Ghosted [Chapter 2.2]

word count: 1803

“Shit,” I said, tugging on Theo and pulling him into the darkness. The shadows loomed over us as we tripped and fell over something laying right in our path. As we sprawled to the ground, I felt the world shift around me. Everything suddenly felt wrong. Where I was laying, how I was laying, and even what I was wearing was clearly off. It felt like I was looking in a funhouse mirror, but I had somehow become my reflection. My limbs were too lanky. My hair was too restrained. My clothes didn’t feel nearly as comfortable as they should have.

The thing at our feet whirred with ancient, forgotten magic.

(A little farther away, the two shadowy beings collapsed into puddles of shifting darkness.)

Glowing, light blue eyes stared at me as I hurriedly sat up. It was like I was looking at a robot or doll; the eyes had no emotion. As the owner’s soft, pulsing hands tightly grabbed onto my wrists, I started to question if Theo was right about this place being cursed.

...Speaking of Theo, where was he right now? The only thing I could easily make out was the thing’s glowing blue eyes. I could feel something partially underneath me. It felt warm like a body. Maybe it was Theo?

Not entirely sure if the thing holding onto me liked the idea of me breaking free from its grasp, I nudged Theo with my elbow. It was harder to move than expected - I felt like I was wading through a thick, syrup-y sea. I assumed that it had something to do with the shadows that had been watching over us just seconds before.

I glanced back at my captor.

Deciding it was probably a bad idea to let Rose’s boyfriend die a second time (if we could even do that) I jerked my hands free from the thing holding them hostage. In response, the thing gave an almost angry whirring noise. Its gaze followed me as I went to shake Theo awake. It moved ever so closer as I gave up on the shaking and propped him up. And when I finally had the smart idea to check if he had any head injuries, it gave a soft, quiet whir.

Of course, there was the slight problem of not being near any source of light. We were a good few feet into the darkness, and too far away from a wall for me to see if I could do what I did back in the hallway. Theo’s phone was out, and I wasn’t even sure I could easily get to mine right now.

I eyed our little friend.

Fighting against the syrup, I held Theo’s limp body in front of its eyes. The light was just strong enough to illuminate his face in eerie, unnatural shadows.

But there was just one problem.

Theo didn’t have black hair. He didn’t have hazel eyes. And the dried blood had been on the left side of his face earlier - not coming down from the right side of his forehead. I wasn’t like I was looking at a stranger. A body hadn’t randomly shown up here. It was a body I knew better than anyone ever would, even though it didn’t make any sort of sense.

It was my body.

I dropped my body and scooted back away from it. The thing seized it and cradled it in its arms. I couldn’t make much more than that out thanks to the poor lighting. I also didn’t really care to. Having my body get taken by a strange ruin dweller wasn’t all that terrifying when I somehow wasn’t even in my body to begin with.

I wasn’t a ghost. I hadn’t gone through myself when I tried hoisting my body up. And it had been breathing, too - I had seen my chest going up and down. But how could that even happen when I wasn’t in it? Didn’t that go against all rules of how life and death worked?

And where was Theo?

...Van? Theo groggily asked.

I frantically glanced around. I had to be losing my mind; I couldn’t tell where Theo’s voice was coming from. It sounded like a whisper in my ear, but I didn’t feel anything next to me when I wildly started waving my arms out around me.

Something got him, Theo whispered, as if I somehow couldn’t hear him. My fingers kept catching air. The syrup got thicker around them. I was struggling to move them at this point, but desperation kept me from giving up. I needed to find Theo - not just to make sure he was alright, but so I could also reassure myself that this was real and not some horrible nightmare. Let-Let me go!

“Theo?” I whispered, voice quiet like his but not laced with fear. “Where are you-”

I gave a startled cry and covered my mouth with my hand.

That wasn’t my voice. That was Theo’s voice. I started frantically patting down my clothes, trying to disprove what I knew had to be the truth. The cloth underneath my fingertips was smooth and fine. I felt buttons and a collar. I felt perfectly ironed - albeit a little wrinkly now - pants. And when I felt my face, I found that the shape was all wrong. My hair was the wrong length and the wrong thickness.

I didn’t just have Theo’s voice.

I had Theo’s body, too.

I unsteadily got to Theo’s feet. The syrup had to be Theo fighting the whole thing, and the reason his voice sounded so weirdly close by was because it was all in his head. He couldn’t speak because I had default control over his mouth.

“I possessed you,” I realized.

Possessed me? Theo said, horror seeping into his voice. Who-Who are you? Let me go or I’ll-

“You couldn’t hurt a fly,” I said, crossing my – his – arms. “You’d get your shirt dirty."

Why does my shirt have anything to do with this?

I started to pace in my spot. The thing on the ground stared at me with blank, glowing eyes as it continued to hug my body. I’d have to get that back in a minute, once I remembered how ghosts got themselves out of possessions. “You’re just too…”

For once in my life, I struggled to find the right word.

“You’re too rich,” I finally decided.

Excuse me?

“I know who you are,” I said. It felt strange hearing the accusation in Theo’s voice instead of my own. I tried to shake the thought away as I kept contemplating how I was supposed to get myself back into my actual body. “I didn’t see a reason to bring it up earlier, but you’re the son of the people who run Mendel Genetics. The company's one of the most successful ancestry trackers in the entire world and regularly helps solve criminal cases by processing the DNA evidence. You guys are loaded.”

There was a pause. I could feel Theo trying to screw his face up into a look of contemplation and confusion, but I was winning the battle for control over his facial muscles. The most he could get was a little twitch.

You’re Van, he said.

“Took you long enough.”

You’re...You’re in my body.

I shrugged. “Looks like I can possess people.”

Theo didn’t have a response to that.

Seizing the opportunity - and the lack of resistance from Theo - I marched on over to the thing sitting on the floor and tried wrenching my body free. Whatever our glowing-eyed friend was, it had an incredibly strong grip. I wrapped Theo’s arms around my body and jerked it back, but all that happened was me getting pulled forward when the thing returned the gesture.

Theo’s body, my body, and the thing all went tumbling into the light filtering in through the open door.

The thing was stunned enough that its grip finally lessened. I gave my body one last triumphant tug, barely managing to hold it upright as I stood Theo’s body up again. It was starting to get confusing keeping track of what body was actually mine and which one I was currently in. How did ghosts ever do possessions? I felt like I was losing myself to all of the chaos. 

I screwed my eyes shut and grounded myself.

If I could focus on what I was supposed to be like, then I’d be able to shove that crisis aside and be able to focus on the more important issue. I forgot the sensations of being in Theo’s body. I recalled what it was like to be in my own body: my height, my slightly superior eyesight, my clothes and anything else that made me me.

And then the world shifted again.

When I opened my eyes, I found myself in Theo’s arms.

My first reaction, of course, was to push Theo away from me. My next was to turn to the thing whirring down on the ground. Ignoring Theo’s offended look, I dragged our friend fully into the light of the hallway. It was time to see what we had gotten ourselves into.

It almost looked human if I squinted hard enough. It had the basic shape of one. The torso, limbs and head were all in the right proportion to each other. But it lacked the defining features. It had no hair. It had no clothes. Its body, which almost looked like it could have been out of human skin but was an eerie shade of bright white, was covered in similar markings to the hallway we were standing in. Our little friend, apparently, was a weird, cultish mannequin.

An old, weird, cultish mannequin. The thing definitely had seen better days. Moss, cobwebs, and what looked suspiciously like little mushrooms caked its skin. It was a miracle that I could see past the grime to tell what color its faux skin was.

Theo hesitantly joined me.

“What-What is that?” he questioned. Asking questions seemed to be his thing. “And where did the shadows go?”

I shrugged.

“I don’t know,” I said - killing two birds with one stone. “I just know that I was able to possess you.”

Theo just stared.

At first, I thought he was staring at me. Then I thought he was staring at the mannequin, seeing that said mannequin was unsteadily getting to its strange feet. But after a minute of watching him, I finally realized he was looking somewhere past us. 

He was staring at the hole we had fallen through earlier.

“The rain stopped,” he pointed out.

I grinned. It looked like it was time to leave this place behind. All it would take was a little bit of convincing on my part.