Spirits from Beyond

EIGHT

JC and Brook led the way up the backstairs to the upper floor. JC took the steps two at a time, grinning broadly. Brook stomped along behind him, more or less resignedly. It was hard to say no to JC when he had the bit between his teeth, ready to dash headlong into action and to hell with the consequences. JC glanced back at Brook and flashed him his best encouraging smile. Brook looked stonily back at him. JC shrugged and pressed on. He swaggered out onto the landing and waited for the others to catch up. He could hear Happy and Melody and Kim talking quietly together, further down the stairs.

“It does seem to me,” said Happy, “that we are doing this whole joining together thing a little more often than I am comfortable with. Partly because I am, after all, a very private person. .”

“With so many things it’s best to be private about,” murmured Melody.

“And also because this whole shining with a very bright light thing strikes me as not always being a good thing,” said Happy, doggedly.

“It feels easier every time we do it,” said Kim. “As though we’re learning some useful, and perhaps necessary, skill.”

Happy sniffed loudly. “Is there something you’re not telling us, Kim?”

“More than you can possibly imagine,” said Kim, smiling brightly.

“We do blaze very brightly when we join together,” said Melody. “And everyone knows. . the candle that burns twice as bright lasts half as long. It worries me, as to exactly what it is we’re burning. Our life-force? Our souls?”

Happy sniggered. “Did you just say. .”

“No I didn’t, and you know it,” Melody said sternly. “Try and keep up with the adults in this conversation, Happy.”

“I have considered the problem,” said Happy. “Nothing like being permanently paranoid to give you a healthy interest in all the things that can kill you. . When we blaze so very brightly, you have to wonder whose attention we might be attracting. Nothing like an unexpected light in the dark to catch Something’s eye. All sorts of Somethings. .”

“Well, we know that the inn, or perhaps more properly the local power source, has been blazing brightly enough to pull in all kinds of Really Bad Things,” said Melody. “Like moths to a flame. .”

“Perhaps we’re drawing the attention of whatever it was that first reached down from Outside and put its mark on JC, in the London Underground,” said Happy. “After all, the light we project when we’re joined does seem very like the light that glows from his eyes. . Anything you’d like to add, Kim?”

“I’m not disagreeing,” Kim said carefully.

“But you’re not answering the question,” said Happy.

“Some questions have no straightforward answers,” said Kim.

“I am changing the subject,” announced Melody. “On the grounds that you are making my head ache even more than usual. Hey, JC! Question. Why are we still messing about with the problems of this haunted inn when we know the real trouble comes from the storm raging outside?”

“Because we can do something about haunted inns,” said JC, not looking back. “Haunted inns are in the job description. We know what to do. We don’t know enough about the storm or the power behind it. Not yet. Happy, talk to me!”

“Any particular subject?” said Happy.

“You said earlier. . that what was going on here had attracted forces from Beyond, luring them into our reality. So if we can shut down what’s happening in the rooms on this floor, then maybe we can break, or at the very least weaken, the link between the inn and the Powers infesting it.”

“Good idea,” said Happy. “Worth a try. I suppose.”

“If only things were that simple,” sighed Kim.

* * *

They all gathered together at the top of the stairs, looking up and down the long corridor as it stretched away to either side. The landing was presenting its best Perfectly Normal, Nothing To See Here, Move Along face; but none of them were buying it. They could all feel a cold, spiky tension on the still air, a feeling of forces lying in wait, of things waiting to happen. Bad things. The light was steady, and the shadows lay still, and all the doors were safely, sensibly shut.

But the landing still felt like one big trap, waiting to be sprung.

“All right,” said Happy. “Where do we start? I’m spoilt for choice, for things to flinch away from.”

JC ignored him, giving all his attention to Brook. “Which of these rooms contain Timeslips?”

“You have to be careful,” said Brook, looking about him uneasily. “You can’t be sure of anything, here. The rooms move around, behind closed doors. Any door you choose might open onto a different Time period.”

“And yet you let us stay in rooms up here, without warning us!” said Melody, angrily.

“I said I’m sorry!” said Brook.

“And that’s supposed to be enough?” said Melody. “Where’s my gun. .”

“Leave the man alone, Mel,” JC said firmly. “He is our native guide in treacherous territory. We need him.”

“Yeah,” growled Happy. “We can always use someone to throw into a dangerous situation, just to see what happens.”

“Don’t listen to the nasty telepath, Adrian,” said JC. “We would never do that to you. Unless it was necessary. Or funny. Now, tell me how to find a room with a Timeslip. There must be a way. .”

The barman nodded slowly, reluctantly. “You do develop a. . feel for them after a while. That’s why I thought you’d be safe in the rooms I chose for you. Be fair; whatever you experienced in those rooms, it wasn’t anything to do with Timeslips, was it?”

“Still looking for my gun. .” said Melody.

“There’s a door down here,” Brook said quickly. “It’s got the right kind of feel to it.”

He headed quickly off down the right-hand corridor, looking closely at each door he passed but not stopping until he was half-way down the landing. JC led the others after him, all of them keeping a careful eye out for anything unnatural, or even out of the ordinary. The doors they passed stayed firmly shut, apparently perfectly normal. Brook stood uneasily before his chosen door. It didn’t look any different from any of the others. He took out his keys, fumbled through them to find one particular key, then stopped. He looked miserably at JC, who nodded firmly back. Brook unlocked the door, turned the door-handle very carefully, then pushed the door open an inch. He stepped back from the door, retreating quickly until his back slammed up against the wall on the far side of the landing. JC gestured for the others to stay put and moved forward to stand beside Brook.

“What’s in this room, Adrian? What lies behind that door? Which particular part of Time Past does it hold?”

“I don’t know,” said Brook, all his attention focused on the slightly open door. “I never know. The only way to find out is to look inside. But be careful; what’s there has a way of sucking you in. .”

“We ain’t frightened of no room,” said JC. “Only. . reasonably cautious.”

He moved forward and pushed the door all the way open with one hard shove. Everyone tensed, trying to be ready for anything; but nothing emerged from the room. JC moved cautiously forward, one step at a time, until he was standing right before the open doorway. As close as he could get without actually entering the room itself. He planted both feet firmly on the threshold and placed both hands against either side of the door-frame, before looking inside the room. The room looked placidly back at him. It seemed like a perfectly ordinary, everyday room. All the usual furnishings. No-one there. JC leaned forward, studying every detail.

“Don’t go in!” Brook said loudly from the far side of the corridor. “Crossing the threshold takes you out of this Time and into the Past. And once that door slams shut, you’re lost in the Past. Like all my missing guests.”

“Are you sure this is a Timeslip?” said JC. “I can’t see anything obviously old-fashioned.”

“Well, there are two clues,” said Brook. “First, none of my rooms have furnishings like that. I had the whole place redecorated when I took over. And second, that’s bright sunlight falling through the room’s window.”

“Ah. Yes,” said JC. “Look at that daylight when it’s night here. Bit of a giveaway, that. Well spotted, Adrian! So the room appearing so normal was part of the trap, to lure me in. Interesting. .”

He leaned into the room, took hold of the door’s handle, and pulled the door closed again. He stood and looked at his hand for a long moment, half-expecting it to look or feel different from having entered the Past. And then he turned back to Happy and Melody and Kim, all of whom were watching him carefully from a respectable distance.

“Why have Timeslips at all?” said JC. “I mean, ghosts and monsters I can understand, but. . traps to drag people back in Time? What purpose does that serve?”

“I think it all comes down to the local power source and the unnatural force contained in the storm,” said Melody. “With such sheer power involved, it’s putting an unbearable strain on local reality. Like Happy said, the rage driving the storm is the rage of the sacrificed victim. I hate to theorise without proper equipment around to back me up, but. . I think the storm’s been building for centuries, becoming so powerful in its own right that it’s. . broken Time. Or at least, local Time. You might say, Time is out of joint, in this vicinity.”

“Time. .” Happy said thoughtfully. “Always tricky. . I’ve never felt the same about Time since the Travelling Doctor explained it to me. Anyway, if the storm currently raging round this inn really was born in the days of the Druids, then what we have here is the Past directly affecting the Present. Which is never good. If the storm is powering the Timeslips, that means there’s a direct connection between what’s inside the inn and what’s outside it. So whatever we can do to weaken, disrupt, or even destroy the Timeslips. . should have a direct effect on the storm.”

“I don’t know which particular pills you’re on right now,” said JC. “But I’d stick with them if I were you.”

Melody shot JC a hard look but said nothing.

JC looked at Brook. “Have you ever noticed any pattern to the Timeslips? Do they appear in any order? Does any one room seem to prefer a particular Time or period?”

“No,” said Brook. “None of this has ever made any sense to me. It’s always seemed. . entirely random. And there’s never any warning! The bad doors come and go; and so do the poor people who get trapped inside them.”

JC turned to Melody. “Come on, you’re the girl science geek expert on this team! Think of something we can try as an experiment. Something to give us more information to work with. And don’t tell me all the things you could do if only you had your proper equipment! I need something we can do right now. So think! Improvise!”

“Okay,” said Melody, frostily. “What if we sent someone into that room, on the end of a length of rope, tied around his waist? The rope would link him to the Present corridor even when he was in the room’s Past; so even if the door did try to close, we could always yank the volunteer back out again.”

“She’s not looking at me, but she’s talking about me,” said Happy.

“The rope could snap,” said JC. “Or be broken by the forces inside the room.”

“And besides,” said Kim. “We haven’t got a rope.”

“Imagine my relief,” said Happy.

“All right, one of you think of something!” said Melody.

“Keep the noise down, children,” said JC. “Daddy’s thinking. .”

“Oh, I feel so much safer,” said Happy.

“The doors open onto Past Time,” JC said slowly. “People walk into the room, into the Past, the door shuts, and the visitor is trapped in that Past moment. But! If we could persuade the doors to open onto the exact Time and moment when the doors last closed, and the person was taken, those people should still be there! Time wouldn’t have changed or moved on, for them! Which means, if we could persuade those doors to open. . we could rescue all the lost people! Yes!”

“Love the theory,” said Happy. “But how would we do that?”

“Trust you to shoot down a perfectly good theory with a practical question,” said JC.

“No! Wait!” Melody said excitedly. “How does each room choose a Time? Each room holds or perhaps generates a different moment of Past Time; so someone or something in the background must be making a decision as to which room holds which Time. And so far, the only thing we’ve encountered in this inn that even seems like a conscious entity, capable of making such decisions. . is the blonde woman!”

“I’m not going to like where this is going; am I?” said Happy.

“The blonde woman does seem to like you,” said JC.

“It’s not mutual!” said Happy.

“She does seem. . attracted to you, Happy,” said Melody.

“I am not volunteering for anything,” Happy said firmly. “With or without a rope.”

“You first encountered the woman in your room,” said JC. “I say we go back there and see if we can summon her. So we can talk to her.”

“No!” said Happy. “This is a really bad idea! You don’t want to talk to her. You don’t know. . You don’t know what she’s like, what she’s capable of. .”

“You won’t be alone, this time,” said Melody.

“We’ll be right there with you,” said JC. “We won’t let anything bad happen to you. I promise.”

“What do you plan to do if she does turn up again?” said Happy.

“Improvise!” said JC, grinning broadly. “Suddenly and violently and all over the place! You said it yourself, Happy; she’s not a ghost, or any kind of surviving personality. Just a mass of emotions that’s somehow hung on for centuries, manifesting as the storm outside, and a blonde woman. If we can’t see off a bundle of retained memories, we don’t deserve to call ourselves Ghost Finders. Come on, my children, we can do this! We summon her up, then either force or trick her into opening the doors into the Past. And then we rescue all the people trapped inside them!”

“But how are we going to do that?” said Happy.

“Don’t spoil another good theory with your voice of reason!” said JC. “I’m working on it!”

“Maybe we should join together again, and glow at her,” said Kim, “Like we did in the bar.”

Everyone looked at her, and they all thought many things, but no-one actually said anything.

“Just a thought,” said Kim.

* * *

Brook led the way, back to the room he’d given Happy. The door was still closed, and Brook looked it over carefully before nodding that everything was all right. Kim strode forward and stared firmly at the closed door.

“Don’t See anything. Don’t hear anything. Can’t feel a damned thing.”

She walked right through the door, and disappeared. Everyone jumped a little. There was a short pause, then Kim ghosted back through the door and smiled brilliantly at everyone.

“All clear! No ghosties, no ghoulies, and very definitely no long-leggity anythings. Open her up, Brookie, and let’s get this show on the road.”

Happy stood at the back of the group as Brook opened the door, pushed it open a few inches, and stepped quickly to one side. JC slammed the door all the way open and strode into the room, turning the lights on with a quick flick of his hand. Kim swept in after him, peering about with great interest. Melody took Happy’s hand in hers, held it tightly, and led him into the room. Happy swallowed hard. If Melody hadn’t been holding on to his hand so firmly, he would have turned and bolted. Brook came in last, stopping inside the doorway.

“Happy?” Melody said quietly. “What happened to you in here? What did that blonde bitch do to you?”

“It wasn’t so much what she did,” said Happy. “It was what she said, what she showed me. .”

“What was that?” said Melody.

“I’m not sure, now,” said Happy. “Maybe. . the true nature of my own mortality.”

They all looked around the room, taking their time, and the room looked back at them, seeming entirely normal. Blocky furniture, too-small bed, dull wallpaper, and unwavering electric light.

“Just as I left it,” said Happy. “Except that the door I saw in the far wall isn’t there any more.”

“Where was the door, exactly?” said JC.

Happy pointed out the spot on the far wall, with a surprisingly steady hand, but he couldn’t bring himself to go any closer. Melody was still holding on to his hand, giving him what strength and support she could. Kim went right up to the far wall and studied it closely; her nose almost touching the wallpaper. She frowned and turned back to JC.

“There’s something here, JC. Something that doesn’t belong in this room, or even this reality. This wall, this little bit of our Space and Time, has been overwritten by some force from Outside. It’s still there, in principle, waiting to be imposed on our reality again. Like this.”

She stepped back and snapped her fingers imperiously. Suddenly, the door was back in place again. Happy cried out involuntarily but held his ground. He looked at the door for a long moment and nodded quickly.

“Yes. That’s it. That’s the door I saw before.”

“You said. . there was a blood-red corridor on the other side of that door,” said JC.

“It wasn’t a real corridor,” said Happy. “It only looked like one.”

“What was it?” said Melody.

“Death,” said Happy. “It was death.”

“Maybe I should go back out onto the landing,” said Brook.

“You stay right where you are, native guide,” said JC without looking round. He moved over to stand with Happy. “The blonde woman you saw. Was she part of the corridor?”

“I don’t know,” said Happy. “I don’t think so. . Connected to it, maybe. One of the faces on what’s happening here. The woman, the corridor, the storm. . they’re all the same thing, really. This is a bad idea, JC. You really don’t want to summon her. You remember what the dark did to us, down in the bar. She was worse. Crueller.”

“Would this woman come to you if you called?” JC said carefully.

“I don’t know,” said Happy.

JC looked to Kim. “What do we have that we could use to compel her?”

“You’re not listening to me!” Happy said desperately. “This is a really bad idea! You have no idea of the kind of Power you’re dealing with here!”

“Do you have a better idea?” said JC, quite seriously. “No? Then we go with what we have. Kim?”

“She’s not a ghost,” Kim said thoughtfully. “She’s the human face of the rage in the storm. . All that’s left of the human sacrifice who began all this. . Happy, can you remember what you were doing, what you were feeling, here in this room, when the door first appeared in the wall?”

“Yes,” said Happy. “I was sitting right there, at the writing-desk.”

“Okay,” said JC. “Go sit there again.”

Happy sat down at the desk, and looked at the pill boxes and bottles still set out before him. He didn’t touch any of them. Melody crouched down beside him. She put a gentle hand on his arm and patted it a few times. He didn’t look at her.

“What were you thinking, Happy?” Melody said quietly.

“I was thinking about dying,” said Happy, in a quiet, distant voice. “Thinking about killing myself and what a relief that would be. Not to have to carry the weight of my world on my shoulders any more.”

“Oh, Happy,” said Melody.

“And then the door showed up, in the far wall,” said Happy. “It opened on its own, to show me a corridor that led to death. It was trying to tempt me. When that didn’t work, the woman appeared. Except, she didn’t try to sucker me in, like the corridor. I suppose you could say, in her own way she talked me out of it. She showed me the true face of death. She saved me. Why would she do that?”

“Perhaps because there’s enough left of the original sacrificial victim to appreciate and value life,” said Melody. “Okay; I think. . you need to remember what you were thinking, and feeling. That could draw her back. Do you need your pills?”

“No,” said Happy. “Not for that.”

He sat still, his head bowed, thinking. About the things that were never far from his thoughts because the tiredness, the bone-deep, soul-deep weariness at the bottom of it all never left him. Melody crouched, close beside him. She’d taken her hand off his arm, so as not to distract him. She could see the pain in him, clear as a wound; and it hurt her almost beyond bearing to know she couldn’t help him. Of everyone in that room, she was the only one who could even guess at what this was costing Happy.

The door in the far wall swung slowly open, folding back against the wall to reveal its blood-red corridor. Everyone in the room made some sort of noise as they took in the crimson, almost organic corridor walls, which seemed to fall away forever. To look at it was enough to disturb the thoughts and soil the spirit. It wasn’t only death; it was the end of all hope. A road you could walk out of life that promised neither Heaven nor Hell, just the end of everything.

Happy slowly turned around on his chair and looked into the blood-red corridor. He smiled; and it was a brief, savage thing. He considered the corridor’s promise, then spat once on the floor, contemptuously. Because when the time did come to end his life, he would be responsible for it. No-one else.

The blonde woman was suddenly there, appearing out of nowhere, strolling calmly down the blood-red corridor. As though she’d always been there, and they hadn’t noticed. She seemed to take a long time to reach the opening into Happy’s room, as if she was crossing some impossible distance, approaching from some unimaginable direction. She finally reached the doorway and stopped dead, right on the threshold. She looked into the room with cold, dead eyes and a disturbing smile. She looked around at the group gathered before her, dismissed them in a moment, and gave all her attention to Happy.

“Some people never learn. Or else they’re suckers for punishment. Haven’t you suffered enough, little man?”

Melody was up on her feet in a moment, moving quickly forward to put herself bodily between Happy and the blonde woman.

“Leave my man alone, you bitch!”

The woman cocked her head to one side, like a bird, and considered Melody thoughtfully. “What will you do if I don’t? Shoot me with your concealed weapon? I don’t think so. I’ve been dead a long, long time. .”

“But that’s all you’ve got, isn’t it?” said Melody. “You have death; while Happy and I have life, and love. Show her, Happy.”

“What?” said Happy.

“Link with me,” said Melody. “Share your thoughts, and your pain, and everything else you have, with me. And then hit her with it, right between the eyes. Show her what she’s missing.”

Happy grinned suddenly and rose to his feet. He took both of Melody’s hands in his and held them firmly. Their eyes met; and everyone in the room felt something move between them. Happy and Melody turned to face the blonde woman in the doorway, and Happy blasted her with everything in their hearts and in their souls, all at once. The woman fell back a step, as though she’d been hit; and then she threw back her head and let out a lost, despairing howl. Some unseen force picked her up and sent her flying backwards down the blood-red corridor, away from something she couldn’t face.

And from out on the landing, there came the sound of doors slamming open.

JC raced out of the room and onto the landing, and all the way up and down the corridor, people came spilling out of the open-doored rooms, looking dazed and confused, but clearly very glad to be back in a world and Time they recognised. Brook came out to join JC, saw all his lost guests come home at last, and whooped with joy, jumping up and down on the spot.

“They’re back! They’re back! Oh you beauty, JC! You did it!”

The returned men and women looked at Brook. There were quite a few more of them than he’d admitted to. They started forward, filling the landing with questions. JC grabbed Brook by the arm and held him still.

“Get them out of here,” he said crisply. “God knows how long those doors will stay open, or how long the blonde woman’s control will stay broken. As long as the guests stay here, there’s always a chance the rooms will pull them back in. . So gather them up, don’t stop to answer any questions, get them all down the stairs, then send them down the road to Bishop’s Fording. They should be safe there. Yes, I know it’s raining; yes, I know the road is flooded; and no, I don’t care! Do whatever you have to to get them moving. Now go! Go! Go!”

Brook quickly rounded up the bewildered guests, and chased them down the stairs with a mix of publican’s authority and really harsh language. Their departing feet made a muffled thunder in the enclosed stairway, and Brook drove them on from behind. He paused, half-way down the stairs, to grin and wink at JC, then he drove his guests on again until they’d all disappeared out of sight. JC allowed himself a brief, satisfied smile, then he went back into Happy’s room.

The door in the far wall was gone, with no trace left behind to show it had ever been there. Happy and Melody were standing together, staring into each other’s faces, lost in each other’s eyes. Kim shook her head and went back to join JC. She shrugged prettily.

“Soppy things,” she said kindly. “But it looks good on them. Love is the drug, I suppose. Still, if they hadn’t done it, I bet we could have. Right, JC?”

“Love conquers all,” JC said solemnly.

Happy finally looked around, to glare at JC. “You used me as bait.”

“It worked, didn’t it?” said JC. “And you did help to save a whole crowd of lost souls. So be proud! I think the two of you basically overpowered Blondie, with your love and devotion. Either that, or you disgusted her with your lust for life. Or possibly, vice versa. Either way, I am very pleased with you; but if I hear one chorus of ‘Love Is All Around,’ I will puke. There are limits.”

“It was a good plan,” Melody said, grudgingly. “But you do realise, all we did was scare her away. She will be back.”

“Counting on it,” JC said brightly. “I’m not finished with her yet. Now, while we are still in a winning mood, let us go deal with the room that eats people. I am in the mood to kick its arse or whatever it has instead of an arse. You find me something kickable, and I’ll kick it. We might not be able to save its victims; but we can at least boot it out of our world. Adrian! Adrian, where are you. . Oh. Yes. I sent him downstairs, didn’t I? Never mind, we can do this on our own. Oh yes we can.”

“Have you been at my pills, JC?” said Happy.

“He doesn’t need pills,” said Kim, proudly. “He was born weird.”

“Come along, children,” said JC.

* * *

He strode out of the room and onto the landing, then paused to glare up and down the long corridor. Rooms stretched away to either side, all of the doors closed again. All very still, like the pregnant pause before the storm. Happy and Melody squeezed through the door to join him, refusing to be separated even for a moment. Kim got fed up waiting for them and ghosted through the wall to stand beside JC. He bounced up and down on his feet, raised his voice, and addressed the empty air in a loud and challenging voice.

“Come on then, you horrible, hungry, little room, you! Where are you? Don’t be shy; show yourself! Or don’t you have the balls to face a real challenge?”

“Please don’t taunt the deadly supernatural threat,” murmured Melody. “Not when I haven’t got my proper defensive equipment to hand.”

Kim looked up and down the long corridor, frowning prettily. “It’s hiding. I can’t See anything. Happy, can you See anything?”

“More than you can possibly imagine,” said Happy indistinctly.

They all looked round in time to see Happy knock back a single fat pill, canary yellow with ice-blue stripes. He dry swallowed the bulky thing with the ease of long practice, then shook his head hard. His eyes bulged, his breathing grew steadily deeper, and he smiled broadly. He started snorting and grunting, and stamped one foot on the ground like an animal getting ready to charge.

“Oh hell,” said JC. “What’s he taken now?”

“Something he usually only takes with me in mind,” said Melody. “I’d stand well back if I were you.”

“But what does it do?” said Kim.

“Amplifies some of his more. . basic instincts,” said Melody.

“The two of you never cease to appal me,” said JC. “Really. I mean it.”

“I can See you!” Happy said loudly, his whole body orientated on the right-hand side of the landing. “Don’t think I can’t See you!”

And he charged straight down the landing, like a bull who’d spotted a way past the matador’s cloak. JC and Melody and Kim hurried after Happy, until he slammed to a sudden halt and stood quivering like a pointing dog, facing one particular room. He grunted and growled at the closed door, his hands clenched into white-knuckled fists. Still grinning his very disturbing grin.

“This is it! I can tell. . This is the room where if you go in, you don’t get to come out again. Except, of course, this isn’t a room and never was.”

“What are you Seeing, Happy?” said JC, moving cautiously in beside him.

“Oh, I’m Seeing all kinds of things,” said Happy, staring at the closed door with wide, unblinking eyes. “JC, you wouldn’t believe some of the things I’m Seeing. Hello, can any of you hear that? It sounds like. . a baby, crying.”

JC looked at Melody, then at Kim, and turned reluctantly back to Happy. “I don’t hear anything,” he said carefully.

“Of course you don’t!” said Happy. Sweat was pouring down his face, but his eyes still didn’t blink. “You were born with mental blinkers on, like everyone else. Don’t worry; it’s not actually a baby. It’s something that’s learned to sound like a baby crying, to lure people in. But I know better. I know a lure when I hear one. .”

He went suddenly quiet, glaring at the door. JC looked at Happy, at the others, then at the door. It gave every appearance of being completely safe and ordinary, but JC still couldn’t bring himself to touch it. All the hairs were standing up on the back of his neck and his arms, in ancient, instinctual warning. It felt like the door was watching him. .

“Excuse me, everyone,” said Kim. “But what are you all looking at? I didn’t hear any baby, and I don’t see any door. You’re all staring at a perfectly unremarkable stretch of wall.”

“I told you. It’s not a room, it’s a trap!” Happy said loudly. “And since it’s a trap designed to lure in the living, you can’t see it, Kim. Being dead, as you are. The room doesn’t want you. Because you ain’t got no body, and therefore no chewy bits.”

“I think I feel left out,” said Kim. “Passed over.”

“Ghost humour,” said Happy. “Ho ho ho!”

“Calm the hell down, Happy, or I swear I will stick a nozzle up your bottom and rinse your insides out with Ritalin,” said Melody. “When this is all over, I am going to have to sit down and work out some serious checks and balances for you.”

“Fun time!” said Happy.

JC tore his gaze away from the door, walked back to the top of the stairs, and shouted down them. “Brook! Get back up here! You’re needed!”

He waited, but there was no response. JC growled under his breath and tapped one foot impatiently.

“I could ghost through this section of wall,” Kim said helpfully. “Or stick my head through and take a quick peek at what’s in there. .”

“Really wouldn’t do that,” Happy said immediately. “Really bad idea, ghost girl.”

“But you said it isn’t interested in me,” said Kim.

“Not to eat,” said Happy. “Doesn’t mean it couldn’t do something very nasty to your ectoplasm. I suppose there must be something Out There, that eats ectoplasm. . There are all kinds of predators, after all. Hate to think what they’d excrete, though. .”

Melody decided she didn’t want to say anything about that and considered the door-handle before her. “Do you suppose it’s locked?”

“That door is only locked when it wants to be,” Happy said wisely.

JC gave up on the stairs and came back to join them, so he could glare at the closed door, close-up. “Come on, Happy, aren’t you picking up anything behind that door?”

“I keep telling you!” said Happy. “There is no room behind this door! A lot of what’s happening in this bloody inn is destructive energies and emotions, mixed and fused together, manifesting in physical ways. . But what we have here is different. This is a predator from Outside that’s forced its way through some crack in the walls of the world. There’s nothing on the other side of the door, or at least nothing you or I could hope to recognise or understand. It’s out of this world. Like Kim said, there is no door there. Just something that’s learned to look like a door, for the same reason it learned to sound like a baby crying. To lure the food through and into its belly.”

“All right,” said JC. “This isn’t a haunted room, like yours. Or a receptacle for a piece of broken Time. This isn’t another side effect of the sacrificed victim, or the storm, or the local power source. This isn’t a room; it’s a Beast.”

“Finally, someone is listening to me!” said Happy. “Marvellous, wonderful; I may faint. Look! There’s Something in there, a really powerful Something. Possibly one of the Abominations from the Outer Rings. They’re always trying to get in at us.”

“But if it is some kind of Beast,” said Melody, “what’s it doing here? What does it want with us?”

“It’s hungry,” said Happy. “It’s always hungry.”

“So there’s absolutely no chance of getting any of its victims back?” said JC.

“No,” said Happy. “They’re gone. Not even any bones left. .”

“Then there’s no need to play by the rules any longer,” said JC, rubbing his hands together. “No more Mister Nice Guy! Happy; what would happen if I were to open this door?”

“What do you think?” said Happy. “You might as well soak your arm in barbecue sauce and stick it down a lion’s throat. But you go right ahead if that’s what you want. I shall be right behind you. Way behind you, watching from the other end of the corridor.”

“Why not destroy the door?” said Melody. “Remove the Beast’s access to our world? I could shoot a whole bunch of really big holes through it.”

“Sounds like a plan to me,” said JC. “Happy! Stay where you are!”

“My heart is currently brave, but my legs are still chicken,” said Happy. “Or, to put it another way-sensible. Bullets won’t do it, Mel.”

“Why not?” said Melody. “I have cursed and blessed bullets, along with ammo dipped in holy water, sacred blood, deadly nightshade, and fallen angel’s urine.”

Happy gave her a look. “Only you would have a gun with poisoned bullets. And it still wouldn’t work. The door isn’t the problem. It’s only the mask on the face of the creature.”

“If cold iron won’t do the job, what about fire?” said JC.

Happy beat a rapid tattoo on the closed door with both fists while he considered the point. “Might work,” he said finally. “Fire has. . cleansing connotations. What did you have in mind?”

JC had already produced something from an inside pocket. He held it out, so they could all get a good look at it. Small and round, easily double the size of a cricket ball, it shone with an almost unbearable light.

“Is that. . what I think it is?” said Happy.

“Oh yes,” said Melody. “I know my supernatural weapons. And for once, I am in complete agreement with you, Happy. Start running, and I’ll try to keep up.”

“How the hell did you get your hands on the Saint Ignatius Incendiary Grenade, JC?” said Happy.

“You didn’t get that from the Carnacki Institute warehouse, or even the armoury,” said Melody. “There’s only ever been one of those horribly nasty and destructive things; and I only ever saw it in the Boss’s office.”

“You stole that from Catherine Latimer’s very own private office?” said Kim, her eyes wide. “Good for you, JC! I am officially impressed. And a bit frightened.”

“The Boss will have a cow,” Happy said solemnly.

“Only if she ever finds out,” said JC. “And given the clutter in her office, that should take some time. As long as no-one here shouts their mouth off, we should all be perfectly safe. No point in worrying her, after all. She already has enough to worry about. .”

“Brass,” Happy said solemnly. “Solid brass. It’s a wonder to me they don’t clang together when you walk down the street, JC.”

“Why, thank you, Happy,” said JC. “That’s got to be the nicest thing you’ve ever said about me.”

“Well, there’s a mental image I wasn’t expecting to take home with me,” said Melody.

“But what does this Saint Ignatius thingy do?” said Kim, leaning in for a closer look at the shimmering thing in JC’s hand.

“It goes bang, in a fiery and spiritually cleansing way,” said Happy. “And when JC decides to try it out, we should all be somewhere else, a very long way away from here. Or at the very least, hiding behind something heavy.”

“You should all be perfectly safe. .” said JC.

“You see, it’s the word should that worries me,” said Happy.

JC looked at Kim. “Actually, you probably should back off, to the end of the corridor. Or, down the stairs. The Saint Ignatius Incendiary Grenade was designed to wipe out everything of a supernatural nature. As well as burning down the house.”

“I’ll go with you,” Happy said to Kim. “Only to keep you company.”

“Me, too,” said Melody. “Since I know for a fact that no-one ever worked out the full blast range on one of these things. First rule of engineering; beware prototypes. Along with, avoid anything made by an engineer who doesn’t have all his own fingers.”

“All right, go,” said JC. “You’re making me nervous.”

Happy and Melody and Kim retreated to the furthest end of the corridor, while JC sniffed loudly and held his head up, humming a merry tune to show how unconcerned he was. He tossed the grenade gently in one hand and looked firmly at the closed door before him.

“Pay attention, door! This should light you up nicely and leave nothing behind but some consecrated ashes. Or something very like ashes. Maybe I’ll make an egg-timer out of you.”

He went to pull the pin on the grenade, and the door swung open before him, falling back to reveal something the human mind simply couldn’t cope with. JC cried out despite himself, staring into what lay beyond-a man transfixed by the Medusa’s gaze. And somehow, he couldn’t seem to let go of the grenade. Kim shot down the corridor at inhuman speed and slapped a ghostly hand over JC’s eyes, putting her supernatural self between JC’s eyes and the unearthly sight that held him.

JC fell back a step, grinned quickly at Kim, and went for the grenade’s pin again. A great sucking vortex opened up beyond the door, pulling him in. JC grabbed onto the door-frame with his one free hand, holding himself in place by brute strength. Kim stood her ground, bewildered, her ghostly form unaffected by the physical force. A howling wind shot down the long corridor as all the air was sucked into the room’s vortex. Happy and Melody were yanked off their feet and went tumbling down the floor as though it were a cliff-edge.

JC clung doggedly to the door-frame with his one hand, trying desperately to pull his other hand back so he could pull the pin on the grenade; but the pull of the vortex was too great. His feet shot out from under him, and he hung horizontally on the buffeting air. Only his single handhold kept him from being hauled in. Kim tried to help, but her hands went right through him.

Happy and Melody were thrown this way and that as they came sprawling and somersaulting down the landing, trying to hang on to each other while also grabbing at anything within reach to slow them down. Melody managed to grab onto the top of the stairs, while Happy shot straight past her. They cried out to each other as Happy was sucked up into the air, shooting towards the open doorway like an arrow from a bow. He slammed right through Kim’s ghostly form, and on into the doorway. He grabbed the other side of the door-frame with both hands and jerked to a sudden halt. He swore harshly at the sudden pain in his hands but hung on, his legs flailing out before him, opposite JC. The two of them flapped like flags in a howling wind.

Melody lost hold of her grip on the top of the stairs and came tumbling down the corridor again. She kept grabbing handholds of the carpeting to slow her down, but the material only tore and came away in her hands. The last stretch of carpet simply disintegrated, and she shot straight through the open doorway. Happy let go of the door-frame with one hand and grabbed onto her. He pulled her to him with all his strength, a few agonising inches at a time, until he could hug her to him with one arm. The impact had almost torn his shoulder out of its socket. Melody clung desperately to him. Happy’s one remaining hold was already weakening as the implacable force pulled both of them in. Bit by bit, his fingers were losing their grip. The air blasting past him was growing faster and thinner, and harder to breathe.

“Take her!” Happy yelled to JC.

And with the last of his strength, Happy threw Melody at JC. Immediately, he was ripped away from the door-frame, and fell and fell into the depths of the room that wasn’t a room.

JC grabbed hold of Melody with the arm holding the grenade, and pulled her to him. She wrapped her arms around him, even as she craned her neck round to look after Happy.

“JC!” yelled Happy, falling away into an unimaginable distance. “Throw the bloody grenade!”

Melody pulled the pin from the grenade JC was holding, and he threw it after Happy with all his strength. Both objects seemed to drop away in a direction that made no sense, growing smaller and smaller. Melody let out a single cry of despair. JC hugged her to him with his free arm. He’d lost one friend; he was damned if he’d lose another. His fingers locked down on the door-frame with desperate strength, and he hauled himself back, inch by inch. He could hear Kim calling out, encouragingly, but he couldn’t spare the strength to turn his head. He caught one last glimpse of Happy, a very small thing, falling away forever, and the grenade rushing ahead of him.

JC forced himself, and Melody, back through the doorway. When she got close enough, she grabbed the door-frame, too, with both hands. Until they were both back out onto the landing, and the door slammed shut behind them. The unbearable suction of the vortex and the roaring wind both cut off in a moment, and JC and Melody fell to the floor. They lay there together, clinging to each other. Both of them crying, harshly, for the good man they’d lost. Kim stood over them, crying her own silent tears.

After a while, JC and Melody sat up, still leaning on each other. Melody cried bitter tears, while JC sat there, exhausted. Kim crouched beside them, wanting to help, trying to comfort them with her presence. Melody turned her face away from both of them, refusing to be comforted.

“After all the things I said to him,” she said, “He gave his life for me without a thought, without a single hesitation.”

And then the door to the hungry room reopened, and Happy came flying back through it at speed. He shot across the corridor, slammed into the far wall, and crashed to the floor. The door slammed shut behind him; and then they all heard a massive explosion, from somewhere far and far-away. An inhuman scream seemed to issue from everywhere at once, then cut off abruptly. The door was gone, leaving behind nothing but a stretch of unremarkable wall. Happy sat up slowly. He was laughing, shakily. Melody pushed JC away from her and scrambled across the floor to take Happy into her arms. She pushed her face into his shoulder, still sobbing.

“I thought I’d lost you,” said Melody.

“I thought I’d lost me,” said Happy. “But apparently the many changes I’ve made to my basic body chemistry made me. . unacceptable. Bloody thing spat me out! Hah! These Other-dimensional entities think they’re so smart; if it had had any sense, it would have kept me and spat out the grenade!”

“Welcome back,” said JC. “I really wasn’t looking forward to finding something good to say about you at your eulogy.”

Melody stopped crying, sniffing back the last few tears. She pushed herself away from Happy and looked at him directly. “Are you saying it puked you out?”

“Well, yes,” said Happy. “Nothing like the supernatural, to make clear your true place in the scheme of things.”

* * *

It took a while before they all stopped laughing. Finally, they got to their feet again, all of them leaning on each other for support. Kim beamed on them all fondly while they got their breath back and looked around. JC stretched slowly, flexed his aching hands, then looked firmly back down the corridor in a let’s-get-back-to-business sort of way.

“One last job, then hopefully we can get the hell out of here,” said JC.

“I’ve always admired your optimism,” said Happy.

“I’m going to try to release the ghost girl Lydia,” said JC. “I can’t help feeling that she’s at the back of everything that’s happening here. Okay; I want all of you to go back down to the main bar. Too many of us at once would only upset her. Happy, find Brook and bring him back up here, to Lydia’s room. He probably won’t want to come, so feel free to be very firm.”

“I’ve still got my gun,” said Melody. “He’ll do what he’s told.”

Kim planted herself in front of JC and fixed him with her best wide-eyed stare.

“Let me come, JC. I could help. Really I could!”

“Sorry, sweetie,” said JC. “But I’m pretty sure you’d scare her. She doesn’t know she’s a ghost.”

Kim nodded, reluctantly, and followed Happy and Melody down the stairs.

* * *

JC strolled down the left-hand corridor, all the way to the last door on the left. Lydia’s room, for so many years. He knocked politely, opened the door, and went in. The young suicide was still sitting in her chair, still reading the magazine she was always reading. She looked around, and smiled easily at JC.

“Oh, hello! It’s Mr. Chance, isn’t it? Any sign of Adrian?”

“Not yet,” said JC. “But I’m sure he’ll be along soon.”

“It’s all right,” said Lydia. “I’ll wait for him as long as it takes.”

JC heard footsteps outside in the corridor even though Lydia clearly didn’t. He stepped back through the door, and there was Happy, leading a visibly reluctant Brook down the landing. JC waited for them to join him, gestured for Brook to go in the room with him, then stopped Happy with a look.

“You stay here,” JC said quietly to Happy. “And don’t get distracted or go wandering off. I’m going to need you. Adrian, let’s go in.”

“I can’t,” Brook said miserably. “I just can’t.”

“You have to,” said JC.

“You don’t understand! I can’t bear to do anything. . that might mean losing all I have left of her,” said Brook.

“She’s only here because of you,” said JC. “You’re holding on to her.”

“Please. Don’t say that.”

“If you love her, let her go,” said JC.

He took Brook firmly by the arm and took him into the end room. Lydia looked round again, her face lighting up as she expected to see her Adrian. Only to recoil a little at the sight of the old man with JC. It was clear she didn’t recognise Brook. Didn’t know him at all.

“Don’t be frightened, Lydia,” said JC.

“I’ve seen that man before,” said Lydia. “Is he a ghost? Why does he keep looking in at me?”

“I can’t stand this,” said Brook.

He tried to leave, but JC held on to him.

“Let me go!” said Brook.

“Happy!” said JC. “Get in here!”

The telepath slouched through the open doorway and smiled at Lydia. She nodded back, uncertainly.

“This is a friend of mine, Lydia,” said JC. “Don’t worry; he always looks like that. Happy, it’s time to do the linking thing again. This time, I need you to forge a mental connection between Lydia and Adrian. Mind to mind, heart to heart, soul to soul, so that they can See each other clearly and know who they are.”

“You don’t want much, do you?” growled Happy. “I’m still recovering from suddenly not being dead after all. I swear, there aren’t enough pills in the world to make working with you worth it.”

He frowned hard, concentrating; and Lydia’s and Brook’s heads snapped round. They looked into each other’s eyes. . and knew each other. After all the years apart, they were finally together again. JC could see it in their faces-a simple, wondering look of recognition. Two lost loves, separated by all the world and Time, brought together again at last. Lydia rose out of her chair and went to Adrian, and they looked at each other.

“I didn’t know you!” said Lydia. “You got old, Adrian. .”

“You didn’t,” said Brook.

“How long have I been here?” said Lydia. “How long have I been waiting for you, Adrian?”

“Too long,” said Brook. “Do you remember. .”

“What I did?” said Lydia. “Yes. I do now. Such a stupid, selfish thing to do. ‘This will show them; this will make them all sorry,’ I thought. All those years we could have enjoyed, together. .”

“You can have all the Time there is, now,” said JC. “No more waiting. It’s time for you to leave this room, Lydia.”

“I won’t go anywhere without you, Adrian,” said Lydia. “I won’t be separated from you any longer.”

“Of course not,” said Brook. “You’re going, and I’m going with you.”

“I can’t ask that of you!” said Lydia.

“There’s nothing left to hold me here,” said Brook. “No family, no friends; all I ever really had were my memories of you. If I can’t be here with you. . then I don’t want to be here.” He looked at JC. “I mean it.”

“Yes,” said JC. “I think you do.”

He nodded to Happy, who nodded slowly.

“The things we do, for love,” said Happy.

He reached out, through the link he’d made between a dead girl and a living man, and gave them both a little of his Sight. Brook and Lydia turned their heads, to stare in a direction beyond the sight of the living. And it was over. The Past disappeared and the original room reasserted itself. It looked much the same: old-fashioned, but with dust everywhere. Lydia was gone, and Brook lay dead on the floor. JC knelt beside the body and checked for a pulse. Not because he had any doubts but because that was what you did. He got to his feet and nodded to Happy.

“Good work. This isn’t quite the ending I had in mind, but I suppose it will have to do. It’s over. And that’s all that matters, really.”

“It doesn’t feel over,” said Happy. He rubbed wearily at his eyes. “Dear Lord, I am so tired. . This has taken a lot out of me, you know.”

“Yes,” said JC. “I know. It’s taken a lot out of all of us.”

* * *

They left the room, and JC closed the door firmly behind them. They walked back down the landing, past perfectly ordinary doors, all of them closed, and went down the stairs to the main bar.

“How does the upper floor feel to you now, Happy?” said JC.

“Empty,” said Happy.

“That’s all?”

“Afraid so.”

“Damn,” said JC. “I was hoping for more than that. Oh. What happened to the people we rescued from the Timeslipped rooms?”

“Brook sent them back to town,” said Happy. “The road was flooded by the storm, so he sent them back over the fields. Slogging through thick mud and pouring rain and heavy winds. . They’ll be soaked to the skin by the time they reach Bishop’s Fording. But that could be a good thing. Keep them distracted enough that they won’t start asking awkward questions till later. And hopefully by then, we’ll be out of here.” He looked at JC. “Not often we get to save people’s lives. It’s a good feeling.”

“Yes,” said JC. “It is.”

When they emerged into the main bar, Melody and Kim were waiting for them. JC filled them in on what had happened. The storm outside sounded worse than ever, loud and threatening, battering at the windows, like some furious creature trying to force its way in.

“So,” said Melody. “Lydia wasn’t responsible for everything that’s going on here.”

“No,” said Happy.

“Then removing Lydia didn’t remove the source of the problem,” said Kim.

“No,” said JC. “But some things. . just need doing.”