Ghosts of Rosewood Asylum (19 page)

Hunter wasn’t making any sense, and his reading
didn’t at all connect with the reading that Sashza had given.

“Tell us about the fingerprints,” Zach said
softly.

Hunter’s arms went spastic, his eyes
fluttered and his entire body shook. He opened his eyes.

“What happened?” Zach asked.

“Dr. Johansson said to go to the stables.”

As the hour grew nearer to 3 AM, the
irresolute Chicago weather shifted dramatically toward colder temperatures. The
unseasonable heat of the day had vanished as though sucked by the escalating
winds into the stygian sky. As the group approached the stables, debate began
regarding the upcoming activities.

3 AM was known commonly as the “Witching
Hour” because it was the inverse time from when Jesus was said to have died on
the cross. Many claimed that while spirits were always active and just noticed
more at night, actual demons used 3 AM to mock God. In the industry, it had
been called various nicknames. Some used “Lights Out,” others referred to it as
“Dead Time.” The
Demon Hunters
called it “Demon Hour.”
Xavier
Paranormal Investigators
invented and used the term “Spirit Hour.” Sara
enjoyed her own double entendre “Power Hour.”

“If we’re going to start on time,” Sara
said. “We’ve only got forty-five minutes to decide and plan it out.”

“What do you mean, ‘if we’re going to start
on time’?” Zach asked.

“We could always do it later and just claim
it was 3 AM,” Bryce said.

Zach and Hunter glared at him. Sara
judiciously said nothing.

“What?” Zach said, harsher than he meant to.

“There were a few times where we—”

“Look,” Zach said. “I don’t need to know
that. This show does
Spirit Hour
on time.”

“Oh. You mean
your
show. I thought
this was
our
show.”

“Boys...” With that tone, Sara didn’t need
to say any more.

They’d reached the old stables building.
Hunter approached the building and put his hands on the wall. Intuitively, the
others stayed back to give him room and finish their conversation.

“Fine,” Zach said. “We call it ‘Demon Hour’
tonight and ‘Spirit Hour’ tomorrow, but we start promptly at 3 AM both nights.”

“Dude...whatever. Fine.”

“So now that the pissing contest is over,”
Sara said. “What are we actually going to do?”

“We power off all lights, cell phones,
electrical devices and film with only the hand-held cameras like always. Then
we could—”

The conversation was interrupted by Hunter’s
muttering. He was at the door and jiggling the knob to get in. “It doesn’t make
sense though,” he was saying.

Zach trotted over and unlocked the door. The
cameraman had fortunately displayed initiative and had been filming Hunter the
whole time.

“Here you go,” Zach said, guiding Hunter
into the darkened structure.

Hunter proceeded to an area in the distance
and to the right. “A man in a dress. A knife with a broken tip. Blood. But it
doesn’t make sense.”

Zach paused a moment to ensure Hunter needed
prompting. “The murder doesn’t make sense?”

“No. It’s not murder. Stabbing, but not
murdering. But...he was murdered.”

“You’re right. That doesn’t make sense. Is
there anything else?”

“The broken-tipped knife. It led to all
this. The fingerprint. All three of them were alive here together.”

“Who?” Zach whispered.

“Doctor. Patient. Cop.”

Before Zach could clarify, there was buzzing
and activity behind him. He spun preparing to give Bryce an earful. Instead it
was Sara’s cell phone causing the noise.

“You’ve got to be shitting me.” She grumbled
at presumably a text message. She pressed a button and raised a finger letting
Zach know it was urgent. She spoke into the receiver. “Matthew, are you
joking?”

She grimaced and slammed the phone closed.

Hunter had snapped out of his psychic state,
so it was no use keeping quiet.

“What is it?” Zach asked her.

Sara looked as upset as he’d ever seen her.
“Grant Winkler is up at the main building. He’s demanding to see you and is threatening
to shut us down tonight.”

Chapter Twenty-One

“The state has us out here to investigate
mysterious fires and you’re blaming us for this one?” Sara managed to brave the
stench of whiskey on Winkler’s breath and get in his face.

“All of them fires wuz just weeds. That tree
was a hundred years old!” He waved in the general direction of the burned oak,
but it caused his body to tilt. He almost lost his balance and stumbled, but
then righted himself. “And I bet you kids had something to do with it!”

“You’ve got no proof—nothing at all to back
that up—”

“All’s I’m saying is that if I say you’re
gone, you pack your shit and go ‘cuz you’re gone!”  His eyes flared.
Unfocused as they were, its effect was muted.

 “And all I’m saying is if you do that,
pack
your
shit ‘cuz I’ll see to it that my network costs you your job!”

The confrontation had escalated over the
course of the previous few minutes. Sara hadn’t even bothered to flirt with the
custodian this time and she had been all business at the start.

“Yeah. You just try that, missy!” 
Winkler moved his face even closer to hers but it was clear he was neither
thinking nor seeing straight. He might well have been kicked out of his
neighborhood bar and had shown up merely to throw his weight around.

“Hey now, come on,” Zach said moving between
them. It was obvious Bryce wasn’t about to play the role of peacemaker this
time.

“‘Hey now c’mon’ is fucking right!” An
animalistic voice shouted.

Zach’s eyes widened. He’d known that voice
since the sixth grade and at this hour, its owner wasn’t likely to be a calming
influence. Before Zach could shoo him away, Ray was towering over Winkler.

“That’s how you talk to a lady?” Ray’s
massive hands struck Winkler’s boney shoulders simultaneously. “That’s how you
wanna be?”

“Fuck you!” Winkler staggered backwards. His
body language spoke louder than his vulgarities.

Zach and Sara each grabbed a Ray Ross arm.
Bryce had faded into the background and the cameraman was still clearly
filming. Should Ray get out of control with Winkler, a lawsuit could cripple
the network.

“C’mon, big man. Let’s go!” Ray stepped
toward him.

Zach and Sara trailed like two ribbons on a
kite.

“Yeah. You think you’re so tough,” Winkler
said. He glanced behind him as if he hoped an army had materialized to
intercede on his behalf or at least save his pride by pretending to hold him
back.

“Tougher than you, old man. You wanna piece
of me or are you gonna go home to your nice warm bottle of booze?”

“Yeah? Fuck you!” He raised a finger and waved
it until it looked like it might topple him. “I’m warning you. One more fucking
problem here and I’ll have the cops out to send all you punks home!”

Zach pulled as hard as he could on Ray’s
shoulder. “Shhh. It’s over,” he whispered. “We won. Let it go.”

“I’m serious. Try me one more time and it
will be bye bye!” Winkler backpedaled until he nearly tripped and then swung
around and strode toward the main gate.

“Night night, crazy man!” Ray called after
him.

“Hey, cool it,” Sara said. “Enough.”

“What? I just—”

“Go back to bed, Ray,” she said, turning and
walking away.

“Hey.” He grabbed her arm. “I did that for
you.”

She shook free and was walking away when she
said it. “Men...”

“Ray,” Zach said. “Go back to bed. Let
things calm down.”

Zach put his hand on his friend’s arm. “I
appreciate what you did.”

“Thanks.” Ray barely looked at him and
stormed off for his tent.

Hunter must have sensed it a safe time to
approach Zach. “Nice quiet little hangout you have here, brother.”

With only fifteen minutes before the
commencement of “Demon Hour,” a decision needed to be made on what to do from 3
AM to approximately 3:30.

“We could just go lights out and see if
anything happens,” Zach said.

“Ugh, that’s so pussy, dude,” Bryce said.
“No offense, Sara.”

“None taken.”

“Seriously, Zach, we’ve only got two nights
here and we’re gonna waste one sitting around twiddling our thumbs and staring
into fucking candles?” Bryce seemed to be getting his second wind, although he
may have had pharmaceutical assistance. “We know this doctor is lingering. He
worked his whole career here and somehow got caught up into the place. Let’s
set him free. Tomorrow night we’ve still got the peach-smelling room, the
basement and who knows what else to exorcise in the main building.”

Zach hated when Bryce made a series of good
points. He looked at Hunter for his opinion.

“Well boys, I don’t know. I don’t sense that
the doctor is a threatening presence, however I don’t know that we’re going to
get a clearer picture from him as to what transpired here.”

“So we’ve gotten from him what we need,”
Sara said. “Look, the state of Illinois called us in here to solve the
haunting. The state is our client, and the state wants these spirits gone. Our
job is to clean this place up one spirit at a time.”

Waiting for direction on their final
activity of the night, both the members of Demon Hunters and
XPI
looked
like death twice baked. Young people or not, most of them had been up at the
crack of dawn and except for short breaks, they had been on the go the entire
day.

Zach’s head felt more and more like a
bowling ball every minute. His eyelids seemed ready to betray him. Worse yet,
and what he couldn’t divulge to anyone, the confusing nature of the two psychic
readings had made him realize he would need to induce an episode of his own in
order to gain clarity. It would have to wait until the following evening and he
would need to be well-rested for it.

“Fine. Let’s do it, then,” he said. “Rico,
Bryce, Shelly, and Hunter, head to the administration building for ‘Demon Hour’
and the spirit release ceremony. Sara can film it. Patrizia, Rebecca and I will
man the main asylum building and especially monitor the basement.”

“Yeah, pun not intended,” Patrizia said.
“We’ll ‘man’ it.”

“You knew what I meant.” Zach frowned. He
was too tired to be politically correct.

“Rebecca could come with me,” Hunter said,
attempting way too hard to sound casual.

Zach flashed him a “not tonight” look.
Psychic or not, Hunter responded by nodding his head in agreement and then
bowing it.

“Okay people,” Sara said. “Get moving to
your positions. I know you’re all tired, but we’ve just one last scene to film,
and then you can sleep.”

“Yes,” Zach called out. “And lastly,
remember to stay in groups of twos at all times. No one wanders off alone at
night!”

As the groups scrambled to get ready for
Demon Hour, Bryce nodded at Zach and motioned him off to the side of the
activity.

“Brah, you looked wiped,” he said.

“I’m pretty tired but no more so than anyone
else.”

“Do you maybe,” Bryce whispered, “want
something to help you stay awake?”

“You mean like...what?” Zach thought he
understood where this was going but wasn’t certain.

“Like, whatever.” Bryce looked away.

“No. Thanks though,” Zach said, wishing to
avoid both conflict and complicity on this topic. “I’ll be okay.”

“Suit yourself,” Bryce said.

Zach wondered if any, and how many, Demon
Hunters and
XPI
members had taken Bryce up on his offer.

Before the group heading to the administration
building departed, Zach called everyone together for a prayer circle. He held
hands with Patrizia. Just inches away from his own arm, under her jacket, a
Michael the Archangel tattoo stood guard—they were about to say his prayer.

After a moment of silence, Zach’s voice
echoed in Rosewood’s lobby with both confidence and humility. “Saint Michael
the Archangel, defend us in battle. Be our protection against the wickedness
and snares of the devil. May God rebuke him, we humbly pray; and do Thou, O
Prince of the Heavenly Host—by the Divine Power of God—cast into hell, Satan
and all the evil spirits, who roam throughout the world seeking the ruin of
souls. Amen.”

Many in the circle repeated, “Amen.”

While there were words of well wishes being
exchanged between various people, Zach called Hunter aside.

“Stand your ground down there,” he said.
“Don’t let them push you around.”