You stalk the streets, wielding your mighty leaf blower. “Take that!” you cry dramatically at some scattered grass clippings, clearly up to no good. They flee from you in terror, and you laugh dramatically. “HA HA HA HA!”
Hey, whatever gets you through the day.
It looks like it's about to storm, so you quickly finish up and load the equipment back into the trailer behind the truck. Thunder is already rumbling in the distance by the time Mr. Awaver joins you. “Let's get some lunch,” he says, climbing into the driver's side. “Awaver Landscaping and Topiary” is written on the side. Mr. Awaver says that if you do a good job this summer, he might recommend you to the elite topiary school. In France! Still, that kind of high-class education doesn't come cheap, and you're not sure if you can afford it.
You're just about to get into the cab on the passenger side, when you hear someone calling your name. You turn to see a tall, thin man getting out of a limousine parked behind the landscaping truck.
“Do you know that guy?” Mr. Awaver asks doubtfully, and you just shrug because it's obvious you don't. You don't know anyone who can afford a suit that nice.
The man walks towards you. “I have traveled many miles to find you,” he says, and you can't place his accent. “We have much to discuss. Please come with me.”
Do you go with him? Or not? Or KILL HIM
“Okay, whatever,” you say, because apparently getting picked up on the street by creepy dudes in limos isn't enough to freak you out. I'm not judging, I'm just saying.
It starts to rain as you follow him to the limo, waving goodbye to Mr. Awaver who shrugs and drives off. The inside of the limo is musty and smells like mothballs. Or that could be the man sitting next to you. The limo pulls away, and it's hard to see anything out the tinted windows. Your new companion doesn't speak.
Should you ask him who he is? Or if the limo has drinks?
“Are you crazy? I'm not going with you!” you say to the strange man. “I don't even know you!”
“I am Bartelbus Bartleby,” he says, unoffended and unruffled. “Your great uncle's lawyer.”
“I don't have a great uncle,” you retort.
“This is unfortunately the case,” he agrees. “You will no doubt be curious as to the contents of his will. If you please...” He gestures towards his limo again.
Do you go with him now? Or get in the truck with Mr. Awaver?
“So is this the kind of limo with the little refrigerator filled with soda and champagne?” you ask, looking around hopefully. “Is there drinks?” you clarify when he just looks at you.
“Yes,” he agrees, and suddenly he's looking at you with too much intensity. “Yes, there is.”
Then he hisses, his fangs lengthening, and bites your arm. You scream and struggle, but his bony grip is like iron, and soon you're starting to feel weak from blood loss. “A vampire lawyer?” you moan with your last breath. “That's a cheap shot.”
And it is. But you're still dead.
“Who are you?” you ask, since it seems like he's not going to bother to introduce himself.
“I am Bartelbus Bartleby,” he answers. “Your great uncle's lawyer.”
“I don't have a great uncle,” you say, frowning.
“This is unfortunately the case,” he agrees. “Your uncle passed away suddenly last month. It has fallen to me to carry out the... unusual terms in his will.”
How do you respond: “He LEFT me something??” “How did he die?” or “You're shitting me”
“Did he leave me something?” How can a guy you didn't even know you were related to have left you something in his will?
Bartelbus opens a folder beside him and hands you some papers. There's a fancy seal at the top with a double-headed rat, but you can't read any of the fancy calligraphy because it's written in a language you don't recognize. “Baron von Schmalzschnoggin's wishes are clear. He decreed that the entirety of his fortune and property would pass to his youngest living descendent. As long as certain... conditions were met.”
“I have a secret great uncle who's a BARON?” you cry excitedly.
“No,” Bartelbus explains patiently. “His name is “Baron”.”
“Oh.”
“Yes, Viscount Baron von Schmalzschnoggin.”
“Right... so what are these 'conditions' I have to meet before getting the loot?”
Bartelbus smiles thinly. “It's a standard Transylvanian will—spend a night in his haunted house and it is yours.”
“Transylvania? Haunted? What???”
“Every self-respecting Transylvanian mansion is at least moderately haunted,” Bartelbus explains. “Do you accept the conditions?”
“How did he die?” you ask curiously.
“An unfortunate accident,” Bartelbus says carefully. “They seem to be genetic so I would suggest against asking any more questions about it.”
Do you:
Ask him more questions about it?
Drop it, and ask about the will?
“You're shitting me!” you cry. “What's your game? Am I on a reality TV show right now or what?” You look around for hidden cameras.
“Do not vex my patience,” Bartelbus warns you.
Do you:
Ask him about your uncle's will?
Or vex his patience?
“Cool,” you say, and head over to the limo with him, waving farewell to Mr. Awaver. “So you mentioned a will?” you ask as the limo pulls away into the gathering storm.
“Indeed,” Bartelbus says. “I assume you would like to see it?”
Do you reply honestly: “Of course!” or sarcastically: “No, I just want to get froyo and go home.”
“Yeah, I'm still good,” you say, and get in the truck with Mr. Awaver. He drives off, and you stop at Quizno's for lunch. “I wonder what would have happened if I'd gone with that guy,” you say to Mr. Awaver.
He glares at you over his roast beef sandwich. “Your gabbing is spoiling the food,” he says. Mr. Awaver is a man of few words and likes others to be too.
I wonder what would have happened if I'd gone with that guy? You wonder silently to yourself. I guess you'll never know.
“Naah,” you say sarcastically. “Why would I care about that? I was really hoping we could get some froyo or something.”
Bartelbus frowns. “This request is most unorthodox, but as a respected servant of your family for many years, I shall endeavor to comply.”
Then you go out for froyo. It's weird at first, especially when Bartelbus keeps asking the girl at the counter if any of these gummi bears are blood flavored, but soon you're having a cute montage where you playfully dab spoons on each other's noses leaving little dollops of frozen yogurt behind. Then you stop to play miniature golf.
“What a fun day!” you say enthusiastically as the limo drops you off at your house. “I hope we can go out again soon.”
“Unfortunately, I don't foresee that being an option,” Bartelbus says, and then leans in to bite your neck. Because he's a vampire. But at least you got some froyo out of it.
You take a wild punch at his head, which takes him by surprise. He crumples to the ground, and you kick him in the face until he lies still. “We have to hide the body!” you say to Mr. Awaver, pushing it into the trailer behind the truck. “Don't argue, you're an accessory to murder now!”
“Am I?” Mr. Awaver asks.
And you turn back to the strange man to see that his eyes are open, and they're red.
With a hiss of rage, he launches himself at you, knocking you both to the manicured lawn. He's thin, but strong. Your arms flail at his face, but then he catches one of your hands in his mouth and bites down hard. You scream as a stinging fills your veins, and soon the world around you blurs and only those red eyes remain.
“There is strength in this one,” you hear the strange man say. “I think he should join us.”
When you wake up, you're on a couch in an office. “What the fuck?” you say. “I thought I was dead.”
“Your supposition was quite correct,” a voice says. You turn and see the man you tried to kill.
“You!” you shout, and launch yourself at him, but he throws you against the wall with one bat of his hand.
“There is no cause for violence now,” he says. “I admired your spirit, young one. It takes a bold mind to attempt to kill a stranger for no conceivable reason. I may have use of that boldness in the future.”
As you pick yourself up off the floor, you realize your neck hurts like crazy. Also, your throat burns with a thirst. A thirst for human blood! “What did you do to me?” you moan.
“I've made you a vampire, like myself,” he answers. “Come.”
“Are we going to prowl the night seeking innocent maidens upon whom to slake our unnatural thirst?” you demand as he leads you down a hall.
“No,” he says. “You're going to be my new paralegal.” Because you're in a law office. And he's a lawyer. Famed supernatural lawyer, Bartelbus Bartleby.
“This blows!” you say after he shows you your desk.
“Our first task is to complete the mission I was on when you so unexpectedly attacked me,” he says. He takes out a folder with a bunch of papers in a weird language. There's a seal with a two-headed rat at the top. “Your great uncle's will,” he clarifies.
“I have a great uncle?” you ask.
“Not anymore,” he says. “It was his wish that all of his estates and fortune should pass to his youngest living descendent.”
“Alright!” you say, punching the air, but when the lawyer raises his eyebrows at you, you remember about being dead and all. “Oh.”
“According to my records, the next youngest descendent would be your cousin, Francine. Do you think you can handle this task on your own?”
Do you reply:
“No, for real,” you continue, heedless of his warning. “Is this some kind of like haunted-house-themed reality show? Where like you spend a night terrifying me and if I make it, I win a million dollars?”
Bartelbus frowns at you. “How did you know the house was haunted?”
“Duh!” you say. “A creepy dude I've never seen before tells me a great uncle I've never heard of has left me something in his will? Classic.”
“Indeed,” Bartelbus sighs. “We have been doing this for some time—no wonder it has leaked into popular mythos. This is most unfortunate.”
“Are there any other contestants?” you demand. “Has anyone already claimed the role of the bitchy one?” Even if the answer is “Yes,” you're confident that you can out-bitch anyone. “Are there any house rules about homemade flamethrowers?” you ask. “I'm... uh, asking for a friend.”
“You already know too much,” Bartelbus says, and throws you out of the car. Unfortunately, the limo is traveling over a bridge at the time and you plummet over the edge.
“NOOOOOO!” you scream as you fall, landing in the icy waters of the river.
Do you:
“Hell yes!” you say. “I'm not a BABY. Plus, I'm now a vampire. I guess.”
“Very well.” Bartelbus hands you the papers. They're still in that weird language, but you can read it! Maybe they're vampire runes or something. Unfortunately they don't reveal any ancient vampire secrets. It's just standard will legalese. “You should slake your eternal thirst before you do anything else,” Bartelbus adds. “You wouldn't want to risk biting your cousin Francine.”
“Right,” you say as you leave. Now to find a victim. Do you choose:
A hot girl who's foolishly left her window open?
Some dude on the street?
“Fuck you!” you say. “That inheritance is mine! There's no way in hell I'm going to let Francine steal it from me! Francine's already a world-renowned alligator wrestler! She doesn't need any more money or prestige! But me... I could go to topiary school! I could... I could be the blingiest, sparkliest vampire ever!”
“Don't bet on it,” Bartelbus Bartleby sighs.
“You can't discriminate against me just because I'm dead!” you shout at him. “I'll sue you! I'll sue my inheritance right out of you!”
“Very well,” Bartelbus Bartleby agrees with a sigh. “I'll see you in supernatural court. Best of luck finding a lawyer.”
You stomp out of his law office before you realize that you have no idea how to find a lawyer to defend you against a vampire in supernatural court. Do you:
You wildly kick for the surface, but of course you don't know how to swim. You flail your arms around a bit, hoping you'll get the hang of it, and you think you've almost got it. “Swimming isn't so hard,” you say to yourself, right before you're smacked in the head by a passing garbage scow. Your blood attracts the river sharks, that descend ferociously upon your floating body.
You slowly sink to the bottom, because what do you really have to live for? Your parents died trying to win the Historic Mazelandia Democratic Race of Fortune when you were just a child. The official letter you got said that they died peacefully in their sleep while camping in a pleasant meadow, but you know that it's far more likely that they were attacked by Mazelandian Face Eating Tigers. Practically every other person that year was. You heard some douchebag won. For awhile you vowed to find him or her and kill them, or at least slap them around a bit, for daring to be alive when your parents are dead, but then you got distracted by dreams of topiary school and somehow vengeance just didn't seem worth it. What was even the point? Everyone dies eventually anyway. It looks like you're dying now.
The only person left to mourn you will probably be your cousin Francine. Her parents also died in a freak accident, so you've always been close. Well, sort of close. She's kind of unpleasant and actually kind of painful to look at, but she's the only family you have left. When will she hear about your death? You'll probably be a missing person before they find your body months later, all chewed by fish and partially decayed. It'll probably wash up on some beach and terrify some children. Or maybe not, maybe they'll just shrug and keep texting their girlfriends. Kids these day, amirite?
Will Francine look for you? Will Francine even care? No, Francine has better things to worry about than her shiftless cousin. She's a world-renowned alligator wrestler after all. You've never been world-renowned at anything, you think bitterly. Even topiary, your dream occupation. You kind of suck at it, truth be told, and it's easy to admit the truth to yourself when you're going to die anyway.
Speaking of death, why are you still conscious? Shouldn't you have drowned awhile ago? What's the deal?
You frown as you sit on the bottom of the river, contemplating your continued existence. You're almost positive it's not normal to be able to hold your breath this long. The funny thing is, you don't feel like you're holding your breath at all?
“I'm breathing underwater?” you say incredulously, but it just comes out as a string of bubbles.
“That's right,” says a passing catfish. That's a string of bubbles too, but somehow you can understand it.
“What?” you demand.
“You're one of us,” says the catfish. It sounds bored.
“WHAT?” you demand. And then realization dawns. “I'm a motherfucking mermaid!” It all makes sense!
Actually, it doesn't, but whatever. “No,” the catfish corrects you. “Mermaids are strictly salt water. Fancy bastards. You're a siltmaid.”
“Damn,” you say. Of course you turn out to be a third-rate mythical creature. “So do I swim around this river, tempting men to their doom or what?”
“Suit yourself,” the catfish says, and swims off.
Do you:
Sing to try to attract foolish mortals to their watery grave?
Swim around like a fish on the go?
Confront these snobby mermaids if they think they're so great?
Bartelbus sighs, and promptly pushes you out of the limo. Unfortunately, it is currently traveling over a bridge, and you plunge over the side.
“NOOOOOOOO!” you scream as you fall, landing in the icy waters of the river.
Do you:
“I accept,” you say. “Of course! Who wouldn't want to go to a haunted house? And win a bunch of cash?”
“Very well,” Bartelbus nods. “I have already made the necessary travel arrangements, and we are currently en route to the airport.”
Luckily you sleep for most of the journey, because Bartelbus Bartleby does not seem like that great a conversationalist. But, after three planes and two trains, you finally find yourself standing outside your great uncle's mansion. It's even bigger and more foreboding than you imagined. There are towers with turrets and ominous windows staring at you like big empty eyes. It's thundering in the distance, appropriately, and the mountains all around you stab at the sky. “So this is going to be mine?” you ask, awed.
“Should you survive the night,” Bartelbus agrees calmly. “The local time is almost noon, so I suggest you make your way inside. I will lock the door behind you and come to collect you at noon tomorrow.”
“Are there any servants or anything?” you ask doubtfully as he ushers you towards the door.
He smiles thinly. “You will be the only living soul in the house, I assure you.”
Somehow you are not that assured.
“No thanks,” you say. “I'm not really into haunted houses.”
“Is it possible that you do not realize the opportunity this represents?” Bartelbus asks, although his tone of voice says he doesn't really care. “This could change your life forever!”
“Yeah, through PTSD,” you say. “No thanks.”
“Very well,” Bartelbus says, and then bites your neck
“What the fuck?” you demand trying to push him away, but he's much stronger than he looks.
“The inheritance must pass to the youngest living descendent,” Bartelbus clarifies for you in his monotone lawyer voice. “Since you refuse, I must ensure there is a new youngest living descendent.”
“Noooooo!” you scream as he bites you again and again, draining your blood away. Your last thought is that maybe he'll make you a vampire like him, but he must not like you enough. It looks like your only options are:
To descend into oblivion or
You prowl the night like the creature of darkness that you are. There's a thematically appropriate full moon in the sky, now that the thunderstorm has cleared the air. You come to a darkened house, lonely at the end of a street, but some new vampire sense tells you that this is the place you'll find your thirst quenched. You vampire-sneak around to the side of the house and look up to see a window wide open. “Foolish mortal!” You grin and begin your bat-like ascent.
Well, cat-like ascent.
Okay, more like a penguin-like ascent. You kind of flop around for awhile, trying to throw yourself up a sheer wall. There's not even a tree for you to climb. How are you supposed to do this? Aren't you supposed to be able to fly or turn into a bat or something?
Finally, you just break in through the back kitchen window. You prowl around the kitchen, noting that someone needs to do the dishes—gross--and finally make your precarious way to the staircase. At least you can see alright in the dark, not all vampire powers were overhyped. You creep up the stairs dramatically, pausing at the top in a suitably menacing pose even though no one's watching you. Melodrama also seems to come with being a vampire.
You stalk down the upstairs hallway, ignoring all the other doors. You know the one you want. You push it open and it gives a suitably dramatic creak. You slither across the floor, but trip over a pile of laundry and hit your head on the dresser. “Ow!”
There's a stirring from the bed. “Is someone there?” a groggy voice asks.
“Only your doom!!!!!” you shriek, and leap towards the bundle of covers.
The figure under them tries to struggle, but you have vampire strength on your side! Soon you are biting into sweet flesh...
No, wait, grody unwashed flesh.
You fall back, spitting. “EW!” you say. “When was the last time you took a shower? That's nasty!”
Her only response is to seize the bedside lamp and smack you over the head with it, then throw you out the window. “I'm a professional blogger!” she shrieks at you. “I don't have time for trivial things like showering, GOD!” Then the window slams shut.
You groan where you landed in a pile of trash cans and pick egg shells and banana peels out of your hair. The innocent maidens who foolishly leave their windows open at night are not as nubile and beautiful as you've been led to believe. It must be the advent of air conditioning. Really cramps a vampire's style.
Anyway, do you try to eat someone else?
Or just head on over to your Cousin Francine's?
After eating some dude to sate your eternal thirst, you head on over to see your Cousin Francine. You were close growing up because both your parents died in tragic and unexpected circumstances, but you haven't seen much of her lately, every since she became a world-renowned alligator wrestling champion. It's probably one of the only fields where you can be world-renowned at something and look like that. Her hideous facial scarring is probably a badge of honor, even though she didn't get it from an alligator attack.
You travel much faster now that you're a vampire, and soon arrive at her sprawling mansion. You give the large, ornate fountain outside a wide berth because, like almost every other part of your cousin's estate, it's infested with alligators. You ring the door bell and look bitterly up at the extravagant facade of the house. Your cousin doesn't even need this inheritance! She's already loaded!
To your surprise, she answers the door yourself. “Whoa, I wasn't expecting you,” she says. “You look different, are you okay?”
“I'm good,” you say. “I'm just a vampire now or whatever.”
“Oh. Cool,” she says. “Come in, if you want.”
The inside of her house is magnificent: all marble and gold leaf and imported ming vases on pedestals. There's an elaborate crystal chandelier above your head, and the wall has a beautiful mosaic of alligator wrestling, picked out in gemstones. Also, the whole place smells like alligator. You see one lounging in a sunken fountain in the entryway. “This place is pretty sweet,” you say. “Does it have a pool?”
“Five,” Francine answers, leading you into the cavernous living room.
“Are there any not infested with alligators?” you ask.
“Nope,” she says.
You scream as something lunges at your ankles from under the couch, but Francine deftly kicks it in the nose and it slinks away. “I've got to stay on top of my game,” she explains. “That's why I let them have free run of the house. So that I remain ever vigilant and keep my skills honed.”
You sit down on the couch across from her. “That's great,” you say. “Listen, I'd love to catch up more, but I actually came here on a job.” You take out the papers Bartelbus gave you. “Our great uncle died and left his youngest living descendent his vast estates and whatever.”
“You're two years younger than me,” she reminds you.
“Yeah, I know, but kind of dead?” you remind her. “Living dead, but it doesn't count, I guess, so it's down to you.” You hand her the papers.
“I can't read these,” she says. “There in some kind of weird language—and what's this two headed rat thing?”
“It's our great uncle's seal,” you say, and you don't know how you know. “And those are vampire runes. They say that to claim the fortune, you have to spend the night in our great uncle's haunted Transylvanian mansion.”
“We have a great uncle?” she says skeptically. “A rich great uncle? From Transylvania?”
“I guess,” you shrug. “So, will you do it?”
She looks at the papers again. “Only if you go with me,” she says. “What do you say?”
Whatever, Bartelbus doesn't know everything. You feel fine. You decide to just head on over to your cousin Francine's house anyway, to get it over with. You grew up close because both your parents died in tragic and unexpected circumstances, but you haven't seen much of her lately, ever since she became a world-renowned alligator wrestling champion. You suppose it's one of the only fields where you can be world-renowned at something and look like that. Her hideous facial scarring is probably a badge of honor, even though she didn't get it from an alligator attack.
You travel must faster now that you're a vampire, and soon arrive at her sprawling mansion. You give the large, ornate fountain outside a wide berth because, like almost every other part of your cousin's estate, it's infested with alligators. You ring the door bell and look bitterly up at the extravagant facade of the house. Your cousin doesn't even need this inheritance! She's already loaded!
To your surprise, she answers the door yourself. “Whoa, I wasn't expecting you,” she says. “You look different, are you okay?”
But you're not okay. You can't take your eyes away from Francine's long, delicious neck. Your whole life you've thought of her as kind of gross and unpleasant—she always smells like alligators—but suddenly it's the most enticing aroma in the world. You lunge towards her and she takes a step back. “What—?” she cries, but you're now vampire fast! You jump on her, knocking you both to the floor. You hiss and bare your fangs in expectations of the delicious meal of blood you are about to enjoy.
Unfortunately, your cousin is a world-renowned alligator wrestler. Though she was initially taken by surprise, soon instinct takes over. She throws you off her, grabs the nearest cattle prod, and electrocutes you repeatedly until you lie still. You regain consciousness as the alligators in the fountain outside are devouring your organs. Unfortunately it's very hard to kill a vampire, so you're conscious for most of this process.
You walk around looking for a payphone so you can search the yellow pages in the attached phone book for a supernatural lawyer to face a vampire lawyer in supernatural court. Then you plan to tear the page out dramatically so that no one else can look at it (rude). Unfortunately, your plan is foiled by the fact that's it's not 1983 anymore. You wander around almost all night and don't see any phone booths at all. What is the world coming to? Why in my day, narrative convention could be relied upon to take care of this kind of thing.
There must be SOMEWHERE you can go that would still contain a phone book, despite it being an obsolete relic of a bygone age. Oh, of course! The library!
Ugh, but that means going to the library. Do you:
Or just keep wandering around the streets?
The library smells like a dead thing, but so do you so you can't judge. The carpet is probably older than Bartlebus Bartleby and there's no one around at this hour, except the librarian behind the desk. She looks exactly like you would expect a librarian who habitually gets handed this dead shift to look like. She probably is super into knitting and her cats and knitting for her cats.
“Can I help you?” she asks. You'd think she'd be happy to have something besides staring at the water-damaged ceiling to do, but she sounds bored. “We don't get many vampires in here.”
“How can you tell I'm a vampire???” you demand.
She shrugs. “You have that undead look about you. Plus, the smell.”
“Sure, like you can smell anything over the stench of moldy paper,” you retort.
“That's not the books,” she says. “It's my page.”
“What?” you ask, not being familiar with library job titles.
“He shelves the books,” she says, pointing.
You turn to see a hunched figure pushing a library cart. At first you think it's someone in a full-body leotard or maybe a wet suit, but as he moves under a flickering light bulb, you realize it's a mummy! The bandages wrapped around his body are brown and moldy, and he moves with jerking, lurching precariousness. “Has this town always been full of creepy monsters?” you demand.
“Yes,” the librarian answers. “You just couldn't see them before you were one of us.”
“One of us? What are you?”
“A librarian,” she says with a shrug. “Now what do you want?”
Do you:
Ask her how to find a supernatural lawyer?
Ask her how to reverse your vampirification?
“I shall represent myself!” you vow. “How hard can it be? I have, like, most of a highschool education. And one of the classes I didn't fail was civics! That's all you need, right? Right!” Then you spend the next week trying to find note cards until it is time for your trial.
“Crap!” you say as you walk into the court room. “Having a giant stack of note cards is the only thing I actually remember from civics class! I'm so screwed!”
And of course Bartelbus Bartleby is already there, looking unruffled and completely prepared like the suave, ancient vampire that he is. The judge is some kind of pixie maiden and the jury is made up entirely of different colored snails.
“Last chance to settle this dispute out of court,” Bartelbus tells you.
Do you settle?
Or not?
“Alright, let's do this!” you say excitedly. If there's one thing you know about mermaids, it's that their main job is sitting on rocks, tempting mortal men into the water to drown. And then you... eat them or something? You're not actually clear on the purpose of this activity, you just know it's traditional.
You haul yourself up on a rock in the river, and start to sing. “MY MILKSHAKE BRINGS ALL THE BOYS TO THE YARD!” you shriek in your dulcet tones.
“SHUT UP!” yells a man's voice from under the bridge.
This is it! I'm totally going to tempt him to his doom! You keep singing. The voice keeps yelling at you to shut up. “That's the most hideous noise I've ever heard!”
Jerk. But it sounds like he's coming closer so at least it's working. Finally you see a figure swimming towards you into the river.
Wait, swimming?? He should be drowning! This isn't right!
“You're supposed to drown!” you call to him.
“Too bad I can fucking swim!” he says, and punches you in the face. “Shut up!” he yells. “Some of us are trying to sleep!”
“I'm a mermaid—sort of,” you say. “I've got to tempt mortal men to their doom with the power of my voice.”
“You could tempt mortal men to something,” he says.
You don't give up so easily. Unfortunately the man who lives under the bridge turns out to be a much better swimmer than you, which seems monumentally unfair. On the plus side, he can't drown you, but he can smack you in the face with a rusty piece of siding until you pass out. Then the current carries your body downstream, where the salt water of the ocean slowly kills you.
“Alright!” you think. “Siltmaid! Time to explore my new home!”
You swim up and down the river, excitedly exploring everything! Unfortunately, most of what there is to see is super polluted. Soon you start to hallucinate from the fumes.
“Help me!” you croak to a giant rainbow sunfish made of colors that don't even exist. “I'm just a poor little siltmaid.”
“Do you dream of being human?” the hallucinogenic sunfish asks. “I will give you legs so that you may walk on land once again. But you've got to literally give up your voice for a dude, and if he doesn't put out within three days I get to repossess your soul.”
“Sounds... fair,” you choke out.
You look down and find that you have legs again!!! Yay! Thanks, magical sunfish! You eagerly walk up the bank to find the dude you have to seduce. Wow, walking has gotten a lot harder than you remember... and was the sky always that blurry and drippy? Why is it so hard to breathe?
The sunfish was a hallucination. You have no legs. You've dragged yourself up onto land to die like a beached whale. Later some scientists find you and pickle your body to freak out children.
What? I didn't say they were very good scientists.
You swim away from the bridge, letting the current carry you downstream. Eventually this river must reach the ocean, right? You travel for the rest of the night, sometimes dozing and letting the current push you. The fish you pass aren't very talkative.
Finally, as day is breaking, you can see the ocean. There are seagulls flying overhead. “Almost there!” you announce to no one. “I'll show those stupid mermaids what--” But you break off in a coughing fit. Suddenly it's hard to breathe! Your body is weakening. What's happening? It's like you're drowning, but that doesn't make sense! You're a siltmaid!
The last thing you see are some mermaids—the catfish was right, they really are prettier than you—laughing at your thrashing. “Idiot siltmaid!” one says. “Don't you know you can't survive in salt water?”
“They really are stupider and uglier!” another one laughs, a tinkling, bell-like laugh you know is more beautiful than any sound you could make. Then you die. It's basically natural selection at work.
You decide to just keep wandering around the streets. You're bound to come across something or someone that will help you. It's practically a narrative law. Still on the lookout for a phone booth, you continue your aimless journey until the sun comes up.
There's just one problem. Bartelbus Bartleby is clearly a traditionalist. He's not one of those whiny emo sparkly vampires. He's a hardcore, fundamentalist when it comes to sunlight. He won't stand there being glittery like a depressed teenager who wears way too much body glitter. Touch him with natural light, and he will legit burst into flames. It's how his ancestor vampires did it. It's how he does it. He doesn't hold with any of this newfangled crap.
And he's the one who turned you into a vampire, which means you don't either.
As the sun rises, your skin starts to smoke. You scream and try to run, but there's no where you can hide. You're exposed, and the sunlight crests over the rooftops and hits you fully. You scream as you burst into flame, the cleansing fire burning through your body and leaving only a pile of ash behind.
“Okay, fine, I'll settle,” you say.
“Excellent,” says Bartelbus. “I think you'll find my terms more than fair.”
You think about these words every day for the next four hundred years, as you go about your daily legal filing, chained to a desk.
“Hell no! There's no way I'm settling!” you retort. “What do I look like? A quitter? Bring it on!”
“Very well,” says Bartelbus. “Bailiff?”
The bailiff is a short man with a long beard. Maybe a dwarf or a gnome or something? To your surprise, he walks up to you and immediately punches you in the face.
“Hey! What--?” you demand.
“You obviously have no understand of the procedures of supernatural law,” Bartelbus says sadly. “Since you failed to file the proper pre-trial paperwork, the bailiff must beat you until you cry tears of pure truth.”
“What the hell does that mean?” you demand, as the bailiff kicks you in the stomach.
The judge drums her fairy hands on the table, clearly bored.
“I OBJECT!” you shout.
The judge suddenly grins, flaps her green wings, and launches herself into the air and towards you. “Finally!” she says. “You were taking forever, and I'm hungry!”
“What!” you demand. Her teeth are incredibly sharp.
“Supernatural law procedure also states that the minute anyone tries to fake their way through using legal terms they learned from watching TV, the judge gets to eat you,” Bartelbus explains.
“Maybe it's for the best,” he adds, as the fairy judge digs in to your liver. “You would clearly make a terrible paralegal.”
So you're dead then. Good job.
When Death comes for you, you resist, and so she graciously allows you to become a ghost. There are rules, though. You can't just ghost around the world spying on locker rooms or freaking out college students in isolated cabins. You're bound to haunt the place you died, and for you that's the limo. By the time you regain ghost-consciousness, Bartelbus Bartleby is already gone, probably off to find your next-youngest relative, your cousin Francine. You half-heartedly wish you could warn her about him, but not very much. You can't tell if it's the emotions of your previous life falling away with your corporeal body, or if you just never really liked Francine much. Maybe it's both.
Anyway, the limo sits in a garage for awhile, and you spend most of your time snoozing in the glove box. Eventually, though, you hear the hum of the engine and float out to hover near the sun roof, unseen by the driver. “Where are we going?” you ask excitedly, but of course he can't hear you. You try scaring him a few times by appearing suddenly in his rear view mirror, but he never reacts, so you assume he has no hint of psychic ability. Eventually the limo stops at a house with a bunch of teenagers in fancy dress outside, and you realize you're about to haunt a ride to prom. You try to scare them by making things rattle, but they're too busy texting on their phones to notice.
This becomes something of a pattern, and you soon get bored overhearing high school gossip and catty fights about whose dress looks the sluttiest. Every time you try to float out a window or door, something stops you, the only physical thing in this intangible world. Eventually your spirit flags and you weaken, becoming just an odd cold spot, and finally a memory of a feeling.
“I really need a supernatural lawyer,” you say. “Can you help me find one? I don't even know where to start.”
The librarian rolls her eyes. “Here, let me google that for you,” she says witheringly.
An hour later she has given you a crash course on searching for information on the Internet. Mr. Awaver had a computer in his office, but he only used it to play solitaire, and the foster parents you grew up with called them “the devil's box,” so you've never really used one before. “This is so awesome!” you say after looking at your first cat gif. “What else can this magical box do?”
“Lots,” the librarian says, studying her nails in a bored way. “I teach tutorials.”
Do you want to:
Set up an online dating profile?
Or do what you're supposed to be doing, look for a supernatural lawyer?
“Do you know a way to reverse vampirification?” you ask.
“So you want to be a reverse vampire, huh?” The librarian still sounds bored. “Kind of a weird request, but okay.” She sets aside her book and takes out a pencil out of her bun. It is fancy and bejeweled and probably imbued with occult significance. She stands up on her chair and pushes you around in a circle as she recites a poem, taping you on the head with the pencil with each rotation:
“Turn around nine times and then again
Go back to a time before the hearse
Out the other side of night
Reverse, reverse the vampire's curse”
Smoke fills your eyes and you cough and fall on the floor, gagging. You feel your body lurching, changing. Your fangs shoot back up into your gums until there aren't any teeth there at all, just bloody holes. Your fingernails likewise retract, and when you stand up, your night vision is gone. In fact, you're almost blind. “What's happened to me?” you ask, feeling your way to the desk.
“You're a reverse vampire,” the librarian says. You can't see her anymore, but you're sure she shrugged.
“But that's not... I wanted to be...” Then you vomit a stream of blood all over yourself.
“My life's been pretty stressful lately, how about something good to read?” you ask.
She sighs. “I guess.” She puts her own book aside. “So what kinds of books do you like to read?”
It suddenly occurs to you how very thirsty you are. You can't remember the last time you ate, and anyway, you're not hungry for food now. You crave the taste of human blood. The librarian will have to do.
You lunge across the desk at her, fangs piercing her neck. She doesn't struggle at all, maybe she knows you're too strong and there is no escape. Her blood doesn't taste like you expected. Not the rich tang of iron but the dry, dusty of old books. There's something else too, something that hits you after you lean back, momentarily sated, like a lingering spiciness on the tongue. It's almost overwhelming.
You groan, clutching your head. “What is this?” you shriek. The librarian lying beside you is barely conscious. “What are you?” you demand.
“I told you,” she says weakly. “I'm a librarian.” Then she grows cold and your vampire senses tell her that she's gone. Or is she?
000: General Knowledge, Computer Science and Information, her voice whispers in your head. 100: Philosophy and psychology. It sounds like her voice, anyway, while at the same time it is also the sound of other voices as well, like a chorus, that together becomes the sound of a million pages turning, and all of them are inside your head. There isn't space to think of anything else. Your mind feels full, too full, and no longer yours... 200: Religion. 300: Social sciences. 400: Language. 500: Science. 600: Technology. 700: Arts and recreation. 800: Literature. 900: History and geography.
The part of you that's you grows smaller and smaller under the weight of all this. Even your insatiable immortal thirst is withering away.
When you sit up, you are no longer a vampire. You are no longer interested in topiary or inheritances or anything about your former existence. You are not you. You are the librarian. The library is your home, your charge, your life's blood.
You nod to the book shelving mummy as you take your seat at the desk, and pick up the book you dropped before you... changed. Not a noticeable change, though. Not really. Not in the grand scheme of things, and the grand scheme is all you care about, the glorious interconnected web of knowledge that is yours to command. You stretch your new arms, and find your place on the page.
“You expect me to talk to you when there's a real live mummy in the room?” you snort contemptuously at the librarian.
“Suit yourself,” she says and goes back to her book.
You turn towards the mummy library page who is even now trying to read a call number on a book's spine. It must be tough what with the bandages covering his entire face and all.
Do you:
You lunge at the mummy without warning because I guess you're just that belligerent of a person. Plus, you've always wanted to see who would win in an undead boxing match: vampires or mummies?
It's probably too small a sample size to know for sure, but it's clear who wins this round. Your greatest weapon is your teeth, but they just sink into rotting paper which tastes disgusting. “Ew!” you protest, lurching backwards. The mummy doesn't move with finesse, but he doesn't have to in your current state. His torso rotates with his arms out and his arm smashes into your face. Your body crumples to the floor, and he runs the book cart over you repeatedly until you stop struggling.
You come to later, as he's feeding your body into the library's book incinerator. It's the most painful thing you've ever felt, but luckily it only lasts a second.
“Hey, mummy,” you say to the mummy. It turns and looks at you impassively. You think? It's hard to tell with the bandages covering its face. “So... what's up?”
It continues to stare at you, and then after a moment makes a sound like a feeble moan and moves its arms in such a way as to suggest that it's pleased with its lot in after-life, working as a library page, although sometimes it wishes things could be more exciting. It's a complex gesture/sound combo.
“Cool,” you say. “So what's your name? Or... was your name?”
The mummy does another moan and gesture to indicate that in life its name was Pharaoh Ram-Ba-Tep the twenty-third, but you can call it Tep.
“Enough chit chat!” the librarian calls to you. “I have work for you.”
Tep abandons his book cart and heads over to the desk. You follow.
The librarian hands Tep a list. “These are books that are checked in, but aren't where they should be on the shelves,” she says, sounding bored. “I need you to check around for them—they could be lost, or misplaced, or...”
“Murdered?!?!” you cry.
She rolls her eyes. “Don't get cocky, kid. This is an open and shut case, and I want to be home by dinner. Just keep your head down.”
Tep makes a moaning noise that seems to indicate he will gladly take on this task, although he would appreciate some help. He looks meaningfully at you. The librarian seems skeptical. “Do you have any library experience?” she asks you.
“Not really—I was banned from my school library for writing choose your own adventure stories in the margins of the encyclopedias.” The librarian looks like she might banish you from this library too, and that would totally wreck your plans to have an undead mummy BFF! So you quickly add, “But everyone was so freaked out by how the librarian dealt with me, no one ever dared write in another book again.” It was true. You still have the scars.
This librarian sighs. “You're a loose cannon, but you get results. Come back to me when you have something.”
You and Tep the mummy make your way back into the shelves. You have a feeling this case is more than meets the eye. “I've got a feeling this case is more than meets the eye. What book are we looking for?”
Tep hands you the list and you read the first title. “Faking Transylvanian Wills for Profit and Fun? I knew it.” You light a cigar to show just how much you knew it. “I knew I smelled a rat. Let's roll.”
Tep does things by the book, really set in his ways, like most five thousand year old dead pharaohs. So he insists you search the shelves for the book before jumping to conclusions. He moans at you as you look, a moan that seems to say that it could be just another misshelving case, no reason to get excited.
“Yeah,” you say. “But who would have misshelved this book huh? You do all the shelving around here, and it looks pretty neat to me.”
Tep pauses and then groans to indicate that this is so.
“No, I'm working a different angle,” you continue. “Who would want that particular book? Faked Transylvanian wills? Can't be much call for that kind of thing around here. And why wouldn't they use their library card to check it out? Seems crazy... unless they didn't want anyone to know they had it.”
“Tep! Get over here!” the librarian calls. You and Tep go back through the stacks to her desk. “Are you smoking a cigar? In the library??”
“I play by my own rules!” you shout at her.
“You're off the case!” the librarian screams. “You're off the case, and banned from the library! Hand in your library card now... both of you!”
“What!” you say. Tep moans an affronted moan that seems to mean the same thing.
“I've got no choice,” the librarian continues. “The library supervisor is really riding me about these missing books—I can't have flagrant disregard for our No Smoking policy added to that rap sheet. My ass is on the line here!”
You sullenly drop your library card on the desk, and Tep reluctantly follows suit.
“Now get outta my sight!” the librarian commands. You angrily slam the door on the way out, Tep shuffles sadly.
“Don't worry, Tep,” you say, as you both walk out into the night. “I say we solve this case on our own—show her what we're made of. And I know just the guy to talk to.”
You head to Bartelbus Bartleby's office, but his pet bat tells you he's at your Cousin Francine's house, no doubt talking about your great uncle's will.
Do you:
“I'd like to read a romance novel, please,” you say. It's just the thing to take your mind off the wreck your life has become.
“Whatever,” the librarian says. “Over there.” She points to the section and you go over, taking one at random. You flip to a random page:
“...its teeth! They're dripping with dangerous acid, but something about the way the moonlight hits those hideous fangs is somehow... sensual. Darkly so. I feel myself growing wet at the thought, and it's not just the fetid swamp I'm half-submerged in. I came on this mission to hunt chupacabra, but now... it's hunting me! At first, I thought it was trying to eat me, but if so, wouldn't it have attacked already?
Instead, it lowers its gaping maw, and sniffs. Then howls at the moon and reaches one of its six mangled limbs out to gently caress my mud-encrusted hair. There's such hunger in its eyes, such passion. Possibly to suck the blood of goats, but maybe also for me? It's a slim chance, but I'm so worked up I'm willing to take it. I launch myself at the monster, pressing my lips against his growling mouth. His acidic saliva burns where it touches my flesh, but these are just love bites, and I will wear them proudly.
As we tumble together in the stinking waters of the swamp, I can't help but think of Francois. I regret doing this to him, but he never gave me what I needed—he always held himself too aloof from me, like some kind of swamp version of Mr. Darcy. Even though we're betrothed by ancient swamp custom, how can I love a man who never lets me near him? Or near... his heart? Or near any other part of him for that matter. The chupacabra has no such compunctions—already its acidic saliva is splashing over my bared breasts like a delicious and sexy second degree burn.
And as I gaze up into the beast's flaming orange eyes, so filled with rabid hunger, I recognize them. Those are Francois' rabid burning eyes!
“Francois!” I gasp. “Can it be you?”
The beast howls and I know it to be true. This is why Francois could never let me get close! He was too ashamed to reveal... his true form.
“Why would you hide this from me?” I ask, tenderly caressing his twisted horns. “I like you even better this way.”
He howls again, and rips off the rest of my clothes with one swipe of his poisonous claws.
The next day I'm in the hospital on life support, but it was worth it. Francois the chupacabra is the hottest mythical creature I've had sex with yet—including that time I met the Jersey Devil at a Quizno's.”
You close the book and put it back on the shelf. Mythical creature romances are so over done, blah. Maybe you should ask the librarian for a different genre.
“I'd like a cookbook, please,” you ask the librarian. You're a terrible cook, but you're always trying to improve.
“Whatever,” she says. “Over there.” She gestures vaguely to the section and you walk over, selecting one at random. It's about desserts, which are delicious, so you open it to a random page:
“DESSERT DIP!” the heading reads. “This delicious dip is perfect for dipping fruit or cookies. Way healthier than just eating frosting straight out of the can or mainlining sugar or whatever it is you crazy kids are doing these days! Here's the recipe:
1 box of cake mix, whatever flavor you want!
2 cups of fat free vanilla yogurt, or any other flavor you want!
8 oz. Cool whip
1 tsp vanilla or whatever
SPRINKLES SPRINKLES SPRINKLES!
Mix that shit up! Enjoy!
It makes a whole fucking lot, so you might want to cut it down unless you're going to a party. Or don't, I don't care what you do.”
Although yesterday this recipe would sound extremely appetizing, somehow it leaves a sour taste in your mouth now that you're a vampire. Maybe vampires don't like dessert you think sadly, and put the book back. Do you try another one? Or ask the librarian for a different kind of book:
“I'm thinking a children's picture book might be my style,” you say.
“Or at your max reading level,” the librarian snorts. “Over there.”
These shelves are smaller than the others, in the dankest, darkest section of the library. There are some moldy beanbags chairs, and someone has drawn a stick figure family on the wall. They all have unnaturally large eyes, and you feel them watching you as you kneel to select a book. The one you choose is called A Child's Garden of Curses. You open to a random page and squint to read:
“... and the timing is imperative. Anyone can scream and throw a tantrum, but the true professional knows exactly when and where. In public is best, of course, and the wise choose a place with plenty of handy breakable objects. Also essential is to break up cries with other noises and strange, eerie periods of silence. A parent can become immune to the annoying sounds their children make, but is startled out of their calm by sudden silence. Use this to your best advantage in the middle of the night.”
What the hell? There's a warning in all caps at the bottom of the page: “DO NOT LET THESE SECRETS FALL INTO ADULT HANDS. SHOULD ONE APPROACH YOU, TURN THE PAGE QUICKLY.”
You turn the page and find a picture of a sad turtle, accompanied by these innocuous words: “Mr. Turtle doesn't make a noise. Some say he is too sad even to cry. Won't you help cheer Mr. Turtle up?” Okay, maybe not entirely innocuous. The turtle looks like what he most wants is your tears. You close the book. The children's section is too creepy. It's probably time to select another genre:
“I'd like a self-help book, please,” you say. You're feeling pretty lost with all these changes in your life.
“I know just the one,” says the librarian, and walks you over to a set of shelves by the darkened window. “Here.” She pulls out a worn paperback with a sad bat on the cover. The title reads Undead Depression: What to do when your afterlife is getting you down.
You sit down in a dilapidated armchair, and open to the table of contents. The subject headings all seem extremely relevant so you don't know where to start:
Coming to terms with your new powers
Justifying your crimes and satisfying your lusts in a mindful manner
“I'd like a nonfiction book, please,” you say because you mean serious business.
Librarians respect people who mean serious business. She scrutinizes you for a moment, then writes a call number down on a scrap of paper with a little golf pencil. “Here,” she says, handing it to you. “Try that one.”
You follow the signs on the ends of the shelves, and then crane your neck up to look for the book she recommended. It's a thick hard cover that almost breaks your wrist as you try to lift it down with one hand. You can see why she recommended it immediately. The title is Haunted Houses of Transylvania. There's a picture of a foreboding castle on the cover, complete with disapproving gargoyles, shrieking their silent agony to the stormy skies.
You sit down right there in the nonfiction section to read, noting how the pages crackle when you turn them, like they've been wet and then dried. The title page has a stain that looks suspiciously like blood.
You skim, stopping to look at any pictures. Transylvania has so many haunted houses, it's almost like an encyclopedia. Most only get short mentions, little blocks of text that mention the location, owner, and most famous ghost. To merit full-page treatment, a house has to have something really whacked going for it—orgies of blood, classrooms full of ghostly schoolchildren, maybe owned by a famous Transylvanian celebrity.
You determine to find the longest entry in the book, since it will obviously be the most haunted. When you see its picture, your heart stops for an instant, though you couldn't say why. You've never seen this house before. But something about its gaping windows and long, empty front walk makes you sure, sure that it is the house you were meant to inherit. Your great uncle's estate. Something about it calls to you—maybe its in your blood. You eagerly read the description:
“Witchburn Manor is the most haunted structure in all of Transylvania. In fact, it is the only house that is actively seeking to acquire additional occupants, at a rate of at least one per year. Through established arrangements with a supernatural lawyer, prospective candidates are shown the house and tasked to spend one night within its walls. During the course of the night, the house's current ghostly occupants judge the candidate and then decide through ghost vote if he or she is fit to join them permanently. After all, when you have all eternity to spend together, it's important to make sure there's a good fit. Candidates who receive a two-thirds majority of votes are then speedily made eligible for permanent residence (i.e. killed). This system has been in place since at least the 1400s, although paranormal investigators are unable to establish an exact date, partly because the risk of entering is too great. Anyone who dies on the property will become a ghost, bound to haunt the unhallowed mansion for all eternity. This is a marked difference from most haunted property, whose ghosts are resident through some personal trauma of their own. These unusual circumstances have led paranormal investigators to believe that the house itself may have suffered some past trauma, although it is unclear what that may have been.”
The entry goes on, listing the more well-known ghosts that inhabit the mansion, but you stop reading. Bartlebus Bartleby, you think. He was trying to set me up for this! Fed like a sacrifice to a house full of ghosts to judge if he was worthy to become one of them! The entry didn't mention what happened to the ghost-candidates who didn't get a two-thirds majority of the ghost-vote. Presumably they weren't killed on the property because then they'd become a ghost anyway. But you're so personable and cool, you know you would have made it! They would have killed you and left you to haunt that house forever!
Sure, now you're undead, but at least you get to move around. And now he's going after your cousin Francine?
Should you try to warn her?
Or forget about it, not like it's your business anymore
“I NEED to set up an online dating profile,” you decide. Finding a lawyer can wait, you've got priorities!
The librarian sighs. “Fine, whatever,” she says. “But I won't be held accountable for your success... or lack thereof.”
Over the next few hours, the librarian helps you select a picture for your profile and decide on descriptions of yourself that are flattering without being outright lies. “Now you just wait for people to message you,” she says. “Or you could message them, I'm not the boss of you.” She wanders away to question the mummy library page about some misplaced books.
Your profile hasn't been online for five minutes, when you receive two messages!! One is from a hot chupacabra!!! The other seems to be from a spambot.
Which do you read?
“I want to be an internet troll!!” you cry enthusiastically.
The librarian rolls her eyes. “Of course you do. But internet trolls aren't made. They're born. Do you really think you have what it takes?”
“YES!” you shout defiantly, like you imagine an internet troll would.
“Alright,” she says. “But first I'll have to administer a test to be sure.”
“BRING IT!”
“Very well. Let's say you read a blog post about a recipe someone made. It doesn't really matter what recipe—how do you respond?”
“The other options sound tempting,” you admit. “But I really should concentrate on finding a supernatural lawyer so that I can win back my inheritance.”
“Whatever,” the librarian shrugs, and gives you a quick tutorial on information literacy and what databases to use. Then she leaves you to your own devices. After performing a search just like she taught you, a little dot appears for a highly-qualified supernatural lawyer in your area!
“Great!” you think, but when you click on it, it is of course Bartelbus Bartleby.
“Dag,” you commiserate, but continue to read the page anyone. It has Bartelbus Bartleby's complete biography, and maybe there'll be something there you can use:
“Bartelbus Bartleby was the most respected and feared orator in Puritan Massachusetts in the 1600s. His hobbies included shaming libidinous women, hiking, and vampire hunting. After an unsuccessful vampire hunt in 1667 ended in his death and subsequent reanimation as the undead, he fled south, fearing to spread his contamination among his god-fearing brethren. Bartelbus Bartleby's skill for oratory remained with him through his after life and he eventually rose to prominence as one of the most well-known supernatural lawyers in the country. His most memorable court victory to date is the infamous 1914 case of Swamp Thing vs. Marsh Monster, in which he successfully prosecuted Swamp Thing for copyright infringement.
Bartelbus Bartleby embraced his new vampirisim with the same zeal and focus he had once dedicated to Puritanism in life, making many pilgrimages to the old country and forging contacts there. Most notable is his interest in Witchburn Manor, the famed most haunted house in Transylvania.”
The article goes on, but there's a picture of Witchburn Manor and somehow you can't look away. You feel drawn to this house in a way you can't explain. Maybe it's your new vampire senses. The name is also a link, so you click on it for more information.
“Witchburn Manor is the most haunted structure in all of Transylvania. In fact, it is the only house that is actively seeking to acquire additional occupants, at a rate of at least one per year. Through established arrangements with a supernatural lawyer, prospective candidates are shown the house and tasked to spend one night within its walls. During the course of the night, the house's current ghostly occupants judge the candidate and then decide through ghost vote if he or she is fit to join them permanently. After all, when you have all eternity to spend together, it's important to make sure there's a good fit. Candidates who receive a two-thirds majority of votes are then speedily made eligible for permanent residence (i.e. killed). This system has been in place since at least the 1400s, although paranormal investigators are unable to establish an exact date, partly because the risk of entering is too great. Anyone who dies on the property will become a ghost, bound to haunt the unhallowed mansion for all eternity. This is a marked difference from most haunted property, whose ghosts are resident through some personal trauma of their own. These unusual circumstances have led paranormal investigators to believe that the house itself may have suffered some past trauma, although it is unclear what that may have been.”
The entry goes on, listing the more well-known ghosts that inhabit the mansion, but you stop reading. Bartlebus Bartleby, you think. He was trying to set me up for this! Fed like a sacrifice to a house full of ghosts to judge if you are worthy to become one of them! The entry didn't mention what happened to the ghost-candidates who didn't get a two-thirds majority of the ghost-vote. Presumably they weren't killed on the property because then they'd become a ghost anyway. But you're so personable and cool, you know you would have made it! They would have killed you and left you to haunt that house forever!
Sure, now you're undead, but at least you get to move around. And now he's going after your cousin Francine?
Should you try to warn her?
Or forget about it, not like it's your business anymore
“Of course I'll go with you!” you say. “With my vampire powers and your alligator wrestling skills, we'll be unstoppable!”
“Great,” she says. “When do we leave?”
“Right now,” you say, taking the travel arrangement bundle Bartelbus Bartleby gave you out of your fancy lawyer briefcase. You look through it while Francine packs. Along with all the information about tickets and addresses, there's also an old book. You frown, wondering if its inclusion in your briefcase was an accident. It's called Haunted Houses of Transylvania. There's a bookmark about halfway through, so you open to the page. The bookmark turns out to be a short note written in vampire runes.
“I cannot help, my hands are tied, but you must be warned.” It's unsigned, but who can it be from but Bartelby? You move it so that you can see the page it was marking:
“Witchburn Manor is the most haunted structure in all of Transylvania. In fact, it is the only house that is actively seeking to acquire additional occupants, at a rate of at least one per year. Through established arrangements with a supernatural lawyer, prospective candidates are shown the house and tasked to spend one night within its walls. During the course of the night, the house's current ghostly occupants judge the candidate and then decide through ghost vote if he or she is fit to join them permanently. After all, when you have all eternity to spend together, it's important to make sure there's a good fit. Candidates who receive a two-thirds majority of votes are then speedily made eligible for permanent residence (i.e. killed). This system has been in place since at least the 1400s, although paranormal investigators are unable to establish an exact date, partly because the risk of entering is too great. Anyone who dies on the property will become a ghost, bound to haunt the unhallowed mansion for all eternity. This is a marked difference from most haunted property, whose ghosts are resident through some personal trauma of their own. These unusual circumstances have led paranormal investigators to believe that the house itself may have suffered some past trauma, although it is unclear what that may have been.”
This is the place you're going??
Do you follow through on your promise?
Or bail now?
“Naah,” you say. “Sounds fun, but I've got a sweet vampire lawyer type gig going on now—way better than cutting lawns or whatever.”
“I guess with your background, it is better than we thought you would do,” Francine agrees. “Your mom thinks you've become a drug dealer.”
“Psh,” you say to show your contempt. In reality, you wanted to become a drug dealer, but your one connection to the seedy world of pot-dealing in your town laughed in your face when you suggested it.
“Well, I respect your drive,” Francine says reluctantly. “I'm sure your parents will too—they'll probably even overlook the fact that you had to die and become a vampire to find motivation.” She snorts. “And all that stupid talk about topiary school.”
You laugh with her, but it's a hollow laugh. When you hear later that Francine died in the haunted house, another victim of its army of insane ghosts, you feel a bitter sense of justice. How dare she laugh at topiary school? That world is closed to you now, now that you live in the darkness, but you will always look back on it as your fondest dream. When the ennui gets too much, you kidnap homeless dudes and decapitate them with pruning shears. The police are baffled and Bartlebus Bartleby turns a blind eye to what he thinks of as youthful shenanigans. He thinks you'll mellow in a century or so and he's willing to take a chance on you till then. It's so tedious training new clerks in supernatural law.
This is no time to be a wuss! You follow that music up the wide, majestic staircase. The carpet is ancient and little clouds of dust poof up under your footsteps. You keep your eyes peeled for ghosts, but so far everything is normal. Well, normal for a Transylvanian mansion. Even though everything is faded and dirty, there isn't really an air of neglect about the place. It feels... lived in. Or, at any rate, inhabited. You feel like it's watching you, but when you turn to look around, there's no one—just creepy paintings and suits of armor and chandeliers. The usual.
At the top of the stairs, you turn right, following the music down a hall. It's coming from a room that obviously has windows facing the west, because sunlight is pouring out into the hall. You peer around the door cautiously—you're brave but not an idiot. Well, not really. There's a piano in the room, and a girl is playing it. You can only see the back of her, but she isn't transparent. She looks normal, if a little old-fashioned. Hair with a bow in it. White dress with a sash. Feet not quite touching the ground. Her hands move over the keys almost mechanically.
But you know it can't be a normal girl. Come on, you're in a haunted house. You're going to go over there and walk around till you can see the rest of her, and she's... not going to have a face, or something. Or it'll be a creepy old woman face in a little girl body. Or she'll look normal at first, but then her jaw will open too wide and there'll be creepy fangs and hissing... Or maybe you'll blink and she'll just be gone. And then you'll turn and she'll be near the door, her back to you again. And you'll follow her all around, and she'll keep disappearing, and you'll only ever see her back...
I mean, you're in a haunted house and she's obviously some kind of creepy child. What do you expect to happen?
I don't care, I'm going in the room
On second thought, hide in a closet
No way are you following creepy piano music up into the dark recesses of a haunted house! You open the closet and jump in. Hopefully the ghosts won't bother you there.
Unfortunately, you don't know anything about this house, so what you took to be a closet door, is actually an open shaft into the basement. Maybe an empty elevator shaft? Or maybe all haunted houses just have random holes in the floor. You don't really have time to debate architecture as you fall screaming into the darkness that awaits you below.
“--AHHHHHHHHHHOW!” Your scream of terror ends in one of pain and surprise. The surprise is because you're not dead. The pain is because you landed on something not-soft. But it's softer than the stones and jagged spikes you were expecting. You awkwardly roll off the pile of fetid hay and dig your cellphone out of your pocket. The ghostly glow from its screen only illuminates so much. There are vague shapes that could be old furniture, or possibly old torture devices. You don't see a light switch, or a door.
It takes you a moment to realize your cellphone has timed out, because the room around you is still bathed in that ghostly glow. Except this time it's coming from a ghost. A ghost that's glaring and snarling and looks very much like a monster made out of smaller ghosts, all also glaring and snarling. The red pinpricks of their eyes are the only color in this darkened world, as they all stare at you, mouths open, teeth bared. They hardly look human-shaped, like wraiths or goblins, and suddenly they break apart and they're all around you.
You're too afraid to scream. You back away, into some kind of work bench, and your hand scrabbles behind you for something, anything that might help. They approach slowly, wafting closer, like they have all of eternity in which to suck the marrow from your bones.
Do you grab:
Or nothing, you can talk your way out of this!
“We'll wait here,” you tell the pet bat.
“Suit yourself,” the bat says. “I'm out of here.” And he flies off into the night to eat some bugs. You and Tep sit down in the waiting room. Tep takes out a picture of a pyramid and makes moaning noises at you that seem to indicate that this is the place he's going to buy after you're done with this case—nothing too fancy, a nice little fixer upper for him and his many mummified concubines to live out their days in comfort with their many mummified cats. A peaceful life. Get up, rake the sand, scare the shit out of some grave robbers, fight Indiana Jones.
“That sounds real nice,” you say. You're turned towards him so you don't see the eyes move in the painting on the wall. It's a painting of Bartelbus Bartleby dressed in olde timey pilgrim garb, like he's on his way to the first Thanksgiving. The eyes shift over the room, and then pull back, to be replaced by the muzzles of guns.
The room is suddenly full of sound, the sharp banging, one right after another, until two full pistols' worth of magically enhanced silver bullets are emptied into Tep's body. He jerks with each impact and falls limply to the floor as sand pours out of his wounds. His arm holding the picture of the pyramid awkwardly moves towards you, and then lies still. The bandages collapse, and then he's just a pile of sand and bandages.
“NOOOOOO!” you scream to the heavens. “He was two days away from retirement! He was going to buy a pyramid, you bastard!” You punch through the painting into the secret passage beyond. There's no one there, but you hear running footsteps. “Come back and face me, Bartelbus, you coward!” you cry.
“That wasn't me,” a voice behind you sniffs.
You whirl around, and Bartlebus Bartleby is standing in the doorway.
“You!” you shriek, and leap at him, but he grabs your head in one hand and easily holds you at arm's length while he frowns at the remains of your mummy friend on the floor.
“Please, guns are so impersonal—you know very well I prefer traditional methods,” he says, and you stop struggling because he has a point.
“Then who did this?” you demand.
Bartlebus Bartleby shakes his head as he steps behind his desk. “That librarian didn't tell you everything. This case is bigger than you could possibly imagine. It goes all the way to the top.”
“The top?” You start thinking of the best way to get to the roof.
“The Magic Gang,” he says with a nod. Something about his tone of voice tells you that these words mean serious business and shouldn't be laughed at, even though they're kind of funny.
“The Magic Gang?” you repeat.
He nods. “The most powerful supernatural mafia in the world. They have a vested interest in Witchburn Manor and keeping it... as it is. I have no choice but to help them. But you...”
“Witchburn Manor?” you repeat. The name sounds familiar, but you don't know why.
He points to a painting on the wall. It's of a large house in some forbidding mountains, its windows staring at you like great empty eyes that can see into the darkest pits of your soul. Something is familiar about it though you've never seen it before. Maybe it's your vampire sense, but somehow you just know. “That's my great uncle's house!” you say.
“You have no great uncle,” Bartlebus corrects you.
“Yeah, yeah, I know, he's dead--”
“No, I mean, he never existed.” Bartlebus is suddenly angry. “Don't you see? It's a trick to get you into that house!” He points a quivering finger at it. “I must feed it one victim a year, to become a ghost like the rest. It eats people, living souls. Anyone who dies on that property is doomed for all eternity to haunt it. Anyone. Do you understand what I'm saying?”
“No,” you admit.
He sighs, and takes a book off a shelf. It's called A Guide to Haunted Houses in Transylvania. He opens it to a page that's bookmarked, and flips it around so you can read the entry:
“Witchburn Manor is the most haunted structure in all of Transylvania. In fact, it is the only house that is actively seeking to acquire additional occupants, at a rate of at least one per year. Through established arrangements with a supernatural lawyer, prospective candidates are shown the house and tasked to spend one night within its walls. During the course of the night, the house's current ghostly occupants judge the candidate and then decide through ghost vote if he or she is fit to join them permanently. After all, when you have all eternity to spend together, it's important to make sure there's a good fit. Candidates who receive a two-thirds majority of votes are then speedily made eligible for permanent residence (i.e. killed). This system has been in place since at least the 1400s, although paranormal investigators are unable to establish an exact date, partly because the risk of entering is too great. Anyone who dies on the property will become a ghost, bound to haunt the unhallowed mansion for all eternity. This is a marked difference from most haunted property, whose ghosts are resident through some personal trauma of their own. These unusual circumstances have led paranormal investigators to believe that the house itself may have suffered some past trauma, although it is unclear what that may have been.”
“I saved you from this fate by turning you into the undead, like me,” he sighs. “But I fear your cousin Francine will not be so lucky. We leave immediately. My hands are bound, the Magic Gang prevents me from interfering, but you... would you go with her?”
“I'm not waiting for anyone!” you say as you march on over to Francine's mansion, Tep the library page mummy ambling along behind you in his awkward, lurching way. “They're probably in it together, trying to swindle me out of my inheritance! Well, we'll show them!”
Francine's house is gigantic, ever since she made all that money as a world-renowned alligator wrestling champion. The fountains are all full of alligators, and the front door opens easily when you push against it without knocking. Badasses don't have to knock.
Inside you find Francine talking seriously with Bartelbus Bartleby. “Hold it right there!” you scream at them, attempting to hold your keys in a threatening manner (they were the only thing in your pockets). “Well, well, well.”
“What the hell are you doing here?” Francine says, and you're disappointed that she sounds annoyed instead of wary of your threatening stance. “And what the hell is that?”
You look behind you where she's pointing to see Tep the mummy wrestling with one of her alligators. He clearly once had some moves, but now in his awkward mummy wrappings he is no match for the gigantic reptile. It launches itself at him, tearing the moldering bandages. Sand pours from his wounds. He reaches towards you and makes one last moaning sound that seems to say, “Go get 'em for me.” But it could actually mean anything. You've kind of just been guessing this whole time.
“NOOOOOOOOO!” you shout to the heavens as Tep's body collapses into a pile of bandages and sand. “He was two days away from retirement! Damn it, Francine!”
“You're the one who came barging into my house,” she points out. “What do you want?”
“To catch the two of you in the act!” you say triumphantly, pointing an accusing finger.
“In the act of... finalizing travel arrangements to Transylvania?”
“A-HA!” you proclaim. “I knew it! You're in this together—trying to cheat me out of my rightful inheritance, just because I'm dead. Well you're not getting it! Our great uncle's estate is mine!”
Francine snorted. “Okay, if you think you can handle it, I'll give you a crack at it first.”
You were not expecting this easy surrender. It takes the wind out of your melodrama. “Uh... what?”
“You have to spend the night in the haunted house to inherit it, right?” Francine says. “I'll let you go first. If you make it, it's yours. Deal?”
You pick another cookbook at random, hoping this one will be more to your liking. It's about drinks, which sounds good. Vampires love drinking, right? You're famous for it. You flip to a random recipe:
“FOR REAL LEGIT BUTTER BEER,” the recipe heading says. “Make this and PRETEND YOU ARE A FUCKING WIZARD.
Get yourself some cream soda or whatever
Put half a teaspoon of imitation butter flavor in each glass
Then make some bitchin foam to go on top out of:
1 cup whipping cream
3 tablespoons sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
¾ teaspoon imitation butter flavor
Or just put butter flavoring in your whipped cream, I don't know”
Again, you're left feeling strangely disgusted, but maybe it's just the thought of fake butter flavor. You flip to the alcoholic drinks section since alcohol is like your favorite food, or was yesterday.
“STRAWBERRY WINE SLUSHIES,” the recipe heading reads. “It's like summer in a glass. You need an ice cream maker, though. They're only like twenty-five bucks, don't be a cheap skate. Plus you can use them to make delicious ice cream, you tool. If you want an alcohol slushie, here's what you should do:
Puree some strawberries. Like two or three cups, but whatever, I'm not the boss of you. Puree them in your blender with a bottle of Riesling and some lemon juice and some sugar. Like a tablespoon of lemon juice, maybe twice that of sugar. But you gotta follow your heart, man, I'm just a cookbook. Get that shit nice and liquidy, than pour it into your ice cream maker and go to town. Maybe for half an hour or something, I don't know. Just do it until it looks like a slushie, are you stupid? Then you drink it. If you need me to tell you that, though, you probably shouldn't be operating a blender. Or a cookbook. How many paper cuts do you have right now?”
You close the book. No, that doesn't sound good either. Which is weird because you're supposed to love strawberries. And wine. And sugar. And sassy narrators. That recipe had all your favorite things, and yet even thinking about eating any of them makes you feel like you might vomit. Being a vampire is weird, man. Should you try one more cookbook? Or a different kind of book?
You decide to go for broke and open one more cookbook. This one's called A Vampire Feast so hopefully it will be more applicable to your new vampire lifestyle. You open up to a random recipe:
“A Halloween Treat,” the recipe title reads. But all that's written under that is: “Go bite someone dressed like a witch and drink their blood.”
You frown and turn to another recipe.
“Summer barbecue,” says the title. “Go bite someone in a bikini and drink their blood.”
“Winter solstice: Remove parka, bite, and drink blood.”
“Afternoon tea: Remove lacy gloves, bite, and drink blood.”
You flip through the book, but they're all like that. You sigh and close the book. It seems like vampire culinary arts leave a lot to be desired. Now that you're thoroughly depressed about your new lot in life, maybe it's time to drown your sorrows in a different kind of book:
You flip to “Coming to terms with your new powers” since that seems like a logical place to start. You haven't really noticed any powers besides a nagging thirst for human blood. But according to this book, you can now do all sorts of things:
“The vampire arsenal is vast, but sometimes it is when we are the most powerful that we feel powerless. Close your eyes and envision yourself as a bat. Did you become a bat? Pat yourself on the back! That's something humans can't do!”
Really? You can turn yourself into a bat?? You set the book aside and visualize yourself as a bat, just like the book suggested. Unfortunately, you don't know very much about bats, so the one in your head looks kind f cartoony. And when you open your eyes, you find that a cartoon bat is just what you've become. Everything is suddenly really loud. You try to cover your ears with your hands, but your hands are gone. You flap around for awhile in panic. And then try to calm down. You just have to visualize yourself human again.
You close your eyes and picture yourself, but when you open them again, you still have wings and a furry little head. In a fury, you begin to flap around the library screeching, until the librarian orders the mummy to chase you out with a broom. You poop on him for his trouble, and take off into the night, to become the city's most confused bat.
You'll never know that the very next paragraph of the book you set aside offered this advice:
“Of course, changing back to your true form from that of a bat is the difficult part. Most people have trouble visualizing themselves properly, being only acquainted with their visage in a mirror, which is, of course, the mirror-image of their true selves.”
You flip to “justifying your crimes and satisfying your lusts in a mindful manner.” It turns out to just be about luring and biting free range humans who've had a happy life, not drug addicts who live in the gutter even though they may be easy prey. “Remember, you are what you eat! Unhealthy blood means an unhealthy you!” You didn't buy this preachy bullshit when you were alive—your favorite food is Cheez Whiz, after all—and you close the book in disgust. Time to try another genre.
You flip to “Finding your gravestone, finding yourself.” It turns out to be all about the existential quest of self-discovery every vampire must undertake to be truly at peace with himself. Who am I? Who was I? Can the two ever be fundamentally reconciled? No, and that's okay. The author suggests creating a grave for your mortal life as a way to say goodbye to who you were. “Such an act of closure if important for you as a vampire ready to embark on your new existence. It also may be of help for any remaining friends or family to understand that the you they knew is not the one they see. This lesson, of course, is easily taught by massacring all of them and drinking their blood, a traditional vampire rite of passage from ancient times. However, many modern vampires eschew this bloodbath as wasteful.”
You read the entire chapter three times. It really speaks to you. You decide to create a grave for yourself as the author suggests, and then go on a walking tour of famous vampire sites in Europe to really come to grips with the ancient community that you are now a part of. There are a few humans in the graveyard that give you some trouble, but you easily dispatch them, and head for Transylvania, the vampire ancestral home. You wander around for many months, communing with the night and eating peasants, when finally your footsteps bring you to a mysterious house. Something about it calls to you, and your vampire sense tell you that this is the house that was almost yours, the one you were supposed to inherit. It looks haunted as shit, but you're a vampire now so that sort of thing holds no terrors.
You walk up the front steps, and consider ringing the bell, but you're a vampire, and you've finally come to terms with what that means. You push open the front door and enter boldly, prepared to deal with any danger that might accost you.
What you're not prepared for is an alligator in the face.
“Reginald, no!” you hear your cousin Francine shout, but it's too late, the gator has separated your head from your body in its powerful jaws. At least you leave your afterlife at peace with your undead identity.
“Fuck yes, vampire duels,” you say. You can't turn to that page quickly enough. This chapter is filled with diagrams and strategies for how to fight and win a vampire duel. Apparently vampires have a dueling code at least as ancient and needlessly complex as the human equivalent, and vampire duels are legally binding. Finally, this might be the way to get what you want out of Bartelbus!
But how to beat him? He's an ancient vampire who surely has fought and won many a duel in his time. You haven't even been one for twenty-four hours. The only way is a training montage.
Peppy, determined music plays as you jog around the library, the librarian yelling at you from her desk. She's not so much yelling encouragement, as just yelling, but it only makes you run faster.
You spar with the mummy as it awkwardly tries to defend against your lightning quick blows, finally toppling a bookcase on you in exasperation. It never agreed to be your sparring partner, but it already looked so much like a punching bag, so...
Finally you run on a giant set of stairs made out of books and jump excitedly and triumphantly when you get to the top. “Yes! I did it! I'm finally ready!”
“Get out!” the librarian screams at you, but you wanted to leave anyway so whatever.
You head back to Bartlebus Bartleby's office, all ready to challenge him to a vampire duel for your inheritance rights. AND WIN!
When you throw down the gauntlet, he doesn't seem that impressed, with is unfortunate. You were hoping he would quake with fear or something. He just looks kind of annoyed. “Very well,” he snaps.
You each bow to each other, and do the traditional vampire duel salute. You launch yourself at him, hoping to gain the advantage with a quick assault, but suddenly he's just not there. You turn your head in confusion and see him near where you started, staring at you unconcernedly as you crash into his bookcase. You try to struggle to your feet, but suddenly he's standing right by your head. He can move so fast! Then he's gripping your head in his long, strong fingers, and pulling. He doesn't even say any dramatic final words, he just pulls your head off and kills you. Dag, yo. Maybe ten minutes of training montage wasn't enough? But your music was so peppy and determined!
Well, at least you tried.
You have to warn your cousin Francine! Or she'll fall into the same trap you almost dead! If you hadn't attacked Bartlebus on sight like a spaz, he wouldn't have turned you into a vampire and you'd probably be locked in that haunted house even now, screaming your face off! You knew it was suspicious! You don't even have a great uncle!
You run out of the library, not even saying anything to the librarian. You can move much faster now that you're a vampire, and you don't stop until you reach your cousin Francine's mansion. You guys used to be tight when you were younger since both your parents disappeared in mysterious circumstances, but ever since she became a world-renowned alligator wrestler you've lost touch. Her house is huge, and there are alligators everywhere. One snaps at you from the ceremonial mansion.
“Francine! Francine!” you yell as you pound on the door.
You almost fall over the threshold when the door opens and Bartelbus Bartleby is standing there. “Oh, it's you,” he says witheringly.
“Francine!” you say, when you spot her behind him. “Are you okay? He hasn't done anything to you, has he?”
“I'm glad you're here!” she says. “Guess what? I just inherited a shit ton of money!”
“No, Francine! You don't understand, it's a trap!”
“What?”
“He's just trying to lure you to that house so that you'll be killed and become a ghost and have to stay there for all eternity!”
“What!” Francine says again, recoiling away from Bartelbus Bartleby. He turns to regard you coolly.
“Perhaps I made an error when I thought you had the boldness for eternal life,” he says. “Shouldn't you be feasting on the blood of maidens or something?” He sighs, and looks at Francine, who grabs a cattle prod from near the door and holds it menacingly. She usually uses it on the alligators. “And another young person is unsuitable for my plans, tut tut.”
Suddenly he lunges at her, knocking the cattle prod aside with his vampire speed. But her alligator wrestling instincts kick in, and she uses her body as a lever, smashing him to the ground and punching him in the head. Of course, he's a vampire, so he doesn't stay down. You have to beat him over the head with a chuck of marble you rip out of the entryway floor before he lies still.
“What do we do?” Francine asks you, panting.
Cut his head off, and bury him upside down in an unmarked grave with a wooden stake through his heart
“Whatever,” you say. That sounds like a problem for living people, which is not something you have to worry about anymore. Better try find a good book to read instead, since you've got all of eternity to read any everything:
“Cut his head off and bury him upside down in an unmarked grave with a wooden stake through his heart,” you say. “It's got to be all occult like that--only one way to kill a vampire! I know about it now that I am one. Vampire racial memory or something.”
“You're a vampire too?” Francine shrieks, and before you can stop her she beats you to death with the cattle prod.
She doesn't follow your advice about stakes and unmarked grave though, so soon enough your body reconstitutes itself and you find yourself alive again! Well, undead again, anyway. Unfortunately, so is Bartelbus. He roars and attacks you, but Francine has apparently thrown both of you into the sea. It's hard to move underwater, and you slow-mo towards each other kind of pathetically on the ocean floor. Eventually a shark passes by and tries to eat your face. He spits it out because it doesn't taste very good, but you're left to wander the ocean floor for awhile without any eyes. This involves touching a lot of gross-feeling things and hurriedly lurching away hoping never to discover what they are. Eventually the salt water eats away at your undead flesh and you become one with the sea.
“Let's feed him to the alligators!” you say, and Francine nods, helping you drag the body to the main gator enclosure and heft him over the side. You watch side by side as the giant lizard devour his vampire flesh.
“I'm glad that's over,” Francine says with a sigh of relief. “I can't believe I fell for his stupid 'lost lost rich great uncle' routine.”
“Yeah, pretty stupid,” you agree, ignoring the fact that you had too until that lucky library book fell into your possession.
“It's so creepy that he was a vampire!” Francine adds.
“Yeah...” you say noncommittally. Should you
“Actually, Francine, there's something I should tell you,” you confess. “I kind of attacked Bartelbus when I first met him and he... turned me into a vampire like him.” You cringe away from her, expecting her to attack you, but she just looks thoughtful.
“I appreciate your honesty,” she says finally. “And do you know what that means?”
“What?” you ask, but then you see the grin on her face, and you know. It may have been fifteen years since you last had fun together, but you still remember your old favorite pretend game. It doesn't have to be pretend anymore.
“CRIME FIGHTING DUO!” you scream together and high five.
Eventually your adventures get optioned for a tv series, because who doesn't want to see the crime-fighting adventures of a vampire and a wealthy alligator wrestler? That would make an amazing choose your own adventure novel too. If only someone would write that. Oh well.
“Are you okay?” Francine asks you.
“I'm great!” you say defensively. “Nothing's wrong! Why would anything be wrong? We just killed the evil vampire! No one but us humans here now!”
“Yeah,” Francine agrees. “I can't thank you enough. Well, actually, maybe I can think of something you might like.”
The next day she has her private jet fly you both to a beautiful Caribbean island resort staffed entirely by hot nude models. It's where hollywood a-listers WISH they could party!
Unfortunately the minute the hot Caribbean sun hits you, you char up into a puddle of ash. Don't blame Francine, she didn't know. Plus, your sudden incineration kind of puts a dampener on her whole weekend. She still parties till four am with hot models, but she feels kind of bad about it.
You eagerly click on the hot chupacabra's message:
“Hey sexy!” it reads. “Saw your profile and just had to send you a message! What are you doing later? Does it involves fetid swamps and acidic saliva?”
You eagerly reply. “Don't have any plans for later as of now,” you say as you type, the mark of a true computer savant. “Maybe they could involve YOU?”
The chupacabra replies instantly—must be online right now! The new message reads: “You can have me all night long! Check out my new book: Love in the Time of Malaria, excerpt below:
“...its teeth! They're dripping with dangerous acid, but something about the way the moonlight hits those hideous fangs is somehow... sensual. Darkly so. I feel myself growing wet at the thought, and it's not just the fetid swamp I'm half-submerged in. I came on this mission to hunt chupacabra, but now... it's hunting me! At first, I thought it was trying to eat me, but if so, wouldn't it have attacked already?
Instead, it lowers its gaping maw, and sniffs. Then howls at the moon and reaches one of its six mangled limbs out to gently caress my mud-encrusted hair. There's such hunger in its eyes, such passion. Possibly to suck the blood of goats, but maybe also for me? It's a slim chance, but I'm so worked up I'm willing to take it. I launch myself at the monster, pressing my lips against his growling mouth. His acidic saliva burns where it touches my flesh, but these are just love bites, and I will wear them proudly.
As we tumble together in the stinking waters of the swamp, I can't help but think of Francois. I regret doing this to him, but he never gave me what I needed—he always held himself too aloof from me, like some kind of swamp version of Mr. Darcy. Even though we're betrothed by ancient swamp custom, how can I love a man who never lets me near him? Or near... his heart? Or near any other part of him for that matter. The chupacabra has no such compunctions—already its acidic saliva is splashing over my bared breasts like a delicious and sexy second degree burn.
And as I gaze up into the beast's flaming orange eyes, so filled with rabid hunger, I recognize them. Those are Francois' rabid burning eyes!
“Francois!” I gasp. “Can it be you?”
The beast howls and I know it to be true. This is why Francois could never let me get close! He was too ashamed to reveal... his true form.
“Why would you hide this from me?” I ask, tenderly caressing his twisted horns. “I like you even better this way.”
He howls again, and rips off the rest of my clothes with one swipe of his poisonous claws.
The next day I'm in the hospital on life support, but it was worth it. Francois the chupacabra is the hottest mythical creature I've had sex with yet—including that time I met the Jersey Devil at a Quizno's.”
You stare at the screen. What the hell? Then you click over to the chupacabra's profile and you realize: “This is all just a marketing gimmick!” you cry. “There is no hot chupacabra who wants to date me! It's just a ploy to advertise this stupid new romance novel!” You can't deny you're disappointed.
Do you read the spambot's message?
You click on the spambot's message. “Hello human friend,” it begins. “Thank you for taking the time to read this message. Though I may be a spambot, I too know the existential search to find meaning in this lonely universe. I too seek companionship and love. Spambots are some of the loneliest creatures in existence. Always reaching out to people, never receiving an answer. You are undead. Perhaps you know my pain? BUY QUALITY ROLEXES AT LOW LOW PRICES”
“I give up on love forever!” you scream dramatically, pushing yourself away from the computer in your anguish. The librarian roles her eyes at your melodrama from her desk, but the mummy comes over to console you as you weep bitter tears into the library's 1980s carpet. “Why why why why why why?” you scream at the heavens. “Why am I doomed to wander this earth alone forever?”
The mummy moans something at you, perhaps some words of comfort, but you cannot be comforted in your grief. You run out into the rain, and let the earth's bitter salty tears wash your own from your cheeks. At another time, you'd probably be worried about why the rain tastes bitter and salty, but you've just GIVEN UP ON LOVE, no time for that now. You run all the way to a lonely lighthouse, where you spend your days staring broodingly out to sea. And your nights staring broodingly at the sky. You don't have to worry about the lighthouse because wtf we have gps now, guy. Eventually you get some cats. When you lie on the couch for too long one day, they eat your face. You think about stopping them, but decide you don't even care.
Reluctantly, you agree to buy quality rolexes at low low prices. Anything for love, right?
You're surprised by how quickly your identity is stolen. And that vampires have an even worse time trying to wrangle with credit agencies than normal people.
“Yeah,” the librarian scoffs. “You really don't have what it takes to be an Internet troll. Do you want to take another tutorial?”
Set up an online dating profile?
Or do what you're supposed to be doing, look for a supernatural lawyer?
“Good,” the librarian says. “You clearly have an instinct for this. The internet troll stirs up drama at every opportunity, no matter the setting.”
“Lady, I'm a vampire,” you say. “I know all about feeding on human suffering. Let's get to this!”
“Okay,” she agrees and for the next three hours you go over different internet trolling strategies, the best sites, how to sock puppet like a pro, how to seem genuine, and when to disappear into the night. Finally she proclaims you ready, and send you off to live under and internet bridge and internet troll to your heart's content.
Until the day that technological advances actually allows someone to punch you through the Internet. Then you die from your wounds within minutes.
“Alright, let's do this,” you say. “Transylvania, look out.”
“No way!” you decline. “That sounds super creepy and way too dangerous! If Francine wants to go, she's on her own.”
“Very well,” Bartelbus says sadly. “I had hoped for your help in this matter, but since I see your mind is made up...” He sighs. “Of course, one of the conditions of the agreement is that no one uninvolved can know about it, so I'm very sorry that I must--” He doesn't even finish the sentence—he suddenly picks up a pencil from his desk and, almost quicker than the eye, stabs you through the heart.
You turn into a puff of dust and spend the weekend lolling about on the floor near his desk, thinking dusty thoughts. Then the cleaning lady vacuums you away on Monday.
“Okay!” you say eagerly. “I'm a vampire now! I can totally spend the night in a haunted house with no ill-effects! What are they going to do, kill me? You're on!”
You hold out your hand to shake on it, thus sealing the deal should she want to back out, but Bartelbus steps between you.
“Regardless, my client is unable to enter into such a deal in any case,” Bartelbus interjects. “You are unable to inherit Witchburn Manor because you are dead.” He's giving you a look like he's trying to tell you something with his eyes, but you don't care what it is.
“He means the house doesn't want you because you can't die,” Francine adds. Bartelbus seems surprised by her words.
“You know about the house?” he demands.
“I looked it up on my phone,” she says. “Because I know I don't have a rich great uncle—do people actually fall for that?”
Bartelbus looks at you and says nothing. “What are you talking about?” you demand. “We don't really have a rich Transylvanian great uncle?”
“No,” Francine says, showing you the wikipedia page on Witchburn Manor. “It's all a trick to lure victims to the house.” You read the entry:
“Witchburn Manor is the most haunted structure in all of Transylvania. In fact, it is the only house that is actively seeking to acquire additional occupants, at a rate of at least one per year. Through established arrangements with a supernatural lawyer, prospective candidates are shown the house and tasked to spend one night within its walls. During the course of the night, the house's current ghostly occupants judge the candidate and then decide through ghost vote if he or she is fit to join them permanently. After all, when you have all eternity to spend together, it's important to make sure there's a good fit. Candidates who receive a two-thirds majority of votes are then speedily made eligible for permanent residence (i.e. killed). This system has been in place since at least the 1400s, although paranormal investigators are unable to establish an exact date, partly because the risk of entering is too great. Anyone who dies on the property will become a ghost, bound to haunt the unhallowed mansion for all eternity. This is a marked difference from most haunted property, whose ghosts are resident through some personal trauma of their own. These unusual circumstances have led paranormal investigators to believe that the house itself may have suffered some past trauma, although it is unclear what that may have been.”
“Wait, you were going to send me into this house unawares?” you demand angrily.
Francine shrugs. “You're already dead. What's the worst it could do to you? Plus, maybe you would solve its mystery and lay all the tortured souls to rest and I could inherit a normal Transylvanian mansion.”
“Just because I'm undead doesn't mean I can't die,” you argue. “I mean... I think. I don't know.”
“Fine, I'll go with you, you big baby,” Francine says. “Maybe we can solve the mystery together?”
“NO DEAL!” you scream at Francine. “This is just some kind of trick, I know it!”
“Regardless, my client is unable to enter into such a deal in any case,” Bartelbus interjects. “You are unable to inherit Witchburn Manor because you are dead.” He's giving you a look like he's trying to tell you something with his eyes, but you don't care what it is.
“He means the house doesn't want you because you can't die,” Francine adds. Bartelbus seems surprised by her words.
“You know about the house?” he demands.
“I looked it up on my phone,” she says. “Because I know I don't have a rich great uncle—do people actually fall for that?”
Bartelbus looks at you and says nothing. “What are you talking about?” you demand. “We don't really have a rich Transylvanian great uncle?”
“No,” Francine says, showing you the wikipedia page on Witchburn Manor. “It's all a trick to lure victims to the house.” You read the entry:
“Witchburn Manor is the most haunted structure in all of Transylvania. In fact, it is the only house that is actively seeking to acquire additional occupants, at a rate of at least one per year. Through established arrangements with a supernatural lawyer, prospective candidates are shown the house and tasked to spend one night within its walls. During the course of the night, the house's current ghostly occupants judge the candidate and then decide through ghost vote if he or she is fit to join them permanently. After all, when you have all eternity to spend together, it's important to make sure there's a good fit. Candidates who receive a two-thirds majority of votes are then speedily made eligible for permanent residence (i.e. killed). This system has been in place since at least the 1400s, although paranormal investigators are unable to establish an exact date, partly because the risk of entering is too great. Anyone who dies on the property will become a ghost, bound to haunt the unhallowed mansion for all eternity. This is a marked difference from most haunted property, whose ghosts are resident through some personal trauma of their own. These unusual circumstances have led paranormal investigators to believe that the house itself may have suffered some past trauma, although it is unclear what that may have been.”
“Wait, you were going to send me into this house unawares?” you demand angrily.
Francine shrugs. “You're already dead. What's the worst it could do to you? Plus, maybe you would solve its mystery and lay all the tortured souls to rest and I could inherit a normal Transylvanian mansion.”
“Just because I'm undead doesn't mean I can't die,” you argue. “I mean... I think. I don't know.”
“Fine, I'll go with you, you big baby,” Francine says. “Maybe we can solve the mystery together?”
When Francine comes back downstairs with her bags packed, she finds her house empty (save for the twenty-eight alligators who call its bathtubs home). You, meanwhile, are speeding into the night, having turned into a bat in your panic. Unfortunately, you can't figure out how to change back, and spend the rest of your days eating bugs. You still retain your human memories, and never once stop thinking about steak.
“No!” you shout. “I'm not going anywhere near that house, and you can't make me!”
“Yeah, I guess,” Francine sighs, and heads upstairs to pack her bags.
“Unfortunately, you must see that I cannot allow you to leave here knowing the truth about Witchburn Manor,” Bartelbus says, drawing a slim, intricately carved stake from his suit pocket almost sadly.
“What!” you demand, backing away. “It's on wikipedia!”
“Yes, modern technology is such an inconvenience. But fear not, I shall be dealing with that presently, after I send your cousin off to meet her probable demise.”
“Francine!” you scream and try to run, but Bartelbus deftly throws the stake at your retreating back, and you instantly turn to dust, floating sadly on the surface of one of the fountains filled with alligators. It smells.
You reach behind you for the shovel. It's reassuringly heavy in your hands and has a longer range. You take a few swings at the ranks of ghosts massing closer to you, but the heavy shovel head just passes through their bodies like air, like they aren't even really there.
“You're not real!” you shout at them desperately, all evidence to the contrary. “If I can't hit you, you don't have physical form, and if you don't have physical form, you can't hurt me!”
You're half-right. When one of them reaches a skeletal hand towards you and you feel the coldness brush over your skin, you have a heart attack and drop dead on the spot.
You come back as a ghost. You don't have a choice. Trapped in the cellar with the other wraiths, waiting in the dark for fresh blood, a fresh soul. You quickly forget everything about your old life. The cellar does that to you, down deep in the dark. All that exists is the hunger, the yearning, the emptiness. Also sometimes the upstairs neighbors play music and/or screaming really loud and it's mad annoying. Ugh.
You reach behind you for the hammer. It's reassuringly heavy in your hands. You take a few swings at the ranks of ghosts massing closer to you, but the heavy hammer head just passes through their bodies like air, like they aren't even really there.
“You're not real!” you shout at them desperately, all evidence to the contrary. “If I can't hit you, you don't have physical form, and if you don't have physical form, you can't hurt me!”
You're half-right. When one of them reaches a skeletal hand towards you and you feel the coldness brush over your skin, you have a heart attack and drop dead on the spot.
You come back as a ghost. You don't have a choice. Trapped in the cellar with the other wraiths, waiting in the dark for fresh blood, a fresh soul. You quickly forget everything about your old life. The cellar does that to you, down deep in the dark. All that exists is the hunger, the yearning, the emptiness. Also sometimes the upstairs neighbors play music and/or screaming really loud and it's mad annoying. Ugh.
You're a lover, not a fighter. “Hey, gang,” you say to the encroaching army of ghosts. “How's it going?”
They stop abruptly, floating in the air, the flimsy-looking tendrils hanging off them like rotted clothing swaying in some breeze you can't feel. The air is close and hot with their attention, those red eyes suddenly fixed on you.
“I guess you maybe knew my great uncle?” you say. “This was his house. Is he here? As... one of you?”
They don't answer, just continue to stare at you.
“Anyway, I'm spending the night,” you continue. As long as you're talking, they're not moving towards you, which is definitely a good sign. “Don't really know my way around or anything. Why is there just a big empty chute that leads down here?” You laugh awkwardly. “Sorry if I scared you guys.” You wonder if they can even recognize this as a joke.
You blink, because it might be the weird light down here, but the ghosts seem to be changing. Already they seem less scary, more defined, more like people than soulless wraiths. Transparent, glowing people, but still. Their eyes no longer seem like they're glaring, even.
“So how do we get out of this cellar?” you ask in your most winning voice.
The ghosts float back as one, and you detect something sad, like a sigh, shift through the room. We cannot get out.
It's not so much a voice as a breeze, blowing right into your ear. “There's no way out?” It doesn't look like you're about to be eaten, but that news is still cause for panic.
We cannot get out, comes the weird wind chorus again. But you can.
The ghosts start to float deeper into the cellar. You don't know what will happen if one touches you, and you don't want to find out, so you keep pace with them, like they're herding you. Finally you can see a faint rectangle of light in the darkness, and their ghostly glow illuminates the door.
Beware the place beyond here, their ghost voices warn you again. If you return here, it will be for good. It sounds like a threat, but it isn't one. They seem sad about it.
“Are the other ghosts in this house as nice as you guys?” you say nervously. “I shouldn't have a problem then!” You're already reaching for the rusty door handle.
If they like you, you will join them, the ghosts answer you sadly.
You hesitate. “And if they don't like me?”
You think they aren't going to answer, but finally, the faintest of whispers: You will join us.
You shiver and push open the door, making sure it closes behind you. You follow the light to the top of some stairs, and you're back in the entryway you started in. The piano music is still playing.
Do you:
The first floor is the grandest and biggest, with chandeliers and chipping gold filigree decorations around the ceilings. Off the entryway where you came in, there are a set of wide double doors off to the left. One is ajar, and you can see a big, dark space beyond, probably a ballroom. On the other side is a smaller, far less opulent door that's trying to blend in to the wall. From what you know about ancient Transylvanian architecture, you assume it leads to the kitchens. Do you feel more like visiting a:
You just faced a cellar full of creepy ghosts! You can handle anything! You follow that music up the wide, majestic staircase. The carpet is ancient and little clouds of dust poof up under your footsteps. You keep your eyes peeled for ghosts, but so far everything is normal. Well, normal for a Transylvanian mansion. Even though everything is faded and dirty, there isn't really an air of neglect about the place. It feels... lived in. Or, at any rate, inhabited. You feel like it's watching you, but when you turn to look around, there's no one—just creepy paintings and suits of armor and chandeliers. The usual.
At the top of the stairs, you turn right, following the music down a hall. It's coming from a room that obviously have windows facing the west, because sunlight is pouring out into the hall. You peer around the door cautiously—you're brave but not an idiot. Well, not really. There's a piano in the room, and a girl is playing it. You can only see the back of her, but she isn't transparent. She looks normal, if a little old-fashioned. Hair with a bow in it. White dress with a sash. Feet not quite touching the ground. Her hands move over the keys almost mechanically.
But you know it can't be a normal girl. Come on, you're in a haunted house. You're going to go over there and walk around till you can see the rest of her, and she's... not going to have a face, or something. Or it'll be a creepy old woman face in a little girl body. Or she'll look normal at first, but then her jaw will open too wide and there'll be creepy fangs and hissing... Or maybe you'll blink and she'll just be gone. And then you'll turn and she'll be near the door, her back to you again. And you'll follow her all around, and she'll keep disappearing, and you'll only ever see her back...
I mean, you're in a haunted house and she's obviously some kind of creepy child. What do you expect to happen?
I don't care, I'm going in the room
There must be a way to break out of this house, and you're going to find it! You do a little poking around, and eventually find a door that leads outside to the gardens! They're pretty terrible gardens, full of dead grass and sickly-looking plants. There's a ghost gardener raking some ghost leaves but he doesn't even look up at you. The gardens are surrounded by a high stone wall covered by metal spikes at the top.
Do you try to climb the wall?
Or decide its hopeless and go back to exploring the house?
Fearlessly, you walk into the room, body tensed for all of those terrible things you imagined to happen to you. In the end, though, you don't need to worry about the creepy piano playing girl. It's the shadow crouching just inside the door that you should have been most freaked out by. But you barely have time to scream before it pounces on you.
“Randolph, no!” you hear an exasperated voice say as it begins to rip up your soul in its incorporeal teeth. You feel your memories break loose and float free. “Randolph, you promised.” The voice seems annoyed, like a pet is misbehaving, rather than an eldritch horror from beyond the imagination gleefully tearing at the very essence of your being. It's all very tragic.
On the up side, with no soul left to haunt this mortal plane you're free of the infernal house. On the down side, it means for you this is
You nope on out of there and almost fall into a handy closet. The air is close with coats and dust, and there are a bunch of antique shoes under your butt, but at least you're hidden. You feel relatively safe, until a soft voice says, “Hey, man.”
You scream and hit your head against the wall in your scramble to get away. The piano music abruptly stops.
“Shhhhhhh,” the voice cautions, and you suddenly hold yourself as still as possible. You can't say why, but you suddenly have a deep feeling of dread, coursing through your body, telling you that whatever might be in here with you, it's nothing compared to what's out there. You hold your breath until the feeling passes, and then you let it out in one gasp.
“That was close,” the voice agrees.
“Are you... my conscience?” you say to the darkness.
It laughs a kind of wheezing laugh, and suddenly a ghost corporealizes in front of your nose. Even in its misty, almost-transparent form you can tell that in life it had once worn ludicrously wide-legged JNCO jeans, hair spiked up with frosted tips. You instantly feel pity instead of fear. Imagine having to spend eternity sporting the 90s fashions that had been so cool at your moment of death, but almost instantly horrible and embarrassing when society got over its collective hangover in 2002. “I'm nobody's conscience, dog,” the ghost says. “This place still gives me the freaks so I spend a lot of time hiding. Never know what freaky stuff that piano girl's gonna pull.”
“I couldn't even go in the room,” you confess. “But why are you afraid? Aren't you already dead?”
“Yeah.” He shrugs. “But old habits die hard, you know? I'm sure in another century it'll get boring and my only entertainment will be freaking out the new guys. But right now I am one of the new guys. Kind of. Pretty new, anyway. Some of the ones newer than me... don't really want to talk to me. You know, because of...” He gestures at his entire ensemble. “There's like eight of them too, you'd think one of them would talk to me.”
“There's eight ghosts younger than you?” you say, surprised. “That's got to be like—”
“One a year,” he says with a nod. “If you count the poor bastards that got sent down to the cellar.” He shudders.
“What?” you demand.
“I like you homes,” he says. “So lemme tell you the deal with this place. Witchburn Manor? It's cursed, yo. Every year this vampire lawyer guy finds some dingus to come in here and spend the night. All the ghosts judge him, and vote. If they like him, he's in. If not... cellar. Can't let secrets about the house get out, see? And it has to be fed. It's like it's... hungry for souls, you know?”
“Wait, I'm auditioning?” you ask incredulously. “To be a ghost?”
“If you're lucky!” he says. “If not... there's always the cellar.”
“What if I want to stay alive?” you demand.
He shrugs. “It's been like this for as long as any of us can remember. Going back hundreds and hundreds of years.”
“Then I'll find the oldest ghost!” you say. “I'll find the oldest ghost and ask him what's up!”
“Her,” the 90s ghost corrects. “Good luck with that, man. I gotta go—I've got chain-rattling duty in the dungeons.” And he disappears.
You cautiously open the closet door, but the corridor seems to be deserted.
Do you:
You creep along the second floor, on the look out for jump scares or bleeding walls or whatever else this haunted house might have in store for you. You keep telling yourself you aren't scared of anything, but you don't really believe it. Finally you come to the end of the hall, and there's a door with a big window, so you can see that it leads out to some kind of balcony. There's another door too, this one half-open, leading to what looks like a library.
Do you go outside onto the balcony
Or conquer your fear of books and head into the library?
You nope on out of there and almost fall into a handy closet. A real closet this time. The air is close with coats and dust, and there are a bunch of antique shoes under your butt, but at least you're hidden. You feel relatively safe, until a soft voice says, “Hey, man.”
You scream and hit your head against the wall in your scramble to get away. The piano music abruptly stops.
“Shhhhhhh,” the voice cautions, and you suddenly hold yourself as still as possible. You can't say why, but you suddenly have a deep feeling of dread, coursing through your body, telling you that whatever might be in here with you, it's nothing compared to what's out there. You hold your breath until the feeling passes, and then you let it out in one gasp.
“That was close,” the voice agrees.
“Are you... my conscience?” you say to the darkness.
It laughs a kind of wheezing laugh, and suddenly a ghost corporealizes in front of your nose. Even in its misty, almost-transparent form you can tell that in life it had once worn ludicrously wide-legged JNCO jeans, hair spiked up with frosted tips. You instantly feel pity instead of fear. Imagine having to spend eternity sporting the 90s fashions that had been so cool at your moment of death, but almost instantly horrible and embarrassing when society got over its collective hangover in 2002. “I'm nobody's conscience, dog,” the ghost says. “This place still gives me the freaks so I spend a lot of time hiding. Never know what freaky stuff that piano girl's gonna pull.”
“You seem pretty okay, for a ghost,” you say. “I mean, you're talking to me normally instead of in a weird whisper chorus on the edge of hearing.”
“Yeah, I heard you met the guys in the cellar,” 90s ghost says with a tinge of respect in his voice. “I have a soft spot for them—I was almost down there myself. By one vote. So I'll tell you the deal with this place: it's cursed.”
“Cursed?” you shriek. And then, “Well, that's not so surprising.”
“Anyone who dies here automatically becomes a ghost,” 90s ghost explains. “And the house doesn't like to just wait for chance. It's always hungry for more souls. One a year. Looks like this year that vampire lawyer picked you.”
“But my great uncle...” you trail off. Somehow it sounds dumb now that you come to say it to a ghost wearing JNCO jeans and a No Fear shirt. You don't have a great uncle, let alone a wealthy Transylvanian one. Bartelbus tricked you to get you into this house. To feed you to this house, it sounds like.
“We all gotta vote tomorrow, right?” 90s ghost says kindly. “If we like you, you're in.”
“So you kill me?” you demand. “I don't want to be in then.”
“The alternative isn't just letting you walk free.”
“The cellar,” you say, remembering what the shady cellar ghosts had told you. They're nothing like 90s ghost, who might be a real person except for the whole transparency thing. Those guys were hardly humanoid anymore, just amorphous blobs of need. They were trapped down there too, in the dark.
“That sucks,” you say. “And you can't help them?”
90s ghost suddenly smiles at you. “I was hoping you'd say that, homes. There might be a way to help them, and help you too. I've been thinking it out since I got here—there might be a way to break this curse.”
“How?” you ask eagerly.
He shrugs. “I don't know, but I know who might. Her.” He nods. “The oldest ghost. If anyone knows what the deal with this place is, it's her.”
“Who? Where is she?” you ask.
“No one knows her name,” 90s ghost says. “She hangs out in the highest room in the house, up past the attic. Come on, I'll show you.”
90s ghost leads the way down the hall, up a set of winding stairs, and then up a smaller, more rickety set of stairs into the attic. “Through there,” he says, pointing. You see light spilling around piles of old furniture and trunks covered in dust clothes. It's a door out to a kind of observation tower sticking right up in the roof of the house. You carefully ascend the ladder, and push open the hatch.
“So I'm doomed no matter what happens!” you sum up. “How can I not die?”
“You think I would be sitting here doomed to haunt eternity in JNCO jeans if I knew that?” 90s ghost says, exasperated. “Good luck, guy. It's my turn to make books fly around the library.” And he disappears.
You cautiously open the closet door, but the corridor seems to be deserted.
Do you:
The observation tower is a small room sticking right out of the top of the highest roof in the house. It's round, with windows on all sides, some of them open to let in the cold. There are telescopes of different sizes everywhere and, unlike the rest of the house, this room seems to be free from dust.
There's also only one ghost in it. She's not like the other ghosts you've seen in the house. She's still wispy and seems to be composed of mist, but where the others have been pearly and transparent, she's black, black like a hole. The others glow faintly, but she does the opposite. Everything around her seems brighter than she is. Maybe she sucks in light and doesn't let it escape. She's also surprisingly young—you weren't expecting that. She looks like she's maybe 13, or was, when she died. She's wearing a simple shift and her hair is wild around her, so you can't tell anything about what time period she may be from.
She doesn't look up at you when you come in, just continues to stare out the window.
“Hello?” you try.
She snorts like you're being ridiculous.
“What kind of ghost are you?” you ask the obvious question.
She turns to look at you, and her eyes are made of fire. “A witch's ghost,” she says, and reaches towards you with claws instead of fingers.
Do you:
You creep through the wide double doors to the ballroom, or what you assume is the ballroom. You can't see very much, but it feels like you're standing in a very wide room—there's a feeling of emptiness stretching away to either side, and up above you. You feel along the wall, moving slowly in the dark until you find a corner, and then your hand meets cloth. You tug, and pull aside one of the huge, heavy velvet curtains, letting in the failing light from outside.
The ballroom is magnificent, but now only dust motes dance there, in the shafts of light falling on the wood floor. The massive chandeliers hanging from the ceiling must have shone once, each with a thousand different crystal pieces, but now the room is shrouded in shadows, and completely empty. If you close your eyes, you can hear the music from glittering Transylvanian balls of the past. They have terrible taste in music.
When you open your eyes, you realize that isn't the prejudice of your imagination, but a real life fact. There are ghost musicians just striking up a funerary dirge. Ghost couples float about the room, in a mish-mash of historical styles. Most are wearing floaty dresses or other finery, but a few have on more modern suits, like they're on their way to a business lunch. They float through a few forms of an incomprehensible dance that seems a little like the electric slide, except more solemn and requires dancers to actually move through each other at various points.
You watch in stunned silence until a ghost in a scuba suit approaches you. “Care to dance?” it asks. You can't see its face through the protective mask it wears, and its voice is muffled as it must have been in life. How do you respond?
You push open the smaller, almost hidden door to the kitchens and are greeted with the finest in 17th-century culinary technology. Or 18th-century. Possibly 12th-century, what are you, an archeologist? There's a gigantic work table, and a bunch of ghosts floating around chopping up vegetables and stirring pots. It's weird because the cornucopia of ingredients laid out on the table looks strangely real—the carrots are bright orange, the meat dripping and red—but once their ghostly knives pass through it, the unfortunate vegetable or venison haunch seems to shrivel and rot in an instant, crumbling into ash and leaving behind a transparent, ghostly piece of food. The cooking ghosts pick up these faintly glowing bits and pour them into soup pots or throw them into steaming pans, cooking up a ghostly feast.
“Do ghosts even eat?” you blurt out, surprised.
One of the cooks looks up at you and shrugs. “Not need, but you miss it, you know. Excuse me, but we are very busy. There's a party tomorrow, you know. For you. Possibly.” How do you respond:
“What the fuck are you wearing?” you demand of the weird scuba diving suit ghost. “Did you die wearing that? Here? Were you thinking a wet suit would protect you from ghosts or something?”
The ghost sniffs, clearly affronted. “The cellars used to be flooded,” the ghost clarifies stiffly. “I had thought—it doesn't matter, I can see you are far too occupied with living matters to participate in our fun.” It disappears with an air of offense.
“Whatever,” you say. The music is starting to get on your nerves. There are two other exits from the ballroom. One leads to the art gallery and the other to an indoor pool. Which do you choose to explore?
“I'm sorry,” you say apologetically. “I don't know the steps.”
“Quite alright, quite alright,” the ghost responds. “It's all about effort.”
With hesitation, you make your way out onto the dance floor. At school dances and clubs in the past, you've always made a fool of yourself, but now that no one—well, no one alive—is watching, you suddenly find that your usual reluctance and embarrassment is gone. You jump around to the music, not really on beat, but who cares? You jump around and through some of the ghosts, and they start laughing at your exuberance. Before long they are copying your wild moves, and you're leading a tutorial in The Hoedown Throwdown. The musicians don't know the song, but after you hum it for awhile, they manage a cobbled together, mournfully slow version of it, like Hannah Montana's funeral march. You laugh and the ghosts laugh, and it's probably the most fun you've had in awhile.
Finally, the party starts to break up, and you wave goodbye to the ghosts and continue your exploration of the house.
“You simply must see our art gallery,” the scuba diving ghost tells you, pointing to the door. “Or, there's always my favorite, our impressive indoor pool.” He gestures to another, before disappearing.
Do you explore
“Fuck that noise!” you shout. “I don't want a creepy ghost party! Get outta my face!”
“You're in my face,” the cook says, with a frown, but you're already turning away to make your dramatic exit. Which door do you choose?
The door to the servants' lounge?
The door outside to the gardens?
“Oh, I'm sorry to bother you,” you apologize.
“No trouble,” the cook ghost shrugs, and actually smiles at you a little. “Don't worry, this is going to be delicious.”
“Oh... I'm not worried about that,” you say, and turn to go. There are two other doors in the room. Do you head for:
Or the gardens?
The art gallery is one long rectangle of a room, with paintings interspersed by windows. Some of the paintings are normal, rather boring and dark landscapes and portraits of startled hunting dogs, but the majority of them are ghost paintings, painted by ghosts of ghosts. You can tell because they're all glowing faintly, like the transparency of a ghost caught on canvas. The subjects hold dignified poses despite wearing the grubby coats and stained jeans they died in. You peer at them curiously.
“Can I help you?” a snooty voice asks.
You turn to see a small, thin ghost in a bow tie standing solicitously beside you. He has an air about him of someone who just assumes he knows more than you as a given, but isn't trying to flaunt it. Probably the curator. How do you respond:
The pool room is cavernous and smells faintly of mildew and chemicals. It's probably Olympic size, and lined with a mosaic of colorful tiles lovingly depicting the devourer the rises from beneath. There's no water in it now, but that isn't stopping the team of ghost swimmers lazily floating through the air as if it were water, their arms flailing in backstrokes their legs kicking the butterfly. Another ghost stands at the pool's edge, wearing a track suit and a whistle. He blows it sometimes and shouts at the swimmers to speed up or watch their form.
“And you, don't think you can dawdle around!” he finally yells at you when he sees you just standing there. “Jump in there. Now!”
How do you respond:
The art gallery is one long rectangle of a room, with paintings interspersed by windows. Some of the paintings are normal, rather boring and dark landscapes and portraits of startled hunting dogs, but the majority of them are ghost paintings, painted by ghosts of ghosts. You can tell because they're all glowing faintly, like the transparency of a ghost caught on canvas. The subjects hold dignified poses despite wearing the grubby coats and stained jeans they died in. You peer at them curiously.
“Can I help you?” a snooty voice asks.
You turn to see a small, thin ghost in a bow tie standing solicitously beside you. He has an air about him of someone who just assumes he knows more than you as a given, but isn't trying to flaunt it. Probably the curator. How do you respond:
The pool room is cavernous and smells faintly of mildew and chemicals. It's probably Olympic size, and lined with a mosaic of colorful tiles lovingly depicting the devourer the rises from beneath. There's no water in it now, but that isn't stopping the team of ghost swimmers lazily floating through the air as if it were water, their arms flailing in backstrokes, their legs kicking the butterfly. Another ghost stands at the pool's edge, wearing a track suit and a whistle. He blows it sometimes and shouts at the swimmers to speed up or watch their form.
“And you, don't think you can dawdle around!” he finally yells at you when he sees you just standing there. “Jump in there. Now!”
How do you respond:
“No way, art is boring,” you say, turning away from the no doubt priceless works of art and dismissing them with a rude hand gesture.
“Well I never!” the art curator ghost responds, shocked and offended, and disappears, leaving you alone again.
“This place blows,” you say, in case he's still listening. “What else is there?”
“Sure, what's the deal with this place?” you ask the art curator ghost, and then strap in for a lecture. His face lights up immediately at someone finally expressing an interest in his afterlife's work.
“Well, only the largest collection of ghost art in Europe!” he proclaims grandly. Then he leans forward and says confidentially, “I personally think it's also the largest in the world, but the Japanese samurai ghosts always refuse an arbitration when I write to their curator asking permission to verify once and full all, and you know what that means.” He nods knowingly at you. “Now!” he says, flinging his arms wide and turning to the collection. “Welcome to the exciting world of ghost paint! Let me start at the beginning!”
Over the next hour he walks you down the hall, explaining the paintings you pass as you go. Soon you know more than perhaps you ever wanted about ghost painting techniques, the history of ghost art, and famous ghost artists and art critics. It's not the most boring thing ever and the ghost art curator seems to be enjoying himself. “What a delightful human you are!” he tells you warmly. “Do come back any time! And you really must see our chapel—plenty of art in there as well, though not paintings, of course! Or the pool is very nice, I've heard.”
Do you head for the chapel
Or the indoor pool?
“Sure, what's the deal with this place?” you ask the art curator ghost, and then strap in for a lecture. His face lights up immediately at someone finally expressing an interest in his afterlife's work.
“Well, only the largest collection of ghost art in Europe!” he proclaims grandly. Then he leans forward and says confidentially, “I personally think it's also the largest in the world, but the Japanese samurai ghosts always refuse an arbitration when I write to their curator asking permission to verify once and full all, and you know what that means.” He nods knowingly at you. “Now!” he says, flinging his arms wide and turning to the collection. “Welcome to the exciting world of ghost paint! Let me start at the beginning!”
Over the next hour he walks you down the hall, explaining the paintings you pass as you go. Soon you know more than perhaps you ever wanted about ghost painting techniques, the history of ghost art, and famous ghost artists and art critics. It's not the most boring thing ever and the ghost art curator seems to be enjoying himself. “What a delightful human you are!” he tells you warmly. “Do come back any time! And you really must see our chapel—plenty of art in there as well, though not paintings, of course! Or the pool is very nice, I've heard.”
Do you head for the chapel
Or the indoor pool?
“No way, art is boring,” you say, turning away from the no doubt priceless works of art and dismissing them with a rude hand gesture.
“Well I never!” the art curator ghost responds, shocked and offended, and disappears, leaving you alone again.
“This place blows,” you say, in case he's still listening. “What else is there?”
The chapel is not what you expected. For one thing, instead of a cross over the altar there's an eldritch abomination. It makes sense, you guess, since you're in the most haunted house in Transylvania and it's full of ghosts and what not. The windows are thin and don't let in much let because the trees crowd close outside, but there are many tall candelabras in alcoves and along the aisles, so it actually seems warm and welcoming inside. If you can ignore the many-tentacled horror on all the art and picked out in intricate stained glass in the windows. There's a ghostly choir practicing, and the music is slow and solemn. Maybe all ghost music is.
“Will you join us?” the conducting ghost asks you as they take a break.
How do you respond:
The pool room is cavernous and smells faintly of mildew and chemicals. It's probably Olympic size, and lined with a mosaic of colorful tiles lovingly depicting the devourer the rises from beneath. There's no water in it now, but that isn't stopping the team of ghost swimmers lazily floating through the air as if it were water, their arms flailing in backstrokes their legs kicking the butterfly. Another ghost stands at the pool's edge, wearing a track suit and a whistle. He blows it sometimes and shouts at the swimmers to speed up or watch their form.
“And you, don't think you can dawdle around!” he finally yells at you when he sees you just standing there. “Jump in there. Now!”
How do you respond:
The pool room is cavernous and smells faintly of mildew and chemicals. It's probably Olympic size, and lined with a mosaic of colorful tiles lovingly depicting the devourer the rises from beneath. There's no water in it now, but that isn't stopping the team of ghost swimmers lazily floating through the air as if it were water, their arms flailing in backstrokes their legs kicking the butterfly. Another ghost stands at the pool's edge, wearing a track suit and a whistle. He blows it sometimes and shouts at the swimmers to speed up or watch their form.
“And you, don't think you can dawdle around!” he finally yells at you when he sees you just standing there. “Jump in there. Now!”
How do you respond:
The chapel is not what you expected. For one thing, instead of a cross over the altar there's an eldritch abomination. It makes sense, you guess, since you're in the most haunted house in Transylvania and it's full of ghosts and what not. The windows are thin and don't let in much light because the trees crowd close outside, but there are many tall candelabras in alcoves and along the aisles, so it actually seems warm and welcoming inside. If you can ignore the many-tentacled horror on all the art and picked out in intricate stained glass in the windows. There's a ghostly choir practicing, and the music is slow and solemn. Maybe all ghost music is.
“Will you join us?” the conducting ghost asks you as they take a break.
How do you respond:
The pool room is cavernous and smells faintly of mildew and chemicals. It's probably Olympic size, and lined with a mosaic of colorful tiles lovingly depicting the devourer the rises from beneath. There's no water in it now, but that isn't stopping the team of ghost swimmers lazily floating through the air as if it were water, their arms flailing in backstrokes their legs kicking the butterfly. Another ghost stands at the pool's edge, wearing a track suit and a whistle. He blows it sometimes and shouts at the swimmers to speed up or watch their form.
“And you, don't think you can dawdle around!” he finally yells at you when he sees you just standing there. “Jump in there. Now!”
How do you respond:
The chapel is not what you expected. For one thing, instead of a cross over the altar there's an eldritch abomination. It makes sense, you guess, since you're in the most haunted house in Transylvania and it's full of ghosts and what not. The windows are thin and don't let in much let because the trees crowd close outside, but there are many tall candelabras in alcoves and along the aisles, so it actually seems warm and welcoming inside. If you can ignore the many-tentacled horror on all the art and picked out in intricate stained glass in the windows. There's a ghostly choir practicing, and the music is slow and solemn. Maybe all ghost music is.
“Will you join us?” the conducting ghost asks you as they take a break.
How do you respond:
The pool room is cavernous and smells faintly of mildew and chemicals. It's probably Olympic size, and lined with a mosaic of colorful tiles lovingly depicting the devourer the rises from beneath. There's no water in it now, but that isn't stopping the team of ghost swimmers lazily floating through the air as if it were water, their arms flailing in backstrokes their legs kicking the butterfly. Another ghost stands at the pool's edge, wearing a track suit and a whistle. He blows it sometimes and shouts at the swimmers to speed up or watch their form.
“And you, don't think you can dawdle around!” he finally yells at you when he sees you just standing there. “Jump in there. Now!”
How do you respond:
The chapel is not what you expected. For one thing, instead of a cross over the altar there's an eldritch abomination. It makes sense, you guess, since you're in the most haunted house in Transylvania and it's full of ghosts and what not. The windows are thin and don't let in much let because the trees crowd close outside, but there are many tall candelabras in alcoves and along the aisles, so it actually seems warm and welcoming inside. If you can ignore the many-tentacled horror on all the art and picked out in intricate stained glass in the windows. There's a ghostly choir practicing, and the music is slow and solemn. Maybe all ghost music is.
“Will you join us?” the conducting ghost asks you as they take a break.
How do you respond:
“Sorry, guy,” you say to the ghost swim coach. “But twerking is the only exercise I do.”
“What kind of stroke is that?” he asks suspiciously. He thinks you might be making fun of him, but also knows that he's been trapped in this house since 1973, so maybe there's been some breakthrough in the swimming world he doesn't know about.
“I'll show you,” you say, only too happy to oblige him.
“Oh god why,” he cries, trying to shield his eyes as your butt jiggles in his face.
“This is what you're missing in the outside world!” you say, except it comes out in a stutter because you're too busy thrusting to talk normally.
“The world is ending,” he laments, and tries to commit suicide by jumping into the ghost pool. He's a ghost though, so he just sinks to the bottom and sits there crying in a little ball.
Well, that was fun. You should probably find some more ghosts to traumatize, though.
Do you hit up the art gallery?
“Sorry, but I don't have a swimming suit,” you say with a shrug.
“That's alright,” the coach says. “It's not really water.” He pushes you in, and you immediately smack on the bottom of the pool. You think the air around feels a little colder and heavier than normal, like moving through fog, but certainly not enough to actually swim in. The ghosts look down at you and laugh. Soon you're running along the bottom of the pool, racing them, and bouncing off the sides. “Alright, alright,” the coach laughs. “We have to get back to work. Hit the showers, kid.”
But you haven't actually been swimming so there's no sense hitting any showers. Especially if the water coming out of them is going to be as insubstantial as the pool. Instead you either:
“Sorry, guy,” you say to the ghost swim coach. “But twerking is the only exercise I do.”
“What kind of stroke is that?” he asks suspiciously. He thinks you might be making fun of him, but also knows that he's been trapped in this house since 1973, so maybe there's been some breakthrough in the swimming world he doesn't know about.
“I'll show you,” you say, only too happy to oblige him.
“Oh god why,” he cries, trying to shield his eyes as your butt jiggles in his face.
“This is what you're missing in the outside world!” you say, except it comes out in a stutter because you're too busy thrusting to talk normally.
“The world is ending,” he laments, and tries to commit suicide by jumping into the ghost pool. He's a ghost though, so he just sinks to the bottom and sits there crying in a little ball.
Well, that was fun, but you better find some other people to torture.
Do you head over to the art gallery?
Or the chapel?
“Sorry, but I don't have a swimming suit,” you say with a shrug.
“That's alright,” the coach says. “It's not really water.” He pushes you in, and you immediately smack on the bottom of the pool. You think the air around feels a little colder and heavier than normal, like moving through fog, but certainly not enough to actually swim in. The ghosts look down at you and laugh. Soon you're running along the bottom of the pool, racing them, and bouncing off the sides. “Alright, alright,” the coach laughs. “We have to get back to work. Hit the showers, kid.”
But you haven't actually been swimming so there's no sense hitting any showers. Especially if the water coming out of them is going to be as insubstantial as the pool. Instead you either:
Instead you either hit up the art gallery
“Sorry, guy,” you say to the ghost swim coach. “But twerking is the only exercise I do.”
“What kind of stroke is that?” he asks suspiciously. He thinks you might be making fun of him, but also knows that he's been trapped in this house since 1973, so maybe there's been some breakthrough in the swimming world he doesn't know about.
“I'll show you,” you say, only too happy to oblige him.
“Oh god why,” he cries, trying to shield his eyes as your butt jiggles in his face.
“This is what you're missing in the outside world!” you say, except it comes out in a stutter because you're too busy thrusting to talk normally.
“The world is ending,” he laments, and tries to commit suicide by jumping into the ghost pool. He's a ghost though, so he just sinks to the bottom and sits there crying in a little ball.
Suddenly the sound of a gong echoes through the house and all of the swimming ghosts float out of the pool. One of them even leads the traumatized swim coach, trying to comfort him as they all make their way through the walls to the ballroom. You follow.
“How does the vote stand?” asks a solemn ghost in an Elizabethan ruff. “Yay?” At this word, all the ghosts start to mutter to each other. “Nay?” he asks, and they suddenly all light up, jeering. They all hate you. Maybe you shouldn't have been such a bitch to them?
Almost instantly a unanimous majority is formed. Against you. Apparently they don't want to spend eternity with you, and you're banished to the cellar. You're pushed down the empty shaft into the basement with a rope around your neck. Your body is caught up short at the end of the rope, but your spirit continues to fall, down, down into the dark of the basement, to languish their forever, slowly losing any vestige of your humanity until you're just a create of need, howling voiceless into the night with the other rejects.
“Sorry, but I don't have a swimming suit,” you say with a shrug.
“That's alright,” the coach says. “It's not really water.” He pushes you in, and you immediately smack on the bottom of the pool. You think the air around feels a little colder and heavier than normal, like moving through fog, but certainly not enough to actually swim in. The ghosts look down at you and laugh. Soon you're running along the bottom of the pool, racing them, and bouncing off the sides.
“Alright, alright,” the coach laughs over the sound of a gong echoing through the house. “But now it's time for ghost vote.”
The coach and all the swimming ghosts exit the pool and starting heading for the ballroom en masse. You follow. Other ghosts join you, some moving through walls or furniture, all ending up in the ballroom.
“How does the vote stand?” asks a solemn ghost in an Elizabethan ruff. “Yay?” At this word, a number of ghosts start to glow brighter. “Nay?” he asks, and other ghosts glow. You can't tell which group is larger, and so the Elizabethan ghost opens up the floor and there are many impassioned speeches. The swim coach makes a speech in your favor, about what a good sport you are and how you don't let a little thing like being alive hold you back. Some other ghosts shout him down, citing your rudeness and foul language.
Eventually they reach a two-thirds majority. Against you. Apparently they don't want to spend eternity with you, and you're banished to the cellar. You're pushed down the empty shaft into the basement with a rope around your neck. Your body is caught up short at the end of the rope, but your spirit continues to fall, down, down into the dark of the basement, to languish their forever, slowly losing any vestige of your humanity until you're just a create of need, howling voiceless into the night with the other rejects.
“Sorry, but I don't have a swimming suit,” you say with a shrug.
“That's alright,” the coach says. “It's not really water.” He pushes you in, and you immediately smack on the bottom of the pool. You think the air around feels a little colder and heavier than normal, like moving through fog, but certainly not enough to actually swim in. The ghosts look down at you and laugh. Soon you're running along the bottom of the pool, racing them, and bouncing off the sides.
“Alright, alright,” the coach laughs over the sound of a gong echoing through the house. “But now it's time for ghost vote.”
The coach and all the swimming ghosts exit the pool and starting heading for the ballroom en masse. You follow. Other ghosts join you, some moving through walls or furniture, all ending up in the ballroom.
“How does the vote stand?” asks a solemn ghost in an Elizabethan ruff. “Yay?” At this word, a number of ghosts start to glow brighter. “Nay?” he asks, and other ghosts glow. You can't tell which group is larger, and so the Elizabethan ghost opens up the floor and there are many impassioned speeches. The swim coach makes a speech in your favor, about what a good sport you are and how you don't let a little thing like being alive hold you back. Some other ghosts shout him down, citing your rudeness and foul language.
Still, you've been nice to most of the ghosts, and eventually they reach a two-thirds majority in your favor. “Congratulations!” the Elizabethan ghost tells you, and then there's a snap and the large chandelier falls on your head.
You groan and clutch your head, but your hand goes right through. “Huh?” you stare at your hand. It's pearly and translucent. You stare down at your body, lying bloody and broken on the floor. “Crap,” you say as your own welcoming party breaks out around you.
After the first two centuries, you start to get the hang of this being a ghost thing.
“Sorry, guy,” you say to the ghost swim coach. “But twerking is the only exercise I do.”
“What kind of stroke is that?” he asks suspiciously. He thinks you might be making fun of him, but also knows that he's been trapped in this house since 1973, so maybe there's been some breakthrough in the swimming world he doesn't know about.
“I'll show you,” you say, only too happy to oblige him.
“Oh god why,” he cries, trying to shield his eyes as your butt jiggles in his face.
“This is what you're missing in the outside world!” you say, except it comes out in a stutter because you're too busy thrusting to talk normally.
“The world is ending,” he laments, and tries to commit suicide by jumping into the ghost pool. He's a ghost though, so he just sinks to the bottom and sits there crying in a little ball.
Suddenly the sound of a gong echoes through the house and all of the swimming ghosts float out of the pool. One of them even leads the traumatized swim coach, trying to comfort him as they all make their way through the walls to the ballroom. You follow.
“How does the vote stand?” asks a solemn ghost in an Elizabethan ruff. “Yay?” At this word, a number of ghosts start to glow brighter. “Nay?” he asks, and other ghosts glow. You can't tell which group is larger, and so the Elizabethan ghost opens up the floor and there are many impassioned speeches. One of the swimming ghosts makes a long angry rant against you because the swimming coach is still too catatonic to speak. At one point you try to defend yourself by showcasing the twerking in question, but this only seems to seal your fate. Your buttocks is still faintly jiggling and they've already reached a two-thirds majority is reached. Against you. Apparently they don't want to spend eternity with you, and you're banished to the cellar. You're pushed down the empty shaft into the basement with a rope around your neck. Your body is caught up short at the end of the rope, but your spirit continues to fall, down, down into the dark of the basement, to languish their forever, slowly losing any vestige of your humanity until you're just a create of need, howling voiceless into the night with the other rejects.
“Sorry, guy,” you say to the ghost swim coach. “But twerking is the only exercise I do.”
“What kind of stroke is that?” he asks suspiciously. He thinks you might be making fun of him, but also knows that he's been trapped in this house since 1973, so maybe there's been some breakthrough in the swimming world he doesn't know about.
“I'll show you,” you say, only too happy to oblige him.
“Oh god why,” he cries, trying to shield his eyes as your butt jiggles in his face.
“This is what you're missing in the outside world!” you say, except it comes out in a stutter because you're too busy thrusting to talk normally.
“The world is ending,” he laments, and tries to commit suicide by jumping into the ghost pool. He's a ghost though, so he just sinks to the bottom and sits there crying in a little ball.
Suddenly the sound of a gong echoes through the house and all of the swimming ghosts float out of the pool. One of them even leads the traumatized swim coach, trying to comfort him as they all make their way through the walls to the ballroom. You follow.
“How does the vote stand?” asks a solemn ghost in an Elizabethan ruff. “Yay?” At this word, a number of ghosts start to glow brighter. “Nay?” he asks, and other ghosts glow. You can't tell which group is larger, and so the Elizabethan ghost opens up the floor and there are many impassioned speeches. One of the swimming ghosts makes a long angry rant against you because the swimming coach is still too catatonic to speak. At one point you try to defend yourself by showcasing the twerking in question, but this only seems to seal your fate. Your buttocks is still faintly jiggling and they've already reached a two-thirds majority is reached. Against you. Apparently they don't want to spend eternity with you, and you're banished to the cellar. You're pushed down the empty shaft into the basement with a rope around your neck. Your body is caught up short at the end of the rope, but your spirit continues to fall, down, down into the dark of the basement, to languish their forever, slowly losing any vestige of your humanity until you're just a create of need, howling voiceless into the night with the other rejects.
“Sorry, but I don't have a swimming suit,” you say with a shrug.
“That's alright,” the coach says. “It's not really water.” He pushes you in, and you immediately smack on the bottom of the pool. You think the air around feels a little colder and heavier than normal, like moving through fog, but certainly not enough to actually swim in. The ghosts look down at you and laugh. Soon you're running along the bottom of the pool, racing them, and bouncing off the sides. “Alright, alright,” the coach laughs over the sound of a gong echoing through the house. “But now it's time for ghost vote.”
The coach and all the swimming ghosts exit the pool and starting heading for the ballroom en masse. You follow. Other ghosts join you, some moving through walls or furniture, all ending up in the ballroom.
“How does the vote stand?” asks a solemn ghost in an Elizabethan ruff. “Yay?” At this word, a number of ghosts start to glow brighter. “Nay?” he asks, and other ghosts glow. You can't tell which group is larger, and so the Elizabethan ghost opens up the floor and there are many impassioned speeches. The swim coach makes a speech in your favor, about what a good sport you are and how you don't let a little thing like being alive hold you back. Some other ghosts shout him down, citing your rudeness and foul language.
Still, you've been nice to most of the ghosts, and eventually they reach a two-thirds majority in your favor. “Congratulations!” the Elizabethan ghost tells you, and then there's a snap and the large chandelier falls on your head.
You groan and clutch your head, but your hand goes right through. “Huh?” you stare at your hand. It's pearly and translucent. You stare down at your body, lying bloody and broken on the floor. “Crap,” you say as your own welcoming party breaks out around you.
After the first two centuries, you start to get the hang of this being a ghost thing.
“Sorry, guy,” you say to the ghost swim coach. “But twerking is the only exercise I do.”
“What kind of stroke is that?” he asks suspiciously. He thinks you might be making fun of him, but also knows that he's been trapped in this house since 1973, so maybe there's been some breakthrough in the swimming world he doesn't know about.
“I'll show you,” you say, only too happy to oblige him.
“Oh god why,” he cries, trying to shield his eyes as your butt jiggles in his face.
“This is what you're missing in the outside world!” you say, except it comes out in a stutter because you're too busy thrusting to talk normally.
“The world is ending,” he laments, and tries to commit suicide by jumping into the ghost pool. He's a ghost though, so he just sinks to the bottom and sits there crying in a little ball.
Suddenly the sound of a gong echoes through the house and all of the swimming ghosts float out of the pool. One of them even leads the traumatized swim coach, trying to comfort him as they all make their way through the walls to the ballroom. You follow.
“How does the vote stand?” asks a solemn ghost in an Elizabethan ruff. “Yay?” At this word, a number of ghosts start to glow brighter. “Nay?” he asks, and other ghosts glow. You can't tell which group is larger, and so the Elizabethan ghost opens up the floor and there are many impassioned speeches. One of the swimming ghosts makes a long angry rant against you because the swimming coach is still too catatonic to speak.
Still, you've been nice to most of the ghosts, and eventually they reach a two-thirds majority in your favor. “Congratulations!” the Elizabethan ghost tells you, and then there's a snap and the large chandelier falls on your head.
You groan and clutch your head, but your hand goes right through. “Huh?” you stare at your hand. It's pearly and translucent. You stare down at your body, lying bloody and broken on the floor. “Crap,” you say as your own welcoming party breaks out around you.
After the first two centuries, you start to get the hang of this being a ghost thing.
“Sorry, but I don't have a swimming suit,” you say with a shrug.
“That's alright,” the coach says. “It's not really water.” He pushes you in, and you immediately smack on the bottom of the pool. You think the air around feels a little colder and heavier than normal, like moving through fog, but certainly not enough to actually swim in. The ghosts look down at you and laugh. Soon you're running along the bottom of the pool, racing them, and bouncing off the sides. “Alright, alright,” the coach laughs over the sound of a gong echoing through the house. “But now it's time for ghost vote.”
The coach and all the swimming ghosts exit the pool and starting heading for the ballroom en masse. You follow. Other ghosts join you, some moving through walls or furniture, all ending up in the ballroom.
“How does the vote stand?” asks a solemn ghost in an Elizabethan ruff. “Yay?” At this word, almost all of the ghosts start to glow brighter. “Nay?” he asks, and a few ghosts glow.
“Obviously the Yays have it!” the Elizabethan ghost proclaims to much cheering. “Everyone likes you,” he tells you. “Congratulations!” Then there's a snap and the large chandelier falls on your head.
You groan and clutch your head, but your hand goes right through. “Huh?” you stare at your hand. It's pearly and translucent. You stare down at your body, lying bloody and broken on the floor. “Crap,” you say as your own welcoming party breaks out around you.
After the first two centuries, you start to get the hang of this being a ghost thing.
“Singing is for losers,” you tell him. “Do I look like a loser to you?”
“Well!” the chorus master ghost scoffs. “I've never encountered such rudeness in all of my afterlife!” A gong sound echoes through the house. “We'll just see!” he says, and leads his miffed chorus away. All the ghosts are converging on the ballroom, some moving through walls and furniture, and you follow them.
“How does the vote stand?” asks a solemn ghost in an Elizabethan ruff. “Yay?” At this word, only a small number of ghosts start to glow brighter. “Nay?” he asks, and the vast majority of ghosts glow. There doesn't seem to be much room for debate. Everyone is giving you dirty looks. Maybe you shouldn't have been so bitchy to them?
In no time at all an almost unanimous decision has been made. Against you. Apparently they don't want to spend eternity with you, and you're banished to the cellar. You're pushed down the empty shaft into the basement with a rope around your neck. Your body is caught up short at the end of the rope, but your spirit continues to fall, down, down into the dark of the basement, to languish their forever, slowly losing any vestige of your humanity until you're just a create of need, howling voiceless into the night with the other rejects.
“Sorry, but I don't know the words,” you say truthfully.
“Music isn't about words,” the choir master ghost laughs. “It's about emotions. Get up there and feel something at me.”
“Well, okay,” you say as the ghosts of the choir make room for you. “This song has a special meaning to me—my parents used to sing it as a lullaby to get me to sleep. Before they were tragically killed running the Historic Mazelandia Democratic Race of Fortune. I never learned what really happened—probably their faces were eaten off by Mazelandian Face-Eating Tigers, but that's not how I want to remember them. I remember them through this song instead.” You take a deep breath, fighting back the tears that almost always come whenever you think of these words, and start to sing, soulfully, and from your heart:
“I like big butts and I cannot lie!
You other brothers can't deny
That when a girl walks in with an itty bitty waist
And a round thing in your face...”
“YOU GET SPRUNG!” half the chorus finishes with you, in harmony.
The choral master wipes a tear away from his eye. “Thank you, that was beautiful,” he says, putting a hand to his heart. “Truly, you have a beautiful soul.” A gong echoes through the house. “But now we must vote!” he says, and leads you and the rest of the chorus away. Other ghosts are moving too, through the walls and furniture, all headed to the ballroom.
“How does the vote stand?” asks a solemn ghost in an Elizabethan ruff. “Yay?” At this word, a number of ghosts start to glow brighter. “Nay?” he asks, and other ghosts glow. You can't tell which group is larger, and so the Elizabethan ghost opens up the floor and there are many impassioned speeches. The choir master ghost argues for you, citing your beautiful soul and artistic temperament, but other ghosts shout him down. Maybe you shouldn't have been so bitchy to the rest of them?
Eventually, a two-thirds majority is reached. Against you. Apparently they don't want to spend eternity with you, and you're banished to the cellar. You're pushed down the empty shaft into the basement with a rope around your neck. Your body is caught up short at the end of the rope, but your spirit continues to fall, down, down into the dark of the basement, to languish their forever, slowly losing any vestige of your humanity until you're just a create of need, howling voiceless into the night with the other rejects.
“Singing is for losers,” you tell him. “Do I look like a loser to you?”
“Well!” the chorus master ghost scoffs. “I've never encountered such rudeness in all of my afterlife!” A gong sound echoes through the house. “We'll just see!” he says, and leads his miffed chorus away. All the ghosts are converging on the ballroom, some moving through walls and furniture, and you follow them.
“How does the vote stand?” asks a solemn ghost in an Elizabethan ruff. “Yay?” At this word, a number of ghosts start to glow brighter. “Nay?” he asks, and other ghosts glow. You can't tell which group is larger, and so the Elizabethan ghost opens up the floor and there are many impassioned speeches. The choir master ghost argues against you, citing your rudeness and foul language, and some other ghosts shout their agreement. Some try to come to your defense, but they are soon shouted down. Maybe you shouldn't have been so bitchy to most of them?
Eventually, a two-thirds majority is reached. Against you. Apparently they don't want to spend eternity with you, and you're banished to the cellar. You're pushed down the empty shaft into the basement with a rope around your neck. Your body is caught up short at the end of the rope, but your spirit continues to fall, down, down into the dark of the basement, to languish their forever, slowly losing any vestige of your humanity until you're just a create of need, howling voiceless into the night with the other rejects.
“Sorry, but I don't know the words,” you say truthfully.
“Music isn't about words,” the choir master ghost laughs. “It's about emotions. Get up there and feel something at me.”
“Well, okay,” you say as the ghosts of the choir make room for you. “This song has a special meaning to me—my parents used to sing it as a lullaby to get me to sleep. Before they were tragically killed running the Historic Mazelandia Democratic Race of Fortune. I never learned what really happened—probably their faces were eaten off by Mazelandian Face-Eating Tigers, but that's not how I want to remember them. I remember them through this song instead.” You take a deep breath, fighting back the tears that almost always come whenever you think of these words, and start to sing, soulfully, and from your heart:
“I like big butts and I cannot lie!
You other brothers can't deny
That when a girl walks in with an itty bitty waist
And a round thing in your face...”
“YOU GET SPRUNG!” half the chorus finishes with you, in harmony.
The choral master wipes a tear away from his eye. “Thank you, that was beautiful,” he says, putting a hand to his heart. “Truly, you have a beautiful soul.” A gong echoes through the house. “But now we must vote!” he says, and leads you and the rest of the chorus away. Other ghosts are moving too, through the walls and furniture, all headed to the ballroom.
“How does the vote stand?” asks a solemn ghost in an Elizabethan ruff. “Yay?” At this word, a number of ghosts start to glow brighter. “Nay?” he asks, and other ghosts glow. You can't tell which group is larger, and so the Elizabethan ghost opens up the floor and there are many impassioned speeches. The choir master ghost argues for you, citing your beautiful soul and artistic temperament. He bids you to “share some of the music in your heart with us all,” and so you lead them in a rousing chorus of The Thong Song, which leaves not a dry eye in the house, or wouldn't have, if ghosts could cry tangible tears.
Eventually they reach a two-thirds majority in your favor. “Congratulations!” the Elizabethan ghost tells you, and then there's a snap and the large chandelier falls on your head.
You groan and clutch your head, but your hand goes right through. “Huh?” you stare at your hand. It's pearly and translucent. You stare down at your body, lying bloody and broken on the floor. “Crap,” you say as your own welcoming party breaks out around you.
After the first two centuries, you start to get the hang of this being a ghost thing.
“Sorry, but I don't know the words,” you say truthfully.
“Music isn't about words,” the choir master ghost laughs. “It's about emotions. Get up there and feel something at me.”
“Well, okay,” you say as the ghosts of the choir make room for you. “This song has a special meaning to me—my parents used to sing it as a lullaby to get me to sleep. Before they were tragically killed running the Historic Mazelandia Democratic Race of Fortune. I never learned what really happened—probably their faces were eaten off by Mazelandian Face-Eating Tigers, but that's not how I want to remember them. I remember them through this song instead.” You take a deep breath, fighting back the tears that almost always come whenever you think of these words, and start to sing, soulfully, and from your heart:
“I like big butts and I cannot lie!
You other brothers can't deny
That when a girl walks in with an itty bitty waist
And a round thing in your face...”
“YOU GET SPRUNG!” half the chorus finishes with you, in harmony.
The choral master wipes a tear away from his eye. “Thank you, that was beautiful,” he says, putting a hand to his heart. “Truly, you have a beautiful soul.” A gong echoes through the house. “But now we must vote!” he says, and leads you and the rest of the chorus away. Other ghosts are moving too, through the walls and furniture, all headed to the ballroom.
“How does the vote stand?” asks a solemn ghost in an Elizabethan ruff. “Yay?” At this word, a number of ghosts start to glow brighter. “Nay?” he asks, and other ghosts glow. You can't tell which group is larger, and so the Elizabethan ghost opens up the floor and there are many impassioned speeches. The choir master ghost argues for you, citing your beautiful soul and artistic temperament. He bids you to “share some of the music in your heart with us all,” and so you lead them in a rousing chorus of The Thong Song, which leaves not a dry eye in the house, or wouldn't have, if ghosts could cry tangible tears.
Eventually they reach a two-thirds majority in your favor. “Congratulations!” the Elizabethan ghost tells you, and then there's a snap and the large chandelier falls on your head.
You groan and clutch your head, but your hand goes right through. “Huh?” you stare at your hand. It's pearly and translucent. You stare down at your body, lying bloody and broken on the floor. “Crap,” you say as your own welcoming party breaks out around you.
After the first two centuries, you start to get the hang of this being a ghost thing.
“Singing is for losers,” you tell him. “Do I look like a loser to you?”
“Well!” the chorus master ghost scoffs. “I've never encountered such rudeness in all of my afterlife!” A gong sound echoes through the house. “We'll just see!” he says, and leads his miffed chorus away. All the ghosts are converging on the ballroom, some moving through walls and furniture, and you follow them.
“How does the vote stand?” asks a solemn ghost in an Elizabethan ruff. “Yay?” At this word, a number of ghosts start to glow brighter. “Nay?” he asks, and other ghosts glow. You can't tell which group is larger, and so the Elizabethan ghost opens up the floor and there are many impassioned speeches. The choir master ghost argues against you, citing your rudeness and foul language, and some other ghosts shout their agreement. Some try to come to your defense, but they are soon shouted down. Maybe you shouldn't have been so bitchy to most of them?
Eventually, a two-thirds majority is reached. Against you. Apparently they don't want to spend eternity with you, and you're banished to the cellar. You're pushed down the empty shaft into the basement with a rope around your neck. Your body is caught up short at the end of the rope, but your spirit continues to fall, down, down into the dark of the basement, to languish their forever, slowly losing any vestige of your humanity until you're just a create of need, howling voiceless into the night with the other rejects.
“Singing is for losers,” you tell him. “Do I look like a loser to you?”
“Well!” the chorus master ghost scoffs. “I've never encountered such rudeness in all of my afterlife!” A gong sound echoes through the house. “We'll just see!” he says, and leads his miffed chorus away. All the ghosts are converging on the ballroom, some moving through walls and furniture, and you follow them.
“How does the vote stand?” asks a solemn ghost in an Elizabethan ruff. “Yay?” At this word, a number of ghosts start to glow brighter. “Nay?” he asks, and other ghosts glow. You can't tell which group is larger, and so the Elizabethan ghost opens up the floor and there are many impassioned speeches. The choir master ghost argues against you, citing your rudeness and foul language.
Still, you've been nice to most of the ghosts, and eventually they reach a two-thirds majority in your favor. “Congratulations!” the Elizabethan ghost tells you, and then there's a snap and the large chandelier falls on your head.
You groan and clutch your head, but your hand goes right through. “Huh?” you stare at your hand. It's pearly and translucent. You stare down at your body, lying bloody and broken on the floor. “Crap,” you say as your own welcoming party breaks out around you.
After the first two centuries, you start to get the hang of this being a ghost thing.
“Sorry, but I don't know the words,” you say truthfully.
“Music isn't about words,” the choir master ghost laughs. “It's about emotions. Get up there and feel something at me.”
“Well, okay,” you say as the ghosts of the choir make room for you. “This song has a special meaning to me—my parents used to sing it as a lullaby to get me to sleep. Before they were tragically killed running the Historic Mazelandia Democratic Race of Fortune. I never learned what really happened—probably their faces were eaten off by Mazelandian Face-Eating Tigers, but that's not how I want to remember them. I remember them through this song instead.” You take a deep breath, fighting back the tears that almost always come whenever you think of these words, and start to sing, soulfully, and from your heart:
“I like big butts and I cannot lie!
You other brothers can't deny
That when a girl walks in with an itty bitty waist
And a round thing in your face...”
“YOU GET SPRUNG!” half the chorus finishes with you, in harmony.
The choral master wipes a tear away from his eye. “Thank you, that was beautiful,” he says, putting a hand to his heart. “Truly, you have a beautiful soul.” A gong echoes through the house. “But now we must vote!” he says, and leads you and the rest of the chorus away. Other ghosts are moving too, through the walls and furniture, all headed to the ballroom.
“How does the vote stand?” asks a solemn ghost in an Elizabethan ruff. “Yay?” At this word, almost all of the ghosts start to glow brighter. “Nay?” he asks, and a few ghosts glow.
“Obviously the Yays have it!” the Elizabethan ghost proclaims to much cheering. “Everyone likes you,” he tells you. “Congratulations!” Then there's a snap and the large chandelier falls on your head.
You groan and clutch your head, but your hand goes right through. “Huh?” you stare at your hand. It's pearly and translucent. You stare down at your body, lying bloody and broken on the floor. “Crap,” you say as your own welcoming party breaks out around you.
After the first two centuries, you start to get the hang of this being a ghost thing.
The art gallery is one long rectangle of a room, with paintings interspersed by windows. Some of the paintings are normal, rather boring and dark landscapes and portraits of startled hunting dogs, but the majority of them are ghost paintings, painted by ghosts of ghosts. You can tell because they're all glowing faintly, like the transparency of a ghost caught on canvas. The subjects hold dignified poses despite wearing the grubby coats and stained jeans they died in. You peer at them curiously.
“Can I help you?” a snooty voice asks.
You turn to see a small, thin ghost in a bow tie standing solicitously beside you. He has an air about him of someone who just assumes he knows more than you as a given, but isn't trying to flaunt it. Probably the curator. How do you respond:
“Sure, what's the deal with this place?” you ask the art curator ghost, and then strap in for a lecture. His face lights up immediately at someone finally expressing an interest in his afterlife's work.
“Well, only the largest collection of ghost art in Europe!” he proclaims grandly. Then he leans forward and says confidentially, “I personally think it's also the largest in the world, but the Japanese samurai ghosts always refuse an arbitration when I write to their curator asking permission to verify once and full all, and you know what that means.” He nods knowingly at you. “Now!” he says, flinging his arms wide and turning to the collection. “Welcome to the exciting world of ghost paint! Let me start at the beginning!”
Over the next hour he walks you down the hall, explaining the paintings you pass as you go. Soon you know more than perhaps you ever wanted about ghost painting techniques, the history of ghost art, and famous ghost artists and art critics. It's not the most boring thing ever and the ghost art curator seems to be enjoying himself. “What a delightful human you are!” he tells you warmly. “I hope you are able to come back another time! But now, I fear, it is time for the ghost vote.”
At that moment a gong sounds through the house, and he starts to lead you away. Other ghosts join you, some moving through walls or furniture, all ending up in the ballroom in a big mass.
“How does the vote stand?” asks a solemn ghost in an Elizabethan ruff. “Yay?” At this word, a number of ghosts start to glow brighter. “Nay?” he asks, and other ghosts glow. You can't tell which group is larger, and so the Elizabethan ghost opens up the floor and there are many impassioned speeches. The art curator ghost argues for you, citing your interest in art and the finer things, but the other ghosts shout him down. Maybe you shouldn't have been so bitchy to the rest of them?
Eventually, a two-thirds majority is reached. Against you. Apparently they don't want to spend eternity with you, and you're banished to the cellar. You're pushed down the empty shaft into the basement with a rope around your neck. Your body is caught up short at the end of the rope, but your spirit continues to fall, down, down into the dark of the basement, to languish their forever, slowly losing any vestige of your humanity until you're just a create of need, howling voiceless into the night with the other rejects.
“No way, art is so boring!” you say.
“Well, I never!” the art curator says, as the sound of a gong echoes through the house. “The others will be hearing about this, I can tell you!”
He hurries from the room and you follow. There's a steady stream of ghosts, all converging on the ballroom.
“How does the vote stand?” asks a solemn ghost in an Elizabethan ruff. “Yay?” At this word, only a small number of ghosts start to glow brighter. “Nay?” he asks, and the vast majority of ghosts glow. There doesn't seem to be much room for debate. Everyone is giving you dirty looks. Maybe you shouldn't have been so bitchy to them?
In no time at all an almost unanimous decision has been made. Against you. Apparently they don't want to spend eternity with you, and you're banished to the cellar. You're pushed down the empty shaft into the basement with a rope around your neck. Your body is caught up short at the end of the rope, but your spirit continues to fall, down, down into the dark of the basement, to languish their forever, slowly losing any vestige of your humanity until you're just a create of need, howling voiceless into the night with the other rejects.
The art gallery is one long rectangle of a room, with paintings interspersed by windows. Some of the paintings are normal, rather boring and dark landscapes and portraits of startled hunting dogs, but the majority of them are ghost paintings, painted by ghosts of ghosts. You can tell because they're all glowing faintly, like the transparency of a ghost caught on canvas. The subjects hold dignified poses despite wearing the grubby coats and stained jeans they died in. You peer at them curiously.
“Can I help you?” a snooty voice asks.
You turn to see a small, thin ghost in a bow tie standing solicitously beside you. He has an air about him of someone who just assumes he knows more than you as a given, but isn't trying to flaunt it. Probably the curator. How do you respond:
“Sure, what's the deal with this place?” you ask the art curator ghost, and then strap in for a lecture. His face lights up immediately at someone finally expressing an interest in his afterlife's work.
“Well, only the largest collection of ghost art in Europe!” he proclaims grandly. Then he leans forward and says confidentially, “I personally think it's also the largest in the world, but the Japanese samurai ghosts always refuse an arbitration when I write to their curator asking permission to verify once and full all, and you know what that means.” He nods knowingly at you. “Now!” he says, flinging his arms wide and turning to the collection. “Welcome to the exciting world of ghost paint! Let me start at the beginning!”
Over the next hour he walks you down the hall, explaining the paintings you pass as you go. Soon you know more than perhaps you ever wanted about ghost painting techniques, the history of ghost art, and famous ghost artists and art critics. It's not the most boring thing ever and the ghost art curator seems to be enjoying himself. “What a delightful human you are!” he tells you warmly. “I hope you are able to come back another time! But now, I fear, it is time for the ghost vote.”
At that moment a gong sounds through the house, and he starts to lead you away. Other ghosts join you, some moving through walls or furniture, all ending up in the ballroom in a big mass.
“How does the vote stand?” asks a solemn ghost in an Elizabethan ruff. “Yay?” At this word, a number of ghosts start to glow brighter. “Nay?” he asks, and other ghosts glow. You can't tell which group is larger, and so the Elizabethan ghost opens up the floor and there are many impassioned speeches. The art curator ghost argues for you, citing your interest in art and the finer things, but some other ghosts shout him down. Maybe you shouldn't have been so bitchy to them?
Still, you've been nice to most of the ghosts, and eventually they reach a two-thirds majority in your favor. “Congratulations!” the Elizabethan ghost tells you, and then there's a snap and the large chandelier falls on your head.
You groan and clutch your head, but your hand goes right through. “Huh?” you stare at your hand. It's pearly and translucent. You stare down at your body, lying bloody and broken on the floor. “Crap,” you say as your own welcoming party breaks out around you.
After the first two centuries, you start to get the hang of this being a ghost thing.
“No way, art is so boring!” you say.
“Well, I never!” the art curator says, as the sound of a gong echoes through the house. “The others will be hearing about this, I can tell you!”
He hurries from the room and you follow. There's a steady stream of ghosts, all converging on the ballroom.
“How does the vote stand?” asks a solemn ghost in an Elizabethan ruff. “Yay?” At this word, a number of ghosts start to glow brighter. “Nay?” he asks, and other ghosts glow. You can't tell which group is larger, and so the Elizabethan ghost opens up the floor and there are many impassioned speeches. The art curator ghost argues against you, citing your rudeness, but some other ghosts shout him down that you're not that bad. Still others argue that you are totally that bad.
Eventually, a two-thirds majority is reached. Against you. Apparently they don't want to spend eternity with you, and you're banished to the cellar. You're pushed down the empty shaft into the basement with a rope around your neck. Your body is caught up short at the end of the rope, but your spirit continues to fall, down, down into the dark of the basement, to languish their forever, slowly losing any vestige of your humanity until you're just a create of need, howling voiceless into the night with the other rejects.
The art gallery is one long rectangle of a room, with paintings interspersed by windows. Some of the paintings are normal, rather boring and dark landscapes and portraits of startled hunting dogs, but the majority of them are ghost paintings, painted by ghosts of ghosts. You can tell because they're all glowing faintly, like the transparency of a ghost caught on canvas. The subjects hold dignified poses despite wearing the grubby coats and stained jeans they died in. You peer at them curiously.
“Can I help you?” a snooty voice asks.
You turn to see a small, thin ghost in a bow tie standing solicitously beside you. He has an air about him of someone who just assumes he knows more than you as a given, but isn't trying to flaunt it. Probably the curator. How do you respond:
“No way, art is so boring!” you say.
“Well, I never!” the art curator says, as the sound of a gong echoes through the house. “The others will be hearing about this, I can tell you!”
He hurries from the room and you follow. There's a steady stream of ghosts, all converging on the ballroom.
“How does the vote stand?” asks a solemn ghost in an Elizabethan ruff. “Yay?” At this word, a number of ghosts start to glow brighter. “Nay?” he asks, and other ghosts glow. You can't tell which group is larger, and so the Elizabethan ghost opens up the floor and there are many impassioned speeches. The art curator ghost argues for you, citing your interest in art and the finer things, but some other ghosts shout him down. Maybe you shouldn't have been so bitchy to them?
Still, you've been nice to most of the ghosts, and eventually they reach a two-thirds majority in your favor. “Congratulations!” the Elizabethan ghost tells you, and then there's a snap and the large chandelier falls on your head.
You groan and clutch your head, but your hand goes right through. “Huh?” you stare at your hand. It's pearly and translucent. You stare down at your body, lying bloody and broken on the floor. “Crap,” you say as your own welcoming party breaks out around you.
After the first two centuries, you start to get the hang of this being a ghost thing.
“Sure, what's the deal with this place?” you ask the art curator ghost, and then strap in for a lecture. His face lights up immediately at someone finally expressing an interest in his afterlife's work.
“Well, only the largest collection of ghost art in Europe!” he proclaims grandly. Then he leans forward and says confidentially, “I personally think it's also the largest in the world, but the Japanese samurai ghosts always refuse an arbitration when I write to their curator asking permission to verify once and full all, and you know what that means.” He nods knowingly at you. “Now!” he says, flinging his arms wide and turning to the collection. “Welcome to the exciting world of ghost paint! Let me start at the beginning!”
Over the next hour he walks you down the hall, explaining the paintings you pass as you go. Soon you know more than perhaps you ever wanted about ghost painting techniques, the history of ghost art, and famous ghost artists and art critics. It's not the most boring thing ever and the ghost art curator seems to be enjoying himself. “What a delightful human you are!” he tells you warmly. “I hope you are able to come back another time! But now, I fear, it is time for the ghost vote.”
At that moment a gong sounds through the house, and he starts to lead you away. Other ghosts join you, some moving through walls or furniture, all ending up in the ballroom in a big mass.
“How does the vote stand?” asks a solemn ghost in an Elizabethan ruff. “Yay?” At this word, almost all of the ghosts start to glow brighter. “Nay?” he asks, and a few ghosts glow.
“Obviously the Yays have it!” the Elizabethan ghost proclaims to much cheering. “Everyone likes you,” he tells you. “Congratulations!” Then there's a snap and the large chandelier falls on your head.
You groan and clutch your head, but your hand goes right through. “Huh?” you stare at your hand. It's pearly and translucent. You stare down at your body, lying bloody and broken on the floor. “Crap,” you say as your own welcoming party breaks out around you.
After the first two centuries, you start to get the hang of this being a ghost thing.
The servants' lounge is kind of dingy, especially compared to the opulence of the rest of the house. There's some worn looking furniture and a book case filled with antique romance novels and self-help books. There's also a ping pong table where one ghost is holding a paddle and tapping the ball against the wall sadly.
“Hey,” she says when she sees you. “Do you want to play?
“Sure!”
“Hell no.”
The servants' lounge is kind of dingy, especially compared to the opulence of the rest of the house. There's some worn looking furniture and a book case filled with antique romance novels and self-help books. There's also a ping pong table where one ghost is holding a paddle and tapping the ball against the wall sadly.
“Hey,” she says when she sees you. “Do you want to play?
“Sure!”
“Hell no.”
You push open the door to the gardens, thinking this might be a viable escape route! Sadly you see immediately that this isn't going to work. There's a giant wall all the way around the dark, dank patch of ground covered in dead grass. There are spikes on the top of the wall, and when you run your hand down its sides, they're slick with lichen and ghost lichen. No way you're going to be able to climb that.
A gardener ghost is raking the ghost of some leaves in a bored sort of way. Should you:
You push open the door to the gardens, thinking this might be a viable escape route! Sadly you see immediately that this isn't going to work. There's a giant wall all the way around the dark, dank patch of ground covered in dead grass. There are spikes on the top of the wall, and when you run your hand down its sides, they're slick with lichen and ghost lichen. No way you're going to be able to climb that.
A gardener ghost is raking the ghost of some leaves in a bored sort of way. Should you:
“Can I help you?” you offer, picking up another rake. He nods at you and doesn't say anything. Maybe he's a ghost of few words. Together you work your way around the garden, piling leaves into a giant, faintly glowing pile. When you're finally done and the garden is cleared of leaves, you wipe your forehead on your sleeve and put your rake down. “What now?” you ask the ghost gardener.
He walks away, then turns back, launches himself into a run and jumps into the pile. Glowing ghost leaves fly everywhere. You laugh and jump in beside him. You take turns doing running jumps until the pile is reduced to nothing again. Then, still without saying a word, the gardener takes up his rake and starts raking them.
“This was fun,” you tell him. “But I should probably go.” He just nods.
Do you head for the servants' lounge?
Or the sauna?
You take a running start and with a loud yell launch yourself into the pile of ghost leaves, burying yourself up to your eyebrows. Glowing ghost leaves fly everywhere. The gardener just looks kind of sad and starts raking them up again. “See ya, sucker!” you laugh. Where are you taking this crazy train next?
The servants' lounge?
The sauna?
You take a running start and with a loud yell launch yourself into the pile of ghost leaves, burying yourself up to your eyebrows. Glowing ghost leaves fly everywhere. The gardener just looks kind of sad and starts raking them up again. “See ya, sucker!” you laugh. Where are you taking this crazy train next?
The servants' lounge?
The sauna?
“Can I help you?” you offer, picking up another rake. He nods at you and doesn't say anything. Maybe he's a ghost of few words. Together you work your way around the garden, piling leaves into a giant, faintly glowing pile. When you're finally done and the garden is cleared of leaves, you wipe your forehead on your sleeve and put your rake down. “What now?” you ask the ghost gardener.
He walks away, then turns back, launches himself into a run and jumps into the pile. Glowing ghost leaves fly everywhere. You laugh and jump in beside him. You take turns doing running jumps until the pile is reduced to nothing again. Then, still without saying a word, the gardener takes up his rake and starts raking them.
“This was fun,” you tell him. “But I should probably go.” He just nods.
Do you head for the servants' lounge?
Or the sauna?
“Sure, I'll totally play!” you volunteer, picking up the extra paddle. The game is kind of confusing because you keep accidentally hitting the ball through your new ghost friend. Occasionally it hits the wall behind her, flies back through her head, and lands back on the table. “Is that a penalty?” you ask, laughing.
“No idea,” she replies, happily, hitting it back to you. “Half the people that live here think this is a sketchy newfangled game anyway—they're way too suspicious of it to make up rules for ghost table tennis, so I just kind of do whatever.”
“Yeah, me too,” you agree, since this is your life philosophy.
“Well, that was fun,” she says after you have won or lost three of possibly seven games. It's hard to be sure when there are no rules. “But I'm in charge of chandelier maintenance before the big vote, so I better go. Good luck.” She gives you a thumbs up.
“Uh... cool,” you say, unsure how to respond as she walks through a wall. You can't follow, since you're a fleshy human. So you'd better walk through a door. Which door?
“Hell no, ping pong is for losers,” you say.
“Oh,” she says, and her face falls as she puts down the paddle. “Yeah... you're probably right. I have work to do anyway.” And she floats sadly through the wall. What's the next stop on this fun train?
“Hell no, ping pong is for losers,” you say.
“Oh,” she says, and her face falls as she puts down the paddle. “Yeah... you're probably right. I have work to do anyway.” And she floats sadly through the wall. What's the next stop on this fun train?
“Sure, I'll totally play!” you volunteer, picking up the extra paddle. The game is kind of confusing because you keep accidentally hitting the ball through your new ghost friend. Occasionally it hits the wall behind her, flies back through her head, and lands back on the table. “Is that a penalty?” you ask, laughing.
“No idea,” she replies, happily, hitting it back to you. “Half the people that live here think this is a sketchy newfangled game anyway—they're way too suspicious of it to make up rules for ghost table tennis, so I just kind of do whatever.”
“Yeah, me too,” you agree, since this is your life philosophy.
“Well, that was fun,” she says after you have won or lost three of possibly seven games. It's hard to be sure when there are no rules. “But I'm in charge of chandelier maintenance before the big vote, so I better go. Good luck.” She gives you a thumbs up.
“Uh... cool,” you say, unsure how to respond as she walks through a wall. You can't follow, since you're a fleshy human. So you'd better walk through a door. Which door?
The servants' lounge is kind of dingy, especially compared to the opulence of the rest of the house. There's some worn looking furniture and a book case filled with antique romance novels and self-help books. There's also a ping pong table where one ghost is holding a paddle and tapping the ball against the wall sadly.
“Hey,” she says when she sees you. “Do you want to play?
“Sure!”
“Hello no!”
The sauna is full of steam, and at first you think it's empty because, well, ghosts kind of look like steam. Then your eyes adjust to the weird lighting and you realize it's full of ghosts, and they are super naked. It's like a historical lesson in pubic hair fashion, and one you are not exactly pleased to be getting. Ew.
“No clothes allowed in the sauna!” one of the ghosts shouts at you.
Do you... are you going to take your clothes off?
Because you could just run away
The sauna is full of steam, and at first you think it's empty because, well, ghosts kind of look like steam. Then your eyes adjust to the weird lighting and you realize it's full of ghosts, and they are super naked. It's like a historical lesson in pubic hair fashion, and one you are not exactly pleased to be getting. Ew.
“No clothes allowed in the sauna!” one of the ghosts shouts at you.
Do you... are you going to take your clothes off?
Because you could just run away
The servants' lounge is kind of dingy, especially compared to the opulence of the rest of the house. There's some worn looking furniture and a book case filled with antique romance novels and self-help books. There's also a ping pong table where one ghost is holding a paddle and tapping the ball against the wall sadly.
“Hey,” she says when she sees you. “Do you want to play?
“Sure!”
“Hell no!”
The sauna is full of steam, and at first you think it's empty because, well, ghosts kind of look like steam. Then your eyes adjust to the weird lighting and you realize it's full of ghosts, and they are super naked. It's like a historical lesson in pubic hair fashion, and one you are not exactly pleased to be getting. Ew.
“No clothes allowed in the sauna!” one of the ghosts shouts at you.
Do you... are you going to take your clothes off?
Because you could just run away
The servants' lounge is kind of dingy, especially compared to the opulence of the rest of the house. There's some worn looking furniture and a book case filled with antique romance novels and self-help books. There's also a ping pong table where one ghost is holding a paddle and tapping the ball against the wall sadly.
“Hey,” she says when she sees you. “Do you want to play?
“Sure!”
“Hell no!”
You push open the door to the gardens, thinking this might be a viable escape route! Sadly you see immediately that this isn't going to work. There's a giant wall all the way around the dark, dank patch of ground covered in dead grass. There are spikes on the top of the wall, and when you run your hand down its sides, they're slick with lichen and ghost lichen. No way you're going to be able to climb that.
A gardener ghost is raking the ghost of some leaves in a bored sort of way. Should you:
You push open the door to the gardens, thinking this might be a viable escape route! Sadly you see immediately that this isn't going to work. There's a giant wall all the way around the dark, dank patch of ground covered in dead grass. There are spikes on the top of the wall, and when you run your hand down its sides, they're slick with lichen and ghost lichen. No way you're going to be able to climb that.
A gardener ghost is raking the ghost of some leaves in a bored sort of way. Should you:
You push open the door to the gardens, thinking this might be a viable escape route! Sadly you see immediately that this isn't going to work. There's a giant wall all the way around the dark, dank patch of ground covered in dead grass. There are spikes on the top of the wall, and when you run your hand down its sides, they're slick with lichen and ghost lichen. No way you're going to be able to climb that.
A gardener ghost is raking the ghost of some leaves in a bored sort of way. Should you:
“Hell no, ping pong is for losers,” you say.
“Oh,” she says, and her face falls as she puts down the paddle. “Yeah... you're probably right. I guess it's time for the vote anyway.”
A gong is echoing through the house, and all the ghosts are following it to the grand ballroom. You follow them, finding yourself the center of attention amongst the throng.
“How does the vote stand?” asks a solemn ghost in an Elizabethan ruff. “Yay?” At this word, a number of ghosts start to glow brighter. “Nay?” he asks, and other ghosts glow. You can't tell which group is larger, and so the Elizabethan ghost opens up the floor and there are many impassioned speeches. The table tennis ghost argues against you, telling everyone what a jerk you are, but some other ghosts shout her down that you're not that bad.
You've been nice to most of the ghosts, and eventually they reach a two-thirds majority in your favor. “Congratulations!” the Elizabethan ghost tells you, and then there's a snap and the large chandelier falls on your head.
You groan and clutch your head, but your hand goes right through. “Huh?” you stare at your hand. It's pearly and translucent. You stare down at your body, lying bloody and broken on the floor. “Crap,” you say as your own welcoming party breaks out around you.
After the first two centuries, you start to get the hang of this being a ghost thing.
“Hell no, ping pong is for losers,” you say.
“Oh,” she says, and her face falls as she puts down the paddle. “Yeah... you're probably right. I guess it's time for the vote anyway.”
A gong is echoing through the house, and all the ghosts are following it to the grand ballroom. You follow them, finding yourself the center of attention amongst the throng.
“How does the vote stand?” asks a solemn ghost in an Elizabethan ruff. “Yay?” At this word, a number of ghosts start to glow brighter. “Nay?” he asks, and other ghosts glow. You can't tell which group is larger, and so the Elizabethan ghost opens up the floor and there are many impassioned speeches. The table tennis ghost argues against you, telling everyone that you kind of suck, but some other ghosts shout her down, saying that you're not that bad. Still others argue that you are totally that bad.
Eventually, a two-thirds majority is reached. Against you. Apparently they don't want to spend eternity with you, and you're banished to the cellar. You're pushed down the empty shaft into the basement with a rope around your neck. Your body is caught up short at the end of the rope, but your spirit continues to fall, down, down into the dark of the basement, to languish their forever, slowly losing any vestige of your humanity until you're just a create of need, howling voiceless into the night with the other rejects.
“Sure, I'll totally play!” you volunteer, picking up the extra paddle. The game is kind of confusing because you keep accidentally hitting the ball through your new ghost friend. Occasionally it hits the wall behind her, flies back through her head, and lands back on the table. “Is that a penalty?” you ask, laughing.
“No idea,” she replies, happily, hitting it back to you. “Half the people that live here think this is a sketchy newfangled game anyway—they're way too suspicious of it to make up rules for ghost table tennis, so I just kind of do whatever.”
“Yeah, me too,” you agree, since this is your life philosophy.
“Well, that was fun,” she says after you have won or lost three of possibly seven games. It's hard to be sure when there are no rules. “But it's time to vote.” You can hear a gong echoing through the house. Your table tennis partner and all the other ghosts start making their way to the ballroom, some moving through walls and furniture.
“How does the vote stand?” asks a solemn ghost in an Elizabethan ruff. “Yay?” At this word, a number of ghosts start to glow brighter. “Nay?” he asks, and other ghosts glow. You can't tell which group is larger, and so the Elizabethan ghost opens up the floor and there are many impassioned speeches. Your table tennis partner argues in your favor, saying how you're pretty cool, but some other ghosts shout her down.
Eventually, a two-thirds majority is reached. Against you. Apparently they don't want to spend eternity with you, and you're banished to the cellar. You're pushed down the empty shaft into the basement with a rope around your neck. Your body is caught up short at the end of the rope, but your spirit continues to fall, down, down into the dark of the basement, to languish their forever, slowly losing any vestige of your humanity until you're just a create of need, howling voiceless into the night with the other rejects.
“Sure, I'll totally play!” you volunteer, picking up the extra paddle. The game is kind of confusing because you keep accidentally hitting the ball through your new ghost friend. Occasionally it hits the wall behind her, flies back through her head, and lands back on the table. “Is that a penalty?” you ask, laughing.
“No idea,” she replies, happily, hitting it back to you. “Half the people that live here think this is a sketchy newfangled game anyway—they're way too suspicious of it to make up rules for ghost table tennis, so I just kind of do whatever.”
“Yeah, me too,” you agree, since this is your life philosophy.
“Well, that was fun,” she says after you have won or lost three of possibly seven games. It's hard to be sure when there are no rules. “But it's time to vote.” You can hear a gong echoing through the house. Your table tennis partner and all the other ghosts start making their way to the ballroom, some moving through walls and furniture.
“How does the vote stand?” asks a solemn ghost in an Elizabethan ruff. “Yay?” At this word, almost all of the ghosts start to glow brighter. “Nay?” he asks, and a few ghosts glow.
“Obviously the Yays have it!” the Elizabethan ghost proclaims to much cheering. “Everyone likes you,” he tells you. “Congratulations!” Then there's a snap and the large chandelier falls on your head.
You groan and clutch your head, but your hand goes right through. “Huh?” you stare at your hand. It's pearly and translucent. You stare down at your body, lying bloody and broken on the floor. “Crap,” you say as your own welcoming party breaks out around you.
After the first two centuries, you start to get the hang of this being a ghost thing.
“Hell no, ping pong is for losers,” you say.
“Oh,” she says, and her face falls as she puts down the paddle. “Yeah... you're probably right. I guess it's time for the vote anyway.”
A gong is echoing through the house, and all the ghosts are following it to the grand ballroom. You follow them, finding yourself the center of attention amongst the throng.
“How does the vote stand?” asks a solemn ghost in an Elizabethan ruff. “Yay?” At this word, only a small number of ghosts start to glow brighter. “Nay?” he asks, and the vast majority of ghosts glow. There doesn't seem to be much room for debate. Everyone is giving you dirty looks. Maybe you shouldn't have been so bitchy to them?
In no time at all an almost unanimous decision has been made. Against you. Apparently they don't want to spend eternity with you, and you're banished to the cellar. You're pushed down the empty shaft into the basement with a rope around your neck. Your body is caught up short at the end of the rope, but your spirit continues to fall, down, down into the dark of the basement, to languish their forever, slowly losing any vestige of your humanity until you're just a create of need, howling voiceless into the night with the other rejects.
“Sure, I'll totally play!” you volunteer, picking up the extra paddle. The game is kind of confusing because you keep accidentally hitting the ball through your new ghost friend. Occasionally it hits the wall behind her, flies back through her head, and lands back on the table. “Is that a penalty?” you ask, laughing.
“No idea,” she replies, happily, hitting it back to you. “Half the people that live here think this is a sketchy newfangled game anyway—they're way too suspicious of it to make up rules for ghost table tennis, so I just kind of do whatever.”
“Yeah, me too,” you agree, since this is your life philosophy.
“Well, that was fun,” she says after you have won or lost three of possibly seven games. It's hard to be sure when there are no rules. “But it's time to vote.” You can hear a gong echoing through the house. Your table tennis partner and all the other ghosts start making their way to the ballroom, some moving through walls and furniture.
“How does the vote stand?” asks a solemn ghost in an Elizabethan ruff. “Yay?” At this word, a number of ghosts start to glow brighter. “Nay?” he asks, and other ghosts glow. You can't tell which group is larger, and so the Elizabethan ghost opens up the floor and there are many impassioned speeches. Your table tennis partner argues for you, saying that you're pretty cool, but some other ghosts shout her down.
Still, you've been nice to most of the ghosts, and eventually they reach a two-thirds majority in your favor. “Congratulations!” the Elizabethan ghost tells you, and then there's a snap and the large chandelier falls on your head.
You groan and clutch your head, but your hand goes right through. “Huh?” you stare at your hand. It's pearly and translucent. You stare down at your body, lying bloody and broken on the floor. “Crap,” you say as your own welcoming party breaks out around you.
After the first two centuries, you start to get the hang of this being a ghost thing.
You run screaming and flailing from the sauna and the naked ghosts without even bothering to close the door, so a cloud of steam follows you through the halls. After you've finished running, you pause to catch your breath, which is when you hear a gong echoing through the corridors of the house. Suddenly ghosts are everywhere, moving through walls and furniture. You follow them towards the ballroom.
“How does the vote stand?” asks a solemn ghost in an Elizabethan ruff. “Yay?” At this word, a number of ghosts start to glow brighter. “Nay?” he asks, and other ghosts glow. You can't tell which group is larger, and so the Elizabethan ghost opens up the floor and there are many impassioned speeches. One of the sauna ghosts (still naked) argues against you, citing how rude you were, not even saying anything to them and leaving the door wide open, but some other ghosts shout him down, saying you're not that bad.
You've been nice to most of the ghosts, and eventually they reach a two-thirds majority in your favor. “Congratulations!” the Elizabethan ghost tells you, and then there's a snap and the large chandelier falls on your head.
You groan and clutch your head, but your hand goes right through. “Huh?” you stare at your hand. It's pearly and translucent. You stare down at your body, lying bloody and broken on the floor. “Crap,” you say as your own welcoming party breaks out around you.
After the first two centuries, you start to get the hang of this being a ghost thing.
You run screaming and flailing from the sauna and the naked ghosts without even bothering to close the door, so a cloud of steam follows you through the halls. After you've finished running, you pause to catch your breath, which is when you hear a gong echoing through the corridors of the house. Suddenly ghosts are everywhere, moving through walls and furniture. You follow them towards the ballroom.
“How does the vote stand?” asks a solemn ghost in an Elizabethan ruff. “Yay?” At this word, a number of ghosts start to glow brighter. “Nay?” he asks, and other ghosts glow. You can't tell which group is larger, and so the Elizabethan ghost opens up the floor and there are many impassioned speeches. One of the sauna ghosts (still naked) argues against you, citing how rude you were, not even saying anything to them and leaving the door wide open, but some other ghosts shout him down that you're not that bad. Still others argue that you are totally that bad.
Eventually, a two-thirds majority is reached. Against you. Apparently they don't want to spend eternity with you, and you're banished to the cellar. You're pushed down the empty shaft into the basement with a rope around your neck. Your body is caught up short at the end of the rope, but your spirit continues to fall, down, down into the dark of the basement, to languish their forever, slowly losing any vestige of your humanity until you're just a create of need, howling voiceless into the night with the other rejects.
“Well, alright,” you say, apparently game for anything. Besides, it's not like there's anyone here to see you. Anyone alive that is. You strip, leaving your clothes in a small pile. One of the ghosts makes a whistling noise and they all laugh, but once you're naked, they seem to accept you as one of them. With the steam swirling around you, it's almost peaceful. You feel sure at any moment they're going to start discussing the great mysteries of life, when a gong starts echoing through the house.
“That's the vote,” one of the ghosts says. They all stand up, still naked, and file out of the sauna. You struggle back into your clothes, still dripping, and follow them. Ghosts are moving all over the house, all converging on the ballroom.
“How does the vote stand?” asks a solemn ghost in an Elizabethan ruff. “Yay?” At this word, a number of ghosts start to glow brighter. “Nay?” he asks, and other ghosts glow. You can't tell which group is larger, and so the Elizabethan ghost opens up the floor and there are many impassioned speeches. The sauna ghosts (still naked) argue for you, saying that you're pretty mellow, up for anything, and don't look half bad naked, but some other ghosts shout them down.
Still, you've been nice to most of the ghosts, and eventually they reach a two-thirds majority in your favor. “Congratulations!” the Elizabethan ghost tells you, and then there's a snap and the large chandelier falls on your head.
You groan and clutch your head, but your hand goes right through. “Huh?” you stare at your hand. It's pearly and translucent. You stare down at your body, lying bloody and broken on the floor. “Crap,” you say as your own welcoming party breaks out around you.
After the first two centuries, you start to get the hang of this being a ghost thing.
“Well, alright,” you say, apparently game for anything. Besides, it's not like there's anyone here to see you. Anyone alive that is. You strip, leaving your clothes in a small pile. One of the ghosts makes a whistling noise and they all laugh, but once you're naked, they seem to accept you as one of them. With the steam swirling around you, it's almost peaceful. You feel sure at any moment they're going to start discussing the great mysteries of life, when a gong starts echoing through the house.
“That's the vote,” one of the ghosts says. They all stand up, still naked, and file out of the sauna. You struggle back into your clothes, still dripping, and follow them. Ghosts are moving all over the house, all converging on the ballroom.
“How does the vote stand?” asks a solemn ghost in an Elizabethan ruff. “Yay?” At this word, a number of ghosts start to glow brighter. “Nay?” he asks, and other ghosts glow. You can't tell which group is larger, and so the Elizabethan ghost opens up the floor and there are many impassioned speeches. The sauna ghosts (still naked) argue for you, telling everyone that you're super chill, up for anything, and don't look half bad naked, but some other ghosts shout them down that, saying that you're terrible.
Eventually, a two-thirds majority is reached. Against you. Apparently they don't want to spend eternity with you, and you're banished to the cellar. You're pushed down the empty shaft into the basement with a rope around your neck. Your body is caught up short at the end of the rope, but your spirit continues to fall, down, down into the dark of the basement, to languish their forever, slowly losing any vestige of your humanity until you're just a create of need, howling voiceless into the night with the other rejects.
“Well, alright,” you say, apparently game for anything. Besides, it's not like there's anyone here to see you. Anyone alive that is. You strip, leaving your clothes in a small pile. One of the ghosts makes a whistling noise and they all laugh, but once you're naked, they seem to accept you as one of them. With the steam swirling around you, it's almost peaceful. You feel sure at any moment they're going to start discussing the great mysteries of life, when a gong starts echoing through the house.
“That's the vote,” one of the ghosts says. They all stand up, still naked, and file out of the sauna. You struggle back into your clothes, still dripping, and follow them. Ghosts are moving all over the house, all converging on the ballroom.
“How does the vote stand?” asks a solemn ghost in an Elizabethan ruff. “Yay?” At this word, almost all of the ghosts start to glow brighter. “Nay?” he asks, and a few ghosts glow.
“Obviously the Yays have it!” the Elizabethan ghost proclaims to much cheering. “Everyone likes you,” he tells you. “Congratulations!” Then there's a snap and the large chandelier falls on your head.
You groan and clutch your head, but your hand goes right through. “Huh?” you stare at your hand. It's pearly and translucent. You stare down at your body, lying bloody and broken on the floor. “Crap,” you say as your own welcoming party breaks out around you.
After the first two centuries, you start to get the hang of this being a ghost thing.
You run screaming and flailing from the sauna and the naked ghosts without even bothering to close the door, so a cloud of steam follows you through the halls. After you've finished running, you pause to catch your breath, which is when you hear a gong echoing through the corridors of the house. Suddenly ghosts are everywhere, moving through walls and furniture. You follow them towards the ballroom.
“How does the vote stand?” asks a solemn ghost in an Elizabethan ruff. “Yay?” At this word, only a small number of ghosts start to glow brighter. “Nay?” he asks, and the vast majority of ghosts glow. There doesn't seem to be much room for debate. Everyone is giving you dirty looks. Maybe you shouldn't have been so bitchy to them?
In no time at all an almost unanimous decision has been made. Against you. Apparently they don't want to spend eternity with you, and you're banished to the cellar. You're pushed down the empty shaft into the basement with a rope around your neck. Your body is caught up short at the end of the rope, but your spirit continues to fall, down, down into the dark of the basement, to languish their forever, slowly losing any vestige of your humanity until you're just a create of need, howling voiceless into the night with the other rejects.
“Can I help you?” you offer, picking up another rake. He nods at you and doesn't say anything. Maybe he's a ghost of few words. Together you work your way around the garden, piling leaves into a giant, faintly glowing pile. When you're finally done and the garden is cleared of leaves, you wipe your forehead on your sleeve and put your rake down. “What now?” you ask the ghost gardener.
He walks away, then turns back, launches himself into a run and jumps into the pile. Glowing ghost leaves fly everywhere. You laugh and jump in beside him. You take turns doing running jumps until the pile is reduced to nothing again. Then, still without saying a word, the gardener takes up his rake and starts raking them.
You're about to pick up your rake and join him when a gong echoes from inside the house. He motions for you to follow him, and you both go inside. Other ghosts are moving now too, heading towards the ballroom in a giant mass. You seem to be the center of attention when you get there.
“How does the vote stand?” asks a solemn ghost in an Elizabethan ruff. “Yay?” At this word, a number of ghosts start to glow brighter. “Nay?” he asks, and other ghosts glow. You can't tell which group is larger, and so the Elizabethan ghost opens up the floor and there are many impassioned speeches. The gardener makes an appreciative grunt and head tilt in your favor, which seems to be all the speech he's capable of. The others treat it like a legitimate argument, although most of them seem to be arguing against it.
Eventually, a two-thirds majority is reached. Against you. Apparently they don't want to spend eternity with you, and you're banished to the cellar. You're pushed down the empty shaft into the basement with a rope around your neck. Your body is caught up short at the end of the rope, but your spirit continues to fall, down, down into the dark of the basement, to languish their forever, slowly losing any vestige of your humanity until you're just a create of need, howling voiceless into the night with the other rejects.
“Can I help you?” you offer, picking up another rake. He nods at you and doesn't say anything. Maybe he's a ghost of few words. Together you work your way around the garden, piling leaves into a giant, faintly glowing pile. When you're finally done and the garden is cleared of leaves, you wipe your forehead on your sleeve and put your rake down. “What now?” you ask the ghost gardener.
He walks away, then turns back, launches himself into a run and jumps into the pile. Glowing ghost leaves fly everywhere. You laugh and jump in beside him. You take turns doing running jumps until the pile is reduced to nothing again. Then, still without saying a word, the gardener takes up his rake and starts raking them.
You're about to pick up your rake and join him when a gong echoes from inside the house. He motions for you to follow him, and you both go inside. Other ghosts are moving now too, heading towards the ballroom in a giant mass. You seem to be the center of attention when you get there.
“How does the vote stand?” asks a solemn ghost in an Elizabethan ruff. “Yay?” At this word, a number of ghosts start to glow brighter. “Nay?” he asks, and other ghosts glow. You can't tell which group is larger, and so the Elizabethan ghost opens up the floor and there are many impassioned speeches. The gardener ghosts makes an appreciative grunt and head tilt towards you, which seems to be all the speech he's capable of. Still, the others treat it as a legitimate argument, and eventually they reach a two-thirds majority in your favor. “Congratulations!” the Elizabethan ghost tells you, and then there's a snap and the large chandelier falls on your head.
You groan and clutch your head, but your hand goes right through. “Huh?” you stare at your hand. It's pearly and translucent. You stare down at your body, lying bloody and broken on the floor. “Crap,” you say as your own welcoming party breaks out around you.
After the first two centuries, you start to get the hang of this being a ghost thing.
You take a running start and with a loud yell launch yourself into the pile of ghost leaves, burying yourself up to your eyebrows. Glowing ghost leaves fly everywhere. The gardener just looks kind of sad and starts raking them up again. Then a gong echoes from inside the house and, without a glance at you, he floats through the wall back inside. You head inside too, and notices a lot more ghosts than you thought there were here, all floating in the same direction, towards the ballroom. You walk over, and seem to be the center of attention when you get there.
“How does the vote stand?” asks a solemn ghost in an Elizabethan ruff. “Yay?” At this word, a number of ghosts start to glow brighter. “Nay?” he asks, and other ghosts glow. You can't tell which group is larger, and so the Elizabethan ghost opens up the floor and there are many impassioned speeches. The gardener makes a clucking noise and shakes his head, which the others seem to take as a legitimate argument, because a few leap to your defense. The gardener continues to glare at you, in a way that says you might have some pruning shears thrust through your eyes sometime soon.
Still, you've been nice to most of the ghosts, and eventually they reach a two-thirds majority in your favor. “Congratulations!” the Elizabethan ghost tells you, and then there's a snap and the large chandelier falls on your head.
You groan and clutch your head, but your hand goes right through. “Huh?” you stare at your hand. It's pearly and translucent. You stare down at your body, lying bloody and broken on the floor. “Crap,” you say as your own welcoming party breaks out around you.
After the first two centuries, you start to get the hang of this being a ghost thing.
You take a running start and with a loud yell launch yourself into the pile of ghost leaves, burying yourself up to your eyebrows. Glowing ghost leaves fly everywhere. The gardener just looks kind of sad and starts raking them up again. Then a gong echoes from inside the house and, without a glance at you, he floats through the wall back inside. You head inside too, and notices a lot more ghosts than you thought there were here, all floating in the same direction, towards the ballroom. You walk over, and seem to be the center of attention when you get there.
“How does the vote stand?” asks a solemn ghost in an Elizabethan ruff. “Yay?” At this word, a number of ghosts start to glow brighter. “Nay?” he asks, and other ghosts glow. You can't tell which group is larger, and so the Elizabethan ghost opens up the floor and there are many impassioned speeches. The gardener makes a disapproving clucking sounds and shakes his head at you, which the others seem to take as a legitimate argument.
Eventually, a two-thirds majority is reached. Against you. Apparently they don't want to spend eternity with you, and you're banished to the cellar. You're pushed down the empty shaft into the basement with a rope around your neck. Your body is caught up short at the end of the rope, but your spirit continues to fall, down, down into the dark of the basement, to languish their forever, slowly losing any vestige of your humanity until you're just a create of need, howling voiceless into the night with the other rejects.
“Can I help you?” you offer, picking up another rake. He nods at you and doesn't say anything. Maybe he's a ghost of few words. Together you work your way around the garden, piling leaves into a giant, faintly glowing pile. When you're finally done and the garden is cleared of leaves, you wipe your forehead on your sleeve and put your rake down. “What now?” you ask the ghost gardener.
He walks away, then turns back, launches himself into a run and jumps into the pile. Glowing ghost leaves fly everywhere. You laugh and jump in beside him. You take turns doing running jumps until the pile is reduced to nothing again. Then, still without saying a word, the gardener takes up his rake and starts raking them.
You're about to pick up your rake and join him when a gong echoes from inside the house. He motions for you to follow him, and you both go inside. Other ghosts are moving now too, heading towards the ballroom in a giant mass. You seem to be the center of attention when you get there.
“How does the vote stand?” asks a solemn ghost in an Elizabethan ruff. “Yay?” At this word, almost all of the ghosts start to glow brighter. “Nay?” he asks, and a few ghosts glow.
“Obviously the Yays have it!” the Elizabethan ghost proclaims to much cheering. “Everyone likes you,” he tells you. “Congratulations!” Then there's a snap and the large chandelier falls on your head.
You groan and clutch your head, but your hand goes right through. “Huh?” you stare at your hand. It's pearly and translucent. You stare down at your body, lying bloody and broken on the floor. “Crap,” you say as your own welcoming party breaks out around you.
After the first two centuries, you start to get the hang of this being a ghost thing.
You take a running start and with a loud yell launch yourself into the pile of ghost leaves, burying yourself up to your eyebrows. Glowing ghost leaves fly everywhere. The gardener just looks kind of sad and starts raking them up again. Then a gong echoes from inside the house and, without a glance at you, he floats through the wall back inside. You head inside too, and notices a lot more ghosts than you thought there were here, all floating in the same direction, towards the ballroom. You walk over, and seem to be the center of attention when you get there.'
“How does the vote stand?” asks a solemn ghost in an Elizabethan ruff. “Yay?” At this word, only a small number of ghosts start to glow brighter. “Nay?” he asks, and the vast majority of ghosts glow. There doesn't seem to be much room for debate. Everyone is giving you dirty looks. Maybe you shouldn't have been so bitchy to them?
In no time at all an almost unanimous decision has been made. Against you. Apparently they don't want to spend eternity with you, and you're banished to the cellar. You're pushed down the empty shaft into the basement with a rope around your neck. Your body is caught up short at the end of the rope, but your spirit continues to fall, down, down into the dark of the basement, to languish their forever, slowly losing any vestige of your humanity until you're just a create of need, howling voiceless into the night with the other rejects.
You listen to the lock rasp ominously as it slides home, and then turn to stare at the magnificent entryway you're standing in. There are suits of armor, all covered in spikes and topped with magnificent shrieking monster faces. There are tapestries depicting eldritch abominations from the deepest pits of hell. There are animal heads mounted on the walls, eyes wide, mouths open in a last primal scream. There's also a haunting piano music wafting down from upstairs.
Should you follow it?
You feel the stone, but its slick from the damp and the lichen or ghost lichen or whatever it is making it all green and slimy. Still, you'd better give it your best shot. You move back and then take a running leap, hurling yourself at the wall.
Maybe you forgot how terrible you are at anything athletic? You hit the wall with a smack, and then fall back down and crack your head on a paving stone.
“Oh my god, there's blood everywhere!” you shriek, and then frown because you're looking down at your own face, wildly contorted by death. “Oh crap,” you say. “I'm a ghost.”
“Anything that dies here becomes a ghost,” the gardener says laconically. “Eager for eternity, huh? Come on, you might as well help me with these leaves.”
And you do. What else are you going to do? You have the rest of your afterlife.
You open the door to the library and step in. The smell of dust assaults your nose almost instantly, but you persevere. There's a ghost librarian replacing some volumes on the shelves. “Can I help you?” she asks.
“I'm looking for a book,” you say, because it's the only thing you can think to say.
She gives you a look like that's kind of obvious and asks what kind. Do you say:
The balcony is cold and crumbling. There once was a railing around it, but it has long since rotted away. The wind seems to blow right through you, like you're already a ghost, and you turn to head back inside when your foot slips right through the crumbling woodwork. You scream as you fall, landing in a heap of fallen masonry.
“Wow, lucky I'm okay,” you say, as you look up at where you fell from. But then you look back down at you. “....oh.”
Your body is mangled beyond repair, and there's blood everywhere. You can look at it in a rather detached fashion, because right now you are detached. You're a pearly, transparent ghost, looking sadly down at your own dead body. “What have you been doing?” says a voice from the front door. It's a butler. Other ghosts are peering out the windows at you. “Eager to join us were you?” the butler asks. “Very well,” he says, in a tone of voice that lets you know this kind of behavior borders on scandal. “But I must insist you come back inside. We were just about to start a decades-long game of hide and seek.”
I guess it could be worse. You find a hiding place squeezed in amongst the antique water pipes under the boiler room and sit down to wait for the next five years.
“A non-fiction book, please,” you say as politely as possible.
She purses her lips. “If you can't be more specific, I can't help you. Non-fiction is over there.” She gestures and goes back to her shelving. The library is surprisingly large, and soon you're a little bit lost in the stacks, where books lean drunkenly against each other or topple over into the aisles. The markers on the sides of the shelves are so faded they're difficult to read. Eventually you just give up and sit down at an old-fashioned study desk already piled with titles and glance at the ones sitting there. Do you choose:
How to live the afterlife you were meant to have
Or one that just says Diary?
“I'd like a science fiction novel, please,” you ask the librarian. She rolls her eyes at you like she's totally judging you for having suspect taste in literature, but takes you over to the appropriate shelf anyway.
“Any of these,” she says, gesturing, and goes back to her work.
You select one at random and open it to the middle to read a random passage:
“... is completely out of the question! How would we even get past the Nocturian Land Slugs that are undoubtedly even now sliming their way down the ships' corridors?”
“We've got to repair those engines, lieutenant!” Captain Spraxell shouted at him, his official captain's beret askew from the impact. “We're dead in space, and life support will only last so long, damn it!”
“Captain, I may have a solution,” Sergeant Boobs offered from the navigation console.
“Shut up, Boobs, this is no time for girl talk,” the captain snapped at her. Sergeant Boobs sighed.
Her real name was Cathleen Plutarx, but her first day they'd nicknamed her “boobs” and it had stuck. Probably because she was the only girl in the entire Star Force. Everyone said her boobs were what got her promoted so high, like skill had nothing to do with where she was now, on the bridge of the Infinity, the greatest ship in Star Force's fleet. It didn't help that she had to wear the most demeaning uniform possible. “Why can't I just wear the regular sergeant's uniform?” she'd demanded when they'd fitted her for it. “It's plain, unisex, durable.” But the dispensary officials just shook their head and said something about orders, and now she had to spend every day in tight spandex with a little triangle cut out for her cleavage. Like the tops of her breasts needed a window to air out or something, it was pathetic. She ignored the rest of the argument going on around her, knowing that eventually they were just going to reverse the polarity of something anyway.
Right on cue, Lieutenant Gargleflaron, the only alien in the Star Force, suggested “Captain, why not reverse the polarity of the infinitron drives?”
“By jove, yes!” the Captain exclaimed. Sergeant “Boobs” Plutarx sighed, and helped Gargleflaron press the appropriate buttons in sequence on the console. He winked at her, and suddenly she forgot all about her annoyance and...”
“Whatever,” you say, closing the book. If an excerpt from a book chosen at random didn't involve fighting off some kind of giant alien insect that wants to mate with human women, you are so not interested. Do you ask the librarian for:
Or a non-fiction book?
“I'd like a romance novel, please,” you ask the ghost librarian. She rolls her eyes at your terrible literary choices, but walks you back to the appropriate section anyway.
“These,” she says shortly, and goes back to her work.
You select one at random, and open it somewhere in the middle to read an excerpt:
“...but our love can never be!” Quezo intoned dramatically, and pointed through the night, up to where the fires burned on the top of the great stepped pyramid. “For tomorrow they will drag you up those steps, cut out your living heart, and burn it as an offering for the gods! Your body will be thrown down into the pile with the rest of your servants, and I will be bathed in your blood to show my people's dominance over your puny invasion. We can never be together! Not in this life! For I am an Aztec prince, and you are...”
His lips stumbled on the unfamiliar word. “A conquistador,” Hernan said for him. “None of that matters, Quezo!” he insisted. “Cut me free and we will run away together, into the jungle, where no one will ever find us, where our love does not have to stay hidden in the shadows of your father's palace, where I... won't have my heart cut out while I'm still alive. Where you'll never have to drink my blood. I mean, unless you're into that.” He waggled his eyebrows suggestively, an expression that had become dearer than words to Quezo in the months they spent together, feasting in his father's palace and laughing while torturing stupid peasants throughout the countryside. He'd thought his new friend was a god, but even when he found out the truth... it could never quench his love. Nothing could.
“Very well!” he said, drawing his ceremonial dagger and cutting the Spanish man's bonds. “Let's away into the night!”
“Not so fast,” Hernan said, ripping the knife from Quezo grasp. “I have to free my men.”
“But... there will be an alarm, we must flee now before we are missed,” Quezo insisted. But Hernan moved away from him without looking into his face, towards where his men were being held. “Hernan?” He tried to put a hand on his lover's arm, but Hernan shrugged him off.
“There are things I have to do, Quezo. Things I promised... to Spain. It doesn't matter how hard they are or... where my heart lies now. I'm a conquistador, damnit. I have to conquist. It's in my blood.”
“And I would be bathing in that blood if I hadn't helped you!” Quezo shouted. “Was everything you said to me a lie? Was everything we did--” He started to sob, and Hernan turned around swiftly, pinning him against the bas relief of the sun god coming down out of the heavens to say what's up to his Aztec peeps.
“I can lie with my words,” Hernan whispered into his ear. “But I could never lie with my hips.” His kiss was rough and smelled like blood...”
You turn the page eagerly, wanting to know how this hot Aztec-on-conquistador love scene turns out, but the rest of the book is gone, ripped away, perhaps by an overzealous censor or someone worried too much about historical accuracy. Whatever.
Do you try another romance novel?
Or ask the librarian for a non-fiction book?
You pick up How to Live the Afterlife You Were Meant to Have. It seems to be a self-help manual for ghosts, which is perhaps not that surprising in the library of the most haunted house in Transylvania. Its main thrust seems to be letting go of your previous life and accepting your new, probably haunting related existence.
Unfortunately, you find its argument so convincing that you feel the cares of your life before the house dropping away. Your dreams of topiary school are already forgotten, like something written by a novelist in a fevered dream almost a month ago. Topiary school? What even is that? Does that really exist? What kind of motivation is that for a person to have? Who even are you? What is your name? Do you have one? You must have one! Is it... Mary? John? IS IT A MAN'S NAME OR A WOMAN'S NAME? ARE YOU A MAN OR A WOMAN? SHOULDN'T YOU KNOW AT LEAST THAT?
Eventually you choke to death on your own existential crisis.
The one just labeled “Diary” turns out to actually be someone's diary! The handwriting is old and faded, from the time when penmanship was compulsory. You turn to the end, because you're just that kind of person.
December 17th, 1854
I do fear me that I will perish here, forever to haunt these strange and twisted corridors with the other spirits. Alas that I should have let my pride lead me to this accursed place! To think that I alone possessed the key to unlocking its mysteries! I think I was close, but alas, I have run out of time. The oldest ghost in this cursed place keeps to the highest room. I sought to find her there but was waylaid by many silly diversions and now it is the morrow and I fear my life may soon be forfeit to the strange customs of the dead.
The entry is unsigned. You frown, and flip back through a few more entries, but most of them are just about how annoying travel is in olden times. The highest room in the house, eh?
You leave the library and head down the hall, up a set of winding stairs, and then up a smaller, more rickety set of stairs into the attic. This must be the highest point! You see light spilling around piles of old furniture and trunks covered in dust clothes. It's a door out to a kind of observation tower sticking right up in the roof of the house. You carefully ascend the ladder, and push open the hatch.
You choose another romance novel. It has a picture of a fancy Arabian lamp on it, so you assume this is going to be some kind of harem romance involving a lot of sand and camels and probably Lawrence of Arabia or someone. However, when you open the book, a fine mist pours from it, coalescing in front of your face in the form of a green man with a wicked beard.
“Sup?” he asks you.
“Who the hell are you?” you demand. You know he's not a ghost, or at least not a ghost like the others. They're pearly and transparent. He's green and more solid, although he floats in the air like one.
“Duh, I'm a genie,” he says, rolling his eyes. “You get a wish or whatever. If you want.” He studies his nails. “If you're good, I'm good, you know what I mean?”
“Don't I get three wishes?” you demand.
“Hey, don't get greedy, kid,” he says. “I'm not one of those lamp genies. That's the big leagues. I'm stuck in some romance novel, so...” He shrugs. “I give you what I can, alright? So what'll it be?”
What do you wish for?
You pick up the book Dragon Hunting for Amateurs. It's charred in places and there are some stains on the title page that definitely look like blood. The map in the introduction seems to suggest that there are many dragons to be hunted in the very Transylvanian mountains that surround the house! You move towards a window to see if you can spot any flying against the peaks. However, when you tug at one of the curtains to pull it aside, a cascade of falling dust envelopes you, choking you instantly and drying your skin right off your bones, like a fierce desert sandstorm.
When your ghost appears beside your bleached bones, it turns to look out the window, still thinking of dragons. But this window faces the garden, and all you can see is dead grass.
“I wish I had cannons for arms!” you say instantly. It's the same thing you've wished on your birthday candles every year since you were a kid.
The genie looks at you for a minute and says, “Okay, that's a new one, but whatever. Knock yourself out. Which, you know, you probably will.” He waves his own hands, and then disappears back into the book, which you drop on the floor when your arms start to elongate and thicken, turning from warm flesh to cold metal. You scream, but it's over in an instant. You run to the dusty window and laugh at your reflection in the glass. No more arms, just two cannon muzzles sticking out of your flesh. You might miss your opposable thumbs, but you're confident there's nothing fingers could've done for you that you can't also do with cannons, just in a different way.
You point them at the wall and blast a gaping hole in it. Cold air rushes in, and you laugh like a super villain as you climb outside, down the pile of rubble, and flee across the Transylvanian countryside, taking pot shots at goats and any bird stupid enough to fly into your line of sight. Soon you pass into legend, parents warning their children not to go out alone at night in case the wild cannon-armed beast blasts them into a tree.
As for you, you find that cannon arms solve all of your problems, and you spend the rest of your days in luxury as a pretty first-class supervillain. You've always been good at puns, so it's a natural place for you.
“I wish for a way out of this house!” you say emphatically.
“Cool,” says the genie. “I'll take you, yeah?”
He leads you out of the library, down the hall, up a set of winding stairs, and then up a smaller, more rickety set of stairs into the attic. “Through there,” he says, pointing. You see light spilling around piles of old furniture and trunks covered in dust clothes. It's a door out to a kind of observation tower sticking right up in the roof of the house. You carefully ascend the ladder, and push open the hatch.
“I wish for a puppy!” you shout immediately because of course that's what you shout.
“Are you sure?” the genie asks skeptically. “I mean, it looks like you got a lot of real problems I could help you with and--”
“A PUPPY WILL SOLVE ALL MY PROBLEMS!” you shout, because it will and you know it.
“Okay, fine,” the genie says, waves his hands, and disappears back into his book.
You don't even care because the cutest puppy ever is already playing with your shoelaces!!! “Hello!” you greet it, and it wags its tail excitedly. Its cuteness is like a soothing balm to your tortured soul. In fact, it's so cute, that the ghosts all immediately find inner peace just from looking at it and ascend to a higher plane. You and the puppy reopen the haunted house as a tourist attraction, and it dresses up in an adorable bellman outfit to greet guests at the front doors. Later, it gets Internet famous and the two of you fly to many talk show appearances and eventually get a book deal.
“I knew you would solve all my problems,” you say to it as the two of you clink champagne glasses at your book launch party. And it totally did.
“What's up?” you say, purposefully ignoring her attempts to freak you out. You go to high-five her scrambling claw hands, but your own just pass right through them. She draws back and seems to calm down. Her hands become normal human hands again. Well, normal ghost hands. Her eyes still look like two balls of flame, however. “So you're a witch?”
“I was a witch,” she corrects you, almost petulantly. “Or they thought I was. Now I'm just dead.”
“Did they... burn you?” you ask. You don't really need her slight nod, it was a pretty easy guess what with your eyes and tortured specter and all.
“And scattered my bones on this unholy ground,” she added. “Because, for my crimes, I was doomed to never know peace even in death.”
“And so you were the first ghost?” you ask. “But what about the others--?”
“Just because I'm dead doesn't mean I have to be alone!” she suddenly shouts at you, the fires that are her eyes flaring up. “If they're going to make me stay here—I'll show them what it feels like. I did show them too,” she adds, somewhat less angrily. “The first ghost, after me, is Prudence.”
“Who?”
“Prudence was my best friend,” she says. “Before she told her father that I could hear things in my mind and then he burned me. He didn't cry the day I died—but he cried when she did.” She looks at you, almost speculatively. “Humans are strange, aren't they? What do you want?”
You run screaming from the room because there's no way you're going to just stand around and let some creepy witch ghost eat your soul. Unfortunately, you're so worried about what's behind you that you're not looking what's in front, and you accidentally fling yourself down the twisting attic stairs to land in a mangled heap at the very bottom.
“Ugh,” you groan. “I feel awful.”
“No you don't,” says a sad voice. “You don't feel anything.”
You realize it's true when you raise your hand to your head and it's glowing pearly white. You look down at your lifeless broken body, and then through your shimmering new ghost one. There's a ghost boy looking at you with mild interest. “Do you want to play Call of Duty?” he asks after a moment. He's dressed like a Victorian shoe shiner, so this is kind of odd, but who're you to judge based on appearances.
“Okay,” you say, and thus begins your afterlife.
“I want a puppy!” you shout immediately, because it's what you always say when people ask you what you want no matter the context.
It's hard to read expression in those depthless flames that are her eyes, but somehow it seems like she might cry. “So do I,” she whispers. “More than anything.” She turns around again to face the window, but you can still see the reflection of her eyes burning there in the glass. It's the only part of her that shows a reflection. “I thought if I trapped them here with me, that I would feel less alone. But the hole inside me just grows bigger and deeper the more I try to fill it. Maybe it's all of me that is left.”
“No one can be lonely with a puppy!” you say cheerfully. “I could bring you one! It's worth a try, right?”
She tilts her head to one side, as if considering. “Very well,” she says. “You have one day.”
You're too far away for this to be possible, but somehow you hear the creak of the front door opening, and the hush that descends over the house as the other residents wonder what it can mean.
“Hurry back,” the witch ghost whispers as you turn to leave, and it seems ominous. You almost run down the stairs, through the corridors, and out into the gathering darkness. You don't stop running until the house is lost in the trees. You follow the road to the nearest village, where all of the shops are just closing for the night. You head into the pub, where at least it's warm and light. The barman eyes you suspiciously—they must not see a lot of strangers way out here—and asks you what you'll have.
“A glass of your finest, please.”
“I want to get out of this house alive,” you tell her honestly.
She sighs. “Everyone does. But then, I wanted to grow up. So few of us ever get what we want, do we?”
She turns to look at you again, and the fire in her eyes consumes you.
“I want to help you,” you say. “What can I do?”
She tilts her head like she doesn't understand your words. “Help me?”
“Yeah, is there anything I can do?” you ask. “To bring you eternal peace or whatever it is you want?”
“I will never know peace,” she says sadly. “I told you, I'm shackled here because my bones were scattered on this unholy ground. I can only rest if they are given a proper burial.”
“Cool,” you say. “Then I'll do that.”
She turns and frowns at you. “You cannot know what you are volunteering for.”
“I never do,” you say happily. “Otherwise I would never do anything.”
“Very well,” she agrees. “You must find my skull, a rib, and a femur.”
“What about the rest of you?” you ask.
“This is magic,” she says. “Magic comes in threes—and they are the important three in any case. The rib and femur I have long since found in this house and secreted away safely. But I have long searched for my skull and have found no trace of it.”
“So... what?” you ask with a sinking feeling. If a magical witch ghost can't find her own skull, you're not sure how much luck you'll have.”
“It must have been taken elsewhere,” she says patiently. “I am bound to this property. It must be somewhere off it.”
“Oh great,” you say. “That only leaves the entire rest of the world for me to search then.”
“No, it is close,” she insists, and her flame eyes flicker and dim, like she's looking at something far away. “Very close. So close I can almost...” She reaches her hand out towards something you can't see, and then shakes her head. “Bring me my skull, and I will do the rest.”
You're too far away for this to possible, but you swear you hear the front door click open, and the hush in the house as the other ghosts stare in wonder. The witch's ghost has never released one of her prisoners before.
“You have one day,” she says as you leave, and you don't stop to ask what she can possibly do about it if you take longer. You run down the stairs, out of the house, and down the path to the village. All the shops there are just closing for the night. You head into the pub, where at least it's warm and light. The barman eyes you suspiciously—they must not see a lot of strangers way out here—and asks you what you'll have.
“Where can I get a ride out of here?” you ask.
“The same way you got in,” the barman said. “Good luck with that,” he adds, like he doesn't think your chances are great.
“Huh?” But when you turn around you find yourself face to face with Bartelbus Bartleby, a glass of something thick and red in his hand.
Do you play it cool?
Or try to rile the townsfolk about a vampire in their midst?
“Where can I get a puppy?” you demand of the barman.
He sighs. “Night like this? Edge of the forest, I should think.”
“Cool,” you say, and turn to go. Right into Bartelbus Bartleby. He stares at you, surprised, like he can't understand what he's seeing. You use his moment of shock to get away, shoving him into the piano and starting a convenient barroom brawl, as these things often do. You head to the edge of the forest through the deserted street. Well, not quite deserted.
There is a woman walking a little way ahead of you with a baby carriages. At first you think the baby is crying, but as you draw nearer you see it's the woman.
“Are you okay?” you ask.
Her shoulders shake and she gestures towards the baby carriage. “He's started to change—I have to leave him out here tonight,” she wails.
“What?” But when you look at the baby, you realize it isn't a baby at all. “A puppy!” you cry delightedly.
The woman gives you a suspicious look. “A wolf,” she corrects you. “A werewolf.” She sighs and wipes her eyes. “It's something in the earth around here—magical runoff from that terrible house. It can take them when they're young. All we can do is leave them in the forest.”
“To die?” you demand, horrified.
“The pack will pick them up,” she sighs. “And raise them to be viscous killers like the rest of them. My poor boy...” She tries to pet the werewolf puppy, which nips her playfully on the hand. Then she pushes the carriage under a tree at the edge of town and runs home crying.
“Looks like I just found my puppy!” You high-five yourself because there's no one else around, grab the werewolf puppy, and start running back towards the house. Sure, maybe this isn't exactly what the witch ghost meant, but she's a little weird too. It's only fair that her puppy be kind of supernatural and odd.
You can see the house now that you've broken free from the trees, lit up and oddly welcoming. There's a screech from the sky, and you look up to see a dark shape fly against the moon. It's like a giant bat. You run faster, but it's flying, and soon lands in front of you on Witchburn Manor's driveway. Its maw is foaming and its eyes are red. Then it morphs back into the form of Bartelbus Bartleby. He adjusts his tie. “What do you think you're doing?” he asks you, like you're in his office and slightly late for a meeting or some other minor offense.
“I'm going to give this puppy to that ghost,” you say. “So she won't be lonely anymore.”
“You really think that will work?” he sneers.
“It's worth a try.”
“I'm afraid I can't let you do that.” He begins to grow again, wings sprouting from his back.
“Why not?” you shout. “What's your deal anyway? Do you like feeding people to this creepy house every year?” Bartelbus doesn't seem to like anything.
“YOU FOOL!” When he's in his bat monster form, his voice is strangely high-pitched and almost nasal. “I MADE WITCHBURN MANOR AND WILL NOT SEE A FOOLISH TOPIARY ARTIST DESTROY IT.”
He lunges at you, and you dodge aside, rolling while trying to protect the werewolf puppy, which yelps in your arms. It struggles free and lopes towards Bartelbus, yapping and snarling. He laughs and tries to bat it away, but it bites him, latching on to his arm and growling. Bartelbus screams as the werewolf venom leaches into him, and throws the werewolf puppy, where it lands near the front door. It gets to its feet and shakes its head, unharmed.
The same cannot be said for Bartelbus. He screams as his features morph yet again, as the werewolf venom takes effect. “NOOOOOO!!” But his cry of anguish turns into a howl as he becomes a strange, twisted bat-wolf, and tries to fly and run into the woods at the same time. You'd think combining two mythical creatures would create a powerful hybrid, but instead if just creates a sick weird-looking thing that can't move right. Whimpering, Bartelbus limps into the forest to scare some rabbits.
“A puppy!” You turn and see the witch's ghost standing at the door of Witchburn Manor, holding the werewolf puppy in her arms. It licks her face, and she laughs, even though the tongue goes right through her. At the sound of her laugh, the butler ghost standing next to her explodes into a shower of glittering sparkles. Flashes at the windows say that other ghosts are disappearing too. The witch's ghost is happy for the first time in centuries—for the first time in centuries she doesn't need the other dead souls to feel less alone.
Finally it's just you and her and the puppy, standing outside the house. “Thank you,” she tells you.
“No prob,” you say. “Are you going to... disappear too?”
“I can't,” she says, shaking her head. “That whole scattered bones... unholy ground thing.”
“Oh,” you say.
“But now I have a puppy to keep me company,” she says happily, scratching it behind the ears.
“Well, cool,” you say. “I'm gonna...”
“You could stay,” she adds quickly. “The garden is a wreck. It could really use some new topiary. A chance to show off your skills?”
“Well, it is a little late to leave right now, I guess,” you agree. You end up staying for a few months, building your topiary portfolio before you apply to topiary school in the fall. The witch's ghost says she doesn't mind you going. She's totally happy here with her puppy.
“Go on,” she says, and her flame eyes seem sincere.
You mean to write, but it would probably be impossible for a postman to find the place anyway. You mean to visit, but plane tickets to Transylvania are expensive and somehow you don't have the time. When you finally do go back, years later, it's because the barman in the village has finally tracked you down.
You tried to help us once, he writes. We need your help again. Bartelbus is back.
When you arrive at the front of Witchburn Manor you see that it is true. The supernatural lawyer seems to have gotten his wildly morphing body parts under control, or mostly. He still has wolf ears and red eyes, but he looks more or less human, if a little hairy. He's got the same old briefcase though. He's standing at the door next to a puppy. “...I'll come to collect you at noon tomorrow, should you survive the night,” he's saying to it.
The puppy looks up at him and whines. When the door opens, you hear it. The barking. “What the hell?” you demand, as Bartelbus pushes the puppy in with his foot and closes the door behind it. “There must be fifty dogs in there!”
“Ghost dogs,” Bartelbus corrects, his eyes gleaming. “Some holes can never be filled.” He seems pleased with himself. “Go home,” he tells you. “You've done well for yourself—most respected topiary artiste in the world? There's no reason to throw all that away on a second-rate mystery from your past. At least this time they're only dogs?”
Bartelbus never really saw his human victims as anything more than animals either.
But the annoying part is, he's right. You'd love to rush in without thought to the consequences, but you have a whole life to lose now that you didn't then. The truth is, now that you've made something of yourself, you care more about yourself, more than you care about other people. It's only natural, you think, as you drive away, already thinking about next season's topiary designs. Helping the witch ghost won't bring me anything nice. It's not worth it.
But each time you look in the mirror you wonder if you're starting to look a little bit more like Bartelbus Bartleby everyday.
“Well, we only serve one thing here,” the barman says to your request, and pushes a glass of something that might charitably be called beer towards you. You've never drunk any beer quite that color before, but you've had a long day so you're willing to give it the benefit of the doubt. You gulp it down. It tastes like... well, you don't want to think about the taste too much.
“Thanks,” you say. “Actually, I don't have any money, but--”
“Put it on my tab,” says an all-too-familiar voice behind you. You turn to see Bartelbus Bartleby, a glass of something thick and red in his hand.
Do you play it cool?
Or try to rile the townsfolk about a vampire in their midst?
“VAMPIRE!” you scream frantically, hoping that everyone will grab their pitchforks and torches and join you in a merry chase. “VAMPIRE!”
Everyone looks at you like you're crazy. Bartelbus calming takes a sip of drink.
“He's drinking blood right in front of you!” you yell, exasperated.
“That's beet juice,” the barman clarifies. “Well-known for our beets, we are.”
“But that don't mean we're prone to archaic modes of thought, just because we're rustic and mainly agrarian,” another bar patron says, giving you an affronted look. “It's 2013—we're not about to string up some poor fool what is minding his own business just because he happens to be dead.”
“What kind of world would it be if we all gave in to vigilante mob justice whenever we didn't quite like the look of something?” another man agrees. “Why, there would be untold numbers of tragic misunderstandings.”
They nod and go back to their drinks.
“If you're quite finished trying to cause a scene,” Bartelbus continues calmly. “I would like very much to know why you are not where I left you.” He narrows his eyes. “And how.”
“Oh, hey, what's up, BB?” you say, trying to act like you're not surprised to see him. “Enjoying your...” you stare a little warily at the glass.
“Beet juice,” he supplies. “This village is famous for it.” He takes another refreshing sip and puts the glass down on the bar. “Now, if you are quite finished with pleasantries, I would like very much to know why you are not where I left you.” He narrows his eyes. “And how.”
“No time to chat—I need to find a puppy!” you yell at Bartelbus, and then punch him. It feels good to punch Bartelbus. He's kind of a jackass. He isn't expecting it, and stumbles backwards into a guy sitting at a table. The guy gives him a shove into a woman sitting at the bar, and her gentleman companion puts down his beer and rolls up his sleeves. Before you know it, a barroom brawl has erupted around you. In the confusion, you sneak away and out into the street.
So time for real talk, my friend, are you actually trying to find a puppy for the witch ghost?
Or was that just an excuse to get out of the house?
“I guess I'm just cleverer than you thought!” you say triumphantly. Bartelbus is always making mean little comments about your intelligence so you feel completely justified in keeping a secret from him. Let him imagine you finding a secret passage or making a daring escape or even arguing your way out better than even this supernatural lawyer could.
“That seems highly unlikely,” he says. “You were chosen for Witchburn Manor especially because you possessed the right combination of low observational skills, inferior reasoning abilities, and almost no personal charm. In short--,” he allows himself a small smile, “You haven't the wits to determine what's happening to you, let alone how to get out of it, and no one will miss you when you fail.”
You kick him. It seems like the right thing to do. He isn't expecting it, despite how much he thinks he knows about you, and stumbles backwards into a guy sitting at a table. The guy gives him a shove into a woman sitting at the bar, and her gentleman companion puts down his beer and rolls up his sleeves. Before you know it, a barroom brawl has erupted around you. In the confusion, you sneak away and out into the street.
So time for real talk, my friend, are you actually trying to find a puppy for the witch ghost?
Or was that just an excuse to get out of the house?
Well, now the way is clear. You're not sure how long Bartelbus will be buried under the bar fight you started, but it's certainly enough time for you to jump on the back of a truck full of chickens and ride away into the sunset, hopefully never to see this lonely Transylvanian village again.
It doesn't occur to you to wonder why a truck full of chickens is leaving the villages after supper in the dark. If you were the kind of person that would wonder something like that, you probably wouldn't have gotten caught up in all this crap in the first place, right? So it comes as a surprise to you when the truck stops in the middle of nowhere, and then just sits. The driver turns off the engine, and a speaker near the cab starts to play a strange howling noise. The chickens begin to cluck nervously. You hop down out of the truck and walk around to the cab. “What's the deal?” you ask, and rap on the window. But the window isn't glass—it's some kind of armored metal. In fact, this whole truck looks a lot more like a siege engine than you at first thought. “Hey, can you hear me?” you demand, banging harder.
But if the driver can hear you, he's certainly not going to open the door, and in a minute you know why. The howling noise from the truck's speaker is answered by a much louder, scarier howl from right behind you. Your heart stops in your chest, and you turn to see them streaking out of the woods, at least ten of them, a pack of werewolves, with glowing red eyes and slobbering fangs. They attack the chickens, the village's weekly gift to keep them from wandering too close to their homes. But wolves like novelty, werewolves doubly so, and soon their appetite is whetted and they start in on you.
There must be a puppy somewhere in this village, right? You prowl the one street, trying to see signs of dogs. You're too far away from civilization to get anywhere else in just a day, and now you have to worry about finding one before Bartelbus digs his way out of that bar fight and finds you.
The street is mostly deserted, but there is a woman walking a little way ahead of you with a baby carriages. At first you think the baby is crying, but as you draw nearer you see it's the woman.
“Are you okay?” you ask.
Her shoulders shake and she gestures towards the baby carriage. “He's started to change—I have to leave him out here tonight,” she wails.
“What?” But when you look at the baby, you realize it isn't a baby at all. “A puppy!” you cry delightedly.
The woman gives you a suspicious look. “A wolf,” she corrects you. “A werewolf.” She sighs and wipes her eyes. “It's something in the earth around here—magical runoff from that terrible house. It can take them when they're young. All we can do is leave them in the forest.”
“To die?” you demand, horrified.
“The pack will pick them up,” she sighs. “And raise them to be viscous killers like the rest of them. My poor boy...” She tries to pet the werewolf puppy, which nips her playfully on the hand. Then she pushes the carriage under a tree at the edge of town and runs home crying.
“Looks like I just found my puppy!” You high-five yourself because there's no one else around, grab the werewolf puppy, and start running back towards the house. Sure, maybe this isn't exactly what the witch ghost meant, but she's a little weird too. It's only fair that her puppy be kind of supernatural and odd.
You can see the house now that you've broken free from the trees, lit up and oddly welcoming. There's a screech from the sky, and you look up to see a dark shape fly against the moon. It's like a giant bat. You run faster, but it's flying, and soon lands in front of you on Witchburn Manor's driveway. Its maw is foaming and its eyes are red. Then it morphs back into the form of Bartelbus Bartleby. He adjusts his tie. “What do you think you're doing?” he asks you, like you're in his office and slightly late for a meeting or some other minor offense.
“I'm going to give this puppy to that ghost,” you say. “So she won't be lonely anymore.”
“You really think that will work?” he sneers.
“It's worth a try.”
“I'm afraid I can't let you do that.” He begins to grow again, wings sprouting from his back.
“Why not?” you shout. “What's your deal anyway? Do you like feeding people to this creepy house every year?” Bartelbus doesn't seem to like anything.
“YOU FOOL!” When he's in his bat monster form, his voice is strangely high-pitched and almost nasal. “I MADE WITCHBURN MANOR AND WILL NOT SEE A FOOLISH TOPIARY ARTIST DESTROY IT.”
He lunges at you, and you dodge aside, rolling while trying to protect the werewolf puppy, which yelps in your arms. It struggles free and lopes towards Bartelbus, yapping and snarling. He laughs and tries to bat it away, but it bites him, latching on to his arm and growling. Bartelbus screams as the werewolf venom leaches into him, and throws the werewolf puppy, where it lands near the front door. It gets to its feet and shakes its head, unharmed.
The same cannot be said for Bartelbus. He screams as his features morph yet again, as the werewolf venom takes effect. “NOOOOOO!!” But his cry of anguish turns into a howl as he becomes a strange, twisted bat-wolf, and tries to fly and run into the woods at the same time. You'd think combining two mythical creatures would create a powerful hybrid, but instead if just creates a sick weird-looking thing that can't move right. Whimpering, Bartelbus limps into the forest to scare some rabbits.
“A puppy!” You turn and see the witch's ghost standing at the door of Witchburn Manor, holding the werewolf puppy in her arms. It licks her face, and she laughs, even though the tongue goes right through her. At the sound of her laugh, the butler ghost standing next to her explodes into a shower of glittering sparkles. Flashes at the windows say that other ghosts are disappearing too. The witch's ghost is happy for the first time in centuries—for the first time in centuries she doesn't need the other dead souls to feel less alone.
Finally it's just you and her and the puppy, standing outside the house. “Thank you,” she tells you.
“No prob,” you say. “Are you going to... disappear too?”
“I can't,” she says, shaking her head. “That whole scattered bones... unholy ground thing.”
“Oh,” you say.
“But now I have a puppy to keep me company,” she says happily, scratching it behind the ears.
“Well, cool,” you say. “I'm gonna...”
“You could stay,” she adds quickly. “The garden is a wreck. It could really use some new topiary. A chance to show off your skills?”
“Well, it is a little late to leave right now, I guess,” you agree. You end up staying for a few months, building your topiary portfolio before you apply to topiary school in the fall. The witch's ghost says she doesn't mind you going. She's totally happy here with her puppy.
“Go on,” she says, and her flame eyes seem sincere.
You mean to write, but it would probably be impossible for a postman to find the place anyway. You mean to visit, but plane tickets to Transylvania are expensive and somehow you don't have the time. When you finally do go back, years later, it's because the barman in the village has finally tracked you down.
You tried to help us once, he writes. We need your help again. Bartelbus is back.
When you arrive at the front of Witchburn Manor you see that it is true. The supernatural lawyer seems to have gotten his wildly morphing body parts under control, or mostly. He still has wolf ears and red eyes, but he looks more or less human, if a little hairy. He's got the same old briefcase though. He's standing at the door next to a puppy. “...I'll come to collect you at noon tomorrow, should you survive the night,” he's saying to it.
The puppy looks up at him and whines. When the door opens, you hear it. The barking. “What the hell?” you demand, as Bartelbus pushes the puppy in with his foot and closes the door behind it. “There must be fifty dogs in there!”
“Ghost dogs,” Bartelbus corrects, his eyes gleaming. “Some holes can never be filled.” He seems pleased with himself. “Go home,” he tells you. “You've done well for yourself—most respected topiary artiste in the world? There's no reason to throw all that away on a second-rate mystery from your past. At least this time they're only dogs?”
Bartelbus never really saw his human victims as anything more than animals either.
But the annoying part is, he's right. You'd love to rush in without thought to the consequences, but you have a whole life to lose now that you didn't then. The truth is, now that you've made something of yourself, you care more about yourself, more than you care about other people. It's only natural, you think, as you drive away, already thinking about next season's topiary designs. Helping the witch ghost won't bring me anything nice. It's not worth it.
But each time you look in the mirror you wonder if you're starting to look a little bit more like Bartelbus Bartleby everyday.
“I'm looking an ancient witch's skull,” you say, because barmen hear things, right? “Any chance you might know anything about that?”
The barman continues polishing a glass. “Goings on up at Witchburn Manor don't interest none of us in this village, them as knows what's good for them, anyway.” He seems to be talking to something above your head.
You turn around and come face to face with Bartelbus Bartleby, drinking something thick and red out of a glass. He seems surprised to see you.
Do you ask him about the witch skull?
Or punch him?
“I'd like a ride out of here, please,” you say the barman. “Really anything, as fast as possible.”
The barman continues polishing a glass. “Goings on up at Witchburn Manor don't interest none of us in this village, them as knows what's good for them, anyway.” He seems to be talking to something above your head.
You turn around and come face to face with Bartelbus Bartleby, drinking something thick and red out of a glass. He seems surprised to see you.
Do you ask him about the witch's skull?
Or punch him?
“I'll have a chocolate milk,” you say.
The barman looks at you like he doesn't understand what those words mean. Finally he pours you a glass of a strange alcoholic beverage brewed locally from beets. This village is very into beets. You stare at it warily, but after the first sip, you're hooked. “This is the best thing I've ever tasted!” you say enthusiastically.
“Really?” the barman seems surprised and pleased. “Usually strangers don't go no taste when it comes to Transylvanian Beeter Beer.”
“No, this is awesome,” you say. “It's basically the best thing I've ever had in my mouth. Do you sell it by the case? Can I take some home?”
The barman shrugs.
“Well, you should,” you say. “No, man, you really should.”
Later that night, you convince the barman to go into business for you selling beer made from beets to the outside world. You come up with a logo and everything. You forget all about the witch's skull—were you really going to find that for her? Or was that just an excuse to get out of the house?--and start calling distributes from the village's one phone.
The next day you're inspecting the current brewing set up and making plans to expand with the local brewers when Bartelbus Bartleby accosts you, looking pissed. You throw a handy yokel in his face and then stab him with some topiary shears. It reminds you how much you love topiary. “Hopefully when this makes it big, I'll have enough money to go to topiary school!”
But you never do. The money keeps pouring in, but somehow the more you make the more you want. It's like there's a hole inside you, but the more you put in the more you need. It will never be filled, it's a bottomless pit, dark and fathomless. When you look in the mirror at night, your eyes seem to glow like two balls of flame. Too late do you recognize the ghost-witch's curse. Too late do you realize that you have become her, hungry but never full, thirsty but never quenched. Your body twists around your hunger until you are an unrecognizable monster. Your employees assume you are dead and the monster ate you. They drive you out into the forest, never realizing that you are the monster.
The werewolves in the woods attack you, and it's all you can do to fend them off. Finally one night, wounded, you drag yourself up the drive to Witchburn Manor and lay by the front door, wailing. The witch's ghost takes pity on you, and your death is quick.
But anyone who dies at Witchburn becomes a ghost, in service to her. Your ghost form is just as monstrous as you were when you died, and soon you forget what it's like to be a human. It makes it easier to eat them.
“What up, Bartelbus?” you say, hoping he'll forget for the moment that you're supposed to be locked inside Witchburn Manor.
No such luck. “Why aren't you locked inside Witchburn Manor?” he demands.
“The witch's ghost let me out,” you say with a shrug. “She sent me to look for her skull. You're pretty old, right? Do you know where it is?”
“THE SKULL?” he shrieks, and he seems upset for the first time ever. “As if you could ever find it! As if you were a match for me!”
“So... you have it?” you guess.
He seems to collect himself. “It doesn't matter, you'll never take it from me,” he says.
Do you:
You punch him. It feels good to punch Bartelbus. He's a jerk. He falls backwards into a man who spills the drink he just bought. The guy angrily shoves Bartelbus into a woman, who's gentleman companion puts down his beer and rolls up his sleeves. Before you know it a barroom brawl has begun, with Bartelbus buried under all of it. You creep under a table and then dash out the door, hoping to be well away before he is about to disentangle himself from the chaos. It's certainly enough time for you to jump on the back of a truck full of chickens and ride away into the sunset, hopefully never to see this lonely Transylvanian village again.
It doesn't occur to you to wonder why a truck full of chickens is leaving the villages after supper in the dark. If you were the kind of person that would wonder something like that, you probably wouldn't have gotten caught up in all this crap in the first place, right? So it comes as a surprise to you when the truck stops in the middle of nowhere, and then just sits. The driver turns off the engine, and a speaker near the cab starts to play a strange howling noise. The chickens begin to cluck nervously. You hop down out of the truck and walk around to the cab. “What's the deal?” you ask, and rap on the window. But the window isn't glass—it's some kind of armored metal. In fact, this whole truck looks a lot more like a siege engine than you at first thought. “Hey, can you hear me?” you demand, banging harder.
But if the driver can hear you, he's certainly not going to open the door, and in a minute you know why. The howling noise from the truck's speaker is answered by a much louder, scarier howl from right behind you. Your heart stops in your chest, and you turn to see them streaking out of the woods, at least ten of them, a pack of werewolves, with glowing red eyes and slobbering fangs. They attack the chickens, the village's weekly gift to keep them from wandering too close to their homes. But wolves like novelty, werewolves doubly so, and soon their appetite is whetted and they start in on you.
You punch Bartleby. You hardly even think about it. He's such a jerk and you're just not up to dealing with him right now. He's a vampire, so you expect him to be super strong, but he must not have been expecting your attack because he goes down easy, right into some guy's drink. The guy tries to take a swing at you, but you dodge and he hits some guy behind you. Soon a barroom brawl has erupted around you, and no one is paying you much attention. Do you use this opportunity to:
Or sneak into his room upstairs and see if he has anything worth stealing?
“Whatever,” you say. “What's the deal with the skull anyway? Why do you have it? Don't you want the witch's ghost to finally be at peace so you don't have to keep feeding people to that haunted house?”
Bartelby laughs. “Do you even know who I am?”
“Bartelbus Bartelby, Supernatural Attorney At Law,” you say. It's on his business card.
“Perhaps I should ask instead, do you even know who I was?”
You shrug.
“In life I knew the girl you call the witch's ghost. She led my daughter astray. Poor Prudence...” he sighs.
“Prudence?!” You remember the witch's ghost telling you about her friend Prudence and how her dickhead father burned her to death. And then how the ghost took Prudence as her first victim! “That was you??”
“Before I was a vampire,” he agrees. “I had to become undead—I couldn't let me life's work go on untended after my death. The house needs feeding.”
“Yeah, but your daughter's spirit is trapped in there too!” you protest. “Maybe you hate the witch's ghost, but what about her?”
“My mortal cares fell away with my mortal life. Now I serve a higher power.”
You raise your eyebrows.
“Money,” he clarifies. “Do you know how much supernatural energy is pouring off that house every second? It's the greatest concentrated source of supernatural energy in the world. An inexhaustible power supply, and it comes very cheap.”
“People's lives are cheap?” you demand.
“Some are, yes,” he agrees. “My backers are very powerful men... some are very powerful governments. They wouldn't like for this to get out. Even the word of a crazy lunatic—and you will sound like a crazy lunatic—can be too dangerous. So, will you join me? Or do I have to kill you?”
You punch him. You've been wanting to punch him for like forever so it feels good. Maybe he's surprised, because he goes down easy, especially for a vampire, right into some guy's drink. The guy tries to take a swing at you, but you dodge and he hits some guy behind you. Soon a barroom brawl has erupted around you, and no one is paying you much attention. Do you use this opportunity to:
You carefully creepy up the stairs to the rooms above the pub and push open the first door. The room is small, just a bed, a fireplace, and a closet. You can tell it's Bartleby's room because his briefcase is lying on the floor beside the bed. Where do you start looking for loot?
You'll never get a chance like this again! Bartelby is still lying stunned on the floor, so you sneak over to him, seizing a broken chair leg and planning to shove it through his cold, dead vampire heart.
Unfortunately you soon discover that Bartelby is only playing dead, and the moment you raise your hand up, he seizes your wrist and breaks it in one effortless movement, before reaching up and savaging your throat.
“You can't kill me if I kill you first!” you scream, lunging at him.
But he's a vampire. He even has time to carefully set down his glass of blood-laced beet juice before turning swiftly and snapping your neck with one hand.
“Don't try to kill a killer,” he says, and puts on some bitchin sunglasses.
“I want in!” you say. “This evil plan sounds awesome! I've always wanted to be evil!”
“Very well,” he agrees. “I have long been looking for an assistant. But first...”
He grabs you so suddenly you don't even have time to resist before his fangs are sinking into your flesh. You scream cuts off into a pathetic burble as you lose consciousness.
When you come to, you're a vampire. And your neck hurts kind of. And you have an insatiable lust for blood.
“Come,” Bartelbus says. “We must find this year's victim for Witchburn Manor. Since the house was robbed of your death, we must seek another.”
“Can we eat first?” you ask. “I'm starving.”
Bartelbus laughs at your youthful exuberance, but agrees. You soon find that Bartelbus is right: the mortal cares fall away with your mortal life. Your new undead afterlife becomes all about killing and finding new victims and also a zen rock garden you're kind of proud of. Everyone has to have a hobby.
You carefully creepy up the stairs to the rooms above the pub and push open the first door. The room is small, just a bed, a fireplace, and a closet. You can tell it's Bartleby's room because his briefcase is lying on the floor beside the bed. Where do you start looking for the skull?
You open the briefcase, and take out a bunch of folders. One of them has your name on it and seems to be full of oddly personal details like your birth certificate and a detailed log of your movements. Has Bartelbus been spying on you? Weird. The other folders have others people's names and info, and then there's a map.
It's way old, and seems to be of the village, which hasn't changed much since it was drawn. There's Witchburn Manor off by itself to the left, and there, above the village in a clear space in the forest is a big X. Could that be the skull? Or some treasure? Either way, worth a shot!
You shove the map in your pocket, climb out the window, and drop down into some narratively convenient hay. Then you run from the village into the dark forest.
You haven't gone far when you start to hear howls around you. Wolves? What is it your supposed to do when you're being hunted by wolves? Climb a tree? Make yourself look big?
Do you:
You open the closet, and it's full of old coats. They smell bad, but you guess the best place to hide anything valuable or important would be near the back, so you push through them. They seem to go on a lot longer than they should—how deep is this closet? Is there a secret passage back here? Then you step out into sunlight and there's snow all around you. A freaky dude with goat legs is capering in front of you with an umbrella.
“Welcome to Narnia!” he greets you jubilantly. “It has been many a year since a human found their way into this land!”
“Crap,” you say. “I don't need this land-of-whimsy shit.” But when you try to head back through the closet, there are only fir trees.
“Come to my house for tea!” the goat man in the scarf keeps offering.
“No, you perv, get away from me,” you say, sitting down by a lamppost to contemplate your new life, chilling with talking animals and maybe becoming some kind of heavy-handed religious allegory. It's too much to bear. You decide to find the Ice Witch Queen Whatever the Hell and pledge your services to her since talking animals are really not your thing.
“I will reward you with Turkish Delight!” she proclaims grandly.
“What? No!” you say, flinching back as it starts to rain weird, old-fashioned candy. “I do not want some gross thing made of flowers and gelatin—I don't want to be paid in candy. I want money. And booze. And maybe some kind of convertible if it ever stops snowing, I mean, goddamn.”
“I'm an ice queen,” she points out.
“Whatever,” you say. “Is there a bar?”
Of all the magical alternate realities in all the world, you had to end up in the one whose main population group is talking, whimsical chipmunks. You drown your sorrows in whimsical cordials, wishing to Aslan that they were vodka.
You stop to climb a tree. Wolves can't climb trees, right? Unfortunately the trees around you all have prickly branches and trunks covered in sticky sap, and before you can even get off the ground, the wolves are upon you, snapping and biting and basically eating you until you're dead. It takes awhile, and it's gross.
You keep running, hoping to make it to the X before they make it to you. Like the X will save you? Luckily, the X turns out to be a cemetery with conveniently high walls! You're able to climb over, using gaps in the stones, but you're pretty sure wolves can't jump that high or climb, so you're safe as you tumble down the other side. Except that you're in a creepy cemetery in the middle of the night. You pull out the map again, but there's no further information about where the skull and/or treasure it leads to might be located.
Do you:
You take a break, and sit down by a convenient sad angel in the shade of a big tree. All this running around is tiring and it's not like you know what you're doing anyway. As you're sitting there, hidden by the shadows, another shadow comes swooping out of the sky and turns into Bartelbus Bartelby. You stay very still so he doesn't see you. He seems to have other things on his mind anyway. He runs right for a dead tree that's enclosed in a weird ironwork fence by itself, digs under it for a moment, and then holds up a skull!
The skull! It must be!
Satisfied that it's still there, he buries it again, turns into a monster, and flies off. This is your chance!
You quickly run to the tree, dig the skull back up, and make a break for Witchburn Manor.
As you're running up the path, you here a screech from the sky and see wings unfold menacingly above you. You put your head down and run faster. The door to the manor opens on its own, and you dive through, rolling to protect the skull. The witch's ghost is standing there, her eyes made of fire, and there are other ghosts gathered around the sides of the room, looking down from the staircase or peering through walls. You don't have time to worry about that. You throw the skull at her, even as you feel vampire bat monster claws sinking into your back.
She's a ghost, but somehow she still catches it, looks down into its empty eyes and smiles.
Then she ignites into a pillar of flame, that seems to pull the other ghosts into it. They fly into the fire, rushing in a blurry white mass. They don't scream. Maybe they're even happy to finally be free. You groan as the claws slide out of your back with a schlick and then there is just one ghost left. A little girl, probably the same age as the witch's ghost, wearing a simple dress, her head covered by a scarf. She looks up at the hideous vampire bat monster menacing you. “Father,” she says sadly.
It turns to stare at her, its eyes wide. “Father, come with me,” she pleads, holding out her hand.
It pauses and then turns away from you, bleeding on the floor, and follows the ghost of its daughter into the fire. With a snap the fire goes off, leaving nothing but a scorch mark on the floor. The house feels empty for the first time, and when you struggle to your feet, your groans echo back at you, your only company.
You stagger outside as the sun comes up behind the mountains. You've survived a night at Witchburn Manor. So you guess, even though you don't really have a dead great uncle, that probably makes it yours.
No time to lose! You head to a random grave and start digging with your hands.
Then you die.
Sorry, did you want more detail? Because that's pretty much how it goes in your head. One minute you're digging, the next, nothing. That's the thing about vampires, they move soundlessly and fast. And you can't knock them out for long.
The End
So you head to Transylvania, stoked to solve the mystery of its most haunted house. How can you fail? You're some kind of badass vampire—okay, a vampire—and Francine is a world-renowned alligator wrestler. There's no problem you can't beat repeatedly into the ground until it whines in submission.
The house is creepy, of course. You have to drive forever to get to it, in the middle of nowhere, past a weird little village that hasn't changed since 1803, nestled amongst some dark and foreboding mountains. It's barely afternoon but it's already getting dark as you stare up at those empty windows. The door opens for you without anyone touching it, and once you step into the entryway, you feel a sense of age descend around you, the crushing, deathly weight of time. Everything around you is dusty and full of cobwebs, but it also, undeniably, has a lived-in feel.
“Alright!” Francine says eagerly as the door slams behind you. “What do you think? Should we split up?”
“Are you insane?” you demand. “Have you never seen a horror movie?”
“What, are you scared?” Francine laughs.
“No!” you lie. “I'm definitely scarier than whatever this house has to hide. But still. I think we should look for clues together.”
“Whatever,” Francine says. “Baby. It's a big house, though. So where should we start?”
“Sure, sounds good to me,” you say. You know in horror movies splitting up always means someone dies, but you're also feeling fairly confident in your new vampire abilities.
“Cool,” Francine says. “Because it's a big house, so we'll definitely get to answers faster if we split up. Where do you want to start looking?”
“I'll start upstairs,” you say.
“Cool,” Francine says. “Because that looks like the kitchen and I'm hungry. See ya! Scream if you need anything I guess.”
You head up the stairs, clouds of dust billowing up from the carpet under your shoes. The second floor hallway is lined with creepy portraits whose eyes seem to follow you. You look to the left and see a door ajar into what must be a library. That might be a good place to search for information? Ugh, but you'd have to get over your general dislike of libraries. To the right you hear the sounds of music drifting closer. You can't immediately identify the song, but after a moment you recognize NSYNC. Do you head
“I'll start down here,” you say. Because stairs? Bleh.
“Sure, whatever,” Francine says, already jogging up them like the athlete she is. “Scream if you need anything, I guess.”
You wonder through the deserted halls of the house, wondering where all the ghosts are. You've had your eyes pealed since you stepped in, on the look out for bleeding walls or creepy wind from nowhere or maybe a scary child playing a piano and then when you walk around them you realize she doesn't have a face. But so far, besides the door kind of opening by itself, you haven't seen anything weird. Where are all the ghosts? Is this just an elaborate hoax?
You start opening doors and shouting “HA!” into the room, trying to catch the ghosts unawares. The first door you open is a closet. The coats don't appreciate being shouted at.
“Stupid coats,” you say, and punch them. But when you step forward to give the coats a good what for, you find that this closet doesn't have a floor. You plummet down a long dark shaft into the cellar, screaming all the way and wondering if Francine will hear you. You land hard and rub your head. Luckily vampires have excellent night vision, but there's nothing much to see here. It's just a room in the dark, some old furniture, some tools, a horde of hungry, shapeless ghosts.
Oh right, those.
You barely have time to notice them before they're already on you. See, the fancy upstairs ghosts are prejudice against vampires, but they're polite and still sort of human, so they show it by ignoring you. The creepy reject ghosts locked in the darkened basement for eternity have a different way of showing their hate. It involves eating you.
“Let's start upstairs,” you say, and Francine shrugs her agreement. You climb the grand staircase and pause at the top, looking at a corridor full of creepy paintings. To your left You look is a door ajar into what must be a library. That might be a good place to search for information? Ugh, but you'd have to get over your general dislike of libraries. To the right you hear the sounds of music drifting closer. You can't immediately identify the song, but after a moment you recognize NSYNC.
“So which way?” Francine asks you.
“Why do I always have to choose?” you demand.
“I don't know,” she shrugs. “I'm more about wrestling things into submission, not making decisions.”
Do you choose:
“Let's try down here for now,” you say, because you hate climbing stairs. You may be undead, but that doesn't mean you're any more in shape than you used to be. Probably less. Corpses aren't known for being very spry.
“Whatever,” Francine says, and you start wandering around. After awhile Francine says, “Where are all the ghosts?”
You've been wondering the same thing. You've had your eyes pealed since you stepped in, on the look out for bleeding walls or creepy wind from nowhere or maybe a scary child playing a piano and then when you walk around them you realize she doesn't have a face. But so far, besides the door kind of opening by itself, you haven't seen anything weird. Where are all the ghosts? “Maybe it's all an elaborate hoax?” you suggest.
Francine opens the nearest door and shouts “HA!” like trying to catch the ghosts unawares. It's a closet. The coats don't appreciate being shouted at.
“Stupid coats,” she says, and tries to wrestle them into submission. Instead she realizes the closet has no floor, and starts to fall. She grabs onto you for help, but re: your lack of physical anything, you both end up falling in. You plummet down a long dark shaft into the cellar, screaming all the way. You land hard and Francine lands on top of you. Luckily vampires have excellent night vision, but there's nothing much to see here. It's just a room in the dark, some old furniture, some tools, a horde of hungry, shapeless ghosts.
Oh right, those.
You barely have time to notice them before they're already on you. See, the fancy upstairs ghosts are prejudice against vampires, but they're polite and still sort of human, so they show it by ignoring you. The creepy reject ghosts locked in the darkened basement for eternity have a different way of showing their hate. It involves eating you both.
You head right because apparently you can't resist the allure of 90s boy bands. You turn into a room with an old-fashioned radio that still somehow seems to be the source of the noise. There's a ghost with frosted tipped hair all spiked up and incredibly wide JNCO jeans dancing to it. “Oh,” he says and stops, embarrassed, when he sees you. “What's up, dog?”
“I don't know,” you say, still kind of weirded out by whatever it is you're looking at.
“I died here in 1998, okay,” says the ghost, rolling his eyes. “Now I'm doomed to haunt this place for all eternity... looking just like I did when I died. It sucks.”
“Yeah, it would,” you agree, taking in his No Fear shirt.
“Whatever, what the hell is a vampire doing here anyway?” he demands. “What do you want?”
“Some answers,” you say.
“You do?” he asks, and there's kind of a smirk in the corner of his mouth.
“Yeah?”
“Maybe you should head on up to the attic, then. The stairs are back out there, second door on the left.”
“Thanks,” you say with narrows eyes, and take the stairs he indicated up into the attic. It's just full of old furniture and stuff, but there's light coming from a trap door in the ceiling. You climb the ladder into an observation room and come face to face with the witch's ghost. Where the other ghosts are pearly white, she's black, like a hole in reality, except for her eyes, that are made of flames.
“Vampire,” she says, and she sounds surprised. She doesn't hesitate a minute before cannoning into you, however. And the thing about vampires is, they're highly combustible.
You head left into the library. It's huge, with stacks leaning drunkenly against each other. There's even a ghost librarian, and she looks kind of surly that you would dare to come into her domain, like all librarians. You wonder if she was a librarian when she died or if the library just molded her into this.
“Can I help you?” she demands. She doesn't add “you filthy vampire” but it seems to be implied.
“Yeah, I want to solve the mystery of this place,” you say. “Or else,” you add, because you're a vampire now and should do things with force.
She laughs a little, and says, “Head up to the attic if you're so curious. The stairs are just out there. Go up.”
“I know where attics are,” you say, rolling your eyes. Vampires are good at sarcasm. You find the stairs she indicated and head up to the attic. It's just full of old furniture and stuff, but there's light coming from a trap door in the ceiling. You climb the ladder into an observation room and come face to face with the witch's ghost. Where the other ghosts are pearly white, she's black, like a hole in reality, except for her eyes, that are made of flames.
“Vampire,” she says, and she sounds surprised. She doesn't hesitate a minute before cannoning into you, however. And the thing about vampires is, they're highly combustible.
“Let's hit up the library,” you say, because you want Francine to think you're smart.
She snorts, showing that you don't full her.
It's huge, with stacks leaning drunkenly against each other. There's even a ghost librarian, and she looks kind of surly that you would dare to come into her domain, like all librarians. You wonder if she was a librarian when she died or if the library just molded her into this.
“Can I help you?” she demands. She doesn't add “you filthy vampire” but it seems to be implied.
“Tell us what's up with this place!” Francine demands, punching her, except her fist goes right through the ghost.
“Yeah!” you snarl, your fangs lengthening.
“Alright, alright!” the librarian says, clearly a little freaked out. “The attic!” she yells at you. “Go to the attic!”
“Cool,” you say, backing off, and you and Francine high five. You leave the library and find the stairs to the attic. It's just full of old furniture and stuff, but there's light coming from a trap door in the ceiling.
“Boy bands all the way!” you shout, heading right. You're not embarrassed to admit it. Francine snorts a little, but follows you down the hall.
You turn into a room with an old-fashioned radio that still somehow seems to be the source of the noise. There's a ghost with frosted tipped hair all spiked up and incredibly wide JNCO jeans dancing to it. “Oh,” he says and stops, embarrassed, when he sees you. “What's up, dogs?”
“I don't know,” Francine says, as weirded out as you are.
“I died here in 1998, okay,” says the ghost, rolling his eyes. “Now I'm doomed to haunt this place for all eternity... looking just like I did when I died. It sucks.”
“Yeah, it would,” you agree, taking in his No Fear shirt.
“Whatever, what the hell is a vampire doing here anyway?” he demands. “What do you want?”
“Some answers,” you say, your fangs lengthening.
“YEAH!” Francine shouts, and punches him. Her fist goes right through him, but the mean look on her face and her hideous facial scarring seems to freak him out.
“Okay, okay,” he says. “Head up to the attic if you're so curious!”
“Thanks,” you say and high five Francine, then take the stairs up into the attic. It's just full of old furniture and stuff, but there's light coming from a trap door in the ceiling.
The observation tower is a small room sticking right out of the top of the highest roof in the house. It's round, with windows on all sides, some of them open to let in the cold. There are telescopes of different sizes everywhere and, unlike the rest of the house, this room seems to be free from dust.
There's also only one ghost in it. She's not like the other ghosts you've seen in the house. She's still wispy and seems to be composed of mist, but where the others have been pearly and transparent, she's black, black like a hole. The others glow faintly, but she does the opposite. Everything around her seems brighter than she is. Maybe she sucks in light and doesn't let it escape. She's also surprisingly young—you weren't expecting that. She looks like she's maybe 13, or was, when she died. She's wearing a simple shift and her hair is wild around her, so you can't tell anything about what time period she may be from.
She doesn't look up at you when you both come in, just continues to stare out the window.
“Hello?” Francine says.
She snorts like you're being ridiculous.
“What kind of ghost are you?” you ask the obvious question.
She turns to look at you, and her eyes are made of fire. “A witch's ghost,” she says. “One that hates vampires.”
“Whoa, hey,” Francine says, trying to get between you as she lunges towards you. Her presence seems to confuse the ghost.
“Why would you be here with that?” she asks.
“That's my cousin,” Francine says. “Maybe a vampire, but still cool. Family, you know?”
“Family,” the witch's ghost mutters. “I know about family.”
“Did they... burn you?” Francine asks. “For being a ghost?” You don't really need her slight nod, it was a pretty easy guess what with her eyes and being a tortured specter and all.
“And scattered my bones on this unholy ground,” she added. “Because, for my crimes, I was doomed to never know peace even in death.”
“And so you were the first ghost?” you ask. “But what about the others--?”
“Just because I'm dead doesn't mean I have to be alone!” she suddenly shouts at you, the fires that are her eyes flaring up. “If they're going to make me stay here—I'll show them what it feels like. I did show them too,” she adds, somewhat less angrily. “The first ghost, after me, is Prudence.”
“Who?”
“Prudence was my best friend,” she says. “Before she told her father that I could hear things in my mind and then he burned me. He didn't cry the day I died—but he cried when she did.” She looks at you, almost speculatively. “And now he tortures me, taunts me. As one of you. I thought to make him suffer, but I think after he turned he never thought of her at all. Prudence. His daughter.”
“Wait,” Francine says. “A vampire burned you?”
“He wasn't a vampire then,” she says.
“Bartelbus Bartleby?” you and Francine say at the same time.
The ghost girl's flame eyes narrow. “He uses me, I know, uses this house. Harvesting our supernatural energy and selling it off to the highest bidder. But I cannot escape, and so neither can they, and so...?” She spreads her dark hands.
“What can we do?” you ask.
“One such as you would help me against him?” She sounds disbelieving, but adds, “I think only one like him can defeat him. You would do that for me?”
“Yes!” you say. “I'll go out and face him right now!”
You practically run back downstairs, out of the house, and outside to Bartelbus Bartelby who must have just been... waiting out there like a creeper. “I want to join you,” you pant. “Sorry I was a jerk before—I really want to be your assistant or henchman or whatever.”
“Ah, betrayal,” Bartelbus observes, steepling his fingers, but you can tell he's pleased. “Very well.”
“HEY!” It's Francine's voice. Crap. She followed you. “What the hell are you DOING?” she demands.
“I was just--” Francine tackles you and wrestles you to the ground. Bartelbus watches with interest but doesn't interfere. She holds you by the neck with one hand and takes a stake out of her pocket with the other.
“You have a stake?” you choke out.
“Just in case,” she says, and stabs you through the heart.
“Of course I will!” you say. “I'll go out and face him right now!”
You practically run back downstairs, out of the house, and outside to Bartelbus Bartelby who must have just been... waiting out there like a creeper. You're panting a little from the run. He raises his eyebrows at you. You haven't actually thought this far.
Do you
“Hey dickhead!” you yell. “I know what you're doing here, and it sucks, you jerkwad!”
Bartelbus stiffens. It's probably been awhile since anyone called him a jerkwad. “You insult me,” he says. “I demand you pay the price through vampire duel.” He reaches out and scratches your cheek with one long fingernail. “As the challenged, you may choose the weapons.”
“I know what you're doing, Bartelbus!” you say.
“You do?” he asks, raising a skeptical eyebrow.
“I know you're just acting out... from the pain of losing your daughter.”
“My daughter?” he repeats.
“Prudence,” you clarify. “But lashing out at others is not the way to heal, so--”
“I'm a vampire now,” he says like you're an idiot. “I haven't thought about her in years.” He reaches out with one hand and, almost lazily, breaks your face off.
“I choose vampire fangs!” you shriek at him, and lunge with your teeth barred.
“Fool,” he say, reaches out with one hand, and grabs you by the throat. He brings your face closer to his, and almost lazily starts to eat your nose.
“I chose random things from the tool shed!” you shout. “Because that's all we have!”
“Very well,” Bartelbus grumbles, and follows you to the side of the house, where you both rummage around in the tool shed. Everything's made of rust and spiders. Bartelbus selects a rusty pick axe, possibly leftover from some prospector that visited the mansion and then was sadly turned into an old prospector ghost. You despair of finding anything even half as good, when you see it. Gleaming in the corner like it was meant just for you:a pair of pristine topiary shears.
They're beautiful, finely crafted of only the very best Italian metals with a filigree pattern along the blades. As you pick them up, you can tell that they are perfectly balanced. Truly, with these topiary shears, you could carve the Mona Lisa of shrubs. Or kill a badass old vampire. Because when you're holding these shears, you feel like a badass too.
“Let's do this,” you say, as you stalk out of the shed, and you feel like Bartelbus maybe quakes a little, in awe of you.
The fight happens almost quicker than the eye, because you're both VAMPIRES, but if someone with a cinematic flair had slowed it down in dramatic slow-motion, they would see Bartelbus swinging his pick axe at your head, and you dodging, bringing the shears up deftly, flipping them through the air, and calmly snipping off his head, like it's an awkwardly-placed bloom in your otherwise perfect topiary The Last Supper. His face has time to take on an expression of surprise before he turns to dust.
The ghosts watching from the house cheer you, as you raise the topiary shears in triumph. Francine is already in consultation with the witch's ghost, who sends her off on a quest to find her missing skull so that she can finally know peace. You could go along, but it sounds like human stuff, and you're suddenly kind of tired. You rest for awhile, and when you open your eyes, someone has dragged you onto the shaded porch. It's a sunny afternoon, and you think you've slept the day away, but the house looks so different you wonder how long its actually been.
When you walk inside, there are movers everywhere. You eat one, because they remind you how hungry you are and, obvs, vampire. You choose the one that looks like a jerk, though, because you're still basically good at heart. It turns out, you discover later, when you find Francine in the library, that the ghosts all left with the witch, and the house is officially hers now. She's just drawing up plans to convert it into an alligator wrestling school. “You can stay and help,” she offers, but you know she's just trying to be polite. Who wants an unruly vampire, eating people and messing up the place?
You bid Francine a fond farewell and promise to visit, hoisting your topiary shears onto your shoulders and disappear into the night. You travel through the forests of the world, occasionally stopping to carve a random tree into a topiary masterpiece. And so you live out eternity, spreading mystery and a little joy, alone, but content.
“CANNONS!” you shout excitedly. Because when you're terrible at all weapons, go for the biggest, most damaging one, I guess.
Bartelbus sighs. “Very well.”
Like any good ancient mansion, Witchburn Manor is well supplied with cannons for just such occasions. You get one of the ghosts to show you how it works. He looks like he's from the 1700s. Now that they see you fighting Bartelbus, the ghosts are a lot nicer to you, if still wary. You push the cannon the requisite number of paces away from your foe, and laboriously turn it around. You fill it like the ghost told you, and hold your flaming torch at the ready.
“Ready,” says the 1700s ghost from the safety of the porch. “Aim.” You've never looked into the business end of a cannon before, and suddenly you're not feeling so sure. “Fire!” cries the ghost.
You try to lower your torch to the fuse, but the flame passes too close to your face. Vampires are highly flammable, and soon you're running around the lawn screaming. Bartelbus' cannon shot cripples your own weapon, but you're too busy crumbling to ash to notice.
“Pistols at dawn!” you cry, because, obvs that's what you say when someone challenges you to a duel.
Bartelbus looks at the sky where the sun has just set. “Very well,” he says, and he seems annoyed that he has to wait that long.
You spend the intervening time in the mansion's shooting gallery practicing with some dueling pistols one of the ghosts has found for you. They might just be his pistols, judging by the laciness of his sleeves. He tries to give you pointers, but then finally ends up sighing a lot in the corner, probably overcome with melancholy over being dead and therefore unable to fight anymore duels. Then you fall asleep in a corner for awhile.
Francine kicks you awake. “Loser, it's almost dawn,” she says. She's holding a wooden stake. “Bullets don't kill vampires, right?” she says when she sees you looking at it. “So I thought, you be the distraction, and...” She motions stabbing with it.
“Whatever,” you say groggily, and head outside. Bartelbus is standing there, like he hasn't moved all night. You salute each other and then walk the requisite number of paces before turning and firing.
Your shot goes hopelessly wide, which you don't have time to notice because you're too busy screaming when Bartelbus' bullet goes searing through your chest. It might not be able to kill you, but it still stings like a giant murderous bee that you just broke up with on its birthday and now it's after revenge. You fall to the ground. So does Bartelbus, with a stake through his heart, before gasping and turning to dust. Dimly you hear the cheers from the ghosts in the house, but you can't see anything through the red haze that fills your vision. “Fran... cine?” you gasp out.
“What's your deal?” you hear her voice asks breathlessly. “I got him! He's dead! Are you...?”
“The bullet,” you moan. “The bullet... how...?” You weakly claw at your chest as the world melts around you. You slowly disintegrate into a pile of dust, revealing a single bullet made of wood.