, but didn’t push…for now.

“Who was your visitor?”

“Alexandra Petrovic.”

“Alexandra? What was she doing here?”

“She was frightened. She came to me with a pretty incredible story.”

“About what?” Rev was intrigued.

Abby thought about what she was going to say. Even she still was having a hard time believing.

“ParaIntell.”

“What about them?”

“Alexandra said they’re forcing Emile to build a more powerful Controller.”

Rev had a sharp eye suddenly. “Looks like we need to talk to Mahoney. In person.”

“That’s what I was thinking,” Abby said reluctantly.

“We’ll infiltrate ParaIntell and shut the Controller down before they can activate it.”

“Good. Great,” she looked away from him. “But you know that won’t automatically get you off the hook, right?”

“Here we go,” he breathed heavily for effect. He was just as exasperated as she about the tension in the air. “Katherine meant nothing to me.”

“Oh, she’s Katherine, is she? First name basis. Nice. Real nice. All the others were just no name bimbos. But not her. Not Katherine.”

“I can’t believe you could be so immature.”

“Immature? Who’s immature here? You can’t go one mission without getting entangled in some illicit affair.”

“There was no affair!” he was getting so angry his ghostly visage began to fluctuate in brightness. “There was nothing illicit. It was innocent, I tell you.”

“If it was so innocent then why was she all over you? Why did she have to kiss you like that? What did you do, Rev? Did you cast another one of your spells on her?”

“Every time! Every damn time I do my job, you have to find something to bitch about!”

“And you have to do something to make me bitch! Rev, can’t you see what you do hurts my feelings?”

“And can’t you see I’m not trying to hurt your feelings, Abby? I never want to hurt you. All I ever want to do is complete our missions. Sometimes I have to do whatever it takes.”

“Even if that means seducing some woman?”

“I didn’t seduce her!” he yelled so loudly it shook the glass in the window. “I didn’t do anything to her. She came to me!”

“That’s what you always say,” she still couldn’t look at him. “You never take responsibility for your actions. You never…”

“Hell with this!” his frustrations went to the boiling point. He had to leave, and now. “Keep on doing it, Abby. Keep pushing me away.”

“I’m not—” she stopped herself when she realized he had gone. She didn’t even see him leave, but knew he’d left her.