The only energy Dalton had when he woke up was to go to the kitchen and make coffee. It was the only thing that could help him focus on something other than the pain and aches that etched across his body.

Maya was playing Guilty Cog while he stumbled out of the bedroom. He took a small glance to see that she was destroying a very high-ranking individual on the leaderboards. Dalton ignored that, not wanting to know how strong she had gotten.

“I talked to your boss while you were sleeping,” Maya said. The screen was reflected upon her eyes. “We talked about a lot of things. You have ghosts haunting your office.”

Dalton poured some coffee. His lips quivered as the sweet elixir went down his throat.

“Worse. They’re ghost users. And the one leading them is a possessed co-worker.” Dalton voice cracked as he sat next to her.

“That bad.” She seemed interested. “Your boss asked me to relay that you deal with them.”

Dalton almost spat out his coffee. A deep-rooted fear squeezed his gut. “Really?”

Maya glanced at Dalton. “You look like a ghost.”

Dalton put his cup down on the table, and grabbed his head, shaking. “Why? Why did he ask me? Why does it have to be me? I don’t want to go back there. There has to be better people than me.”

Even though she was winning, Maya put her controller down and turned to him, giving him a straight gaze. “What do you want to do Dalton?”

“You’re dying.” Daltons made a quick glance to the screen.

“What do you want to do? Do you want to go back there?” Maya asked once more.

Dalton thought about it for a moment, remembering the terrible things that happened to him. He stood no chance against Ozul. Everyone in his department got eaten by him, and yet…he remembered what Malcolm said.

Make sure to save us all.

Why had he said it like that? There was no way he would be able to save all of them. Yet, he had asked Dalton. He did not ask Louise, or even asked him to have Maya save them. He asked him specifically.

“I…” Dalton finally said. “I don’t know.”

Maya placed her hand against her chest. “If you want, I can save everyone.” That made Dalton turn to her. “I can easily deal with any ghost. I want to help you.” She took his hand and leaned in towards him.

Her eyes sparkled like sapphire as he met her gaze. It was filled with such warmth and kindness like the soft flames of a hearth. He did want to ask her to take his burden.

Dalton shook his head. “I can’t ask you that.”

“Why not?”

“I can’t. I want to, but I can’t. I can’t rely on you like this. If I were to place a reason why.” Dalton closed his eyes, trying to place the right words. “I would say that it’s because I would lose something important.”

Maya smiled. “You sound like a hero. Something important.” She elbowed him.

“No, you misunderstand. I’m not going ask you to do this for me, but I am going to ask you for help right now.” Dalton met her gaze with his own determined ones. She suddenly blushed looking away.

“What is it?”

“Can you teach me how to kill a ghost?”

#

It was tough. Very tough. The candidates were lined up, waiting for his final evaluation. He turned to Louise.

Her body was cold, as if she were dead.

“What do you think?” He purred. “Which one tickles your fancy.”

His voice was coming back together, and he felt his heart grow bigger as he asked his beloved. Louise frowned, giving him a sympathetic look. He wondered why.

“It looks like your souls are linked together now. It will be tougher to separate you,” Louise said sadly. “Like trying to stop two people mid coitus.”

Ozul gasped. “My dear, don’t say such inappropriate things. That is something that only married people do under the oath of their love.”

“You can feel it can you not? Her feelings are changing your nature. Soon it will be permanent.”

“Sweety, you are not making sense. Now tell me, which of these men do you think would be a Best Man?” Ozul asked.

Louise gave him a very sad look. He did not understand why. Their wedding was a wonderful occasion. He noticed that her binding was getting a little too loose for comfort. With a little will pushed on the three rings around her, he could feel the rings snap in place, become as tight as a horse’s strap.

#

“The first thing you have to know is that Ghost Users are weird. They dress weird. Their powers do not make much sense,” Maya explained. She brought out a chart to explain her reasoning. “If you follow the line, you can see the stranger the stronger the power is. For example, I have faced a Ghost User that had the ability to turn you into mushrooms.”

Dalton raised his hand. “Is this a joke?”

Maya shook her head. Her eyes deadly serious. “It sounds like a joke, but it is a horrifying power. The Ghost User turned a whole town into mushrooms.

“Moving on, some powers sound normal. Like the ability to shoot fire or shoot green splashes, but they are weak compared to the stranger powers that ghosts grant their users. Ghosts become much stronger as they age. It’s like wine, but some of them go bad and are worse.” Maya held up a crystal. “In order to beat a ghost, there are two ways, use magic or use ghosts. Since you don’t know how to use magic, the best way to go about this is to have you use a ghost. I would recommend the ghost that was haunting you.”

“Wait right there,” Dalton said. “I don’t think that’s a good idea. He’s going to kill me.”

“Well, I suppose we can use the one that I captured earlier.” She held out another crystal. “The last person she possessed, she controlled them and made them eat the innards of other people, but I’m sure you can take it.”

Maya was not being sarcastic. He could see in her eyes that she was deadly serious and put faith on his abilities, even though he had none to speak of. The crystal she was holding was shaking in excitement. Maya noticed and blew a magic infused breath at it, and it calmed down.

“Sometimes it shakes because it wants blood. I had to freeze it again, so it would not escape.” Her eyes sparkled and she handed the blood red crystal to him.

“You know, I think I want to be possessed by the ghost that already possessed me.” Dalton’s mouth twitched, and beads of sweat ran down his cheek.

“Is that so?” Maya looked at the blood red crystal and then at the blue crystal. “If that’s what you want, that’s fine. But I can attest that this ghost is tough. Her ability is called Island Vacation. She has the ability to create to an island where you have to solve a mystery, and if you fail you get murdered and are forced to play a side character on the island giving hints to the player until finally a player finds the murderer.”

Dalton blinked and shook his head. “What? Are you saying that this ghost has the ability to throw you on an island where you have to solve a whodunnit murder?”

“Yes, and it was tough.” Maya looked away. “I did not think that the murderer was actually the maid. She was so nice.”

“Why is it so complicated?” Dalton couldn’t help but share his shock and displeasure. “What happened to the user after you solved the murder?”

“Uhmmmm, well they get murdered,” Maya said. “There is always a balance to these powers.”

“Yeah, no thank you. I will take Satoshi as my ghost then.”

“Satoshi?” Maya frowned. “Who is that?”

“The ghost that is haunting me.” Dalton looked at the blue crystal in her hand. “Who is haunting me?”

Maya nodded, listening intently to the blue crystal. While Dalton couldn’t hear any of what the blue crystal said, he could see it brighten and dim.

“He has told me he does not want me to reveal his name, so I won’t,” Maya said.

Now that made Dalton a little afraid. Who was haunting him? His family had many enemies, and Dalton was sure that it was one of them.

“Dalton, you are thinking too hard. You’re going to have creases on your forehead if you continue to do that,” Maya said.

“Okay, so how do I use a ghost?”

“No, that’s not right. The first thing is how do you see ghosts.” Maya corrected him. “It doesn’t matter if you are possessed by them, if you cannot see them, they might as well just be a parasite that sucks on your life force.”

“I think I just heard something shocking. Was the ghost haunting me sucking my life force?”

“He only sucked a few years off your life. It’s alright.” Maya waved her hand dismissively.

“That doesn’t sound alright! I want those few years back!” Dalton yelled.

The blue crystal in her hand blinked. Maya translated. “He says your life force tasted like rubber.”

“I don’t care if tasted bad! He shouldn’t have eaten my life force! Make him give it back to me!”

Maya giggled. “Dalton is funny.”

“…Please?”