Page 11 of The Asylum
“Where?” Jack demanded, turning to look.
“There.” I pointed. I could swear it was a male figure, but you couldn’t make out any features. It was human-shaped, and that’s all I could tell.
“Phil,” Jack said.
“I’ve got it. There’s also something behind it. A shapeless mist, light grey, almost white in colour, to the left of it,” Phil replied.
Pyro crowded me, and I knew he was ready to grab me and run if need be. We watched for several more minutes and spotted a third shape. This one made me shiver. It scurried up a wall and crawled around the ceiling. Then it rushed towards us and darted back, repeating the action several times. The shape reminded me of a contorted human spider.
“I don’t like this,” I muttered, and Pyro wrapped an arm around me. I didn’t know what I thought would happen, but this was scary.
“There’s another,” Jack murmured and pointed to a doorway. A small figure stood there; again, it was hard to distinguish a shape. If it was a grown man, he was a very short one. This was beyond disturbing.
“Are you getting them?” Jack asked.
“Yes, and this can’t be debunked. There are too many, and they’re not our shadows because look, ours are there,” Phil said and pointed. He turned the camera toward our shadows and filmed them.
The spirit box cackled and spat a word out.“Watching.”
“Yes, you are, aren’t you?” Jack agreed.
“Did you die here?” Phil called out.
“Shut up. Death. Killed. Murder. Blood. Insane.”The words floated out of the spirit box as we all gaped.
“Do you mean us harm?” Jack asked.
“Yes. No. Maybe. Woman. Smell. Drink. Blood. Talk. Fuck off! Kill you,”the static hissed.
“More than one person is haunting here,” Jack figured out.
“There are several at least,” Pyro agreed, on edge and alert as his head kept darting from one area of the room to another.
“Do you think they’re evil?” I asked.
“Good question. Something feels off here, but evil? I can’t honestly say,” Jack replied.
Somehow, that didn’t reassure me like Jack thought it would. I had a newfound respect for what Callie and Sunny did, and they did this weekly! I don’t know what I’d expected, but it hadn’t been this. This situation was frightening, edgy, and worrying. I’d not really considered the paranormal, but I certainly was now.
Ghosts had been things like Casper on TV, not real spirits with thoughts and emotions. I was getting a rude awakening into the supernatural, and it was a whole new learning curve. Deep down, I’d guessed that Callie faked a lot of the footage, but now I was up front and personal, and it was certainly opening my eyes.
“You okay?” Pyro asked.
“Yes, reconsidering my outlook on a few things… did that move?” My voice ended up high-pitched as Pyro’s silhouette moved of its own accord.
“What?” he asked, spinning around.
“Damn!” Jack exclaimed as Pyro’s shadow stayed still and didn’t move with him. “Phil, are you getting this?”
“Yeah. Pyro, how are you feeling?” Phil asked.
“A bit light-headed but okay,” Pyro replied.
Jack sent him a concerned look. “Do you feel tired?”
“Yeah.” Pyro yawned.
“They’re draining him, using his energy to materialise. We need to get out of here. None of us has enough protection to beat this back,” Jack said.
