Most people have no idea we exist. That’s by design. Most ghost containment specialists operate in the shadows. It’s the way it has to be in this line of work. We take that task very seriously.
It’s also important to note that our name is a bit of a misnomer. Yes, we go to places most people dread to tread and remove ghostly entities, but that’s only half of our job. We also release ghosts into certain places. Some of the more famous “haunted” spots around the world are because GCS agents put the entity there. Governments, scientists, wealthy people with grudges, and dying small towns desperate for a tourist trap have all given us a call now and then. We always deliver.
Something else I think you should probably know up front, ghosts are a kind of energy. We all have an internal energy. You and me, our bodies are lousy with the stuff. People worldwide have called it different things over time, but the most common phrase I’d use is “life force.” In GCS terms, we call it “spectral energy.” When people die, our energy tends to ground out and extinguish.
Sometimes though, that doesn’t happen.
There is a litany of reasons why spectral energy would escape into the wild, and I won’t go through them now. I will say that the energy contained in each person varies not only in amounts but also in potency. Some people burn hot, some people simmer, but we all have something inside us that can cause havoc.
Which brings me to our last job. This one…this one, got away from us—big time. When you work with spectral energy as long as I have, you develop a sixth sense about the work. Some jobs feel off from the jump. That was the case with our last gig. In fact, I was the only one who said we should pass. I told my superiors that this felt off. They said I was being paranoid and hinted that I was getting a case of “the frets.”
“The frets” are something we do not joke about in my line of work. Working with ghosts and the energy around them can do strange things to your mind. We’ve had teams of doctors and scientists look into the issue for decades, and they still don’t understand what causes it. They do know that prolonged exposure to spectral energy can lead to bouts of mania and auditory and visual hallucinations. Then you lose control of your limbs. Extreme cases can lead to violent outbursts and death.
I don’t have “the frets.” I want that to be clear. I am of sound mind and body. I’m writing this down to ensure I have a clear record of the events. I did not approve of the job or the actions our team took. I was just following orders.
About a week ago, we got a phone call from someone who wanted to remain nameless. Typically, we don’t do anonymous jobs. You want the work, you come correct with information. But the amount of money this person or group was willing to pay was larger than anything we’ve ever received. I assume the big bosses knew more information but weren’t telling us lower-level staffers anything. That was the first strike for me.
The second strike came when they told us they wouldn’t be telling us from where we’d be extracting. Part of the deal was that the extraction team was to be blindfolded and delivered to the area without us knowing anything. We would follow the same protocol when we were getting ready to release the ghost. This NEVER happened. It’s not only against company policy but also a safety violation.
Again, I protested to our bosses, but they wouldn’t hear it. They said I was being overly cautious. Things would be fine. The job wasn’t the biggest we’d ever done or even the most dangerous. The only thing that would be different from this job and all others was the level of secrecy. Everything else would be just like a typical job.
Of course, that wasn’t true either. We operate in five-person teams: two extractors, two injectors, and a team leader. For this job, they only wanted three people. Again, they gave no reason. Granted, we could operate in three-person teams in a pinch, but it’s not advisable. Despite my misgivings about the case, I was assigned to the team. That should’ve been strike three…but the money was too good to pass up. I agreed and was told to hang tight. We weren’t given a firm date for the extraction but to be on standby.
Last night, I got the call.
I arrived at HQ and met with my teammates. For their sake, I’ll call them Alpha and Omega. We all were blindfolded and walked into the back of an unmarked van. About three hours later, my team arrived at a spot in the middle of the desert. We were told the van couldn’t take us the entire way and we’d have to walk the last leg of the journey. We unloaded our gear and watched as the van drove into the darkness.
It was a new moon, and it was pitch black in the desert. We were told that from our location, we needed to walk due west about half a mile. They told us we’d probably hear it before we saw it, but they assured us it was nothing we couldn’t handle. The van would return in twenty minutes. Other than that, we were left in the dark. Literally.
“What kind of ghost haunts the middle of the desert?” Alpha asked, lugging up their backpack.
“All kinds of people died crossing this land,” Omega answered.
“True, but how would a modern person even know about this? Who’s coming out here today?”
“A better question,” I said, “Was why couldn’t the van take us the last half mile?”
“Quicksand?” Alpha said, half-jokingly.
“Maybe they’re afraid of what’s out there,” I said, “nothing about this job feels right.”
“I think you’re being paranoid,” Omega said.
“You gonna tell me I got the ‘frets’ too?”
They both stopped and stared back at me. I sighed, “The boss suggested my concern was potentially the start of the ‘frets.’ It’s total bullshit. I’m fine.”
“Would you know if you were?” Alpha asked.
“Guys, I’m fine. It was a threat from the boss because I thought we should’ve passed over this job.”
Alpha and Omega looked at each other and then back at me. I shook my head, “I’m okay. I swear to God.”
“God doesn’t have anything to do with it,” Omega said.
“If you start wigging out, I’ll leave you out in the desert,” Alpha said, and I believed him.
“If I start wigging out, I’ll let you leave me out here.”
That broke the tension. We all laughed and kept walking. I’ve done hundreds of jobs, and nothing scares me anymore, but this whole job got under my skin. It was so dark out there that if we didn’t have our flashlights, you wouldn’t be able to see your hand right in front of your face. I assumed there were billions of stars overhead, but the clouds covered up every speck of light.
“Hold up,” Alpha said, “you hear that?”
We stopped and, for a second, didn’t hear anything except the sand blowing in the breeze. Then, just in front of us, we heard the quick shushing sound of something cutting through the sand. We were unarmed and not spoiling for a fight, but if we had to, we were ready. Some light combat training is required for the job. This, I also cannot go into.
“Fuck,” Omega said, “It’s a sidewinder!”
The snake darted right through our light beam, and we all relaxed. As fast as it came, it went. I shook my head, “those things can move eighteen miles an hour.”
“I believe it,” Alpha said.
“Especially when they feel danger,” I added, remembering back to a nature documentary I saw last week.
“What was that guy running from?”
Then I felt the hair on my arm start to rise. A sickening sensation came over me. It felt like ten thousand pin pricks all over my body. We were near something, but it wasn’t just spectral energy.
“You guys feel that?” I asked.
Both of them shook their head no. I was starting to doubt my own feelings when Alpha pointed to the left and exclaimed, “What the fuck is that?”
Everyone turned our heads, but we didn’t need to to see the blue light forming about twenty feet away. It started as a small ball but quickly stretched out, forming what looked like an arched doorway. But it wasn’t done mutating. Once the archway was formed, the whole thing elongated backward, creating a tunnel into the darkness. It looked like a lost piece by H.R. Giger.
We all stood there, stunned. We had over fifty years of experience in this field between the three of us, but none of us had seen anything like this before. Once the light had finished taking shape, the now faded blue light pulsed like it was a heartbeat.
“What the fuck is that?” Alpha repeated.
“That doesn’t seem normal.”
“Nothing about this job seems normal,” I said, my eyes never leaving the pulsating tunnel to God knows where.
“Is this what I’m supposed to extract?” Alpha asked.
“Maybe,” Omega said.
“We should get a closer look,” I said, surprising even myself.
I started off toward the tunnel and the other two followed behind me. The closer we got to the structure, the more rigid and dense it seemed. This was like no energy we’d seen before. Everyone was at a loss. Especially Alpha, as he was the lead extractor on this job.
“I don’t know what to do here,” he told us.
“Maybe this whole thing is the ghost,” Omega offered.
“Maybe this is what delivers the ghost,” I countered.
“From where?”
“That’s what scares me,” I said, meaning every word.
“Should I try starting,” Alpha said?
I was about to respond when we heard an ear-splitting whistle emanating from the tunnel. It wasn’t like a train whistle but something more high-pitched. It burrowed into your brain and nested there. We all plugged our ears for the thirty or so seconds it blasted out.
“Fuck this,” Alpha said, pulling up his gear and getting ready to extract.
“Hold on!” I yelled. “Look!”
A red light started forming at the tunnel’s far end. Then two. Then three. Something from the darkness bellowed, sending out a shock wave of sound that blasted back the scrub brush nearby. A fourth red light and a fifth showed up.
“Whatever the fuck that is, it’s pissed,” Omega said.
It screamed, and it sounded like three people doing so at once. Again, we clapped our hands over our ears. Whatever this thing was, it was upset, and it was advancing. I shined my flashlight into the tunnel, but the beam of light just disappeared. It was swallowed by the darkness. A second later, a blast of energy shot out, and the bulb of the flashlight burst.
“Stand back,” Alpha said, gearing up, “I’m gonna snag it.”
“Wait,” Omega yelled, “what are we supposed to grab? The tunnel or the thing inside?”
“Both, I guess,” Alpha said.
“I don’t think the gear can handle that kind of energy.”
“Only one way to find out,” Alpha said.
Alpha got the extraction gear ready as fast as possible. Omega and I got into position and kept an eye on the tunnel. Whatever was in there was getting closer. The blue light, which had dimmed when the tunnel grew, was growing in intensity. The rate at which it pulsed increased as well. It was like this light-eating ghost tunnel was helping to birth this thing into our world.
The sides of the tunnel started to expand and contract like it was breathing. As soon as the walls started moving, a deep and constant rumble of bass filled the air. You could feel it in your gut, and it only got louder and louder. I thought my eardrums were going to rupture.
“You ready?” I screamed over the noise.
Alpha gave me a thumbs up. He walked towards the tunnel and aimed the extractor at the opening. He flipped a few buttons, and the gear sprang to life. As soon as we saw the clawed hand of the ghost breach the tunnel, Alpha slammed down the button, and the extraction began.
I cannot go into the specifics of the procedure. It’s proprietary equipment, and it would violate my NDA if I discussed the process in detail. What I can say, though, is that during the extraction, the energy crackling in the air caused so much light during the extraction process that it looked like high noon for about ten minutes.
I can state that Alpha was only able to capture the ghost inside the tunnel. As soon as they started the process, the tunnel started shrinking and reverting back to that small blue light we had seen at the start. The tunnel totally disappeared as soon as the energy from the many-eyed ghost was contained. It’s probably still out there.
When you snag spectral energy from the wild, our gear typically gets warm. Not surprising – energy creates heat. But Alpha had to fling his gear off of him, or he’d have severe burns. Whatever was inside was straining the containment capabilities of our gear.
“What the fuck do we do now?” Omega asked.
“Wait for our ride,” Alpha said. “We need to let that cool down, or it’s going to burn a hole through the van.”
“Where did the tunnel go?” I asked.
“I dunno,” Alpha said.
“How did it not get trapped?” Omega asked, “I mean, it didn’t even waver when we started blasting it. When has ANYTHING ever resisted our tech?”
“I don’t like this,” I repeated.
We didn’t have time to think. We saw the headlights of the van appear and flash to us. We waited ten minutes for the equipment to cool down and then dragged it back, careful not to touch anything. Along the walk, I kept looking around us. Omega noticed.
“You okay?”
“I have a feeling we’re being watched,” I said.
“We are,” Alpha said, motioning to the van.
“No, I mean by something else.”
“There probably are several different energies out here,” Omega offered, “they saw what we just saw. They’re probably keeping an eye on us.”
“I can feel it, though,” I said, “their energy is attuned to us. I think we did something bad.”
“You feeling okay?” Alpha asked.
“I’m fine,” I said, harsher than I should’ve. I think it put them on edge. Again, I do not have ‘the frets.’ I’m perfectly fine. But I know when something is going wrong in a job. I can tell when we’re being used for something. It felt like that.
“Doesn’t this feel off to either of you? When was the last time we had to drag equipment away because it was too hot to touch? When have you ever seen a ghost emerge from another ghost? When has the night sky ever lit up like the middle of the day because of an energy transfer?”
“It’s weird, I’ll grant you that,” Alpha said, “but this whole job is weird.”
“But to not tell us who this is for? Or what we’re doing? Or hiding us from finding out where we are?”
“People with higher pay grades make those decisions,” they added, “I just do my part.”
That’s when I heard the muttering start. I glanced around to see if anyone else had heard it, but they hadn’t. But I know I heard it. And I know where it was coming from: the equipment.
I tried to block them out, but they were constant. I couldn’t make out any specific words, but they would not shut up the entire way back to the van. That’s not supposed to happen. Once an energy is inside our gear, it doesn’t come out until we let it.
The van door opened, and I was surprised to see our boss sitting there. He was never at a job site. Far as I knew, he rarely left his office. He grinned when he saw us.
“Did you get it?”
“Yeah,” Alpha said, proudly nodding back to the gear. “It’s burning hot, though.”
“What’s going on?” I asked, tossing my gear down.
“You’re doing the job,” my boss said.
“What was that? It wasn’t like anything we’ve ever seen.”
“World is full of wonder,” my boss said, “now load everything in and let’s get these blindfolds on.”
“We can’t bring this thing into the van. It’s leaking,” I said.
Everyone looked at me. I nodded at it, “I’m hearing…mumbling coming from it. It’s leaking energy.”
Alpha spoke up, “I gotta say, I’m worried he’s showing symptoms of ‘the frets.’” He looked at me and shrugged, “Sorry, bud, but I’m doing my job.”
“I’m fine,” I said.
The boss snapped to Omega. “What about you? You worried?”
Omega swallowed, “I don’t think he has ‘the frets.’ I think he’s concerned about the job. That thing… that’s not normal spectral energy. I know you saw the light from where you were parked. That’s never happened.”
“Are you two refusing to go along with the job?”
After a beat, Omega shook their head ‘no.’ “I just think there is something unnatural about this.”
“Our whole job is unnatural,” Alpha repeated. It was clear he shared none of our reservations.
“We should bury that thing in the desert and give back the money,” I said.
“We are not doing that,” my boss said, “Can you finish the job or not?”
I wanted to walk away, but doing so would jeopardize my livelihood. My skill set doesn’t exactly translate to other occupations. I silently nodded ‘yes.’
“Then load up the van, and let’s get going.”
Ten minutes later, we very carefully placed the gear in the back of the van. The voices were louder the closer I got to it. The temperature had cooled down, but it was still warm to the touch. I was sure Omega might’ve heard something too, but they weren’t speaking up. We sat in the van, and our boss placed blindfolds over our eyes.
Three hours later, the van came to a stop. The boss pulled off our blindfolds and opened the door. We were on a cul-de-sac in a suburban neighborhood. It looked like the kind of place I grew up in.
“We’re releasing this thing here?” I asked incredulously.
“It’s what they want.”
“Boss, that can’t be true. Are we sure we got the right address?”
“We can’t do it here. Not this thing.”
“We’ve done this a hundred times in a hundred places that look like this.”
“Not the same. Not at all,” I said.
“I don’t care what you think. The group that hired us wants it released here, and they paid handsomely for it.”
“These are families,” I protested.
“Hasn’t stopped us before. Look, you know we can range the energy. We’ll keep it away from the houses. Now, it’s three in the morning, can we please get this done before we arouse any suspicion?”
I finally nodded in agreement. That’s when everyone started hearing the whistling. It was coming from the extraction gear. It started small and slow, like a tea kettle coming to a boil, but quickly picked up and got unbearably louder.
“What the fuck?” the boss said.
The gear started to vibrate and smoke. The energy was going to burst. We had to get it out of the van before we left a smoking crater in the ground. Omega popped out of the van and opened the back doors.
“What are you doing?” my boss yelled.
“Saving us,” I said as I kicked the gear out the back door. “Get in,” I screamed, and Omega did just that.
“Floor it,” Alpha yelled. The driver did, and we tore ass down the street.
Behind us, we heard the explosion. My boss grabbed the driver and screamed, “Stop!” He stomped on the brake, and we lurched to a halt. I held the seat in front of me, but I still nearly went through the windshield.
We all climbed out of the van and looked back. There was a smoking hole where the equipment had been. But no one gave a shit about that. What we cared about was the ghost that was standing there. Or, at least, what we thought was a ghost. Looking at that thing, I wasn’t so sure.
The creature yelled and roared. I swear it locked eyes with me. Then it took off, running right towards us. Everyone else scrambled back into the van, but I didn’t. In my peripheral vision, I saw porch lights start turning on. People were gonna come out. They were gonna see it. They were gonna see us.
“Stay inside,” I screamed at the top of my lungs, “there’s been a gas leak! Stay inside! Wait for the police! Don’t look! It could blind you!”
The lights shut off.
The creature ran right past the van and into the darkness of the neighborhood. In the distance, I heard sirens and knew where they were headed. We needed to leave like a bad house guest, and that’s what we did. As soon as I shut the door, the van rocketed off and out of the neighborhood.
We’re back at HQ now, and I’ve been placed in a decontamination area. I’m writing this all down to ensure my story is on the record. The boss said he wanted to “have a discussion” with me and “run some tests” to make sure I’m okay. I have a feeling he’s going to try something.
Again, I do not have “the frets.” I am of sound mind and body. I know what I saw. I know what we did. I’m…sorry to whoever might run into this…this thing we unleashed. I don’t know if it’ll stay in that neighborhood or if it’s loose in our world. I don’t know what it’s capable of.
Worse, I don’t know how to stop it.
There is a good chance this will be my last job. I think they’ll try to sideline me, but I might just quit if they don’t. A meager penitence for what I did, I know, but I don’t know what else to do. If you hear whistling or growling where there shouldn’t be whistling or growling, turn the other way and run for your life. I can’t promise that it’ll save you, but I can promise that it’ll give you a fighting chance.
I’d ask you to pray for me, but the things I’ve seen have made me believe God doesn’t exist. I hear my boss coming now. Spread my story before people get hurt. Please.