Ex-Communication, Peter Clines [ebook reader online free txt] 📗

Andy gestured at the figure stretched out on the bed, the center of attention. Jarvis’s body was handcuffed to the railings. Restraints ran across its chest and legs. A bright red foam brace, the kind used for neck injuries, held its head down. The corpse had started moving three hours after Jarvis died. It had been moving a lot more in the five or six since then.

Andy looked the dead man in the eyes. “You said there are lots of spirits here?”

The ex nodded. “A few dozen, at least,” it said. It had Jarvis’s voice, but the inflections were off, as if the salt-and-pepper man was doing a very good impression of someone. It sucked some air through its lips. “It’s hard to be sure.”

“Why so many?” asked Danielle. She stood by the door, across the room from Stealth. Her eyes were everywhere except the body. “Is it because so many people had violent deaths?”

The ex shook its head. “Ghosts aren’t really that rare,” it rasped. “There are all sorts of reasons for people to end up stuck here on Earth. The real trick is doing it deliberately.”

“So there are a lot of ghosts here?”

Jarvis’s body tried to shrug under all the straps and cuffs and its brows wrinkled for a moment. “Like I said, it’s hard to be sure.”

“Why?”

“This isn’t like the movies, George. We’re not all hanging out in the ghost clubhouse or something. It’s a form of purgatory. Yeah, you get to see your friends and loved ones, walk through walls, sneak into movies, all that stuff. But you can’t interact with anything. You can’t even see other ghosts. There could be a hundred other spirits in the room with us right now. I can’t see ’em.”

“But you have said there are several dozen here at the Mount,” Stealth said.

The ex nodded again. “I can sense them pretty much the same way you do. Cold spots in a room. Echoes that sound a little off. I’ve just got more experience spotting them and telling them apart.”

“So who are they?” asked St. George. “Or were they, I guess?”

Another awkward shrug from the dead man. “No clue. I can tell them apart, but for all I know there’s thirty or forty dog and cat ghosts wandering around looking for balls to chase or something.”

“There are dog and cat ghosts?” asked Andy.

“Of course there are,” said the ex. “You think dog heaven’s something people just made up?”

St. George glanced over at the window. “What about you?” he asked Zzzap. “Can you tell who they were?”

The gleaming wraith hung just outside, shedding his excess heat to the open air. He shook his head. I can see little wisps and glimpses of them, he said, like I’m seeing something out of the corner of my eye, but Max is the only one I’ve ever seen clearly.

The ex tensed in the restraints for a moment. Its fingers stretched wide and then relaxed. “Damn,” it said, flinching again. “That stings.”

Worse than you thought?

“Not much.”

“What is the problem?”

“No problem,” the ex told Stealth. It flinched again and gritted its teeth. “Like I said, this body’s coming back to life. The nerves are starting to fire again. It’s a bit painful.”

“Could they all come back the way you did?” asked Andy.

“The ghosts?”

“Probably not.” The ex dipped its chin as best it could at its body. The head restraints made it look like a spasm. “I’m a pretty practiced sorcerer and this took me six months of prep work. And a fair amount of luck.”

Andy nodded. “But they could, hypothetically, come back? You could bring them back.”

“The mechanics are a little different, doing it to someone else instead of yourself, but the principle’s the same.”

“Anyone?” said Stealth.

“If their spirit was still hanging out, yeah.”

“Hang on another moment, please,” said Andy. “This begs the next question—should we bring anyone back?”

“Why wouldn’t we?” asked St. George.

“Because it violates God’s plan,” said Andy, “or the natural order, if you prefer.”

I don’t know if you noticed, said Zzzap from the window, but the natural order’s been violated from pretty much every angle you can imagine.

“He’s got a point,” said St. George. “With all those things walking around out there, it’s hard to make a case for God’s plan.”

“This is exactly when we need to make a case for God’s plan,” said Andy. He glanced at Stealth. “If you’re an atheist, just look at it from a moral point of view. If we agree those things outside are abominations, that they’re wrong, then what does it mean if we’re doing the same thing in here?”

“Well, it’s not quite the same,” said Jarvis’s corpse. Its fingers stiffened and relaxed as a spasm swept over its body. “Out there you can argue a few million corpses are getting desecrated by a virus. This is more like resuscitating someone. This body’s restoring itself. It’s going to come back to life. Real life, with a pulse and breathing and everything.”

“Except you died,” said Andy, “and it’s not your body. You had your time and now you’re trying to get more.”

The dead man’s head twitched again. “So you’re saying it was God’s plan I got bitten by a zombie and my soul was trapped in a demon’s walking corpse for fourteen months? Doesn’t that mean the abominations are part of the plan?”

“We are not here to debate ethics or theology,” said Stealth.

“Then why am I here?” asked Andy. “I’m supposed to be a moral and spiritual counselor, yes?”

“Nothing personal, father,” said the ex, “but I’m no longer a spirit and I don’t need counseling.”

St. George felt himself smile. Zzzap let out a hiss of static that passed as a laugh.

“I’m not trying to be a pain in the ass,” Andy said. “I just want you all to stop and think what this is going to mean to people. There’s about a thousand people out there in the After Death sect who think exes still have souls buried in them somewhere. There’s already this girl