Chapter Text
Hand on the doorknob, Armand braced himself for what would be waiting for him on the other side of the door. He held his breath, turned the knob, and pushed.
The house was empty and blessedly quiet. Armand let out his breath in a sigh of relief, then went to gather the camera and equipment from the dining room where they'd left them.
By the time Daniel joined him again, he was in the living room, setting up their flashlight.
“Hey, Armand, I didn't mean –”
“We have a job to do,” Armand interrupted icily. “I thought perhaps we could do the flashlight in this room.”
Daniel stared at Armand for a long moment before saying heavily, “The flashlight sounds good.”
“Whenever you're ready.”
Daniel shook himself, stretching his mouth into a wide grimace, then a tight pucker, before pasting a presenter mask onto his face. Armand didn't know Daniel was such a good actor.
“What I have here is a regular old flashlight. The top is slightly unscrewed, so a spirit should be able to easily turn it on and off with a simple touch. I'm going to ask yes or no questions and ask the spirit to turn the flashlight off or on in response. Now, this flashlight can turn on and off on its own, so for the responses to be trustworthy, they need to be timely and repeatable.”
A loud creak came from the stairwell behind them. Daniel didn't show any sign he'd heard it, so Armand kept his eyes steadfastly forward.
“Mary, are you there? Go ahead and touch the flashlight if you are.”
They waited, staring at the flashlight. After a minute or two, the light turned on.
“To believe that's you, we're going to need a response a little bit faster. Now, are you there, Mary?”
He paused again, and the flashlight didn't move.
“Okay, it looks like either Mary isn't here or doesn't like the flashlight. Should we try something else?”
Armand stiffened as he heard a short curse muttered from behind him, and the quick tapping of barefoot feet slapping the floor. He made himself relax, look like nothing was wrong. If other people didn't hear anything, he didn't hear anything, he reminded himself.
As Daniel was reaching out to put the flashlight away, the blonde woman from the hallway tapped the tip of the flashlight again and again, making the light turn off and on.
“Woah!” Daniel shouted. “It looks like we do have someone with us after all.”
The woman stopped touching the flashlight and snuck a glance up at Armand. He carefully continued staring into space rather than at her.
“Is that Mary again? Turn the light on for yes.”
She tapped the light and the flashlight blinked on.
“Great! Hi Mary, thanks for coming back. You had something you wanted to tell us, right? Turn the light off for yes.”
Mary tapped the flashlight to turn it off. She glared at Armand and sneered, “This would be a lot easier if you'd stop pretending you can't see me.”
“Is it about your death, Mary? Light on for yes," Daniel asked, unaware of anyone talking.
She turned the light on.
“Great. Now, how do I figure this out with only yes or no questions?” Daniel mused.
“Can you please just tell him?” Mary whined at Armand. He didn't react.
“Alright, how about this. You said your death was an accident, right, Mary?”
Mary reached out and slammed the flashlight. It wiggled a little bit from her touch, and Daniel's eyes went wide.
“Wow, she is really insistent. So I'm guessing that your husband didn't mean to give you the poison pills?”
Mary tapped the flashlight in quick succession again, turning it off and on three or four times.
“We've got a lively one here, folks. I'm not really sure how to ask about the confession with yes or no questions, so how about we get the spirit box out again?”
Mary groaned and yelled, “I can't do anything with that stupid box! Can you control radio waves with your mind?! Just give me a Ouija board or something!”
Daniel screwed the top firmly back on the flashlight and put it back in his beat up backpack and pulled out the spirit box instead, turning it on to that irritating white noise.
“Go on, Mary, what were you trying to tell us?”
“My husband wrote the note because he was so guilty about his mistake! He blamed himself!” she shouted angrily.
Sulphur, said the box.
“Huh. I wonder what that means.”
Stop, the box said, then something distorted that Armand thought sounded like Bush.
“Stop Bush?” Daniel laughed. “Good news, he hasn't been president in years!”
“This box is useless!” Mary shouted.
Friend.
“Was there another person involved? More than you and your husband?” Daniel asked.
Mary turned back to Armand. “Please tell him I can't control the spirit box,” she begged. Armand had to work hard to ignore her.
Indoor surprise, came the garbled metallic voice.
“Please, Armand.”
Fuck. Maybe if he indulged her and helped her tell her story, just in a small way, she would leave him alone.
“Daniel?”
“Yeah, babe?” Daniel perked up like a prairie dog at his boyfriend giving him any attention.
In the background, the box said, sister.
“I don't think this is working.”
“I don't know, these are sounding pretty consistent. I think she's telling us that there was another woman at home, waiting to ambush them.”
Mary wailed wordlessly.
Shower war pluck.
“Yeah, you hear that? The woman was waiting for them in the bathroom!”
Certain commerce.
“Um, I guess the woman… wanted money?”
Armand sighed. “Daniel, please, I think we should do something else.”
“What do you think we should do instead?”
Go home, Armand wanted to say. Leave this whole ridiculous venture behind and fall asleep cuddled safe in their bed.
“How about we try the Ouija board in the master bedroom.”
“Oh, that's a great idea!”, Daniel said at the same time as Mary said, “Bless you, dear.”
As Daniel turned off the spirit box and they climbed the stairs to the bedroom, Mary trailing behind them, Armand felt like he was being led to his execution.
When they got to the bedroom, Daniel set up the board on the floor.
“Okay, there's a tripod in the bag, yeah?”
Armand dug through the camera bag until he found a tripod.
“Yeah, great. You wanna set it up and check and make sure I'm in frame then come sit with me?”
Armand fiddled with the camera until he got a good shot, then sat down across from Daniel. Mary sat down next to Daniel, her legs tucked elegantly under her.
Daniel gave Armand a quick smile before slipping back into host mode.
“We are finally here, where it all went down. The bedroom where Mary and William died. Joining me is my cameraman, Armand, because as everyone knows, you can’t use a Ouija board by yourself. Say hi to the people, Armand!”
He turned to the camera and waved his fingers shyly, then turned back to the board.
“Okay Armand, put your fingers on the planchette.”
They both put both their hands on the planchette, knuckles brushing. Mary leaned over and put her hand between the two of them, touching the sides of both of their hands. Her hand felt cold and tingly, like peppermint. Daniel shivered a little bit, shook himself, and put on his host mask once again.
“Now, Mary, can you tell us, once and for all, what happened that fateful night?”
Mary pushed the planchette along the board, and Daniel spelled out each letter.
“A-C-C-I-D-E-N-T. Accident. I got that, Mary. But can you tell me, what about the letter?”
Mary mumbled under her breath as she spelled out her next word.
“H-E-F-E-L-T-G-U-I – wait, it's stopped.”
“This is tedious,” Mary said sharply, eyes flashing at Armand. “ You can just tell him.”
“Maybe there was….a disruption in the spirit plane,” Armand suggested.
“Wait, no, it's going again! A-R-M-A –”
Armand panicked and pushed the planchette away, towards the Y.
“I could feel you push that, man,” Daniel said, annoyed. “Why would you do that?”
“Sorry. I won't do it again,” Armand said in a small voice.
“Okay, let's try again, huh, Mary? Let's see, S-E-E-G-H-O-”
Armand pulled his hands away as if he'd been burned, and stood so quickly that he knocked over a chair that was behind where he had been sitting.
“Armand, what the heck?”
“I-I need to, I can't-”
“Is she trying to tell me you can see ghosts?”
Armand turned to face Daniel. His eyes were huge and wounded. He didn't know what to say, couldn't say anything. He felt a gnawing pit in his stomach opening up. Swallowing him whole.
ooooo
“Armand, do you see ghosts?” Daniel asked again.
“Ghosts aren't real!” Armand snapped.
“Well, what the fuck is going on with you?” he yelled back. Armand flinched, and Daniel took a slow deep breath and forced his shoulders to relax. “Babe, I love you. Something's wrong, and I want to help. You gotta let me in.”
Armand hugged his arms around himself and looked down at his feet. That was fine, Armand could try to give him the silent treatment. Daniel could wait him out.
Finally, in a small voice, Armand admitted, “Yes. I can see ghosts. I've been able to my whole life.”
Daniel wanted to ask a million questions. What the fuck, ghosts were real and his boyfriend could see them??!!?! But Armand was braced as if expecting to be hit, so Daniel made himself calm down and focus on his boyfriend. There would be time for questions later.
“Why didn't you ever tell me?” he asked softly.
“I didn't want you to think I was crazy.”
“Oh, baby, no. Of course I think you're crazy, but it doesn't have anything to do with ghosts.”
That got a small, wet chuckle out of Armand. Daniel pumped his fist in his mind.
“This doesn't change anything between us, babe.”
Armand turned his puppy dog stare on Daniel and asked hopefully, disbelievingly, “Really?”
Daniel pulled his boyfriend into his arms and kissed the top of his head. “I promise.”
After a moment of cuddling, Daniel noticed Armand glancing over his shoulder.
“Is she – is Mary here right now?”
Armand nodded.
“What was she trying to tell us?”
He pulled himself out of Daniel's arms and took a deep breath before launching into his explanation.
“It was an accident. Her husband brought home the wrong bottle from work, and they didn't know until after she had taken the pills and it was too late. William was consumed by guilt and grief. He blamed himself. That's why he said he killed her in his note, not because it was murder. Then, he took the pills himself because he couldn't bear to be without his beloved wife. Mary has been here since, trying to clear her husband's name.”
“That makes a lot of sense, actually. We have to tell her story.”
“How? We can't exactly just say that Mary's ghost told us.”
“I think I have an idea.”
“We're back at the scene of the crime for one final attempt to have Mary tell us what really happened here all those years ago,” Daniel said into the camera on the tripod in front of him. He turned to Armand, sitting on a chair next to him with big headphones over his ears. “Armand is here to help me with something called the Estes method. Armand, can you hear me?”
Armand stared straight ahead. Of course, he could hear Daniel, but it was easy to pretend otherwise.
“Armand is wearing noise canceling headphones hooked up to the spirit box. I'll be asking questions that he can't hear, and he'll interpret the answers from the spirit box. This way, the answers we're expecting to hear won't bias what we interpret from the spirit box.
“Alright, let's get started.” Daniel leaned over and pretended to turn on the spirit box. Armand would be giving him the answers straight from Mary instead.
“Mary, you know the drill. Say one of our names if you're here and want to talk.”
Armand sat quietly for a moment, then said, “I think I heard Molloy?”
“Going formal for this last session. Alright, I can work with that. Mrs. Hazlett, you've made it really clear that it wasn't a murder, it was an accide–”
“Accident,” Armand interrupted. That was a nice touch, make it sound like he didn't know he was talking over Daniel.
“Yes, but if it was an accident, why would your husband confess to your murder?”
Armand sat quiet again until he said, “Thank.” They had agreed that Armand would pepper in some unrelated words to make the session seem less on the nose. That must be what thank was.
“Oh, you're wel–”
“Guilt. Sad. Distort.”
“I think I get it now. Your husband was so guilty about what he had done by accident, he needed to confess his guilt. Is that right?”
“I think it said yes?”
“Why did Mr. Hazlett take the pills after you?”
“It said sad again.” Armand sat still for a moment before continuing, “Apart.”
“So William didn't want to be apart fro–”
“Thread.”
“Ah, he couldn't stand to see the threads of fate tying you together severed.”
Daniel saw Armand twitch. He was probably trying to keep in his laughter over Daniel's melodrama.
“Is there anything else you need to tell us?”
Armand turned his head to the side, looking away from Daniel, then jerked his head back front. He must have looked over at Mary.
“Treasure forever.”
Oh, that made something in Daniel's chest twinge. “You two will treasure each other forever?”
“Daniel. Armand.” Armand turned to Daniel, eyes wide. He was a pretty good actor “Those were pretty clear. I'm certain it said both of our names.”
“You're saying… we should treasure each other forever?”
“Time. Love.”
“I guess that's a good note to leave it on, huh?” Daniel said. He thought he managed to keep the tremble out of his voice. “Mary is leaving us with the most valuable advice there is–”
“Bucket.”
“Okay, Armand, we're done.” He gestured to Armand to take off his headphones. Once he had, he started again.
“Mary is leaving us with the most valuable advice there is: treasure your loved ones. Hold each other close. You never know how much time you'll have together. I'm Daniel Molloy, and this has been Voices from Beyond.”
When they had turned off the camera and packed away the equipment, Daniel couldn’t stand not knowing for another second longer.
“What exactly did Mary say at the end there?”
Armand looked at the empty spot next to him and smiled, hesitant but soft.
“She said that she recognized the love she shared with William in us. She told us to take care of and treasure each other always.”
“Wow.”
“She also says thank you.”
Daniel looked over to the empty space that Armand had been looking towards.
“You're welcome, Mary. I want to be able to tell people's stories, and yours deserved to be told. I'm glad Armand could help me tell it right.”
“Can we go home now, Daniel? I'm exhausted.”
Daniel was exhausted, too, and it was still an hour long drive home, but he was ready to be back in their own bed, without a ghost watching over his shoulder. After tonight, they needed some alone time.
“Yeah babe, let's go.”
“....I'm Daniel Molloy, and you've been watching Voices from Beyond.”
Lestat spun around in his chair with a huge grin on his face.
“This one has one hundred thousand views in under a day! The people love you, Daniel!”
Daniel bowed his head modestly and bumped his shoulder against Armand's.
“I've gotta give credit to my secret weapon over here. Couldn't have done it without my partner.”
Armand fought against the instinct to hide his blush behind his hands, standing tall.
“Daniel is who the people love. And we think that you should give him his own show, where he can decide what to do.”
Lestat beamed at the two of them. “But of course! Our channel's subscriber count has exploded since we added you in to the network! The fans cannot get enough Daniel Molloy. Whatever you want, Daniel.”
Daniel couldn't believe how a stupid ghost hunt had changed his life. Armand was finally opening up about his childhood, he had figured out how to contact Daniel's Grandma Betty and say goodbye (he was still reeling over that one), and three people had asked for his autograph over the last week! He hadn't managed to convince Armand to go to therapy yet, but they were working on it. Voices from Beyond gave him more than he ever could have imagined possible, and now it was going to give him the opportunity to work towards his dream career.
“So I was thinking I could do an interview series….”