Chapter Text
I remember the minute
It was like a switch was flipped
I was just a kid who grew up strong enough
To pick this armor up
And suddenly it fit
God, that was so long ago, long ago, long ago
I was little, I was weak and perfectly naive
And I grew up too quick
A Boy in The Basement
When Charles woke, the first thing he registered was pain. Blinding, burning, mind-numbing pain. Every tiny movement was met with an overwhelming wave of exhaustion, weighing him down like a sack of rocks at the bottom of a lake.
He knew he needed to move. He needed to start figuring out where he was, or to go find his mum, but he was just so tired. Moving sounded like so much work. It would be so much easier to stay there, nestled safely between the lines of bleak reality and peaceful unconsciousness.
Eventually, though, his need for pain relief won out. He did his best to roll over, or shift, but each attempt was squandered by a collection of bigger, scarier pains. Quick blinks triggered intense throbbing behind his eye, and every twitch made the soreness in his wrist even worse. He was pretty sure it was swollen, too, judging by how it refused to bear weight.
After his third failed attempt at sitting up, a rush of tears spilled down his cheeks. The idea of moving felt impossible. Even just the thought of it made him want to be sick.
"Mum?" he called out desperately. There was no answer. She never answered, when his dad got like this. Things would only get worse if she did.
A sob escaped his throat, echoing off of the cold stone walls. He just didn't know what else to do.
Up until now, his father’s punishments had been limited to slaps and shoves and words. Nothing that left a lasting mark. Discipline was a family matter. It was well understood that if Charles were to share these experiences with anyone outside of his mum or dad, there would be consequences.
Now, though, his injuries were visible, and the prospect of explaining them to another adult struck his heart with fear. Teachers and counselors always told him that lying was wrong. “Honesty is the best policy,” they said. It was always better for him to tell the truth, no matter the potential outcome.
Charles tried to think of what his father might say to a statement like that. A brutal image of a fist connecting with his face surged to the forefront of his mind instead. The realization that he had been punished for disobeying yet another rule sank into his bones, clawing at his chest like a feral animal.
The next shuddering breath he took lodged in his throat. The one after that clung stubbornly to the back of his tongue, refusing to make its way into his lungs. His breaths came short and quick after that. For a moment, Charles thought he might pass out again.
It took some time, but eventually, he managed to slow his breathing to a normal pace. He told himself that his swollen eye didn’t matter much because the room was too dark to see anything anyway. There was still the matter of what to tell his teachers, but Charles had always been an overactive boy. If he told the adults that he'd run into a door, or fallen out of a tree, he was sure they’d let the matter drop.
He took another deep breath and wrinkled his nose. The scent of mildew and wet earth overwhelmed his senses. He recognized the smell easily. He’d gone and earned himself yet another punishment in his dad’s creepy basement.
A small stream of memories returned to his mind, providing a bit of context. He’d mucked things up. Again.
Charles knew the whole ordeal had been his fault, really. He’d been spinning one of his mum’s dinner glasses on the kitchen table when it slipped out of his hands. The sodding thing hadn’t even been anything special—just a clear glass with a chipped rim and a red flower painted on the front. His mum had gotten it at a rubbish sale down the street as a free add-on to a set of plates. Charles had been there when she purchased it. The whole lot had only cost a quid.
Its lack of value hardly mattered, though. At the time of his mistake, Charles had been finishing out his previous punishment of sitting at the table and “thinking about his actions.” It apparently fit the crime of playing with his toy airplanes too loudly. Which, was hardly Charles’s fault. Imitating the rumbling sounds of a jet engine was the probably best part about owning model planes.
Remaining seated at the table for long stretches of time was one of his dad’s tamest punishments, though Charles always found it near impossible. His mum wasn’t allowed to speak with him while he sat there, and his dad never so much as spared him a glance. He felt like a ghost, sometimes; he wasn’t allowed to say anything, and his parents milled about the house as if he wasn’t even there. At least when his dad screamed, or banned Charles from meals for the day, his mum could still give him a cuddle without putting them in harm’s way.
Plus, it was boring. He wasn’t allowed to draw or listen to music or anything. He just had to sit quietly and think about what he’d done.
Which was dumb. Charles hated thinking about his actions. He just liked doing them. That was the whole point of them.
So, maybe he had been just a little glad when the glass shattered on the floor. His mum had finally turned to face him, and even if she'd looked horrified, Charles had still felt so relieved. He finally felt tangible, the sinking feeling of being ignored fading away. Then his father had looked at him, too, and the comforting feeling of being seen turned to ice in his veins.
His father had said nothing as he had dragged Charles from his seat at the table, pulling him along like a dog on a leash. Charles had struggled against his hold and reached a hand out to his mum, silently begging her to do something. Anything. But, all she did was stare. Her delicate hands clutched the broom she was using to sweep up shards of glass, thumbs methodically rubbing over the wood in a soothing gesture. Charles had never been more jealous of a broom in his life.
It could have been much worse, all told. Charles may have been tossed down the basement steps like a life size rag doll, but he was awake and alert and not bleeding. He would take the wins where he could get them.
Searching for an exit briefly crossed Charles's mind, but he quickly decided it wasn’t worth the trouble. It wasn’t as if he could jimmy the lock with his bare hands. Until his dad came back, he was stuck here. Might as well get comfortable.
Finally, Charles finally managed to pull himself from the floor. He kept expecting to trip over his dad’s boxes of old magazines, or one of his mum’s birdhousing kits, but the space was curiously empty. He couldn’t remember the basement ever being so tidy, even when they had first moved house.
As Charles stumbled clumsily around the unfamiliar space, he allowed his mind to wander. His thoughts eventually settled on a book he had read for a school project a few months ago. It had been an entire book full of bat facts, and it ended up being absolutely brills. He’d bothered his parents with those facts for days, spouting them off endlessly, until his dad had gotten irritated and tossed the book in the bin. The librarian still bothered him about the ever-increasing late fee every now and again, though Charles would have to be mental to bring that one up to his parents.
One of the terms he’d learned from the book was echolocation. As far as Charles could remember, echolocation made it so that bats could see in the dark by making a bunch of high pitched noises. He couldn’t remember exactly why bats could use echolocation and humans couldn’t. Maybe they could, and Charles had just never tried?
He let out a few high pitched squeaks and squinted his eyes, attempting to make out what was in front of him. The darkness didn’t seem to lessen at all. He let out a final shrill sound, took a large step forward, and promptly collided with a wall.
So much for his humans-using-echolocation theory.
Regardless of his method, though, Charles had found what he was looking for. He traced along the wall slowly, shuffling to the side, until he found a corner where two walls intersected. Corners were safe, he’d learned over the years. They provided him with some cover. Settling in the corner meant that he could see the entire room, and no one could sneak up on him.
Not that it would make much of a difference now, given the lack of light.
Charles sank to the floor and wrapped his arms around his legs, trying his best to ignore his injured ribs. He tucked his knees against his chest and leaned his forehead against them, pretending he was up in his bedroom, hiding in the safety of his closet.
The moisture of the basement air clung to his skin, adhering to his form like a soggy jumper. He listened to the drip drip drip of a steadily leaking pipe somewhere in the distance, lulling him into a trance-like state. The pain in his head faded to a dull ache as he lost himself in the surrounding darkness. Time slipped through his awareness like water through a sieve. There was nothing to do but wait.
Some time later, Charles’s ears picked up the sound of gentle footfalls above him. The steps were soft and slow, almost careful sounding; nothing like the heavy, quick steps of his father. He sat stock still as the footsteps stopped outside of the basement door. He curled around himself tighter and eyes screwed tightly shut, willing the person to go away.
Then, there was a light. A beautiful, soft light that Charles could see from behind his closed eyelids. He was drawn to the brilliance of it like a wilting flower to the sun, raising his bowed head to look towards its source.
To his shock, a teenage boy stood at the top of the basement steps, holding a brightly glowing book in his hand. He was much older than Charles, closer to an adult, and he looked as if he had stepped straight out of one of the old-timey movies that his dad sometimes fell asleep in front of after dinner. He wore a bowtie and a fancy waistcoat, complete with posh-looking knee length trousers and a thick brown overcoat.
Charles shivered. It would’ve been nice if his dad let him bring a coat into the basement every now and again. It was always freezing.
The boy’s hair was slicked down and pushed off to one side, not a single strand out of place. Charles reached up and touched his own unruly locks, wondering how the other boy managed to get his hairstyle to sit so neatly. His own hair was thick and messy, always settled into a haphazard tangle of curls. He couldn’t imagine being able to flatten it all down on his head like that.
“Charles?” the boy asked, startling him from his thoughts. His voice was soft and kind, like his mum’s often was after a particularly rough night with his dad.
Charles looked up, his good eye blinking owlishly. “Who’re you?”
He looked back at Charles, lips set in a wobbly frown. If Charles had to guess, he’d say the strange, stuffy-looking boy was trying not to cry.
There was a long beat of silence. And then:
“Oh, my dear. What has she done to you?”
Twelve Hours Prior
“So you’re telling me that you finally found a fucking ghost therapist?" Crystal asked. "Glory hallelujah, I’ve been waiting for this day.”
“Psychiatrist, if you wanna get technical,” Charles replied. “Dr. Hargrove was a shrink back when she was alive, but don’t get excited—she’s not exactly the helpful sort. She’s more like the bloke who created Frankenstein, except with less scary lightning and more general mind fuckery.”
“The doctor in Frankenstein is the only character that bears the name of ‘Frankenstein,’” Edwin said.
Charles stared at Edwin blankly, thrown off by the abrupt change of subject. “Come again?”
“The doctor’s name is Victor Frankenstein. His creation is referred to by a variety of monikers, none of which are solely ‘Frankenstein.’ The closest colloquial title would be ‘Frankenstein’s monster.’”
“Are you sure about that, mate? Because—“
“I am quite sure, Charles. I’ve read the book numerous times.”
“Right, but—”
“Okay! Moving on,” Crystal said impatiently, before fixing Charles with an incredulous stare. “Did you seriously not know that?”
Charles shrugged. “Never got ‘round to reading it.”
“Bad excuse. There’s a billion movie adaptations, one of which I have literally watched with you.”
“Are you referring to that absolutely heinous musical production that you two watched with Niko last month?” Edwin asked, his face pinched in distaste. “I found their use of an abnormal brain in the doctor’s creation to be quite a discredit to Mary Shelley’s original work.”
Crystal shrugged. “I mean, I guess Young Frankenstein isn’t the best Frankenstein adaptation to use as a reference, but my point still—”
“ Oi, enough,” Charles said, cutting them both off. “Christ, you two are bloody impossible. I thought we were moving on.”
“Right, of course,” Edwin said, casting Crystal a sidelong glance. “A spirit named Dr. Violet Hargrove has been reportedly conducting experiments on other ghosts, the descriptions of which have been relatively disturbing in nature. She seems to be quite… eccentric.”
“Absolutely bloody barmy would be a more accurate description, mate,” Charles said sharply. “She’s nabbing ghosts and forcing them to relive the most traumatic moments of their lives.”
Crystal’s mouth dropped open slightly. “Fucking why? What could possibly be the point of that?”
“Currently unclear,” Edwin replied. “It’s unlikely that we’ll discover any specific motives until we are able to speak with her, but in the interest of a hypothesis, there are a few similarities between victims that should be noted.”
Edwin retrieved his notebook off of the desk and flipped it open, reading from a section of quickly scrawled notes. “After speaking with our prospective clients, I have discovered that all of the doctor’s subjects have a history of extraordinarily painful life experiences. They have all also managed to build a solid emotional support system post-death.”
Crystal blinked at him. “They did what now?”
“I will admit that Niko noticed this pattern, not I,” he said, looking vaguely embarrassed. “Every spirit that has been kidnapped by Dr. Hargrove was reported missing by at least one other spirit, if not more. The victims all seem to have built close interpersonal connections within their chosen afterlife: friends, family, lovers, et cetera.”
“Jesus,” Crystal said softly. “That’s really sad.”
“It is. It is also why time is of the essence, as it is only a matter of time before another spirit goes missing.”
“Right,” Crystal said, nodding in agreement. “So, are all of her past victims still present in the mortal world?”
Edwin steepled his fingers, his expression taking on an air of intensity. “Some of them, yes, though a number of them have disintegrated due to the intensity of their re-experiences. Given that they all had reported histories of horrific injuries, abuse, and violent deaths, I cannot say I’m surprised.”
Charles stifled a grimace at Edwin’s flippant use of the word abuse . No matter how many times he heard the word used in casual conversation, the ugliness of it still made him flinch. Fortunately, his friends were too absorbed in their conversation to take notice.
“So, where is she? Off haunting some deserted asylum somewhere?” Crystal asked.
“You watch far too many horror films,” Edwin said primly. “She is currently running experiments out of her old home office in Greenwich.”
“Which,” Charles interjected, “happens to be down the street from an abandoned hospital.”
“Called it,” Crystal said, offering Charles a celebratory high five. Charles obliged, the resulting crack ringing out through the otherwise quiet office. Crystal pulled her hand away, shaking it. “Ow. Good one.”
Edwin rolled his eyes, opting to ignore them both. He instead pulled a large roll of paper out from his bottom desk drawer and unfurled it over the desktop, revealing a set of marked-up blueprints.
“Charles and I have come up with a potential plan, though our lack of information has left a number of variables unaccounted for,” he said, pointing to a small circled section within the plans. “One of the victims’ friends reported that the good doctor has a hidden basement on the premises. Once her work is completed, it is used as a holding cell until she is prepared to release her victims back to their loved ones. We believe there is a decent chance of the basement holding spirits that we have not yet gotten reports of, and if that is the case, our first priority is rescue.”
Edwin looked to Charles expectantly. “Charles?”
“Right mate, just a tick,” Charles said, reaching into his backpack. “Given that we have no idea why she’s so keen on holding ghost hostages, we can’t exactly force her to move onto her afterlife. So—Where the devil is…” He pulled a burlap sack out of the backpack. “Aha! Found it.”
Charles upended the pouch, sending an iron neck shackle clattering to the office floor. Crystal moved to pick it up, turning the collar over in her hands.
“Is this the same one that Esther used on you?” she asked warily.
Charles nodded. Crystal scowled at the shackle as if it had personally murdered her entire family.
“The idea is that if we truss her up with iron and leave her to be claimed in place of the captive spirits, then it’s possible she’ll be dragged to Hell whether she’s ready to move on or not,” Charles said. “Good ol’ irons to fire play, innit?”
Crystal hummed in agreement, taking the sack from Charles’s hands and shoving the shackle back inside. “The name could use some work, but otherwise, I’m sold.”
“I’d like to see you come up with some, then,” Charles said. “I do all the heavy lifting ‘round here when it comes to naming schemes. It’s bloody exhausting.”
“And with all that practice, you should be better at it by now,” she teased.
"If you two are done," Edwin cut in imperiously. “Niko will be back from her shopping trip in a few hours, and we will need to leave time for transportation to Greenwich. If we are to prepare, now would be the time.”
“Oh yeah, sure,” Crystal said, leaning on the desk. “So, what comes next?”