Chapter Text
“Ghosts are souls.” Sarah's distant voice creeped down the black hall. Alex and I hid around the corner in the dark, waiting for the trio to return to their room.
“And who has souls?” Ethan asked. “ People. And you know who’s also a person? Loretta. She's a human unbound to the physical world.”
Alex pulled out her wand. The tip of it glowed like before, but I still denied it being nothing more than a glorified flashlight.
A thump echoed in the distance.
Sarah, Ethan, and Benny's cloaks whooshed in the air as they ran back inside their room. I guess wherever they might've been going was no longer important.
Alex sighed in relief.
“So how does that thing work?” I asked. “Your wand.”
“It's an illusion, remember?”
“ You're telekinetic!”
She shook her head as we went inside the bright elevator.
“I just need you to ward off those weirdos again,” she said, pressing the first floor button. “They're back!”
“But I don't understand. If you're just an Illusionist, what are they after?”
“You know what, can we just silently agree that I might be lying about that?”
“About…”
She pursed her lips.
“I'll play along.” I smiled.
She wore a shaky grin. The elevator opened to a dim lobby, where new guests sat with their luggage, waiting for service. Even minutes before midnight, about twenty people kept the hotel awake. I noticed Raven among them, falling to someone on her phone while looking outside.
Alex sat in one of the sofas, in front of a small table with a bowl of jelly beans. She scooped a handful of them.
“So can you turn those into a giant, gummy beanstalk?” I asked.
She shrugged with a smirk, “Sounds like something Max would do. My little brother.”
“Hmm. So you are different.”
A familiar pair stood outside under a street lamp: the ginger guy with the glasses and Allyson, the blond woman. The mist slowly fogged the glass doors. The thunder returned.
I knelt by the sofa arm and whispered up to Alex. “Can't you just make them turn around?”
“I don't like messing with people's minds anymore,” she explained.
“Oh… understandable. I'll be right back.”
I put my hood up and stepped outside in the chilly drizzling rain. Just as I did, the power cut off in the Tipton once again. The lobby swam in darkness and the murmurs of angered guests.
Ahead, Allyson fiddled with a stubborn umbrella with a notebook stuffed under her arm.
“Need some help?” I reached out my hand.
“Thank you, sir!”
She handed it to me. As I messed with it, I noticed her eyes lingering on me.
“So…” she perked up. “Have you seen anything strange since we last met?”
The umbrella burst open, spraying water around us.
“Actually, I have!” I lied. “Me and my friends heard of a psychic staying at the hotel down the street.”
“So did we, and it was the Tipton.”
“Wha— um… well, we heard it was the St. Mark.”
“We checked. It's never them. The Tipton is the hotbed for magicks and…”
Her voice faded from my ears as I noticed strands of her wavy hair drifting up. It wasn't just frizzy—her hair stood straight up on her head, pointing to the sky.
“Ally!”
Her friend grabbed her arm and bolted down the road, leaving me behind.
I stepped forward, wanting to follow them, until blue light flashed around me.
A bolt of lightning struck the umbrella!
I screamed and launched it down the sidewalk, with lingering electricity stringing from my fingers.
It broke off and vanished. My ears rang and my body tensed in fear. Static buzzed in my hands before fading.
I stumbled back into the brick of the hotel and hurried back inside. In my daze, I stood by the door, staring out at lobby with glazed eyes. And the lobby stared back, horrified.
A woman screamed. Raven.
“It's REAL! It's the ghost!”
Ghost?
I glanced down at my closed fists, to see my skin flickering a faint blue.
Everyone screamed and scrambled out of the lobby, knocking over their bags and tripping.
As I lumbered inside, the light in my skin died, as well as the lobby.
Alex and Raven were the only two left as the power came back on.
“Tony?” Raven sprinted over.
Before I knew it, my legs turned to jelly and I fell into her arms.