A Romance Between A Ghost And A Human


    Walking into his apartment, a man with long red hair and a short, neatly-trimmed beard dropped his keys on the table nearby before heading for the kitchen. In the background, the sound of a hockey game was blasting from the living room TV. He grabbed a beer, cracked it open, and gave a wide yawn before walking that way. His eyes scanned over the room as he took a sip of his drink, before shaking his head while moving to the bathroom, setting his can on the table there on his way past. “If Thompson doesn’t shape up, they’re gonna bench his ass! And after we spent so much to trade for him. What a complete jackass. Talented, but still a jackass.”


    In the bathroom, he did his business, then moved to wash his hands. As he shut off the faucet and straightened up, his eyes focused on motion within the mirror. The motion of a figure standing behind him, translucent and barely visible, mouth opened in a loud scream.


    Ever since he was a little boy, Gunnar Massey had been able to see things that other people said weren''t there. It had started when his family moved into an old house back when he had been only eight years old. Gunnar''s dad had been transferred for his job and the promotion allowed them to buy a very nice place, practically a small mansion. Unfortunately, from the very moment they arrived, Gunnar claimed to have seen a scary old woman wandering through the building humming to herself in the middle of the night, as well as a man in the garage who was never there when his parents looked. No matter how many times he dragged them out there, often in the middle of the night in those early days. Which didn’t exactly help the whole situation.


    His dad said he was imagining things, but Gunnar knew the house was haunted. He just couldn''t convince anyone else of that. Well, at least he couldn''t convince anyone until Andrew Pine showed up one day, a few months after they had moved in. He was Gunnar’s age, and was going around the neighborhood selling chocolate bars for his school. When he had shown up, Gunnar had been watching the old woman ghost walk around the tree in the front yard, motioning as though she was feeding the birds. When Andrew asked what he was looking at, he reluctantly told him. He had expected the same sort of reaction that he got from everyone else, but in this case, Andrew had believed him. He couldn’t see the ghosts himself, but still took his word for it. And he always wanted to know what the ghosts were doing, or if Gunnar saw any others.


    They quickly became friends after that, and Andrew always believed everything Gunnar told him about the ghosts. It was actually thanks to his new friend that he made his first contact with them. Up to that point, he had been too frightened to actually talk to them, terrified of how they would react. But with Andrew’s help, he was finally brave enough to actually get their attention directly. And he didn''t back down when the old lady ghost glared at him. Through his persistence, he finally managed to get her to actually talk to him. And once that happened, he came to understand that she was mostly just a somewhat grouchy old lady like any other. She just happened to still be dead. Her name was Alice, and the man in the garage was Maurice, her son, who had died almost twenty years after she did. He had died in that garage, suffocating in his car.


    Once he knew about that, Gunnar was able to talk to the man, calling him by name. That broke through Maurice’s shell, making him actually react. And after that, Maurice and Alice didn’t scare Gunnar anymore. They were just stuck in their ways, Alice going through the routine she did every day when she was alive, while Maurice liked to putter around the garage pretending he was actually working on a car that was no longer there. Once he knew that, Gunnar convinced his dad to park their own car inside the garage instead of leaving it out on the driveway. That gave Maurice an actual vehicle to pretend with. And it wasn’t always pretending, given Gunnar’s dad claimed the car ran better ever since he started parking it in that garage. He called it good luck. Maurice called it good maintenance, and had a few other choice words for how Gunnar’s dad had been treating the vehicle in the past. Words Gunnar wasn’t allowed to repeat.


    The point was, while he had been afraid of the ghosts at first, Gunnar came to understand that they were just people like anyone else. There were good ones and bad ones. That was scary sometimes when he was out and about and happened to see some of the bad ghosts (they could be very intimidating). But he learned not to give too much of a reaction so they wouldn''t realize he could see them and start following him. As it was, now that he was a full-grown adult, he’d had twenty years worth of experience dealing with them. And yet, even then, it was always startling to look in a mirror and see a figure you didn’t know was standing right behind you.


    “Dude!” the ghostly man shouted almost right in his ear, “putting your cold beer down without a coaster? Not cool! That’s my grandma’s table, remember?”


    Grimacing, Gunnar rubbed the back of his neck sheepishly. “Sorry, Andy, guess I was distracted. Won’t happen again. Unless it does, then you can really yell at me. You have my full permission to give me the full banshee treatment.”


    Yes, the ghost in his apartment was that of Andrew Pine himself. After growing up right alongside Gunnar, the two of them becoming inseparable over the years, Andrew had died. It was an accident, an old man simply losing control of the vehicle just as he was crossing the street. That was eight years ago now, shortly after both of them had graduated college. It still hurt whenever Gunnar thought about everything Andrew had lost. Everything they had both lost.


    And yet, they hadn’t lost as much as most would have in their situation. Gunnar could see him, could interact with him. Andrew was limited to staying within the general area of his favorite old keychain. That was what his ghost had attached itself to. Whenever they wanted to go out together, Gunnar simply carried the keychain with him. Otherwise, it was in a safe place in the apartment.


    Andrew, a slightly shorter man with long curly hair that had been black when he was alive, offered him a rueful smile while shaking his head. God, he looked just as he had the day he left the apartment eight years earlier. Well, maybe slightly more translucent and blue, but still. His eyes centered on the living man’s before he replied, “Too bad these seeing ghosts powers of yours didn''t come with a better memory.”


    Gunnar, in turn, retorted, “Hey, I remember the important things.”


    Andrew gave him a look before raising one thin eyebrow. “Is that right, big guy? Like what?”


    Gunnar’s hands moved in a pantomime of cupping the other man’s face gently. “Your favorite color is gray. Your favorite animal is the ostrich. You were born April third. We met on August eighteenth. Your favorite movie is Napoleon Dynamite. Your favorite food is chili dogs. When you were six years old, your grandfather took you on a private plane and let you hold the controls. You had an imaginary friend named Duncan until you were--”


    Laughing, the ghost man interrupted. “Okay, okay, so you know me.”


    He nodded. “Like I said, the important stuff.” In that moment, Gunnar felt the face solidify under his fingers, as Andrew used the energy he had gathered to stop being intangible for just a moment. Once he did, the two of them leaned in to one another and touched lips gently. Andrew could only manage to make himself solid for a few seconds at a time, and needed long breaks in between. This was what they used them for, a fleeting, too-short kiss now and then.


    As he felt his best friend and love of his life shift back to being intangible, Gunnar stepped past him to pick up his drink from the table and nodded toward the TV. “Now let''s watch the game.


    “And hope Thompson stops being such a jackass.”


    *******


    What Are Phoenixes?


    The story of the Phoenix appears in various forms throughout the universe. Though specifics vary, it is always a winged creature made of fire, with the ability to be reborn after death.


    Most people, even those who know of the wider supernatural world around them, believe the Phoenix to be an unsubstantiated myth, or simply one of several different ordinary birds associated with fire. But in truth, true Phoenixes do exist, though they are incredibly rare. They are rare because each Phoenix is born from a star, and each star is only capable of creating and sustaining a single Phoenix in its lifetime.


    A Phoenix will continue to exist as long as the star it is tied to survives. It draws power from the star, is capable of breathing fire that rivals the heat from its birthplace, and each Phoenix can travel at the speed of light. It is, in essence, the living embodiment of the star itself. When its body is destroyed, it simply reforms through its connection to the star and is born anew.


    Some Phoenixes shared their birthplace with dragons, though the latter were placed there artificially. Phoenixes are natural parts of the star they come from. They are its heart and its guardian. Anything that threatens the star must face the might of the Phoenix.


    And that is a might that is all but unparalleled. For while Dragons are given power through millions of years spent at the heart of a star, and the so-called Seosten Archangels gained their indestructible wings through an artificial connection to a star, the Phoenix was a child of the star.


    *****


    Where Did Doxer Get His Elemental Teleport?


    They were known as Tiphs. Frog-like creatures about the size of a large dog, with four long tentacles emerging from their back. Each tentacle was a different color, one blue, one white, one red, and one brown. The creature itself shifted its color between each of those. Their tentacles were each capable of manipulating one of the classic elements based on its color. Fire from the red, wind from the white, water from the blue, and earth from the brown.


    When in deep trouble, the Tiph could escape by shifting its body and all of its tentacles to the same color and then vanishing within an elemental explosion of what that color was tied to. More than one Tiph working together could create large, more elaborate elemental explosions, which made most people reluctant to confront them. And when five or more of the creatures worked together, their elemental escape teleport could leave a clone duplicate of one of their bodies behind, made from the element they had used. That elemental clone could act on its own for a brief time before vanishing.


    Unfortunately, none of those abilities had been able to save a particular pack of Tiphs when they became the target of the young Eden’s Garden Heretic known as Doxer.


    ******


    Jacob and Gaia Non-Canon Continued


    Previously in this storyline, Flick, posing as Jacob, was lost in the vast reaches of space on Fahsteth’s ship. Toward the beginning of their long journey back to Earth, passing through a magical storm erased her memory, leaving her continuing to pose as Jacob with no idea of what her true form is.


    “One, two, three, four, five.” Counting out each step as he walked down the hall from the door of his own room (or at least the one he had been sleeping in ever since he and Gaia had found themselves trapped on this spaceship out in the middle of deep space) to the next door down, Jacob frowned. This was his third time doing this, fourth counting the first time he’d done it without counting. After a moment of hesitation, he pivoted on his heel before starting to walk back the other way. Once more, he counted aloud very deliberately. “One, two, three, four, five.” His voice was full of tension that was getting worse with each repetition.


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    Once he reached that doorway, the young man felt the one back behind him that he had just walked away from slide open, before Gaia came into view. She was watching him curiously. “Is this perhaps some strange physical exercise from your time that I don’t have the proper context for, or is something wrong?” While asking that, she stepped away from the door, allowing it to slide shut.


    Turning to face her, Jacob exhaled heavily. “I don’t know. Something feels wrong. I mean, a lot feels wrong about this whole situation, but--” He made a face and slumped a bit. “It''s stupid.”


    “I’m quite certain it’s not,” Gaia informed him before stepping that way. Her hands found his, gently raising them while she met his gaze. “It’s alright, what exactly feels wrong about it?”


    It took Jacob a moment to respond, as he collected his thoughts. In the meantime, his hands returned her squeeze, which seemed to calm him enough to answer. “My stride. It feels too long. I think it should take me six and a half or seven steps to cross the distance between our rooms, but it only takes me five. Every single time, it only takes me five steps. It feels wrong.” He got that much out before his eyes rolled at his own strange feelings. “See, I told you, it’s just stupid.”


    Gaia, however, shook her head. “I don’t see what’s so stupid about that. We know you almost certainly changed your appearance before meeting with me, to hide your identity in the future. Clearly the… ahh… true version of yourself is shorter than this one. Nothing stupid about that. Your mind is more accustomed to taking more steps to reach its destination, that’s all.”


    Processing that, Jacob bit his lip thoughtfully before giving a short nod. “I guess you’re probably right. I don’t know why that was bothering me so much. I know this isn’t my real body and all. I must be shorter, just--something about it was tickling my brain or something. As soon as I started thinking about how it should take me more steps to get to your room, I couldn’t let it go. My brain couldn’t let it go. It’s like--it’s like it was trying to tell me something more important.”


    “Perhaps it’s trying to bring back the memories you lost due to that magical storm,” Gaia suggested gently. “This ‘realizing you should be taking more steps’ might simply be the first… ahh… foot in the door, so to speak. It’s possible that those memories may be attempting to return. If the effects were temporary…” She trailed off thoughtfully. It had been three days since that storm, and she had watched Jacob struggle to recall what were clearly very important memories that whole time. If the loss was temporary and could possibly fade after enough time had passed, that would be a weight off both of their shoulders. The urge to use her own memory manipulation abilities to help Jacob had been quite strong, but the risk was too great. She couldn’t allow herself to accidentally find out too much about her own future by seeing those memories, which would be essentially inevitable if she was trying to bring them back for him.


    But if they were coming back naturally, perhaps even before the ship could make it back to Earth, that would take care of the problem. And even if they didn’t come back by then… “You remember what I said,” she asked while offering the young man an encouraging smile, “about Hecate?”


    Jacob, for his part, seemed to relax just a bit, the tension easing out of him somewhat. “Yeah, they’re good at memory stuff. So once we get back to Earth, all we have to do is find them and they should be able to fix this. I mean, hopefully, if there’s any of my actual memories left at all.”


    “And the fact that you have this feeling about your steps would seem to imply that there are,” Gaia pointed out. In truth, it could mean many things and not necessarily that his memories could be found and recovered, but there was no sense in making him worry. Particularly not right now when there was little they could do about it either way. They just had to find Hecate. While she might not trust herself to safely do something about those missing memories that she wasn’t supposed to see, Hecate was a different story. They could do what she could not.


    Yes, if there was even the faintest trace of those memories, Gaia’s old mentor would be able to fix them. She had no doubt about that. All they had to do was make it back to Earth and find them. That second part in itself could potentially be more challenging, but one step at a time.


    But right now, there was a different step they had to pay attention to. Namely, “Breakfast,” she announced firmly, turning on her heel while releasing one of Jacob’s hands. She kept the other to give him a tug. “I’m famished, and I know you are too. You’ll feel better after getting something to eat.” They couldn’t exactly gorge themselves day and night in elaborate feasts, but there was still plenty of food to get them back where they belonged, even with the passengers they were feeding.


    And as far as Gaia was concerned, one of those passengers could be thrown out the airlock any time. There was little reason to keep Fahsteth around, aside from the idea that he might end up being able to tell them something important about any ships they came across out here. After all, Jacob apparently had some but not much experience with such things, and Gaia was clueless. As for their other passenger, the diminutive-yet-confident Laein, she didn’t know much either. Not that it was easy to get the girl to admit that, especially when she had clearly become convinced that if she didn’t know enough to help them, they would toss her out that airlock. But no, while Fahsteth could go out there any time, Gaia was already far more fond of this Laein girl. She was feisty and clearly compensating for her fear with loud, boisterous claims of violence and power. Under that, however, was someone very much worth getting to know. Bit by bit, they were chipping away at that shell. And yet, even if she had been completely forthcoming, there probably wasn’t much she could tell them. The girl clearly had even less experience with this than Jacob.


    Or maybe Jacob had a lot of experience and just couldn’t remember. That was a possibility, but one they had both dismissed. From the way he had acted and things he had said even before losing his memories, Gaia was pretty sure that while being on a star-faring vessel like this wasn’t completely new to him, it also wasn’t something he did all the time. Her instinct said even if he still had his memories, there wouldn’t be much he could say about ships they found out here.


    Together, the two of them walked to the--what had Jacob called it? Lift. They walked to the lift (he’d also called it an elevator, which was an amusing word), before ascending to the hallway with the kitchen and dining room. The whole way, Gaia kept hold of Jacob’s hand. Normally he would have pulled it away by that point, but this morning he seemed particularly vulnerable and uncertain. Clearly, the experience of realizing he should be taking more steps between rooms, and the resulting understanding of what that meant, had left him a bit… subdued and uncertain. Seeing that made Gaia even more determined to help him. For right now, that meant keeping him distracted and reassuring him that they would be able to fix it once they got back to Earth. And once they were there, all they had to do was find Hecate, no matter what that took.


    Soon, their food was prepared, and the two of them sat down to eat. After taking a few bites of a truly delicious egg and sausage combination, Gaia tapped her fork lightly against the plate while musing, “I assume you’ve still been trying the mirror thing and it hasn’t helped that much?”


    Jacob’s head shook. “No, it hasn''t helped at all. I stand in front of the mirror and shift my face to anything that comes to mind, trying to find one that looks right. I''ve seen familiar faces, but I don''t know why they''re familiar. One of them might be mine, or just people I know. There’s a lot of different ones in there. Maybe that''s because I know a lot of different people, or maybe I''m just making them up. Either way, I still don''t know anything about what I''m supposed to look like, what my name is, where I come from, anyone else’s name, or anything useful. I know I''m from the future. I know that you''re very important to me. I know I can''t let you find out any details about where I come from or it could change the future, which could be really bad. But I don''t know anything else. I don''t remember any other details. No matter how much I try, nothing actually clicks. Hell, maybe I have already thought about the real truth. I keep making up completely random scenarios in my head, but maybe one of them isn''t actually made up. Maybe I really remembered something and I just don''t know that I actually remembered it. Maybe one of the fifty different ideas I came up with about my own history is actually real. I have no way of knowing.”


    By the end of that, his voice had risen a bit, and he picked himself up from the table, letting his fork fall while turning away to face the other way. A heavy, annoyed sigh escaped him as he caught himself against the nearby counter in his frustration, gripping it tightly. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry.”


    “You don''t need to apologize,” Gaia assured him while leaving the table to step behind the man. Her hand found its way to his shoulder while she continued. “I am very certain that I would be just as frustrated in your position. Perhaps even more so. And I should be the one apologizing. If I trusted myself to help your memories without seeing them myself, or at least believed I would be able to efficiently erase them from my own mind if I did see, this wouldn''t be an issue anymore.”


    After a brief hesitation, Jacob lifted his hand to where hers was on his shoulder, resting it there with their fingers touching. He audibly swallowed before interlacing their fingers. “You''re already doing a lot to help, believe me. I don''t know how I would''ve come through this if you weren''t here, Gaia. If I had to lose all my memories and be stuck out in the middle of space and in the wrong time all by myself, I just… I don’t know. I really don''t know how I would deal with it.” He turned finally, facing Gaia directly as their hands fell away from each other. “I''ll tell you one thing though, I probably would have killed Fahsteth by now.” It was a somewhat grim half-joke, half-certainty.


    “Oh, really?” Gaia joked back. “In that case, perhaps I should disappear for a little while and give you some time alone, if you think you could end up improving the company on this ship so much.”


    The words made Jacob chuckle, a sound that brought a smile to Gaia’s face. It was strange how easily her mood could shift simply by making him feel better, even if only for a moment. She wanted to help him get his memories back, wanted to help him remember who he was and what he was doing. And yet, a part of her had to admit that, aside from his lost memories, these past days aboard the ship had been some of the best in her recent memory. Or even not so recent. Spending time with Jacob on this strange and incredible vessel was something of a vacation away from every other concern they both had back on Earth. There was nothing they could do to make the trip go any faster, so the two of them simply had to wait patiently. It gave them time to talk, time to--well, sort of get to know one another. While Gaia could say plenty about her own past, there hadn’t been much Jacob could say about himself even before losing those memories. And yet, she did believe she was getting to know him as a person quite well.


    Giving a soft cough after a moment of silence had passed, Jacob took a step closer and embraced her. He clearly needed it right then, and Gaia immediately reciprocated, closing her arms around him. They stood there together like that for several long seconds, neither of them wanting to pull away. Their breakfast was getting cold, yet neither cared that much. What mattered right then was the comfort and reassurance they both got from that hug.


    It might have continued for quite a bit longer, had they not suddenly been interrupted by a loud blaring scream that made Gaia jump and spin around with her hand raised toward the source of the interruption, prepared to defend herself and Jacob. A red light was flashing along the ceiling, while the scream continued. Only belatedly did she realize that it was coming from the ship itself, not a person who had managed to sneak aboard somehow. The ship was talking to them, warning them about something dangerous.


    “The alarm?!” Jacob shouted over the sound of it. “What--the bridge, come on!” He started running that way, with Gaia right behind him. “Can you figure out what its problem is?! And maybe turn it down a little?! I think we get the point!”


    The latter Gaia was able to do immediately, taking the alarm down to a much more tolerable level so it wasn’t blasting out their ears anymore. Unfortunately, she was still sorting through what exactly it was having such a tantrum about when they made it to the bridge. While controlling the ship’s technology was child’s play, understanding the information it was presenting took a bit more.


    Moving across the bridge toward one of the control seats, Jacob called out, “Can you just tell it to put whatever it''s upset about on the screen? Maybe that’ll be enough to tell us what the problem is.”


    Yes, Gaia could definitely do that. She sent that instruction to the computer, and it responded immediately, putting the source of its sudden panic up on the screen for both of them to see.


    For a long, silent moment, they stared together. Gaia’s head tilted uncertainly. “I don’t understand. That looks like a… giant living organism, a sea creature out here in space? But not… something’s wrong with it.” The thing was still very far away, but getting closer by the moment. It was directly in their path, and had clearly noticed them.


    Jacob’s voice was grim, as he took two steps forward to stare very intently at the image on the screen. “Oh, something’s wrong alright. With it, and with us being here. With the whole universe, really. But hey, at least I actually remember something.


    “That’s a Fomorian ship.”