Haunted (Kaylor)

2

"Are you sure this is allowed?"

"Who cares? What are they gonna do, lock you up? Oh, wait." It was the evening of the first day, and all of the patients had been sent to their rooms. Karlie had spent a boring day at The Institute, following Cara around and trying not to attract any negative attention. As much as Karlie didn't want to believe Cara's ramblings (and as much as she empathized with Lily's exasperation), she found herself getting suspicious as the day passed.

First, there were hardly any non-patients around. There weren't any doctors, nurses, or even guards watching them most of the time - a few people would make sure they didn't get into too much mischief when they were outside, but that was about it. Considering there were people here that were considered dangerous, Karlie found this very odd.

Second, no one really told them what to do. There were bells that rang occasionally, supposedly signalling for people to move to another activity, but there was no rhyme or reason to it. The closest thing Karlie had gotten to "treatment" that day was a group yoga and meditation session that was led by another patient who had nothing better to do.

All of this changed, however, when it got closer to nightfall. Once dinner was finished, guards herded people to their rooms, closing the doors after them and turning out the lights in the hallways. It seemed strange to Karlie that they didn't care where people went unsupervised during the day but were so concerned with where people might go at night. She supposed that maybe the night staff was smaller and didn't want to deal with any incidents.

Cara had come to break her out about twenty minutes after the lights went off - although it wasn't really a breakout. The other girl had demonstrated that the guards didn't actually lock the doors, and cited this fact on the number of people who had called for them during the night to ask to go to the bathroom. "They hated escorting people to the bathroom all the time," she had said. "And I must admit a lot of us did it just to annoy them. But now they leave our doors unlocked, and if we're careful, we have the run of the place."

Cara led Karlie down the dark hallway, sneaking quietly past other closed doors. "Why don't they have cameras?" Karlie asked in a whisper.

"Lily's theory is that they're just too lazy to bother watching them, but mine is that they blew their budget on experiments and couldn't afford them," Cara whispered back. Karlie was silent for a moment.

"What sort of experiments are we talking about?" she asked.

"Oh, you know, the usual..." Cara geticulated. "Superhumans, mutants, that sort of thing."

"And you have evidence for this?" Karlie said disbelievingly.

"Not exactly," Cara admitted. "But you've got to admit that something fishy is going on here. But I do have some ghost evidence."

"Oh, right. I forgot about that," Karlie said nonchalantly. Inwardly she shuddered. She had not forgotten about the ghost. "Where are we going, by the way?" she asked as they took yet another turn. She had lost track of where they were; everything looked different in the dark, but she really didn't know the building well anyway.

"I'm taking you to listen to something," the other girl answered.

"...A ghost?"

"We have a winner!" Cara took another turn and led her down yet another hallway. This one was different from the others, though. It wasn't the same porcelain-white as the others. Actually, one wall of it was made of old stone, and Karlie realized that they must be right next to the older half of The Institute.

Cara stopped suddenly, making Karlie almost bump into her in the dark. She motioned to the wall, and Karlie raised an eyebrow.

"Look!" Cara said impatiently. "What do you see?"

"A whole lot of nothing," Karlie answered. "In case you hadn't noticed, it's pitch black."

"Oh, come on. Your eyes have to be better than that." Karlie stepped closer to the wall and stared at it.

"That's a door," she said, surprised. Cara snorted.

"Yeah, it is. And y'know what it says? 'Danger: High Voltage.'" Why would anything in that old stone building require a room like this? And why would it be connected to this side of the building?"

"I don't know," Karlie said, "but why don't we find out?" Cara's eyes gleamed in the dark.

"I like the way you think," she said. "But it's locked. I'm not good enough at picking locks to do it in the dark, so here's what I'm proposing: you, me, and a lockpick wander down here during dinner tomorrow. The light will still be on, but no one will be around - especially since the guards are all going to be waiting at the cafeteria to round everyone up for the night. We sneak in, see what's in there, and sneak back once the lights are off."

"You know, that just might work," Karlie said. "But what if -" Suddenly a loud scream interrupted her, echoing through the hallway. Karlie jumped and grabbed Cara's wrist, trying to figure out where it was coming from. "Oh my god, what is that?"

"The ghost," Cara laughed. "I've been hearing her almost every night for the last six months. My room is at the very end of our hallway, and the nearest to here, so I guess I'm the only one who's noticed. I traced the screams to this hallway months ago, and lo and behold, a door." She gestured to it enthusiastically.

"See why I don't think this is just a typical 'high voltage' room?"

"Yeah," Karlie gulped. "You're right, this is way creepy. Is it always screams?" She winced as another one split the air.

"Nope, she cries a lot too," Cara said. "I've been trying to think of a name for her. 'The Wailing Ghost' is kind of boring, but I guess it covers both the screams and the sobs, so it's as good as I've got so far."

"What does Lily think?" Karlie asked curiously.

"She thinks it's just one of the poor things over there having an episode," the other girl answered. "But every night? For six months, and who knows how long before I got here?" She shook her head. "Nope. I'm not buying it."

"Well, I'm not sure if it's a ghost, but there's definitely something wrong," Karlie said. "If that's a patient, they've got serious problems, and it doesn't sound like they're being treated right. If it's not a patient - well, I guess that would make it a ghost, or..." she hesitated. "...An experiment, as much as I don't want to think about the possibility of that being real."

"You'd rather ghosts be real than people with superpowers?" Cara said incredulously. "You are strange, aren't you?" Another scream rang out, but this time it sounded strangled, and it quickly changed to sobs.

"Can we go?" Karlie said uneasily, backing away from the door. "I really don't like this."

"Yeah, sure," Cara agreed, grabbing her by the arm and leading her back down the hallway. The cries trailed after them, raising the hair on the back of Karlie's neck, and only faded once they'd gotten close to the residence wing again.

"So are we on for tomorrow?" Cara asked as they arrived back at Karlie's room. Karlie sighed, still shaken up from what she'd heard earlier.

"I mean...it's kind of our duty, isn't it?" she asked. "If there's something malicious going on here, no one will ever find out if we don't investigate. If that wasn't a ghost - which I am hoping it's not - then it might be someone who needs our help."

"So that's a yes?" Karlie turned to her new friend, nodding.

"Yeah. I'm in."