I’ve seen the darkest parts of humanity. I’ve watched civilizations drink their greatness down and burn themselves on the altar of their pride. But I’ve seen selflessness and generosity. Love. Everytime I give up on them, everytime I think they just aren’t worth it, they surprise me.

Why 5

Sometimes when a spirit comes through to our world it’s disoriented. It lashes out at whoever opened the way. This is not that. I don’t know what this is. I walk out to my car and get in.

If this were a decade ago, I would have called the police from a pay phone. As it is I’ll need to figure something else out. I can’t just leave her all alone in there. Her family deserves to know.

There is a restaurant near here. Restaurants tucked into neighborhoods, what’s old is new again. They specialize in crepes. Pretty delicious and they have a landline. I think it’s meant to be ironic. But it’ll do.

They say that love conquers all.
And for the most part they’re right. I’ve seen it topple kingdoms and cause the slaughter of thousands. But true love, true love conquers truth. I’ve seen it destroy gods, lay waste to hope, and infect populations. There is nothing more destructive than love. Nothing more despicable than those that cast aside duty for love.

Why 4

You know, standing over the corpse of a dead girl isn’t as sexy as all those cop shows make it out to be. It’s not the smell, it’s all the hungry ghosts. They swirl around drinking the essence of the dead. Waiting for the mourners, waiting for their pain. I’m not saying that there aren’t happy spirits carousing in playgrounds, but I’ve never met them. Maybe it’s the company I keep.

Time to get to work.
I can feel her ghost, hovering and hiding.
She’s in the first aetheric.
To start, I spin a spool of energy out, life force distilled. Then I shape a window from this world to that. It forms and the chaos of the recently dead, the small elements and weak attachments comes into focus. Through it all I see her form. More solid, but missing peices. A surge of power and I force the clutter away, another and I open the window, a third and she stands before me. Confused and afraid, no god to claim her. The white gods detritus all over her, as it clouds all these young fools.

She’s missing chunks, something has taken bites out of this poor girl. She’s missing her tongue, her heart and liver. Lots of nutrients in the liver but I’m proper fucked. No tongue, no info.

But this is confirmation, no mortal killer did this. With a mortal, there may be bits missing from the body, but the spirit is another matter entire. She should be intact. This wasn’t just desecration, this was hunger.