A Ghost Out For Profit
By Graham Winegarden
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Graham
was sitting in his room reading again. That was all he seemed to be doing
lately. Jack kept telling him, study, study,
study, but Graham really needed a break and was ever so grateful when there was
a knock at his door. He quickly invited in who ever it was and then watch as
Denise walked into his study. She was tallish and wiry in a panther like way,
but her face said she had a problem. Graham motioned for her to sit in the
chair across from him. She did, and then said,
“I
have a problem,” then she paused as if figuring out how to word it. “The small
town where my mother lives is having so trouble. I asked a friend at the
Hoffman Institute to look into it, but they are to busy.” She paused again. “I
would like you to help me look into it?” Graham and Denise had been friends for
about seven years and he had never seen her so unfocused. He at once said,
“Of
course I will help.” She then handed him a cassette tape. He went to the stereo
and put it on. She then handed him a file and said,
“I
will be down stairs.” Graham watched her walk out and he thought, ‘Wow, She
thought the Hoffman would want this! What is going on? They only deal with the
most extreme and dangerous weirdness.’ He then started the tape. It seemed to
be a conversation between two CBer’s, The first was someone called Rolling Rhonda and she sounded
as if she were in some kind of truck. The second was a place called Hal’s Happy
Eats. Rhonda was ordering a meal as she was going to be there in about 20
minutes. Then the connection got very statically Rhonda said,
“What
the hell is that? It just came out of know where. A light of some sort, it is
lighting up the whole area, I have never seen anything like it before. It is as
bright as a sunny day now.” She paused and all that could be heard was her
panting breath. Then she said,
“It’s
coming closer I can barely see the road. Oh no, it is
heading right for ...” Then all that can be heard is static.
Graham
then looked at the file folder. It was a biography of some one called Rhonda Plutkin. From reading it Graham found out she had grown up
around the trucking industry and had been behind a rig steering wheel for the
past forty years. Ten of those years had even been in the army, where she had
driven through some of the roughest hell holes on earth. She had even received
a bronze star for bravery. Graham thought, ‘This is not the type of woman who
would do this for a joke.’ At that point he got to a police report, everything
was missing, the truck, it’s cargo and even Rolling
Rhonda. There had been no sign of them even after a province wide warrant went
out. The police had no explanation for what had happened. Reading on in the
report, he found this had not been the first truck to go missing, but it was
the first time a driver had disappeared. All the other drivers had been found
wondering down the side of the road with no memory of what had happened.
Graham’s
curiosity was definitely peeked as he rejoined Denise. He said,
“When
do you want to leave?”
“As soon as possible.” Graham nodded and said,
“Give
me an hour and I will be ready to go.” He then packed up some gear and left.
Getting to Hal’s Happy Eats, they found Denise’s mom working behind the
counter. She showed them to a table in the back and brought them both coffee. She turned to Denise and said,
“It
is good to see you sweety, I wish it had been for other reasons. The first thing I
should tell you is they found Rolling Rhonda. She was just walking down the
highway. From what I have heard, she is not in very good shape. She barely
knows who she is and in he incoherent babbling she says something about an evil
spirt or a ghost. She says it took her and her truck
to some place then brought her back. She does not know where she was, or can she even describe it. It is almost as if her mind has
been wiped clean of the whole thing.” Denise and Graham looked at each other
because they knew of many ways to do such a thing.
At
that moment an argument broke out between two
customers, and Denise’s mom said,
“I
wondered how long it would take?” Graham and Denise both looked at her in
confusion, so she continued, “The town is running out of anything that is
brought to us.” The two still looked confused, “We have not had a delivery of
any kind in three mouths, and it is starting to show. The stores in town are
running out of everything. That is except the new Odds & Ends store. They
seem to have just about everything, but the prices they charge are outrageous.”
Then she looked over at a woman sitting in the corner. Graham turned and followed
her gaze, but what he saw he could not believe. Excusing himself he walked over
to the table and said,
“Hello
Katrina.” She smiled and said,
“I
was not sure you would recognize me. How are you Graham?”
“Oh,
you left quite an impression the last time we met. You do remember making a
fool out of me, don’t you?”
“I
had so hoped you had forgotten about that.” Graham then changed the tone of his
voice to be more accusing and said,
“What
are you doing here?” She looked a little hurt by the new tone but said,
“Well
my attempt to conquer the corporate world did not go so well after you left me
in charge. I just made it out of there
with my life, you see I became the object of a hostile take over and I do mean
hostile. I then came up here to get away from it all for awhile.”
“You
mean you are still hiding out from some one or some thing. So who was the
hostile party who took over Bio-gen?” She smiled and
said,
“I
don’t think you know this particularly mean and nasty demon.” Graham smiled and
let it go. He changed the subject by saying,
“So
do you know what is going on here?” She looked at him and a big smile crossed
her face,
“So
you are still trying to save the world are you? Well to answer your question, I
have no idea. I looked into it, but it was almost as if who or what ever is
involved knew I could handle them.” Graham thought about that and then said,
“What
do you think this thing is?”
“I
have no idea, but what ever it is, it is smart and powerful, and those are to
things I do not want to go up against. It might be a ghost but it would be like
no ghost I have ever heard of, and what would a ghost want with a couple of
dozen truck loads of high tech computer stuff. If you can answer that then
maybe you will have your answer.” Graham was quite for a second then said,
“So
how have you kept your stock up?”
“You
still don’t trust me, that hurts.” Then she pouted for
a moment. The shrugging it off she said,
“I
thought that this would come up sooner or latter, but at least you understand.
I get demons to bring it in. They bring it in through dimensional travel, and
therefore don’t have to face the ghost or what ever it is.”
“That
must be expensive?”
“No
not really I have a clan that owes me big time and this is just
a little thanks.” Graham nodded that he understood and did not pursue it
any further. He nodded to Katrina and then turned back to his table. She
watched him go and Denise could not be sure but thought she saw a flash of
desire cross Katrina’s eyes as see watched Graham.
Back
at his table he sat down and had a drink of his coffee. He then explained to
Denise what he had found out. He also said that he believed what Katrina had
told him. Denise said,
“So
do you think we should go and see this Rolling Rhonda?” Graham thought about
that for a second, then said,
“I
am not sure if we should help her to remember. She may have blocked it out
because see can not deal with it. What do you think?” Denise was quite for a
moment then said,
“I
am not sure, but I can not think of anything else.”
“I
have a plan, and if it does not work then we can go and see her.” Denise looked
at Graham then nodded Ok. Graham called over Denise’s mom and said,
“Do
you think you can get us in to see someone of importance in this company that
is shipping out all this high tech equipment?” Denise’s mom said,
“That
would be Technology Services Inc. They are just outside of town. I can take you
and introduce you to some of their people.”
“Ok,
lets go.”
They
then made their way out of town. Driving up to an ultra modern building, they
entered, and eventually made their way to the office of a senior vice
president. There Graham laid out his plan. All he needed from them was a truck
full of the same sort of equipment that they had been losing anyway. Graham
guaranteed the truck or at least the equipment would get through. This was not
enough and so Denise made a call to her friend at the Hoffman Institute and
that quickly got them a truck with a load. They made arrangements to pick it up
that night thinking if there was going to be some sort of a fight it would be
best to do it when there were as few people around as possible. Denise then
went and spent a couple of hours with her mother before they left. Graham
started walking around town and ended up at the only spot he knew anyone, The
Odds & Ends Store. He walked in and said,
“I
am curious who is after you?” Katrina smiled and said,
“Are
you going to save me?”
“Maybe,
do you think I should? I mean what have you done to improve the world lately?”
“I
may not be up for the Nobel Peace Prize, but I am keeping this town alive.”
“Yes
you are, but I hear your prices keep going up.”
“Yes
that was true, but as you can see I am having a sale.” Graham looked around and
saw sale tags on everything. He smiled and said,
“You
figured I was coming.” It was then Katrina’s turn to laugh, which caused her
whole face to light up. Graham liked the way it looked, It
made her raven hair look so dark that it almost absorbed the light. She said,
“Maybe, or maybe I just remember what it is like to be part
of a community.” Graham smiled because he liked Katrina and he even liked her
more if she was going to give up her selfish ways. The two of them talked for a
little while and Graham picked up some spell components. He left with a good
feeling and thought he would come back and see if he really could help her with
her problem. Then he met up with Denise and they headed back out to Technology Services
Inc.
They
were shown to a truck with a trailer attached to it. They got in and started
out. Neither Graham or Denise had ever driven a truck
that big and so it took Graham a few minutes to get it right. He ground the
gears a few time leaving the compound and could see a few smiles on the faces
of the people in the compound. They quickly headed down the road. It was a long
drive, but only the first hour and a half would be dangerous. They got out on
to the highway and Denise started using her psychic powers to see if anyone or
anything was watching them. She did not sense anything.
They
had been driving for about half an hour when Denise grabbed Graham’s arm. She
said,
“There
is something out. I am not sure what it is but it is stocking us.” She paused
and concentrated then continued, “It feels as if there are multiply minds. They
seemed to be in conflict, they do not all want to be stocking us. They are
worried about hurting us and they are ashamed about what happened to Rolling
Rhonda.” Denise looked at Graham, then continued on again, “These begins are
not from are world, and I am almost sure they are being used by some one, but I
can’t get a picture of who.” She was then silent for a couple of minutes. Then
she said,
“Graham
we have to help them. They are not bad they are just afraid and are being used
because of it. Why is it everything has to be so
complicated? What ever happened to the good guys wearing white hats and the bad
guys wearing black hats? Now even the bad guys might not be bad they could be
being used by even worst guys. My head is starting to hurt just trying to
figure it out.” Graham smiled at her and gave her a little pat on the hand.
Then
a light appeared in front of them. At first Graham thought it was just on
coming traffic, but it got some incredibly bright as it came forward. Graham
said,
“Ok
D, it is time. Get in touch with this thing and find out what it wants. She
closed her eyes and started to concentrate. Her mind reached out and she could
sense all the life around them. It was like little sparkling lights. Then she
turned towards the entity and was almost mentally blinded by all the light.
This was all mental light not physical light. After she started to get use to
the light she started to notice that it was so bright because of the number of
individual lights not so much the brightness. There must have been a billion or
more in that small area. She picked one small speck and tried to communicate
with it, but it was to simple to understand her, it
was like trying to communicate with an ameba. She then pulled back and tried to
communicate with the whole thing. She felt little probes of consciousness
coming at her, then it hit her. It was a human mind
and a very powerful one at that. It said,
“Who
are you?”
“My
name is Denise, and I am investigating the ghost.”
“Stupid
woman, you have no idea what you are dealing with. It is not a super natural
being, but an extraterrestrial being. It is here to help me get my revenge on
Technology Services Inc.” At that moment Denise got a Flash of images into her
head. The creature is floating through space just feeding off of cosmic
radiation. It is hit by an energy field of some kind. The next thing it knows
is it is on this planet and inside what it now knows is a computer. It has
tried to escape our planet but it needs more energy to break free of earths
orbit.
Denise
sends it an image that she can help it. Then she finds herself on the floor of
the truck and every nerve in her body seems to be on fire. The pain was
incredible, Graham stopped the truck and tried to help her, but all he could do
was to put her in the sleeper. The light swarmed the truck, and seemed to
change. Then in a blink of an eye it was gone. After a couple of seconds Denise
seemed to calm down, and after about a minute was back to normal. She said,
“The
creatures have taken away the power it had given to who ever it was they were
helping. It is also coming back and I said I would help it.” Graham nodded that
he understood but said,
“How
are we going to help it?” she smiled at him and said,
“I
think you have the power to free them from earth.” Graham looked at her but all
she did was smile.
She
directed Graham to pull the truck over and they walked out into the middle of a
field. It took only a blink of an eye an the entity was there
. Denise closed her eyes to concentrate, in order to communicate with
the entity. She explained what she had in mind and the entity thanked her. The
entity then rose up above them and Denise said,
“Case
your fireball spell to explode as close to orbit as possible. The entity will
hitch a ride on it and the explosion should throw it back into space.” Graham
looked at her as if she were crazy. He said,
“Do
you know how destructive that spell is?” She nodded yes and said,
“I
have see it take down a large building as well as
vaporize a demon, but this entity is neither. These are creatures that live in
space and eat radiation for breakfast.” Graham looked up at it and said,
“Is
it ready?” Denise thought, then nodded her head yes. Graham focused his mind to
cast the fireball spell. He knew it would explode as soon as it hit something,
and if that was the entity, both him and Denise would
be fired in the explosion. The spell had some material components that Graham
pulled out of his pockets. It was a small yellow waxy ball that he would charge
with the magic. It had a sulfuric smell to it and just sat in his palm as he
spoke the incantation and waved his other hand over it. The gestures Graham
made were so subtle that no one could see them. After a second the wax ball raised from his hand and burst into flames. He held his hand
up towards the entity and blew on the ball of flame that floated above his
hand. It left his hand so fast that it could barely be followed by the human
eye. It shot into the entity, and graham could hardly believe his eyes the
entity was absorbed into the ball of flame and they both headed off towards the
stars. They watched for a couple of seconds and then they saw a small
explosion. Denise smiled and said,
“It
worked, the entity said thank you.”
They
got back into the truck and made there delivery. Technology
Services Inc’s. Security found out who was
behind everything from the information Denise gave them, but by the time they
tracked him down he was gone.
The End
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