The Trouble with Ghosts

Welcome to the Zone

Welcome to the Pan Oceanic Special Zone, usually abbreviated as the POZ or the Zone, a high-tech micro-nation of the future. It is situated on the most northerly tip of Queensland, once part of the nation of Australia, however it is now home to the Archimedes artificial intelligence and the Board of Governors who rule the small enclave.

When the Virus of 2020 ripped the world apart, it was the advanced technology produced by the Zone that helped to rebuild the shattered nations of the planet. In turn, thousands of displaced people flocked to the Zone to help build the megalopolis of Pan City and its satellite cities such as Sptifield and Haven.

In the year 2047, referred to as V-27 by many citizens (since it is 27 years since the Virus), the Zone has a thriving economy, massive population and a higher percentage of the Awakened living under its governance than anywhere else in the world.

The Awakened are the product of the Virus, a contagion that killed millions as it re-wrote the genetic code of every human being it touched. It gave the lucky ones potent, physics defying super powers such as Levitation or Telekinesis, Telepathy or Boosted Strength. The unlucky died outright or became the Changed, twisted mutations that sought only to infect others with the Virus before succumbing to the effects on their abused flesh.

Most of humanity that survived found they had gained no special Abilities at all, simply had to exist in a world that was forever altered. Thus in many nations the Awakened became pariahs, despised for benefitting from a disaster that killed the greater majority of the human race.

This is the world. Welcome to Tales from the POZ.

Prologue – Head Office, the Factory

Mrs Green regarded her partner with a worried frown, her vivid blue eyes hooded under dark brows like gleaming rivers beneath a cloud wracked sky.

“Are you sure we want to interfere so directly, Mr Black?” she asked the tall, dark suited figure on the other side of their shared desk. She picked up a cup of still warm tea, green of course, and took a dainty sip. The man grunted in a way that was both affirmative and negative at the same time, taking a hefty swig of his own coffee. Black with no sugar as was to be expected from him.

“Our Clients aren’t leaving us much choice” he finally conceded, placing the half empty cup onto the desk surface. Mrs Green clucked in mild disapproval so he lifted it again and placed it on the coaster she had already laid beside his charcoal coloured hat. She flicked him a tiny smile of thanks and he grinned in reply, showing strong white teeth the colour of faded bone.

“The Suppliers are making demands too” she added. “Both sides have always viewed our business as their property. Perhaps the time has come to make them remember exactly who we are?”

“And who exactly is that, Ga-Ga?” he asked. Mrs Green felt a faint thrill course through her when he used his pet name for her. That was so like him to try and distract her away from the matter at hand.

“Why Thanny, you know who we are” she giggled, her frown gone and her eyes blazing like the very sun. “We’re the heads of the Company. We are the ones who should decide how the Factory is run, not these outsiders!”

“So we are agreed then, Mrs Green” he demanded gently. “You’ll let me break the rules this one time?” His eyes bored into hers, deep wells of infinite darkness like a shaft into the heart of the world.

“How can I say no to my oldest and dearest partner” she acquiesced, tilting her head so her long brown hair fell beside her plump cheeks. She looked up at him from beneath that mane and felt a surge of affection, knowing that their fates had been entwined from the very beginning of this great endeavour.

“Thank you, beloved wife” said Mr Black and stood up in one fluid motion. He placed his hat on his head, adjusting the brim so it sat at a jaunty angle, leaving half his sallow features cloaked in shadow. “I’ll make the necessary arrangements. If it goes to plan, we shall have acquired a very powerful new employee”

“And if it doesn’t, the Suppliers and our Clients will tear this factory apart” said Mrs Green.

Mr Black showed his teeth again, a favourite gesture of his. It kind of defined his look so Mrs Green was used to it, despite how it terrified many of their staff.

“Then we’ll just have to start again” he declared easily. “It’s not the first time and I doubt it will be the last”

“No, I don’t want to lose this place” Mrs Green answered firmly. “I like a lot of the employees this time around. It would be simply terrible to lose them forever”

“You mother them too much, Ga-Ga” he chided her softly. “You used to be quite hard on them not so long ago. Now you let them walk all over you!”

“I can’t help it, Thanny” she laughed in response. “It comes with the job. Now stop wasting time and get out there on the Factory floor. Find that one spark and make it shine brightly for us!”

“As you command, Mrs Green!” he said and turned away, vanishing into the shadows that cloaked his side of the office. The woman sat for a while staring at the space where her partner had been, her eyes drifting to the coffee cup still cooling on the wooden desk. A slight frown reappeared on her tanned forehead .

“How come he always leaves me to do the washing up!” she snapped to the empty office.

East Park, Spitfield, V27 (2047 Common Era)

Letty

The trouble with Ghosts is that they have no sense of privacy.

Letitia could see the Shade standing quietly near her bedroom window, the light from the street cutting through his translucent outline. He looked fairly substantial for a ghost and with his body intact, which was unusual. Most of the ones who sought her out had gaping bloody wounds or major parts of their anatomy missing.

“I need your help” his voice whispered to her, urgent and demanding. She glanced at her phone, propped up beside her bed on its charging stand. The time was Three-Twenty-Six in the middle of the night!

“Nope” she spat sharply and pulled the covers over her head. “I’m not dealing with you until morning”

Her sleep was undisturbed until Seven AM on the dot when her phone alarm went off, dragging her out of a very confusing dream where she was lost in a vast warehouse, vainly searching for a mis-labelled box. Still chasing errant boxes in her brain, she opened her eyes to the ghost. He was less than a hand span from her face, bending his tall frame over her bed.

“Shit!” she squawked and instinctively lashed out with her right fist, missing the ghost and punching her phone clean off the stand and onto the hard concrete floor of her bedroom. There was a muffled cracking sound as it bounced off the thin rug laid over the scuffed grey floor and she swore again, using some of the juicier swear words her mother had forbidden.

She swung her legs out from under the blankets, letting her bare feet touch the floor. With a jerk she threw the covers off and sat up, making the ghost step quickly backwards. Letty always slept in a long t-shirt and shorts, so she wasn’t worried about flashing her unwanted visitor. The Shade turned his head aside anyway, as if embarrassed by the sight of her sixteen year old body.

That was interesting she thought to herself. Ghosts rarely gave a damn about watching the living, so this one was definitely unusual!

“Why are you in my bedroom?” she demanded, causing the apparition to regard her once again, his eyes dark and menacing yet showing a calm intelligence. Seeing him this close up, Letty noticed he was wearing the uniform of a soldier. Not one of the Border Patrol outfits, because she knew all too well what they looked like. This was an older style like something from the last Global War.

“I told you” the ghost replied with a mild tone of reproof. “I need your help”

“I don’t do requests” Letty snapped back. “If you want to find the Other Side, go look someplace else. I’m kind of busy today”

She stood up, tugging her t-shirt down to make sure she covered her stomach. Letty was the first to admit she was a bit plumper than she would have preferred but she was still self-conscious about it. The action brought the v-neck down, exposing the top of her boobs in their pale skinned glory. Those bad girls she was proud of and her two past boyfriends and one girlfriend had declared them her best asset. Well, that and her cute smile.

Her unwanted guest quickly looked away once more, as if the sight of a teenage bust was a big no-no. Letty was beginning to wonder what kind of a soldier this guy had been when he was alive, since he acted like some old-world gentleman.

“It’s not the Other Side I am seeking” he answered her. “I need you to find someone here in this place and introduce me to them”

“Can’t you find them yourself?” she questioned him. “You found me so you must have some ability to see the mortal world”

“It doesn’t work that way” the Soldier said. “This world is like shifting shadows and echoing voices in the distance. Only in your presence does it become clear to me. Without you to guide me I will never find the one I seek”

“Okay, I get that” she reluctantly agreed. It wasn’t the first time she had heard such things from the Shades and Spirits she had encountered. “So why is it so important I help you find this person?”

The Soldier stepped up close to her, his eyes boring into her own and sending a chill down her neck.

“They hold the key to stopping the destruction of the world. I need to warn them that the end is coming!”

Letty laughed and flopped her butt back onto the bed.

“Shit!” she smirked. “I thought it was going to be something serious!”

=====

Letty brushed her teeth in the tiny bathroom of the apartment, sending the toothbrush back and forth with angry pushes of her wrist. She glanced in the mirror over the cracked plastic sink, watching the closed door and wondering if the Soldier had wandered off in disgust yet. He had seemed quite stunned by her casual dismissal of his quest, but she had heard this kind of crap so many times before.

Every damned ghost that realised she could see them had some urgent message to pass onto the living. They claimed it was always utterly vital that she convey their warnings, threatening of the coming Judgement Day, Apocalypse or the Ragnarok of the Gods. She had to look that last one up online and found out it meant pretty much the same thing as the other two.

All the dead wanted to tell us was that everything was ending. Yet it never did and life kept on rolling along, day after day. They were preoccupied with letting the mortal world know it was screwed, which made Letty wonder if the dead were bored or just paranoid.

She spat out the toothpaste and rinsed her mouth, checking that her teeth were shiny and sparkly. If her smile was her second best asset (after her rack of course) then she was going to keep them perfect as long as she could. In a life as shitty as hers, she wanted to hold onto what she could.

Letty took a moment to examine her face in the mirror, wondering what the Soldier saw when he looked at her. Almond shaped eyes of deep green gazed back at herself, a gift of her Japanese mother and Russian father. They were framed by thin, heavily plucked eyebrows that sat over her stubby nose. She pouted her lips and assumed the smug expression all her girl friends used for their selfies, trying to suck in her plump cheeks.

On Letty it just made her look like she was constipated. She relaxed her face into her usual grumpy scowl and decided this was the look she preferred. Her eyes strayed to the medicine cabinet behind the mirror and on impulse she pulled the door open. The boxes of her mom’s medications were exactly as she had left them last time. Letty took out the closest cardboard box and lifted the top – there were still six tablets left in the plastic trays, the other twelve long gone.

It took all her self-control to close the box and place it carefully back on the shelf. She made sure it was in the same position with the label facing outwards, then gently closed the cabinet. A single tear welled up in her left eye and she dashed it away, knowing it was not going to be today.

Letty jerked the door open into the narrow corridor, seeing the ghost standing expectantly in the doorway to her bedroom. For a guy who looked like he could have taken on an army when was alive, he looked lost and defeated right now. Something inside of her shifted and she made a decision.

“Okay, Soldier Boy” she declared. “Let me put my warpaint on and we can go find your person. Just who is it I am taking you to see?”

The ghost looked embarrassed now as if she had caught him out somehow.

“Ah, that’s the problem” he admitted. “I can’t remember their name or where they are meant to be”

“Seriously?” she gasped at him. “Fine, then I may be able to track something down using your name. Find your living relatives or some shit like that”

Letty could swear she had never seen a ghost blush with confusion before. The Soldier lifted his shoulders in an apologetic shrug and refused to meet her eyes.

“I can’t remember that either” he finally confessed.

Letty groaned and sank against the doorframe, her head banging gently against the moulded plastic.

“This is why I hate ghosts” she said with a sigh.

=====

She had dressed in her usual black corset over a black chemise, black skirt that reached her knees and her favourite knee high ass-kicking boots with the chromed steel toe-caps. Soldier man had steadfastly looked at the wall while she dressed, making her kind of like his weird consideration for her privacy.

Right now she was seated at her dresser, applying white foundation over her cheeks and forehead. Her visitor was observing these preparations with interest, his all too intelligent eyes watching as she painted dark circles around her own almond shaped eyes then applied vertical lines over her white glossed lips. A bit of careful blending and then she sat back, pleased with her skull face makeup.

“Why is your face made up like a skeleton?” he asked her with a hint of amusement. “Is it camouflage to hide from ghosts?”

Letty turned in her chair and grinned her best toothy smile at the Soldier ghost.

“It’s because I’m a Dead Boy” she explained. He regarded her solemnly and crossed his arms over his chest with a frown.

“I can see two things wrong with that statement” he countered. His eyes had dropped to her bust, now pushed upwards and outwards by the tightly laced corset she was wearing. The girls were even more prominent than before, so she looked down at them then back at the ghost with a wicked smile.

“Not them...” he said hurriedly. “You are obviously a living person and also female is what I meant”

’’I know what you meant” she relented with a laugh. “I guess you never heard of the Dead Boys wherever you came from. It’s a local gang that I belong to here in East Park. They control these couple of streets and the big cemetery at one end. Our members all wear skull face to show our allegiance, plus these cool tattoos on our wrist or palm”

Letty held out her left wrist, pulling back the chemise cuff to show the skull and bones laser-inked over her veins.

“Everyone is a Dead Boy, whether they are male, female or non-binary” she continued. “It’s a very tolerant group in that regard”

“Is that so?” mused her guest. “Doesn’t sound like any gang I heard of”

Letty fixed him with a hard stare, her exaggerated lips turned down.

“You seem to have a very selective memory” she grumbled in a low tone. “You remember other things but not your own name?”

“The past is clearer but what happened in my last days feels like it was erased somehow” he admitted grudgingly. “If it helps, you can call me Sergeant”

“You remember your military rank?”

“Not as such” the Sergeant replied. He pointed to the sleeve of his ghostly uniform where three black chevrons indicated his rank. Letty stepped closer and examined them, squinting at a letter that sat beneath the stripes. It was a capital M in dark blue she reckoned, although his translucent nature made it hard to be sure.

“You were in the Mercenary Guild?” she asked. “My father served in the Guild here in the Zone so I recognise that device from his uniforms. His was coloured white though rather than blue”

The Sergeant pondered for a moment, apparently dredging up fragments of his memories.

“Blue was for the Royals, based out of the Re-United Kingdom” he answered. “I guess I was English or at least serving with them. White is the colour used by the International Brigades so your father could have served anywhere in the world”

He held her eyes for a moment and a questioning look came over his face as something dawned on him.

“What’s your name?” he asked. “I only know I was drawn to you but I have no idea who you actually are”

“Oh yeah” she replied. “I was so caught up wondering who the hell you were I forget to tell you who I was!” She stood back and came to attention, like she had seen her Papa do when she was a girl. Her right arm came up smartly and she gave the Sergeant a salute.

“Letitia Gregorvich reporting Sir!” she snapped out with another grin. “But if you call me Letitia I will kick your ass, Sir” she added. “Everyone just calls me Letty”

Her ghost raised his right arm in a crisp salute then lowered it with a bemused grin of his own.

“Stand at ease, Letty” he told her. “And since I am a non-com, don’t ever salute me again. I had to work for a living, at least while I was alive”

“Copy that, Sergeant!” she affirmed. “Now that we are all formally introduced, I guess I had better take you to see someone that can help us find your forgotten person”

“Who would that be?”

“Someone who knows way more about ghosts than I ever will” Letty answered. “Her name is Mira Yelenov, but everyone around here calls her Baba Yaga”

“Sound like a name from a fairy tale” the Sergeant mused.

“Yeah” Letty agreed. “That’s because she’s a Witch”

=====

When they entered the small kitchen and adjoining living space, Letty’s eyes were drawn inexorably to her mother, standing silent and unmoving in front of the refrigerator. Her drawn face tilted slowly to regard Letty, her eyes hollow and vacant, lips parting as if to speak.

“It’s Okay, Mama” Letty blurted out suddenly. “I’m going to pick up some breakfast at the corner store. No need to worry about making me anything!”

Letty rushed to the apartment door, disengaging the heavy bolts and yanking on the sturdy handle. She stood aside and gestured urgently to the Sergeant, as if to summon him into the outer corridor by sheer will power.

“Umm, Letty, your mother.....” began the ghost confusedly until the girl raised a finger to point at him warningly.

“You don’t get to speak to my Mama, got it?” she growled. “Hurry up and let me close the door. Mama doesn’t like visitors”

The Sergeant stepped out into the dingy corridor, barely through the opening before Letty slammed the door closed with a loud whumpf. She paused and gathered her thoughts until she was ready to lift her skull face to the ghost. Her back was to the closed door and she stood there like a guardian, warning off anyone who would dare to enter.

“Mama hasn’t been the same since Papa left us” she explained softly. “She worked real hard so I could finish my basic education. Now it’s up to me to take care of her, you understand?”

Her green eyes shone fiercely from the dark circles of her make-up, like twin lanterns gleaming in the shadows. Or perhaps Witch-light guiding lost travellers to their doom.

“Copy that” the Sergeant said at last.

Letty nodded her thanks and led him along the graffiti strewn passage to the far end where a stairwell could be glimpsed. They descended three flights of stairs, opened a scratched metal door and entered the main lobby.

She had taken two steps into the empty seeming space when a man detached himself from the wall at her back and rammed a knife into her side.