The Witch Doctor Incident

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Chapter Five

Day 5 Monday January 16th, 2006

Danny curled up on his bunk, a position becoming too familiar to Thor. A day and a half had passed since their loss at Pariah Dark’s castle. Phantom’s injuries crippled the team, the fact made worse by the loss of two of their members, Joseph Anderson and Albert Townsend. A third of their team laid unconscious, unnatural comas caused by the Witch Doctor. The next third, Phantom and himself, were injured. Smithy was also hurt but mobile, her injuries consisting of bruises littering her backside and a nasty cut down her cheek and neck. The only one healthy was their pilot, Jacobs, since he remained out of the fight, trapped in the speeder buried under the rubble of a stone wall.

Yelling came from the direction of the cockpit, Janet and Eric going at it again, as they fought about whether to leave the doubtful safety of the ghost forest or to venture out to search for Nuodov and the children. Danny flinched as a dull thud sounded when someone, probably Jacobs, hit a wall. They were destroying themselves from the inside out, tempers flaring and personalities clashing left and right.

Thor was just as guilty as the other two, loosing his cool more than once over little things. The only one not yelling was Danny. He just stayed distant, retreating farther into his shell as the hours went by. Physically, he was healing faster than a human and the ecto/blood mix didn’t seem to cause any negative reactions. Mentally, Danny was just as messed up as the rest of them, his temperament defaulting to depression instead of anger like the humans.

“It’s over! Anders and Towns might as well be dead, Phantom’s out of commission and Thor is two steps behind him. We have to go back to the Real World.”

Danny looked up, his eyes burning green. He shot off the bunk and headed for the cockpit. Instinctively, Thor limped after him and stopped dead in the doorway. Danny had Jacobs pinned to the wall, aura burning a bright white that lit up the space while the human struggled in his grip.

“So you’re giving up!” Phantom yelled in his face. “We lost once so it’s time to lay down and die. You want to go back to the safety of the real world and forget about fifteen children lost out there! You want to deny the sacrifices that Anderson and Townsend made fighting Nuodov?”

“No, that not what,” he was interrupted when Danny slammed him against the wall again.

“Yes, we lost, but that doesn’t mean that the fight is over. I have fought things that would scare you senseless. I have failed, multiple times, but I didn’t give up. If you fall down once do you stay on the ground or do you get up again?

“Yes, we have no clue where the Witch is, no idea where to start and there is the distinct possibility that the children could be dead!” Everyone flinched at his cold voice. “But what we still have is hope! All those things could be true, emphasis on ‘could’. But there is a chance that those ideas are wrong and we could still find the kids. We still have a chance so we still have hope.”

With that he let go of Jacobs’ shirt and floated to the ground, instantly turning from enraged ghost to a child.

“Don’t give up that hope,” he said and disappeared. Seconds later they could hear him land on his bunk, kicking the metal cabinet in frustration. Thor leaned against the wall just as stunned as Eric or Smithy.

“If we keep doing this she wins,” Thor added his two cents.

Jacobs collapsed against the wall that only a minute before he was pinned to, hands scrubbing his face. “The kid’s right,” he finally admitted. “We have to go look for her.”

“What about your idea a couple of nights ago, looking at Dark’s Castle for clues… see if she left any hints.” Janet’s suggested after a time and both men nodded in agreement. “Okay. Jacobs, get us in the air within five minutes, no more stalling. I’m going to check on Danny.”

Janet left the cockpit, her face tinged green by the ambient light of the ghost zone as she sat on Phantom’s bunk. Thor just turned and watched her, not making a move to follow and allowing them some privacy.

Janet sat on the bunk and looked at the boy. Danny stared straight ahead, scooting towards the wall when she first approached. Sensing that he wasn’t ready to talk yet, she pulled her feet up onto the bunk, stretching out her legs and resting her back against one of the cabinets in between each bunk.

Finally the boy leaned against her side and the huntress wrapper her arm around him to comfort him. Sometimes one could forget that the cocky little ghost that helped her and her husband hunt on occasion was a fragile teenager underneath. Before this whole mess, her and Brian were the only ones able to break through the shell the boy built around himself and see his true self and the emotions that he hid. She knew that the boy had friends and the relationship he had with the Red Hunter seemed a little more that friendly, as much as he tried to deny it while blushing.

He had those friends but ‘family’ was something unattainable for the ghost. He let it slip that once upon a time he had a family, parents and a sister, but they were ‘unreachable’. She knew that she couldn’t replace what he loss but she tried to give him a second home. They told him over and over he was welcome to stay, permanently if he wanted. He would stop for a couple of days, easily merging with the living members of her family, laughing and helping out like the kids.

Then there would be those rare times that she would wake up in the middle of the night. Something urged her to go downstairs and she could find Danny sitting on the couch, looking so lost and so incredibly human. She would sit next to him without a word. He remained next to her, sitting too stiffly to be comfortable. Eventually he would sag next to her, leaning on her shoulder and tears would slip down his face.

Now was one of those times. Even as the speeder roared to life and the engines pushed them out of the forest and back to the dangers of the ghost zone, Danny leaned against her, quiet tears spilling down his face. Even if she never found out why he cried, even if he never confided in her, she was there for him lending him a shoulder to cry on so he wouldn’t be alone. She could at least do that for him.

“We can’t give up,” he whispered while she started to rock him back and forth.

“We’re not,” she said fiercely as she tightened her grasp on his shoulders. “We’re not.”

oOo

Thor poked his head out of the cockpit before deciding to walk into the hold. Danny and Janet remained in the same positions, woman sitting up while the ghost leaned against her. They both looked at his approach, eyes solemn after the fight in the cockpit just a bare hour before. “We’re here. Do you want to come up front?”

Smithy looked at the ghost who in turn nodded. She slid off the bed first and Danny followed, black socks gently touching the floor. The three made their way to the front where Jacobs sat in the pilot seat absorbed in his task. The hunters dropped into the open seats while Danny floated up, sitting Indian style about two feet above and behind the pilot.

Ahead in the parting mists Dark’s castle appeared. Jacobs and Smithy started flicking switches and screens lit up. “Right now we’re scanning with everything we’ve got: RWI Detector, ecto-signatures, heat sensors, and a couple of things Jack really didn’t explain.”

Jacobs trained his attention on the multitude of switches, gauges, and screens, searching fro the tiniest blip or sign, faded green eyes bloodshot from the lack of sleep. Janet Smith leaned back in her chair. Her face looked pinched, skin pale under the freckles, Danny not looking much better. Thor could only imaging how rough he looked since the stress and lack of sleep took a toll on him too. Minutes crept by as every one waited for a result, any result from the sensors and scans.

“I think I found the trail,” Eric said softly, eyes unblinking and focused on a screen to the left, a simple black background with green specks. The other three surrounded his chair, all focused on the line marked by his finger.

“The powder from the gremlins,” Danny gasped, eyes following a tendril of gray winding out of the castle along the path Jacobs found inching deeper into the zone.

“She ‘called’ the gremlins,” Janet said, excitement creeping into her voice. “Nuodov made a hand gesture, right Danny? The ones you and Anders destroyed are following her. She left us a trail of bread crumbs.” For the first time since entering the ghost portal they had a chance of finding Nuodov and rescuing the children, they had the hope that Danny promised.

“Follow it,” Danny ordered.

“How do we know it’s not a trap?” Thor asked warily.

“We don’t,” admitted Janet. “But it’s our best lead. Do you have any other ideas?”

“No,” he said softly.

Jacobs angled the speeder to run parallel with the trail, a glittering silver path leading around towards the nearest edge of unexplored space of the ghost zone.

The trail through the zone thinned, a fading path that disappeared into the black and green. On Eric’s screen the way lit up with dazzling intensity and the signal only grew brighter the longer they followed it.

“So what’s the plan?” Thor asked. Janet bit her lip and Jacobs flanked in her direction.

“Jacobs and I suit up and search while you and Danny wait in the speeder.” Protests rose all around her.

“You’re hurt, both of you,” she yelled over the noise. “You’ll just slow us down.”

“Not if Thor and I work together,” Danny told her, surprising Thor more than anyone else. He figured that he alone would be left behind, unable to go faster than a limp.

“What do you mean?” Eric demanded while their leader gaped.

“You and Jacobs head out on your own first. We.” He motioned to himself and Thorton, “wait a little while and then we head out. Whichever group finds the children first radios the others and they either distract Nuodov or come to help the first group.”

“Makes sense,” Eric agreed. “And if by chance they se us come in either they will follow the first group or they will go after the speeder where the second group will be waiting for them.”

“Okay, we’ll go with that. Danny, can you fly the speeder?”

He smiled and perked up. Jacobs slid out of the seat and Phantom replaced him. The humans disappeared into the back to pull on the black ectosuits and strap on their weapons. When they made their way back into the cockpit Thor dropped into the passenger seat dangling a pair of white boots, Danny’s boots, in his hand.

“I figured you wouldn’t want to end up in a fight wearing only your socks.”

Danny took them with a small smile and thanks. He waved his hand and the white turned to a steel gray and the rips sealed over on the boot one of the gremlins chewed through. He pulled on the footwear and glanced to see Thor’s dumfounded look.

“I’m too tired to try to fix the entire jumpsuit so this will have to do,” he explained.

“But…how did you…never mind, I’ll ask later.” Thor sounded exasperated but he didn’t ask. Janet laughed before becoming serious.

“On my signal turn on your suits. At the same time, Danny, I want you to flip the switch marked ‘EEPFE’ next to your left hand. Ready? Three…Two…One…Now!”

A hum filled the cockpit as green auras formed around the three humans. They looked around but nothing seemed different or out of place.

“What did that do?” Phantom asked, hand dropping away from the switch.

“ ‘That’ temporarily infuses the speeder with ectoplasm,” Smithy explained. “EEPFE actually stands for Electro-Ectoplasmic Field Emitter. Any sensors would think we were a weak ghost or a bit of semisolid ectoplasm. It won’t fool the naked eye but it will hide us at a distance and fool any passive sensors she might have.”

“Okay. I’ll go with that.” The boy settled in his chair as the others strapped into their seats. As they flew Janet and Jacobs fleshed out the plan, trying to guess every scenario possible while Danny and Thor added their ideas.

Jacobs noticed the lone chunk of rock first. Like an island in an ocean it stood alone, probably only four feet across and a single wooden pole rose off its surface, beads clinking gently in the wind of the ghost zone’s night.

“I’ve seen those not far from the Fenton Portal and Dark’s Castle,” he said, waving with a free hand as he pushed the speeder a little farther from the object.

“What color were the beads?” Janet asked as she fiddled with one of the numerous screens, zooming in.

“They glowed…red, I think.”

“And I bet those beads on the pole would have glowed red again if we passed it without the ectoplasmic field.”

“That’s how she knew we were in the castle.” Thor stared accusingly at the seemingly innocent stick, green beads waving and twirling as they passed. Beyond the marker rocks and the ever present green mist wove a gauzy veil around the path they followed.

Maneuvering around and extra large portion of earth, he gasped and a whispered curse slipped past Jacobs’ lips. Just beyond the rock a thin veil of fog wrapped around the ruins of a castle. Dark walls fell away with jagged edges. Curtained windows spilled slivers of light across the stone courtyard. Inch for inch, the ruins match Pariah Dark’s Castle.

No words broke the silence in the cockpit. Danny’s hands glided across the controls easing them closer to the half derelict fortress. Janet appeared between them, pointing her finger at a dark nook just big enough to set the speeder.

Heading towards the darkened part of the courtyard, they landed well away from the lit windows. A half-broken wall covered them while creating a dark niche. Danny flipped off the dashboard lights leaving the cockpit awash in the hunters’ green light that even tinged Danny’s normally white aura. Silently Janet motioned towards the cargo area. The last guns were snatched out of a cabinet. Thor pressed a hidden button next to two of the bunks. A shimmering shield formed and covered Anders and Towns, protecting them until someone could retrieve the speeder.

Janet reached over and adjusted Danny’s headset, brushing hair out of the camera’s line of sight. On impulse, she grabbed the boy in a hug. Eric coughed and looked away as she pulled away leaving her hands on the boy’s shoulders. “Be careful kid.”

“I will if you will,” Danny replied. The woman laughed and hugged him one last time. She then extended her hand towards Thor. He reached out and shook it while whispering good luck.

Eric replaced Janet, shaking their hands solemnly in goodbye.

Janet and Eric eased out the partially opened door, making no noise as they stepped out. Thorton hit a button and the door slid silently into place. He stood at the small window inset into the door. Worried, he watched the first two hunters until they entered a doorway and disappeared from sight.

While he waited in the cargo hold, Danny moved into the cockpit invisibly so he could observe the sensors and keep watch out the windshield. As the speeder approached the castle only a couple ‘real world’ bogeys tripped their sensors. Ecto-signatures, on the other hand, filled the area. Many signals registered low in energy, either weak ghosts or some of the semisolid ecto that wove through the debris field around the castle. The stronger signals concentrated in two separate areas. The signatures remained stationary as they drew nearer and at the time Jacobs guessed that one of the two groups contained the children.

After an eternity Phantom appeared at his side.

“It’s time,” he stated, his voice just above a whisper. Thor nodded and triggered the door. The door slid to the side allowing the cool wind of the ghost zone to tear at their hair and the ghost’s loose shirt. Mechanically, his fingers tightened around his gun, bring it up to fire at the first hit of trouble.

He stepped down to the ground and Danny stayed close enough to the door to reach through and trigger the door closed, his hand slipping out before the door could crush it. Making sure that the boy still had all five fingers, the pair made their way to the same entrance Smithy and Jacobs used before. Going down the first corridor, they didn’t speak until they reached the first branch were the hallway turned left and right.

“So which way?” the ghost asked looking at the two very separate paths. Since their radios stayed silent, Thor knew that the others had not found the children or trouble, yet.

“Eric said that at the first intersection they would take a right and head for the far group.”

“So if they took a right then we head left,” Danny guessed hesitantly. They set off down the corridor, both tensely searching for clues. Thor took a moment to glance down at the detector in his hand. The range remained shorter that the speeder’s sensors but it was all he could carry one handed since he clutched the largest ecto-gun in his right. Phantom hovered next to him, fingertips gliding along the left-hand wall.

“Hold on,” he said as he stopped next to a blank portion of the wall. Thor watched with interest as the boy’s hand turned a transparent blue and pressed against the blocks.

“I can’t phase through it,” he said to himself but Thor overheard.

“Is that going to be a problem?”

“It could,” the ghost confessed. “This is definitely the same stuff Dark’s Castle is built from. I couldn’t phase through the walls there either.”

“So that’s why the gremlins busted through the walls there instead of passing through?”

“Those things aren’t even real ghosts as much as I can tell. They lack the basics,” he floated off, leaving Thor jogging to keep up.

“Basics?” the hunter asked as they continued down the hallway, turning right when the intersection they came to was partially collapsed leaving them only one way to travel.

“Basic ghost powers,” Danny elaborated. “The normal stuff like flight, intangibility, invisibility, and overshadowing. The overshadowing might not be a real basic ability but I’ve seen all kinds of ghosts use it.”

After that they dropped into silence. The two made their way along darkened hallways. Occasionally torches or wooden doors broke up the blank walls the deeper they headed into the castle. He glanced down at the sense from time to time to make sure they traveled in the right direction while his gun stayed trained ahead. Danny also held his hands away from his body, raising his palms when they approached each turn, leading around the corners and up stairs while Thor dropped behind and followed.

Danny paused when he first heard the noise and Thor stopped just a half a step behind him. Up ahead a wisp of blue smoke twirled around in the empty corridor. A chitterling noise came from its direction. It took no notice, whispering to itself as they approached.

A small puff of blue slipped past Phantom’s lips when Thor glanced at the boy. They both tensed when the little creature spun around and headed in their direction. First it darted around Danny, racing around his feet and legs. Seeming to tire of this, it began to float around Thor, not attacking…just playing.

The wisp curled around his shoulder and whispered in his ear, “They’re not here…turn back…turn back…”

Thor ignored the small voice as he started farther down the hallway. Danny followed, his boots adding quiet footsteps to the hunters heavier tread and the blue creatures constant murmuring. They made it halfway down the corridor before the hunter started to relax, thinking the Whisper was just a distraction. While it continued its twirling and muttering, Danny looked nervous. He looked round and round, literally turning around to watch their backs.

“We’re almost there,” Thor said, trying to soothe the boy. They made it another ten feet before it all went south. The Whisper grew bored circling Danny’s head so it made it’s way back to Thor.

“Too late,” it whispered, wrapping around Thor’s ankles before darting down the hallway into a block darker than the rest at the end. A deep rumble surrounded the human and ghost standing in the middle of a black corridor. No doors broke the walls and the ceiling started to shift and break apart.

“Run!” Danny yelled but Thor froze. Dust and small rocks dropped from above but he couldn’t move, feet rooted in place and horror flooding his mind. Phantom hit his back, propelling him into motion. They ran towards the nearest end of the hall. It looked too far to reach and as the first large rock crashed to the floor he knew they would never reach safety.

Danny grabbed his back, pulling at his suit causing him to stumble. He spun around as the ceiling collapsed around them and a flash of light illuminated every individual stone.

He caught a glimpse of wide blue eyes before everything turned black.

Chapter Six