Ghost Hunt((Open))

[Westbrook Academy]

[Chris Sloan]

Chris nodded, "I understand, and you wouldn't have to do magic or have people use it on you. Think of it as a regular chance to hang out with other students. I'll make sure they know not to use magic on you."

[Cadabra]

She made a double take toward Chris after she caught his pass; each time her brow raised higher in surprise and ire. As Chris turned to look back to board, she pushed off the desk, leading with her head at a tilt and pulling her hair back into its place behind her ear. She wanted him to see her expression.

She pointed a finger with her other hand toward the board behind her. “I can not believe...”

She wanted to make this pause last.

“Can not believe, Chris, that you have to look to me for my opinion. You should already know it!”

The bite to her lip faltered, and a smile broke out from one ear to the other.

She spun around on her heel, to face the board, giving it and whoever or whatever was behind or in front of it the same smile. “But only if he will be my date to all of the dances.”

[Westbrook Academy]

[Chris Sloan]

Chris watched the message appear and couldn't help but laugh. "Good one Lucas. But really, consider my offer. Like I said, you won't have to do magic or anything, it would just be a chance to hang out. To be honest a ghost in the magic club sounds awesome."

[Cadabra]

Cassandra slid into a quiet smirk. "Oh I like him. Oh I like him a lot."

[Westbrook Academy]

[Chris Sloan]

Chris smiled, "Thanks Lucas. I know Cassandra here would like to have you around, and so would I."

[Liminal]

• 18. A baker payers his assistant baker $8 an hour. Each week the baker adds $10 for a food allowance. The baker’s weekly earnings are given by the formula: E = 8h + 10
  a) What does “h” mean in this formula?
  b) How much would the assistant baker be paid if we worked a 35 hour week?
  c) A 40 hour week?

Blake read the problem in his algebra book. He really didn’t think the baker would think about the assistant’s earnings in terms of E equals eight H plus ten. If the baker didn’t think that way, why did he have to? Whatever. He was just about to write on his homework that the “H” stood for hours when someone knocked on the door. Whoever it was, almost certainly had to be better than the baker.

He walked over and opened the door. “Hey--” He paused, then stepped out in the hallway and looked around. Nobody was there. He shrugged to himself. Maybe he heard one of his neighbors? Whatever. He closed the door and went back to his homework.

He wrote down that H stood for hours. He considered answering 13b by saying that the formula he’d been given was actually for the baker, but he was pretty sure Ms. Davis wouldn’t appreciate him pointing out the textbook’s mistake. He was about to start multiplying the numbers out when he heard another knock at the door. And it was definitely his door, he thought to himself as he set his pencil aside.

Once again, he went to the door and opened it. Once again, nobody was there. He looked down the hallway in both directions, but there was nobody in sight. What the hell? He shrugged, closed the door, and went back to his homework again.

He’d scarcely picked his pencil up when he heard yet another knock on his door. This one was even louder! He stood and started to walk towards the door with a bit of irritation... then stopped.

A few feet away from the door, inside his room, he could see what he’d call a “wake” in the ethereal energies on the ethereal plane. Most people created small disturbances in the energies on the ethereal plane, which meant in theory that Blake could see where people were through walls and doors and stuff (since those things didn’t exist on the ethereal plane). In practice, he normally couldn’t tell, since the disturbances were very faint and easily swept away by other currents. Plus, they were hard to distinguish from random eddies. If he focused sometimes he could pick them out, but often it was mostly guesswork.

But his dorm room was something of a calm spot on the ethereal plane. When Blake slept, sometimes he’d phase ethereal energies over into the material plane while he was dreaming. And sometimes those energies would affect other people’s dreams. It didn’t seem to happen all that often, thankfully. But it did happen often enough that his parents claimed he had nearly given them a heart attack on two occasions, and the school had put him in a private room with enchantments in the walls. The enchantments prevented his powers from accidentally leaking into adjoining rooms. On the ethereal plane, it also served as a bit of a barrier. Currents that hit it would be mostly deflected, and the energy that did pass through was much slower. So unlike most other places, there weren’t fast currents and eddies here to obscure wakes.

So he was quite certain that he was in fact looking at the wake caused by a person. A person who wasn’t there. That meant either an invisible person... or a ghost person.

“I can see you, you know. You’re standing right there.” Blake pointed directly at the wake.

The wake didn’t move, so presumably the person didn’t either. Blake frowned faintly in thought for a moment, then walked over quickly and waved his hand through the air. The wake moved off to the side, but not before Blake’s hand passed through where it was without hitting anything.

Blake paused, then laughed a little. “Hello, Lucas. You’re making it very hard for me to get my homework done.”

There seemed to be some additional activity in the wake, but it didn’t move. Perhaps Lucas had gestured?

“Uh... I know I just said I could see you... but I can’t really. I can just sorta see where you are? You leave a bit of a wake on the ethereal plane. Oh, I know, hold on a second.”

Blake went and got a piece of clean notebook paper out then turned back toward Lucas, holding it up for a moment before putting it on the desk with a grin. “So how come you were knocking on my door?”

[Westbrook Academy]