“Through my pencil flowed the pieces, numbers and variables spinning together to form equations, equations weaving in and out, coming together in new, unusual, wonderful ways, creating a new whole, a whole based entirely upon math, and logic, and truth. Twenty beautiful problems, works of art meant to be explored slowly, thoroughly, to be appreciated fully, but we couldn’t linger. We were racing through the Louvre, past da Vincis and Picassos, pausing briefly only to glean what we needed before sprinting to the next work.”
Her mother, her father, her grandmother, her sisters and brother — her dog — they could not see her grin. They could not hear her tell them she was fine — indeed, better in death than the corpse that lay on the bed beside her. They could not touch her hand, though her dog licked the corpse’s hand. They could not hug her one last time, though her mother hugged the corpse, burying her head into its chest. They could not card their hands through her hair, though her grandmother’s hand wove patterns into the corpse’s hair. They could not play together in the streets, or huddle together to listen to her grandmother’s stories, or eat dinner together and make her father laugh.
And they never would again.
Her grin slipped from her face, and tears spilled from her eyes, unable to touch the ground when they fell from her cheeks.
“Blank as a field of fresh snow, untouched by the tracks of wolves, or deer, or wooden sleds ridden by small children, their laughter echoing in the air. Blank as a wall before memories have time to accumulate in the form of photographs taken to preserve the past, and artwork lovingly drawn by the clumsy hands of a child, and awards and diplomas received before final goodbyes are said and another being is released into the world. Blank as my mind as I tried to find words, words that made sense, words that sounded like the memory of a child’s laughter, like tinkling bells, like a symphony. But the words wouldn’t come. I stared at the blank sheet of paper, and the paper stared back behind black lines like shades, its white, taunting glare searing my eyes. I blinked, losing the staring contest. I blinked again, hoping that some change would occur, some flash of inspiration, colorful against the glaring white. But the page (and my mind) remained the same.
“Its form was like fire and knives, forged in darkness. Its edges were sharp, yet flickering, and they cut into his torso and arms as it wrapped itself around him like a snake. The top of its head flickered and waved, trailing behind its every movement. Its clawed hands wrapped over his head and around his face, forcing him to look into its eyes. The eyes were the worst— red like blood, glowing like embers, tinted with malice.”
“A blast of warm wind as unnatural as the trees rustling on the other hillside took him off guard, nearly sent him tumbling off the path. Reigen turned to see Mob, wind blowing his hair from his face, a look of deep concentration as he held the shoe aloft with one pointed finger, his other hand outstretched towards the campsite across the river. Leaves and grass and dirt whipped past his student, leaving the boy untouched but flying at Reigen’s suit and face and hair; so he turned again and saw the detritus that didn’t buffet him fly down the hill and across the river, picking up spray from the water and plant matter from the other hillside as it rose to the campsite. Reigen could only watch as people were bowled over, as screams were drowned out by the snapping of ropes and the flapping of tents as they came apart under the onslaught, wrenched from the ground to join the debris climbing with the wind. He couldn’t look away as the wind and water and debris rose to take the form of something huge, something monstrous, something that ballooned and expanded as the wind rose and the screams grew more shrill and—
And suddenly, it was gone. Just a light breeze remained, connecting one hill to another. The debris and the floating person seemed to pause for a moment, suspended in the air.
He remembers green and purple and red and black and floating, always floating, ever floating, waves of ectoplasm washing over him, washing through him, pushing and pulling him to and fro long before he had the words for to or fro or floating or color. He remembers suddenly knowing those words, the same way he knew which greens to absorb and which reds to avoid. He remembers knowing that this was the Ghost Zone, the Infinite Realms; that there were nigh uncountable ghosts within, all connected to the Zone through the ectoplasm they absorbed and expelled and the electrochemical signals they shared; that he was a ghost, that he had a lair, that his name was— was— ”