Chapter 9
CHAPTER
NINE
Oscar felt like he’d been standing inside a refrigerator for hours. Every limb seemed distant, numb, as though they belonged to someone else.
Someone unable to move. Wrapped up like a mummy in a sheet, while freezing water slowly leached away all warmth and life.
The crash made him start—and suddenly, the cold eased. His heartbeat quickened—he hadn’t even been aware of it slowing, until it was once again frantically pushing warmth through his body.
“What the hell was that?” Nigel dashed to the door and looked out into the hall. “Was there a wheelchair here before?”
Oscar’s toes tingled as the warmth returned. Feeling more steady by the moment, he followed Nigel into the hall, Chris behind him.
Only a few feet from the bathroom door sat a wheelchair that definitely hadn’t been there when they came in.
“I think it was further down the hall,” Chris said. “Closer to the ward doors.”
Unease walked fingers up Oscar’s spine. He turned to Nigel, who still clutched the digital recorder in his hand. “Is that still on?”
Nigel nodded, so Oscar said, “Who’s here? Did you move the wheelchair? If you want to talk to us, speak into the device in my partner’s hand.”
Did he sense a presence here? It was hard to tell. He was still recovering from the sensations of the cold bath, for one thing. For another, the spirit might have used up all its energy pushing the wheelchair. Moving objects was costly for ghosts, and it was possible it had expended itself to the point he could no longer feel it.
Or he just wasn’t good enough.
“We should get you back to the tent,” Nigel said, putting away the digital recorder. “You need to warm up.”
“I’m fine.” Which was mostly true. Now that the adrenaline rush was fading, fatigue set in. The encounter with the spirit in the bathroom had left him drained, as though he’d subjected himself to a brutal workout.
But they still had one more floor to go, and only a few hours before dawn to investigate it. “I’m fine,” he repeated. Nigel gave him a skeptical look, but accepted his answer.
The long walk down the ward threatened to leave him shaky, but Oscar did his best to hide it, so Nigel and Chris didn’t try to talk him into leaving. The stairs were even worse, and he was puffing by the time they reached the uppermost floor. No sounds from Zeek and Adrienne had drifted from the northern wing, which was surprising given the asylum’s size and thick stone walls.
Once there, Oscar put down his backpack and pulled out their other new piece of equipment besides the PolterPal. He’d been wanting to try this for a while, but it had been out of reach cost-wise before Ms. Montague paid for everything.
Holding it loosely in one hand, he waited for Chris to choose the angle for the shot. When Chris gave him the go-ahead, he said, “The fourth floor was restricted to the most violent patients. As you can see, it’s far more utilitarian than the lower floors.”
He moved his headlight slowly over the wall. Here, orange tile covered the lower half; plain white paint chipped slowly off the upper half. The doors were heavy slabs of steel, more appropriate for a prison than a hospital.
“These are the seclusion cells.” Oscar stepped into the nearest one. The walls inside were completely covered in tile, and a drain pierced the center of the floor. Iron rings hung from one wall.
The oppressive atmosphere of the tiny cell seemed to leach even more strength from him. “Nigel, would you mind talking about this part?” he asked.
Nigel gave him a searching look—they’d agreed early on in their partnership that Oscar would remain the face of the show. But rather than point that out, he only nodded.
“Our, uh, our research before we came here uncovered some unsavory things,” Nigel said, pushing his glasses higher on his nose as he spoke. “I guess we’ve already seen that down on the third floor, with the hydrotherapy. They used hydrotherapy here as well, in a sense. Unruly patients would be chained to the wall there, and then blasted with cold water from hoses—that’s why there’s a drain.”
While Nigel talked, Oscar turned his attention inward. Was the heavy sorrow in his chest his own, generated by the cruel treatments the patients here had suffered? Or did it come from an outside source?
Damn it. He needed a way to tell, to be sure. What did other mediums do? Had Mamaw known some trick, or did she just go with her gut?
Maybe it was the sort of thing that came with experience. Experience he didn’t have, because he’d come here too soon.
Nigel cleared his throat, and Oscar realized he’d stopped talking some time ago.
“Sorry—I zoned out. Thanks for taking over, babe.”
“You’re not all right, are you?” Nigel asked, peering at him closely.
“Just really tired. I think the ghost in the bathroom drew a lot of energy directly from me.”
Chris lowered their camera slightly. “I thought you could, I don’t know, keep them from doing that?”
“I can, but we’re here to find the spirits that need our help.” Oscar managed a tired smile. “If sharing my energy allowed her to communicate, it’s worth it. I’ll be fine after some food and a nap.”
Nigel’s lips pressed together. “Just be careful.”
“I will.” Oscar wanted to kiss him, but this wasn’t the time. “Let’s go back in the hall. I want to try out the SLS.”
They regrouped outside of the cell, and Chris started filming again. Oscar held up the new piece of equipment in his hand so it could be seen clearly.
“This is a Structured Light Sensor camera, or SLS for short. It uses infrared light to map its surroundings and detect humanoid shapes. Let me demonstrate.”
He pointed the SLS cam at Nigel. A stick figure immediately appeared superimposed over him. “Wave your arm, Nigel.”
Nigel gave a little wave; the stick figure did as well.
Oscar turned the SLS and aimed it down the dark hallway. “Let’s see if we’re the only ones here.”
At first, nothing happened. As they stood in silence, eyes fixed on the SLS screen, Oscar became aware of just how damned quiet the building was.
At least, in their vicinity. The place was huge and built with thick stone walls inside and out. Adrienne and Zeek could be screaming at the top of their lungs, and the sound would never reach them here.
The women locked in these seclusion cells had screamed. Screamed until their throats were raw, but the patients on other floors hadn’t been able to hear. Only the nurses and doctors patrolling the halls, acting as though nothing was wrong…
Part of a stick figure materialized on the screen.
Oscar’s breath stuck in his throat. What looked like a head and upper torso leaned out from one of the doors, as though peeping at them from inside the cell.
“Look,” he whispered.
The figure wavered—then ducked back inside.
All the fine hairs on his arms stood up. “Should we follow it into the room?”
Nigel took a deep breath. “That’s what we’re here for,” he whispered back.
Oscar started to take a step forward—then froze. A second figure had appeared on the SLS, standing in full view at the end of the hall.
Then it charged directly at them.
Oscar threw himself back, one arm going out instinctively to protect Nigel. For a moment his medium’s senses beheld the spirit in terrible clarity: a heavy-set woman in a nurse’s outfit, dark hair pulled severely back, a scowl on her face.
Just as she reached him, she seemed to dissolve into mist, her stick figure vanishing from the SLS screen. A cold wind gusted over him, biting and angry, then fell still.
“What the fuck was that?” Chris yelled, panning with the camera.
Oscar let his arm fall, his heart pounding against his ribs like it wanted out. His tongue stuck to the roof of his mouth, and his legs threatened to shake.
Nigel wrapped a hand around his wrist. “Let’s go back to the tent.”
This time, Oscar didn’t argue.
“Are you all right?” Nigel asked.
Oscar sat in one of the folding chairs inside the command center, a blanket over his shoulders and a cup of hot coffee cradled in his big hands. Some of the color had come back into his cheeks, thankfully, and his expression changed from shaken to thoughtful.
“Can I see the film from the fourth floor hallway?” he asked Tina, instead of answering.
She’d been watching Oscar with concern, but now swung back around to her monitor. “From the static cam, or Chris’s?”
“Either is fine.”
Dr. Lawson stirred from where she’d been sitting by Tina. “Let’s see it from Saito’s camera—we’ll get more angles that way.”
Chris went to their camera and popped out the card. “You can just call me Chris, Dr. Lawson.”
“Old habit from my teaching years. Indulge me,” she replied.
“It’s true,” Nigel said. “All these years, and she still calls me Taylor.”
“It’s how I remind you to respect your elders.”
Tina scrubbed through the video until she reached the fourth floor. Everyone else crowded around to see what they’d captured.
Nigel hated seeing himself on camera, but he tried to ignore the embarrassment and focus. Oscar used the SLS to spot the ghost peeping out of the cell, before the figure ducked away and the second ghost appeared. As it rushed them on the SLS cam, Oscar fell back and threw an arm across Nigel.
His face grew hot, even as warmth suffused his chest. Oscar’s instinctive thought had been to protect him. He didn’t think he needed protecting, but it was sweet anyway.
Chris’s camera swung wildly, catching a brief shot of a gray mist rushing at, then past, them.
“That’s what you saw?” Oscar asked. “A mist?”
“And the representation on the SLS.” Nigel nodded. “I take it you saw something more?”
“She was wearing a nurse’s uniform, and she didn’t look happy to see us.” Oscar’s lips pursed thoughtfully. “She showed up once the spirit in the seclusion room made contact with us.”
“Maybe we can find out who she was,” Nigel said. “It might help us move her along to the other side.”
“I don’t know if she’s going to want to go.” Oscar paused, uncertain. “Hear me out. She appeared to us after we made contact on the fourth floor. But something interrupted our attempts to talk to the ghosts on the first and third floors. Bangs, the wheelchair crashing into the wall…”
Nigel took a sharp breath. “You think it was her. Is she trying to keep us from making contact with the other ghosts?”
“The child spirit or spirits didn’t try to make contact, and nothing happened.” Oscar shrugged. “She felt angry. Maybe she sees us as intruders in her domain?”
It was an interesting theory. “Could you tell what era she was from?”
Oscar’s face screwed up in concentration. “Not Victorian, I don’t think? But not modern. She wore the traditional nurse uniform—white cap, white apron, sleeves with big white cuffs. Sorry, I know that doesn’t help much.”
Dr. Lawson leaned forward, gaze fixed on Oscar. “Did you sense anything from her? Get any impressions?”
“Like I said, she was angry. That was all I got from her.”
“What are you thinking?” Nigel asked his old advisor.
“A lot of bad things happened here,” she said slowly. “Occasionally, the newspapers would do an exposé concerning the squalid conditions and chronic neglect.”
“So you think she might have been alive here during one of those times?” he asked. “She sees us as someone who might report her for mistreatment? Or doesn’t want us to interview the patients and find out what conditions were really like?”
“It’s possible.”
The grit on the drive outside crunched under footsteps, and a minute later Zeek and Adrienne popped inside. Their faces were flushed from excitement or exertion, or both.
As soon as he saw them, Zeek pumped his fist. “You guys won’t believe what happened! A voice?—”
“Zeek,” Adrienne started in exasperation, but the sober mood of the rest of them seemed to catch her attention. “What happened? Are you all right?” she asked instead, her worried eyes going to Chris.
“We’re fine,” Chris said stiffly.
“They had an encounter with the spirit of an angry nurse,” Dr. Lawson put in.
Nigel shifted uneasily. “I don’t know if Ms. Montague wants us sharing information…”
“I don’t give a fig what Patricia wants.” Lawson crossed her legs and sat back. “Knowledge is safety in this business, and I’m not going to let her get you all killed.”
Adrienne seemed uncomfortable—no doubt she was also worried about Ms. Montague throwing them off site. But Zeek nodded.
“That’s smart,” he said. “Maybe we could do, like, crossover episodes? Post on our channels at the same time, send each other’s audience over to get the whole picture?”
“That would be quite the one-sided exchange,” Adrienne said with a frown.
Chris glared at her. “This attitude is exactly why we broke up.”
Her nostrils widened in affront. “Maybe you’re happy with your dinky little channel?—”
“How about a compromise,” Oscar said, holding up his hands. “We’ll show you our footage of the nurse, and maybe we can listen to your audio file?”
“Great idea!” said Zeek, who seemed relieved someone had intervened. “Let me hook my camera up—you can hear it pretty easily even without messing around with the settings.”
While he connected his head cam with their laptop, Tina replayed the fourth floor footage. Oscar explained what he’d seen with his medium’s senses while the misty blur dashed across the screen.
Zeek let out a low whistle. “That’s some talent you got, dude,” he said admiringly.
Oscar blushed. “Thanks. So, what did you get?”
While Zeek positioned the laptop so they could see, Nigel rested his hands on Oscar’s blanketed shoulders, squeezing gently. It seemed silly, but he couldn’t help but feel proud someone else had noticed how talented his boyfriend was.
Of course, lots of people had noticed Oscar’s talent at football back when he’d played for Clemson in college. Even though Nigel had subjected himself to watching games on the couch with Oscar during football season, he couldn’t honestly say he had any real idea what was happening on the field at any given moment.
Well, that didn’t matter; he was proud of Oscar for that too. Even if he didn’t understand the draw himself.
“Ready?” Zeek asked. When they nodded, he clicked play.
Zeek’s head cam showed Adrienne standing in the middle of a hallway, its utilitarian look indicating the fourth floor. Their lights cut through the darkness, illuminating the doors to the seclusion rooms in flashes.
“…no sign of our shadow figure yet,” she said, sounding frustrated.
“Don’t worry,” Zeek’s voice said. “We’re getting some great footage.”
“I know, but?—”
A loud bang sounded from behind them. Both jumped and turned, lights illuminating an empty corridor.
“Oh shit!” Zeek yelled, turning to catch Adrienne’s reaction. “Did you hear that?”
“I heard it.” She took a few steps forward, concentrating on the direction of the bang. “Hello? Who’s there?”
Silence.
“Can you do that again and let us know you’re here?” Adrienne asked.
From seemingly nowhere, the flat, unnerving voice of a ghost spoke directly into the mic. “Get out.”
“What the fu—” Zeek yelled on tape. The real Zeek hit pause and turned to them expectantly.
“Pretty awesome, right?” he asked. “What do you think?”
Nigel exchanged a look with Dr. Lawson. “I think Oscar is right. This nurse does not want us here.”
“Then too bad for her,” Adrienne said, folding her arms. “She’s going to have to do a lot worse than that to get us to leave.”
Dr. Lawson looked grim. “Given someone from the original investigating team died, she may take you up on that challenge.”