Ghost of a Chance

by Simon Green

Genres: Literary Fiction

Synopsis

New York Times best-selling author Simon R. Green has crafted numerous acclaimed science fiction and fantasy novels, including Blue Moon Rising, Blood and Honor, and Shadows Fall. In this first installment of the Ghost Finders series, JC Chance, Melody Chambers, and Happy Jack Palmer are agents of the Carnacki Institute-a place where the sole purpose is to "do something" about ghosts. But what exactly? Lay the spirits to rest? Send them along their merry way? Or maybe just kick some goulie butt?

Release date: August 6, 2015

Publisher: Quercus Publishing

Print pages: 170

Sample

Everybody knows there are bad places in the world.

Houses that make you walk by on the other side of the street. Bedrooms that no-one in their right mind would try to sleep in. The television screen that isn’t empty enough, the mirror with too many faces reflected in it, the voice in the night, and the dark at the top of the stairs. There are bad places everywhere, in crowded towns and empty fields. Places where there are no safety barriers, where the walls of the world have worn thin, places . . . where we know we’re not safe. It’s in these bad places that we see things we don’t want to see.

As I was walking up the stair,

I met a man who wasn’t there.

He wasn’t there again today.

I wish that man would go away.

Ghosts. They’ve been around as long as we have, in one form or another. Strange sights and sounds, visitations and wonders, spirits of cold earth and empty graves come back to trouble the living. Things that won’t lie down; and none of them bound by the laws of the living. The dead; and things that aren’t dead enough.

There are bad places in the world, but it isn’t ghosts that make these places bad; it’s the bad places that make ghosts.

*

As the world changes, so do the ways in which we see ghosts. From dark shapes in the night and ancestral revenants to lovers separated too soon and thwarted enemies; from stone tape recordings and electromagnetic phenomena to men and women caught in repeating loops of Time, like insects trapped in amber. Ghosts have always been with us, like guests reluctant to leave the party, like bad memories that won’t go away . . . Ghosts are nightmares of the Past, refusing to give way to the Present. Mankind’s dark side, Humanity’s unconscious.

England’s dreaming . . .

And so, in this brave new twenty-first century, don’t expect ghosts to be limited to old manor houses or abandoned rectories. The modern idea of the bad place, the genius loci, the setting that disturbs and troubles us, has moved on. These days you’re more likely to see ghosts in empty car parks, in shut-down factories, or in an underpass with a bad reputation. Places where it can get very dark and very dangerous, and no-one with any sense goes there alone.

There are such things as ghosts whether you believe in them or not. Tapping on your window late at night, waiting patiently to be noticed at the foot of your bed, stubbornly refusing to lie down. And that’s where the Carnacki Institute comes in. The Institute exists to investigate, interpret, and hopefully Do Something About all the many mysteries and strange supernatural events that flare up every year. All the things that shouldn’t happen but unfortunately do. The Institute’s field agents are trained to deal with spooks and spirits, poltergeists and demons, Timeslips and other-dimensional incursions. They are ghost finders, and when they find them . . . they step on them. Hard.

Of course, not all ghosts are dark forces, intent on Humanity’s ruin. Some are poor lost souls, trying to find their way home. And they . . . can be the most dangerous of all.

These days, ghosts turn up in the damnedest places.

It was a cold night under a cold sky, in a supermarket car park a short distance outside the Georgian city of Bath. The supermarket was shut, the car park was deserted, and all the normal people had gone home to sleep the sleep of the just, or at least the weary. A great open space, now, with its carefully laid-out parking bays, half a dozen cars parked haphazardly across the asphalt. A dozen or so abandoned supermarket carts stood forlorn and forgotten in the night. Nothing moved in the surrounding empty fields, not even a breath of wind; and only the faintest of sounds made it all the way from the distant city. Nothing of interest here, nothing to see; except for the three figures standing together in the middle of the car park, looking expectantly about them like theatre patrons waiting for the play to begin.

No lights in the closed supermarket. There was only the harsh yellow glare of the car-park lights, left on as a favour to those who waited, and the blue-white glare of the full moon, sailing high in the star-speckled sky. A cold wind gusted suddenly out of the east, adding a distinct chill to the hour before dawn. Scattered litter tumbled end over end across the great open space, like mice suddenly disturbed in a dark basement. The two men and one woman ignored the wind and the chill as they waited for something to come out of the darkest part of the night and do its best to scare them.

“How much longer are we going to stand around here, freezing our nuts off?” said Happy Jack Palmer.

“Until something ghostly shows up and justifies our expense claims,” JC Chance said cheerfully. “If not tonight, then perhaps tomorrow night, or the night after that. It is, after all, the suspense and uncertainty of things that makes life worth living.”

“I’d hit you if I dared take my hands out of my pockets long enough,” Happy said darkly. “What, exactly, are we supposed to be looking for?”

“I wish you’d, just once, read the briefing files, ” said Melody Chambers, not looking up from the equipment she was casually assembling in a semicircle before her. “No-one’s seen anything, as such, but there have been hundreds of reports from people using this car park after dark: feelings of unease, panic, even outright terror . . . and a very definite sense of being watched by unseen, malevolent eyes. People are afraid to come here any more, even in broad daylight.”

“Ah,” said JC. “The usual.”

“Why can’t ghosts manifest during working hours?” said Happy, a bit wistfully. “It’s not as if there’s any rule that says ghosts can’t appear in daylight. I think they do it to be spiteful.”

“That’s right, Happy,” said JC. “They’re only doing it to annoy you.”

Happy scowled fiercely. “I am not an early-morning person! I have been up for twenty-seven hours straight, and I’m not even getting overtime! Somewhere there is a hotel bed calling my name, and I wish I were in it.”

“So do we,” said Melody. “If only so we could get a little peace and quiet. I’ve known poltergeists that were less of a nuisance than you.”

“Can’t we at least order some pizza?” said Happy. “I’d kill for a meat feast with a stuffed crust.”

“Hush, man,” said JC, peering about him into the gloom with lively enthusiasm. “If you want to find ghosts, you have to go where ghosts are. Logic. You can’t expect to find Jaws in a swimming pool.”

“I want to go home,” Happy said miserably.

“You always want to go home,” said Melody. “How you ever got the nickname Happy is beyond me. I can only suppose your school was an absolute hotbed of irony.”

“Listen,” said Happy, “I am a Class Ten telepath. If you could see the world as clearly as I do, you’d be clinically depressed, too. I want some of my little pills.”

“Not now,” JC said immediately. “I need your head clear and your thoughts sharp.”

“Spoil-sport.” Happy sniffed loudly, sulking. “Come on, JC, we’ve been here almost five hours now, and nothing’s happened. This place is as dead as my love life. Let’s call it a night. My stomach’s empty, my back is killing me, and my feet aren’t talking to me. All to investigate a ghost that may not even be here. I mean, be fair: a sense of unease and of being watched? You can get that in a public toilet.”

“Bear up,” said JC. “All in a night’s work for the intrepid heroes of the Carnacki Institute.”

Happy grimaced. “God, I hate it when you’re being this cheerful. It’s not natural. Especially given the nature of what we do.”

“Be strong!” urged JC, beaming even more brightly because he knew it got on Happy’s nerves. “Remember . . . when the Ghostbusters have a headache; when the Scooby gang are having a panic attack; when Mulder and Scully don’t want to know and the psychic commandos of the SAS are sitting in a corner crying their eyes out . . . Who do you send for? The specially trained field agents of the Carnacki Institute!”

“He’s quite right, you know,” Melody said coldly. “It isn’t normal to be that cheerful, at this hour of the morning. You haven’t been dipping into Happy’s pills again, have you?”

“I do so love to see the sun come up!” said JC.

“They’re not paying me enough for this,” growled Happy. “In fact, they couldn’t pay me enough for this. It’s only the general gloom and the opportunities for self-pity that keep me going.”

“Be quiet, you annoying little man, and let me concentrate on my instruments,” said Melody. “Or I’ll short-circuit your kirlian aura.”

Josiah Charles (JC) Chance looked fondly on his bickering team-mates, then turned his attention back to the shadows and the dark. JC was tall, lean. Full of energy, and far too handsome for his own good. Well into his late twenties, he had pale, striking features, a great mane of dark, wavy hair, intense eyes, a proud nose, and a mouth whose constant smile would have been more reassuring if it had touched his piercing gaze a little more often. He wore a rich cream suit of quite striking style and elegance, and wore it well. A born adventurer, risk-taker, and experienced ghost finder, JC Chance was the rising star of the Carnacki Institute; and he knew it. He knew more about ghosts, hauntings, and paranormal phenomena than any man should who hoped to sleep soundly at night. Fortunately, he also knew a lot of things to do about them. Really quite unpleasant things, sometimes, but that came with the job.

Melody Chambers was the main brain and science geek of the team, and therefore strictly responsible for all the marvellous new technology supplied by the Carnacki Institute. In fact, Melody had been known to slap people’s hands away if they even tried to touch her tech. She was very protective of her toys, even if she did tend to break them on a regular basis, usually by trying to get far more out of them than the design specs allowed. Pushing the very edge of her late twenties, Melody was pretty enough in a conventional way, short and gamine thin, and burned constantly with more nervous energy than was good for her. She had a disturbing tendency to rush headlong into any situation that looked like it might promise her something, anything, that she hadn’t encountered before, armed with a complete willingness to kick the hell out of anything that proved even a bit stubborn. Melody Chambers wasn’t nearly scared enough of the dark, considering what she did on nights like this.

She wore her auburn hair scraped back into a severe bun, serious glasses with black plastic frames, and clothes so anonymous they actually sidestepped fashion or style. In her spare time, she enjoyed a sex life that would have scared Casanova out of his jockstrap. It’s always the quiet ones . . .

Then there was Happy Jack Palmer. Telepath, smart-arse, and full-time gloomy bugger. Closing fast on thirty, and resenting it bitterly, Happy was short and stocky, prematurely balding, and might have been handsome if he ever stopped scowling. He wore grubby jeans, a rude T-shirt, and a battered old jacket, and looked like you’d have to put him through a car wash to get the top layer of soil off him. He shaved when he remembered and enjoyed all the worst kinds of food, traces of which still showed on his jacket. He claimed to have a heart of gold. In a box, under his bed. The most reluctant hero ever accepted into the ranks of the Carnacki Institute, and owner of so many medical prescriptions he had to file them in alphabetical order to keep track, Happy had an unequalled talent for detecting the presence of things that most people wouldn’t even admit existed.

He saw things and heard voices, and only the pills let him lead anything like a normal life.

Thrown together by fate, held together by repeated success, the three of them made a good team and did good work. And because they worked so well together, they got all the most difficult, dangerous, and demanding cases. Happy was always threatening to quit but never did. Partly because he enjoyed the company, mostly because he enjoyed the free medical benefits. JC made no secret of the fact that he was still looking for some solid proof on the fate of human consciousness after death. And Melody stayed because the Institute gave her access to the very latest tech, and because she couldn’t hope to do nearly as much damage anywhere else.

She moved happily back and forth in front of her assorted computers, scanners, and certain arcane assemblies of her own design, arranged on a collapsible frame. Her fingers flashed across keyboards, adjusted dials, and administered the occasional warning slap to any piece of equipment that didn’t do what it was supposed to do fast enough to suit her. Lights flared and flickered, monitor screens blazed, and information came flooding in from every direction at once. JC kept a watchful eye on it all, from a safe distance.

“Picking up anything interesting?” he ventured casually after a while.

“You wouldn’t understand if I told you,” said Melody, not looking round. “Everything’s operating as it should, all the motion detectors and temperature tests are fine, and there’s not a single energy spike across the board. Rest assured that if anything ectoplasmic should deign to show its face in what’s left of tonight, I am ready and waiting to analyse it in any number of interesting ways. A ghost mouse couldn’t fart around here without me knowing.”

“And if our ghosties and ghoulies don’t present any measurable activity?” said Happy, cunningly.

“Then that’s why we have you,” said Melody. “Though I often wish we didn’t.”

“Girl geek.”

“Spice Girls fan.”

“Children, children,” JC murmured. “Play nicely, or there will be spankings.”

“I hate it here,” Happy said miserably. “It’s cold, it’s damp, and I think moss is starting to grow under my testicles.”

“Eeew,” said Melody. “There’s a mental image I wasn’t expecting to take home with me.”

“Hold it,” said Happy, his head coming up suddenly, like a hound catching a scent. “Hold everything. Did either of you feel that?”

“Feel what?” said JC, moving in close beside Happy and looking quickly around.

“We’re not alone,” said Happy, frowning, concentrating. “There’s something here with us . . . No visible presence, can’t say I actually heard or smelled anything . . . but there’s definitely a sense of being observed. And not in a good way.”

“Not friendly, then?” said JC.

“What do you think?” Happy said pityingly. “When was the last time we encountered a happy ghost? Very definitely not including the Laughing Ghoul of Leicester, bad cess to his mouldering bones. If you were hoping to meet Casper the Dead Baby, you’re in the wrong team. We only get the bad-tempered ones.”

“Let us remain optimistic,” said JC. “If only out of a sense of perversity.”

“Easy for you to say,” growled Happy. “You’re not a Class Eleven sensitive. Damn . . . the presence is so strong now it’s almost overwhelming. My head is pounding.”

“Take some of your pain-killers,” said Melody. “You’re so much more bearable when you’re medicated.”

“No,” said JC. “No pills, Happy. Concentrate.”

“Not even the little purple ones? You like those.”

“Maybe later, Happy. Hang in there. Melody, anything showing up on your instruments?”

“Nothing. Not a damn thing anywhere. And no; I don’t feel anything.”

“You wouldn’t,” Happy said scathingly. “You have all the sensitivity of a night-club bouncer.”

“Not listening, not listening,” said Melody.

“According to the briefing files,” said JC, “an old lady was knocked down and killed in this very parking lot a few months ago. A reversing car ran over her. Driver swore he never even saw her. Could she be our ghost? I do good work with little-old-lady ghosts. They trust me.”

“No fool like a dead fool,” Happy said absently. “This doesn’t feel like any old lady, JC. I’m not even sure it’s human. I’m getting images now, sounds, associations . . . None of them recent. This is old, and I mean really old. Centuries past . . . Dark, brutal, hungry. I don’t like the feel of this at all.”

“Where is it?” said JC, glaring about into the harsh light of the car park and the darkness beyond. “Can you narrow it down to a location, or even a direction?”

“It’s everywhere!” said Happy, turning round and round in small, stumbling circles. “It’s closing in on us, from every direction at once! The whole damn area’s haunted, not only the car park . . . But this is the focus, all right. We’re standing at ground zero.”

“Melody?” said JC. “Tell me something, Melody. Anything.”

“My instruments are lighting up like Christmas trees,” said Melody, moving quickly from one screen to another. “But none of the readings make any sense. I’m getting sharp spikes in the upper electromagnetic range, massive energy surges almost overloading the sensors . . . Far too strong for any human revenant. Something’s coming, JC. Something huge and powerful . . . Coming up out of the past, out of the deep past, the really long-ago . . . I’ve never seen readings like these, JC. We are off the scale here, people.”

“It’s been here all along,” whispered Happy. “Waiting for some poor damned fools to break its bonds and turn it loose . . .”

“Hold on,” said Melody. “I’m getting something, on the radio station I keep detuned for Electronic Voice Phenomena. I can’t tell where it’s coming from, but . . . Listen to this. It’s in the air, all around us . . .”

She cut in the main speakers, and a massive chorus of grunts and growls, sudden shrieks and deep coughing sounds, spilled out into the empty car park. Voices, the voices of men, but as much animal as human, the voice of the beast in all of us. There was rhythm in the sound, and definite traces of sense and meaning, but no recognisable words. Harsh, aggressive, and terribly exalted; but also deeply disturbing, on a primitive, almost atavistic level. Voices from out of the Deep Past, when we were still learning how to be human. JC shuddered as gooseflesh rose up all over him, and his scalp crawled. Melody clung desperately to her instruments like a drowning woman. Happy’s face twisted as he shrank away from the sounds. JC put a calming hand on Happy’s shoulder and gestured for Melody to shut off the sounds. She did so, and blessed silence returned to the car park. Nothing moved in the harsh glare of the electric lights or in the surrounding darkness. Even the wind had stopped blowing.

“What the hell kind of language was that?” said Happy, shaking his head slowly.

“I’m not sure it was a language,” said Melody, giving all her attention to the monitor screens. “Or at least, not anything we would recognise as such. It’s old, very old. Ancient. It may even predate language as we know it.”

“So much for the little-old-lady theory,” said JC. “I have a strong suspicion we are in way over our heads, people, and sinking fast.”

Happy sniffed loudly. “Situation entirely bloody normal then.”

A car horn went off, the sudden sound shockingly loud in the quiet night. It blared viciously, aggressively, on and on as though some unseen hand were pressing hard on the horn. It sounded like some angry beast, roused suddenly from slumber with slaughter on its mind. More horns joined in, from every corner of the car park. The noise grew unbearably loud, the cars howling like a pack of wolves beneath the full moon, anticipating prey. And then the sound cut off abruptly, all the horns stopping simultaneously. The sudden quiet would have been a relief . . . if the night hadn’t been so heavy with threat and menace. Hap. . .