The Séance • Marvel

Civil War: Chapter 05

And so Roxxy kept her promise. The next day she took Vanessa to a rehab center where she was admitted into a three-month program to help with drug rehabilitation. At first, everything was incredibly hard that Vanessa was starting to regret it. The constant shaking, headaches, fatigue, nausea, watery eyes, even the loss of appetite, were all affecting her. "This was a mistake," she told Jason one afternoon, "This is not what I want." "Push through it, Ness. It's just your body getting rid of all the things that don't belong there" he said. "Since when did you become a doctor?" She asked him. "I don't I just listen."

Vanessa wanted to push through it because she really did want to get better, but it was hard. So hard. She'd been taking drugs for most of her life and she was so addicted to them that she didn't know how to function when she wasn't high. Vanessa continued to attend counseling both alone and in a group. Vanessa knew she had a problem, but she didn't exactly want to admit how bad it was. So, it took some time before she finally opened up about talked about it. Of course, she didn't say anything about being able to see ghosts otherwise she'd be put into a mental facility insisted of a rehab one.

Apart from counseling, Vanessa also started meditating again. Although she wasn't exactly sure what she was doing. One day she sat on the floor of her room. Her roommates were somewhere else, so she had the time to speak with Jason. "What do I do?" She asked him. "Man, I don't know. She always said clear your mind and all that bullshit. How are you sure this is going to help?" He asked. "I'm not, but it can't hurt to try."

And so Vanessa closed her eyes and tried to clear her mind, whatever that meant. She didn't feel anything, nothing exciting happened. "It's too loud," she said, referring to all the screams in her head. Since she had come off all drugs the voices and screams in her head had gotten much louder. Every day more and more ghosts appeared and she had no way of shutting them out. Meditation was the only solution she'd thought of other than drugs. And so every day she continued to meditate, multiple times a day.

Eventually, she found that clearing her mind was not the solution. She had to let all of the ghosts in order to shut them out. And so she did. Vanessa once again sat on the floor with her legs crossed. Vanessa followed the voices inside her head instead of running from them. She didn't know if she was imagining it, but Vanessa found herself in a dark void. Silence filled everything for a couple of seconds before figures started appearing in front of her. All of them reaching towards her.

Their hands felt cold and clammy. Vanessa moved away from their reach, but everywhere she moved there were more ghosts. "Help us Vanessa" they called out. "I can't help you. There is nothing I can do. Please just leave me alone" she begged. The room soon become loud, screaming and crying everywhere.

Vanessa wasn't sure what else she was supposed to do. She was cold and afraid. The ghost continued to circle Vanessa all of them reaching out. Vanessa closed her eyes and put her hands up to stop them. She kept waiting for them to grab her, but nothing happened. When she opened her eyes, she noticed that she was alone in the void. Vanessa looked down at her hands and found them slightly glowing.

When Vanessa opened her eyes in the real words, the voices were quiet. Not entirely gone, but merely muffled. Vanessa looked over at Jason, "I can hear my own thoughts" she said with a large smile.

And sure enough, after a few weeks, she began to see a difference in the number of ghosts that appeared throughout the day. Jason, of course, always stayed because as he liked to mention he had no other place to go. Nate had shown up once or twice to visit and tell her that he was proud. Which was probably the greatest compliment she was ever going to receive from him.

Ever since the last time that Howard Stark had shown up, he'd never appeared again, and Vanessa figured that it was because he'd finally moved on. But, other than that no random ghost would appear throughout the day. At nights, however, she would constantly be awakened by nightmares of ghosts reaching out to her, then waking up and finding her room filled with them. She would instantly block them out, but it was much harder to do when she was asleep and unaware. As it became increasingly harder to have a good night's sleep, Vanessa decided that it might be the best time to seek a therapist's help.