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Chapter Text

The Sandsburough House. Orangeburg, South Carolina . In the 1800s it was the sight of the Boden Mansion, a prestigious family who allowed it to be turned into a field hospital during the Civil War. From 1861 to 1865, the mansion found it’s polished floors soaked in the memories of injured soldiers who lost their lives fighting for their beliefs. During this time, Joseph Boden’s wife, Abigail, contracted yellow fever while helping the nurses tend to the wounded and passed soon after. In 1870, the Boden’s two youngest died in a carriage accident. Heartbroken after the loss of his family, Joseph Boden left the Mansion, never to return. In 1902, the house was purchased by a couple in hopes of turning the aging building into a boarding school, but only a few short years after the school was opened, the building burned down in a mysterious fire, killing three children and five of the household staff. The lot remained vacant for many years, until in the 1920s a townhouse was build on the bones of what was once the Boden Mansion. The house changed hands many times, converting into a Bed and Breakfast that saw the suicide of twenty-two year old Sarah Jones, the fiancée of a soldier who lost his life in World War Two, and the death of forty-eight year old Steve Roberts, who had his throat slit by a disgruntled poker player who had lost his money to Roberts in a game. 

In 1973, the house was purchased by Zane and Nathan Sandsburough, a homosexual couple who, despite the dark history of the house and the land it was built on, decided it was a place they could begin their own family, away from the shadows of those who frowned upon their relationship. After two years in the house, the men adopted eight year old August and her eleven month old brother Jamie, siblings orphaned when their father was killed in the Vietnam War and their mother, wrought with grief over the loss of her husband, committed suicide by throwing herself in front of a train. The family lived and grew in the house, ignoring the ridicule and hardships they undoubtedly faced due to their lifestyle. Then, the house saw its final, and most abominable tragedy. On a summer night in 1978, a group of radicals from a local church broke into the Sandsburough house, proceeding to shoot and then lynch Zane Sandsburough, stringing him from the large oak tree in their front yard with the word Faggot carved into his chest. Nathan Sandsburough was castrated before being tied to a pole and burned alive just feet from where his lover’s body hung. Jamie and August Sandsburough were killed in their beds and the words “Better they be angels in Heaven than suffer the sins of their fathers” written in Zane Sandsburough’s blood on their bedroom walls. 

The current owners of the Sandsburough house, Matthew and Diane Reines, are aware of their house’s dark past, and report seeing shadowy figures in the first floor parlor, the sounds of horses out toward the back of the property, and even children playing hide and seek in the upstairs bedrooms. They’ve agreed to talk with us, so the Ghost Adventures Crew will be traveling to South Carolina to investigate these claims of the paranormal hauntings. Could these be the ghosts of past tragedies seen by this cursed land? Could the children said to be seen and heard playing be the lost souls of Jamie and August Sandsburough or the three children lost in the boarding school fire? Or is it possible something more sinister lurks in the shadows… 

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I was standin’ at the upstairs window, starin’ out over the browning lawn when I felt a tug on my nightgown. “Auggie my head hurts…” I looked down to see Jamie next to me, pressed into my side, big brown eyes squinted up at me as he rubbed at his forehead, blond locks sticking up in a million different directions. I smiled, pushing them back from his pale forehead. “I know, Jamie. It’s okay, it’ll be over in a second.” Jamie had been lucky, they’d taken care of him first. Used a pillow and everything all proper like. If it weren’t for the blue tinge on his lips you’d’a never knowed. Unconsciously I raised my hand to scratch at my chest, fingers catching at the edge of the small penny size hole in my nightgown, fabric stiff with blood. I’d not been so lucky. I’d woken up. I’d fought back. I’d seen Pop and Naddy in the front yard. If I closed my eyes right there I could still see them. Pop was swingin’ just like the little tire he’d made for us and Naddy was lookin’ like one of them sparklers Mista Henry brought for us on New Year. Thinking of Mista Henry made me sad. Made me think of Pop and Naddy and how they was always there to greet me when the bus came home from school, Jamie sittin’ high on Pop’s shoulders with just the biggest grin… On Sundays we’d go to church, Pop sayin’ that we wasn’t gonna grow up to be urchins not knowing the Good Lord and all. Some good the Lord done us… 

I blinked open dry eyes, pulling myself from my memories to crouch down next to my little brother. Past was past, no point in tryin’ to change it. Least we’re together and all, and we still gots us our friends and we still have our Sunday lessons and all, even though the church we used to go to got blown away years and years ago. I looked into those big brown eyes, eyes that never really knew what was goin’ on. What we was. “Remember the trick Pop taught us, Jamie? Ya jus’ close your eyes real tight like and blow out your ears!” I watched the little boy scrunch his eyes tight, cheeks puffed out like he’d stuffed them with cookies again, and I had to stop a giggle. That memory was a good one. It was middla June and Old Missus Jenny from across the road had brought over chocolate chip cookies and lemonade. Naddy had told us only one because we’d ruin our supper but as soon as he’d gone out back to help Pop in the backyard Jamie had stuffed as many cookies as he could fit into his mouth. He’d gone to bed early with no supper and a bad tummy ache. “All better now?” I asked when Jamie opened his eyes again, breath leaving him in a loud pfft . “All better,” he told me, smiling to show off the missing tooth the Tooth Fairy had brought him a silver dollar for. All too soon, though, the smile was fading. “I miss them, Auggie. When do you think they’re coming back?” I pulled the little boy closer, insides aching. “I don’t know, Mini Bean. I jus’ don’ know…”

 We hadn’t seen Pop or Naddy since the night it all went bad, and nobody could tell us where they’da gone to. When they got me, it had hurt. A lot. Everything had gone all dark and fuzzy and when I’d woken up, my body was on the floor and Jamie was standin’ next to me, his little body still tucked into bed like he was still asleep, the pillow they used to end his life laying on the floor, Big Bird and Cookie Monster staring up at us in mock cheerfulness, but Naddy and Pop had never showed. We’d watched the firemen come, then the ambulances and the police. They took away Naddy and Pop and me and Jamie, all wrapped up in big white bags. I held Jamie close, made sure he wouldn’t see as the people in black came back with the police and took pictures of the house, washed away the writing on the wall and I thanked every angel up in Heaven that Jamie couldn’t read good just yet. I didn’t want him seeing what those people we went to church with, those people we sat with in the pews on Sundays with, the people who cheered when I joined the preacher in the pool when I was eleven years old and I wanted Jesus in my heart just like everyone else. I didn’t want him to see the hate in their hearts, just because Pop and Naddy loved each other instead of loving women. 

It was after the police stopped coming and the people in black stopped taking pictures that we finally saw them. We’d saw the children sometimes, Jamie would talk to them, or we’d hear them trying to play with our toys in the middle of the night when we was supposed to be sleeping, but when the house finally went all quiet and still again, we saw the others. First it was Miss Fennel. She was a tiny little lady maybe the age of my Sunday teacher with her dark hair pulled in a bun and a poofy grey dress with one of those white aprons I always saw in my studies book about how maids and such used to dress. She came first, pulling us into a hug and telling us that it was all gonna be okay, that we wasn’t alone and she was gonna make sure we wasn’t lonely. It was her and Miss Berkley and Missus Rosenberg who sat us down and told us that we wasn’t alive no more, that no one was gonna be able to see us, and that we was just waiting for the angels to come with their big pretty light and take us to to Heaven with them. The angels had already come and took Elijah, one of the little boys who died when the Misses had died. He said he saw his granny and then he was gone to Heaven with her. 

After that we slowly learned about the others, but we didn’t see much of them ‘sept on occasion. There was Missus Abigail, she was real nice, reminded me of the pastor’s wife, all regal in her pretty dress and the way she talked, but she always seemed either sad or really busy, runnin’ around talkin’ ‘bout the soldiers all sick and where the nurses were, and then she’d just up and disappear to nowhere. Miss Berkley, who was a big plump lady who looked like one of Aurora’s fairy godmothers, the blue one with the attitude. She was my favorite fairy. Miss Berkley said Missus Abigail was from an old time, the Civil War, just like we’d been learning about in school. She said the house we was in had been a mansion and that Missus Abigail and her family had taken in injured soldiers and that Mista Robert Lee himself had stayed the night one night. She said Missus Abigail likes to sleep most of the time, that the fever worn her out, and when she ain’t sleepin’ she’s out by the woods with her children. Pops never let us out near the woods, said there was bears out there and he didn’t want us getting ate. We saw the soldiers she was talkin’ about too. Most of them didn’t talk back and she called ‘em shadows, like memories, the parts of them that stayed and repeated over and over. They’d come into the living room or the kitchen, and I’d run and take Jamie somewhere else because I didn’t want him seeing all that. 

There was always blood when the soldiers came. They was black men and white men, all wearing those grey uniforms like from my history book. Some was missing limbs, others was clutching bandages around their heads or bellies and some was just laying there moaning. I even saw one who was missin’ his legs and he kept telling the Shadow Nurse near him that his foot itched. I’da laughed weren’t for the sad look on his face, all confused like, like when Jamie saw a dog outside and wanted to run pet it but the dog ran away. Like Jamie couldn’t understand why he couldn’t pet the dog, the man couldn’t understand why he couldn’t itch his foot. The Miss Ladies told us to leave them, there was nothin’ we could do for them anyways. Some of the soldiers, though, some of the soldiers were like us, they wasn’t shadows. Most of them stayed to themselves, they shared flasks on the front porch, or they watched the shadows of their brothers as they writhed in pain in the kitchen. Lota them seemed stuck in their heads, they’d look at me and Jamie and mumble “war ain’t no place for chilgen…” and then they’d go back to starin’ at nothin’. 

There had been two other kids besides Jamie and me, they died in the fire that took Miss Fennel, Miss Berkley, and Missus Rosenberg, but the angels had come and took them away some years back. Couldn’t tell when, time goes all funny when you’re dead, but the angels had come for them. They brought Josiah his baby sister he lost to influenza when she was five, and they brought Mary her Grandma. Miss Fennel went with them too. She weren’t so sure at first, she didn’t wanna leave me and Jamie, but the angels brought her the fiancé she lost to an accident. Me and Missus assured her we’d be okay, she should go with the angels, and she left with a smile on her face. It weren’t long after they left that the house got bought. The new owner was nice enough, little older but not as old as Missus Jenny, and she turned it into one of those little hotels like what we stayed at when Naddy and Pop took us to the beach one Christmas. She never really bothered us, and we didn’t bother her ‘cuz Pop always taught us you don’t mess with people who don’t deserve it, but then the pretty blonde woman with the sad eyes came to stay. She still swings in the upstairs bathroom sometimes, just back and forth like she’s on a swing set, her head at a funny angle and one hand to her tummy. I knew what had happened, even when Miss Berkley didn’t want me to, but I made sure Jamie never did. 

Mista Steve stayed in the attic playing cards with some of the soldiers. I didn’t really like him, he was scary looking and had crazy eyes, and it was only worse with the blood all down his front and the way it would kinda gurgle when he laughed, showing his hand to the soldiers. Missus Rosenberg banned us from going to the attic. 

“Children, it’s time for lesson!” I turned to see Miss Berkley standin’ in the door, hands tucked into her kinda singed apron. “Sunday lesson in the parlour, you two! Now scoot!” Miss Berkley always taught us Sunday lesson, said it’d keep us all properlike and “break you of that bumpkin way of speaking you picked up from those soldiers”. She said we needed to speak proper, like we had education. She said Pop and Naddy wouldn’t appreciate it if we let slip our proper English just ‘cuz we were around old century soldiers more often than we were around people who knew how to talk. I took Jamie’s hand and followed her down to the living room, waving at Corporal Worston as we passed. He had a big bandage around his head and one arm in a sling, and I’d heard some of the others joke that he was the “Corporeal Corporal”, and had had to borrow the dictionary someone had left on the soggy bookshelf to look up what the word meant. I liked Corporal Worston, he was always friendly to us, telling us stories of what it was like growing up in Mississippi before the war. He was the oldest in his family and had just turned eighteen when the war started. 

We jumped the broken step, fifth from the top that had always been squeaky and Pop kept asking Naddy when he was gonna get someone to fix it, but I think they secretly liked it ‘cuz it would let them know if one of us was tryin’ to sneak downstairs. It had been the one that woke me up the night it all went bad… I pushed those thoughts away angrily, tightening my grip on Jamie’s little hand. No, those was bad thoughts about bad people long since gone to Hell, and I knew that’s where they went ‘cuz we learned in Sunday church that God says ‘thou shall not kill’ and Jesus had said ‘let the little children come to me for they shall inherit the earth’ and Jesus and God don’t like when kids get hurt and people break His rules. Those people who broke into our house and hurt our family, they got what God had comin’ to them. 

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We had our Sunday lesson, Miss Berkley reading to us from an old bible she’d pulled from deep in her skirts. We learned about Peter and how he could walk on water when he just had faith that Jesus would keep him standing. “See children, when we keep our eyes on our Lord, He will keep us standing even in the storms. When we stray is when we start to sink, but He will still be there to pick us back up again and He will always make sure to keep our heads above the water.” We bowed our heads and said our prayers after that, and then she took us outside to play for a little while. As I sat on the wooden swing someone had hung from the big oak and watched Jamie chasing butterflies, I thought about the story Miss Berkley had read. Jesus had stepped out on the water with Peter and had made sure he didn’t drown. Last summer Mista Henry had invited us over to go swim in his pond for the Fourth of July. The pond had these big wooden posts that Mista Henry said had once been part of a dock that a hurricane took, and I was walkin’ along them just like I was walkin’ on water too. 

Pop was on the shore with Naddy and Jamie, and I’d heard him tell me to stop and get off, but I was havin’ too much fun pretendin’ I was dancin’ on the water and I didn’t listen. I was way out, farther than I’d ever swam when I’d stepped on a wobbly one. I tried to catch my balance, but the post was slippery and before I knew it I was in the water tryin’ to see. I was panicking ‘cuz I couldn’t feel the bottom and I couldn’t climb back onto the posts and in my mind all manner of sea monster was under the water waiting to wrap its slimy tentacles around my ankle and pull me down, down, down and nobody would ever find me, there’d just be my skinny bones picked clean and lying on the bottom of that pond forever. And then a hand was grabbing my arm, pulling me up to the daylight and I was in Pop’s arms as he swam us back to where Naddy and Jamie were waiting. He didn’t scold me, didn’t yell at me. He let me calm down, asked if I was okay, and I promised I’d never ever do that again, I’d listen when he told me not to do something. I was like Peter. I hadn’t listened and I’d lost my ability to float, and Pop had come and saved me. 

Fingers playing with the age fuzzy rope of the swing, toes digging into the grass under me, I turned my eyes to the deep blue sky. “Lord,” I said softly, not wanting to bother Miss Berkley and Jamie, “please send us Pop and Naddy. Lord, it’s been so long, it’s like we is--are trapped in the desert wandering for our years with no hope of the promised land. Please, Lord, it’s been forty years and while I’m thankful you left people to take care of us and keep us company during this time, we really miss Pop and Naddy. Please send them back to us. Amen.” As I finished my prayer, I felt a soft breeze catch my hair and send it curling around the swing ropes. A moment later, Missus Rosenberg came rushing from back of the house and over to us. “Miss Berkley! Bring August and Jamie inside! The owners are coming, and they have guests!”

Chapter Text

Zak Bagans stared up at the modest two story building before them. Sandsburough House. A lot of history surrounded this house and the land it was built on. Aaron Goodwin stood across from him, camera panning in their surroundings before focusing back on the dark haired man. Next to Zak stood Nick Groff, camera trained on the current owners, Matthew and Diane Reines. The Reineses bought the house roughly two years ago in hopes of restoring it and making it livable again. The previous owners lost the house to foreclosure back in the late 90s, and since then the building has been ravaged by a decade of squatters and hurricanes. The Reinses so far have rebuilt the outer walls and had started on the reconstruction on the lower floors. It is down here they say they receive the most activity. Knowing Aaron had the camera trained on his back and Nick was ready with the other angle, he turned and addressed the couple. “So what kinds of activities have the two of you encountered while trying to renovate?” 

Diane shared a look with her husband before turning back to the investigator. “It started out with just odd noises, doors closing elsewhere in the house, and tools moving from where they’d been left on the counter all the way onto the back porch. At first we didn’t think much of it, you know? Just thought it was an old damaged house making all the groans associated with it--” Zak took that moment to just ease in an interruption. “But what about the tools? I mean, a drill or something moving all the way from the counter in the kitchen to the back porch? That’s a pretty big move for something just maybe being misplaced…” Matthew chuckled, wrapping an arm around his wife’s shoulder. “We had some crew members working on the renovations with us, and for a little while we just assumed maybe they were moving them around and just forgetting, someone borrowing a power saw or sledgehammer for another project.”

“So what made you change your mind?” Zak noted the way Diane’s eyes shifted toward the old wooden rope swing he’d noted hanging from the oak tree in the front yard. When they’d pulled up he’d noticed it swinging lightly, but at the time had brushed it off as momentum from a breeze. But judging by the way Diane Reines looked at it, he suspected there may have been more than just a breeze to put that swing in motion. Interesting… “The place is haunted,” she finally said, giving him her full attention with one of the most serious looks he’d ever seen on someone’s face during an interview. “We got a call one evening from one of our contractors. We’d been out here earlier in the day, but I’d had an appointment so we’d left him and his crew to their work. It was probably about, what, six that evening? Yeah, about six and he gives us a call and he’s panicking. He’d been working in the back of the house when he heard running feet upstairs. We hadn’t done a lot of work up there just yet because the stairs were a bit questionable at the time, and he was supposed to be alone in the house so he figured maybe it was an animal that had gotten in or something, but then he heard the sound of children giggling. He told us that when he went to investigate, he saw these two little kids, a boy and a girl running down the stairs and into the kitchen. He followed, thinking maybe they were neighborhood kids who’d snuck in for a little fun and he followed after them, but the kitchen was empty except for this huge puddle on the floor.” Diane paused, visibly shaken. “Was it a water puddle?” Zak prompted gently. “Like maybe a burst pipe or something?” He was met with a determined headshake. “No, it was blood. It was a puddle of blood maybe three to four feet in diameter, like someone had bled out right there in the middle of the kitchen.”

Zak turned to Nick, seeing a matching look of shock on the younger man’s face. “You’re saying that your contractor followed two children into the kitchen where he found no sign of them, but a blood pool with no source?” Matthew nodded. “That’s right. After he called we rushed down here soon as we could, and the three of us did a complete sweep of the house and could find no signs of the kids he saw, but the puddle was still there. We went ahead and sent him home, told him we’d completely understand if he wanted to quit but he said no, he’d stay on the project, but he said he’d never be here alone again, and he and his crew would not stay past four.” 

“What about the kids?” Aaron asked from behind his camera. Zak nodded, grateful for the other man for bringing it up. “That’s right. When we first talked the two of you said you were familiar with the history of this house, all the tragedies that plagued it…” 

Diane nodded. “We believe the children our contractor saw that day were August and Jamie Sandsburough. We’ve heard from neighbors that they’ll sometimes hear children laughing, or see them through some of the windows, and we’ve seen them a few times ourselves.” Zak nodded, turning to face Aaron’s camera. “Eyewitness reports, people. Eyewitnesses to the ghosts of August and Jamie Sandsburough, the two little kids who were executed in their sleep while their gay dads were murdered on the front lawn just feet from where we are standing right now.”

He paused for dramatic effect before turning back to the Reinses. “Do you want to see where they died?” Diane asked, motioning toward the slightly overgrown lawn. Zak nodded. “Hell yes! You actually know the exact spots that Zane and Nathan Sandsburough died?” The woman nodded, leading the three investigators out toward the tree. “I remember hearing about the murders back then. I was just a kid, but it was on the news when I got home from school and I can remember my parents talking about it. My dad had actually kept a copy of the paper. When we bought the property, I dug it out from some old boxes and we actually found the exact places that Zane and Nathan were killed.” She led them to the tree first, pointing up to the branch where the old swing was hanging from. “Right there, that’s where they hanged Zane Sandsburough.” Zak stepped close, bringing Nick to focus the camera on the tree branch because he was the tallest of them. “Oh, wow,” Zak muttered, eyes fixed on the point between the fraying, lichen covered knots, a strange sense of familiarity curling in the pit of his belly. “Is it just me, or does it look like the branch is kind of scarred right there? Like the bark is just a bit deformed… Like the tree itself is making sure nobody ever forgets what happened.” 

He tore his gaze away from the deformed portion of bark, an odd feeling of loss washing through him but was gone as soon as it had appeared. Zak brushed it off as just residual. A great tragedy had happened here, it was only natural for that feeling to linger around. Diane was watching him with an unreadable expression, almost unsettling. “Has anyone ever seen his spirit around here? Maybe hanging from this very tree?” She shook her head. “No, no one has ever reported seeing Zane or Nathan around here. Speaking of Nathan, he died right over here,” she motioned them to follow and came to stop at a simple paving stone not even three yards from the tree. “We put the stone here because later, when the house is all restored, we want to do a little memorial thing for them, and this way it’s marked out for the future.” Cameras trained on his back, Zak squatted, one hand stretched out to rest on the cool paving stone. “Nathan Sandsburough was burned alive right here, in this very spot. It’s hard to believe, you know? We always think of the Witch trials and ancient history when we think of people being burned alive, but this was just over forty years ago. A group of religious people killed this family all because they were homosexuals living in a time period where it was considered a sin…” 

Looking up, he found his gaze landing on Nick, who was standing opposite him, camera focused down. The younger man looked pale, face wet in the afternoon light filtering in through the clouds. He looked in a trance, eyes focused on where Zak’s hand still rested against the stone marker. The Vegas native could only wonder what was going through his head. “Nick, man, you okay?” When the younger man didn’t respond, he tried again, worry pinching the back of his throat. “Nick?” Brown eyes blinked once, twice, before focusing on the crouched man. “Huh?” The New Englander looked confused, like he briefly had forgotten where he was and how he’d gotten there. “You okay man?” Zak tried again, making a mental note to ask the Reinses about possessions in the history of this place. The last thing they needed was a repeat of the Moon River Brewery. “Yeah, yeah I’m fine. Just… Zane Sandsburough had ‘faggot’ carved into his chest. A faggot is a bundle of sticks typically used to start a fire, and his partner was burned to death. The irony just kind of hits you hard, you know…?” 

Zak stood, taking a step closer to the younger man, wanting to reach out and offer him some form of comfort, but it wouldn’t have been appropriate, not with cameras, and not in front of the Reinses. Offering Nick a minute to regain his bearings, he turned to Matthew Reines. “You think we could go inside the house now?” The older man nodded, leading them up the front porch. Aaron followed close, camera on them, but Zak lingered back a little, wanting to make sure Nick was really okay. It would do none of them any good if his head wasn’t in the right place when they went in for the lockdown tonight. Especially if there was the chance that something more demonic was going on in this house. “Nick, you sure you’re okay?” he asked, voice pitched low to keep it from carrying across the lawn to where Aaron waited with the Reinses, getting a little more background on the house for use as filler later if necessary. Nick nodded, fingers fiddling with the eye scope of his camera. “Yeah, yeah I’m alright. I’m all me.” He offered Zak a smile. “It’s just something about this place, makes me feel almost like… I don’t know, like I’ve been here before? Like deja vu I guess. I’m good though. Come on, I wanna see inside this house.” Zak nodded, falling into step beside the other man. He knew how Nick felt. There was something about this place… 

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They started in the kitchen where the Reinses contractor had seen that blood pool. “This is where it was,” Diane said, standing in the middle of the kitchen space. Most of the kitchen was done, cabinets replaced with dark stained ones and a nice granite countertop, but the walls were still covered in large patches of white spackle and there were holes where new appliances and the kitchen sink would eventually go. “That was about a year ago, but it’s happened a few more times since, someone would come in, or we’d come back in the morning and there’d be blood all over the floor, sometimes there’d be handprints on the wall or the counters.” Zak took in the walls, noticing the spots where it looked like it had been scrubbed a little harder, or the pink tinge to a spot they just had to paint or spackle over. “What do you think it is?” 

“We think it’s the Civil War soldiers. Before the house was built here, it had been a Mansion for a very prominent family who opened it as a field hospital during the Civil War. A lot of soldiers passed through the front door and are still here. Matthew and I were here making lists of what we still needed. We were up on the second floor when we heard boots downstairs. We thought maybe one of the workers were here and didn’t think much of it, but then we heard talking, like two men bickering. I stuck my head out, and when I looked down the stairs I saw these two men in Confederate uniforms, but I could only see them from the shoulders up. One of the carpenters reported seeing one in the kitchen. He thought it was one of the crew until he got close and realized the man was missing a leg. Then he actually saw a nurse come in through the back door to speak to the soldier.”

“Wait,” Zak interrupted, straightening from where he’d been leaning against the countertop. “You’re saying the carpenter actually saw two full body apparitions interacting with one another? Here in the kitchen?” Diane nodded. “We think that back when this place was the Mansion this area was the parlour, and it had been converted into a makeshift ER. When the mansion burned down and the first Bed and Breakfast was built here, we think the kitchen was probably built over that part of the foundation.” Zak nodded, turning to Aaron. “Go ahead and mark right here in the doorway. We’ll put an X-Cam here tonight to see if we can catch another apparition. Where else have you seen a lot of activity?” The latter was directed back to the Reinses, who led them up to the second floor with a warning to watch for the broken step. The first room they came to was the hall bathroom, situated almost directly at the top of the stares. “This is the bathroom where Sarah Jones hanged herself back in the forties. We’ve actually seen her shadow a few times, hanging from the shower curtain rod. Sometimes the tarps will flutter a little, even when the window is closed.” 

There were orders for another X to be placed, and then they were moving again, this time to the modest bedroom near the end of the hall. The former room of Jamie and August Sandsburough. “So this is where they died…” Zak took in the room, mind’s eye placing where the beds would be, where August would work on her homework in front of the window while Jamie played with his wooden builder blocks. The image in his mind was so clear that for a moment, it felt to Zak that he was actually there, standing in the doorway while he watched the children at work and play, relaxed in the knowledge that they were safe and loved. My kids… Zak felt his heart stop at the thought. Where had that come from? If this place was already getting to him, it was going to be a long, emotional night. Diane nodded, motioning to the wall adjacent to the window. “This is where they died, and that’s the wall where they’d written “ better they be angels in Heaven than suffer the sins of their fathers ” in Zane Sandsburough’s blood. The previous owners had painted the walls when they lived here, though, so I don’t think you’ll be able to take a blacklight and see the actual writing,” Zak did an exaggerated snapping of the fingers like ‘ah gosh darn it!’ for the camera, “but we’ve definitely had a lot of activity here.”

“What kind of activity have you experienced?” 

“Well, they like to play hide and seek. We’ll hear them running around, giggling, doors will open and close. A couple workmen have been grabbed, like a child was hiding behind them to get away from whoever was chasing them. I’ve actually had my hand held a few times. We’ve also heard children and horses out near the property line, we think it might be the Boden children who were killed in a carriage accident. So yeah, there is a lot of activity in this house, and we figured maybe you guys could maybe put at ease some of these spirits.” 

Zak turned to his partners. It sounded to him like maybe a lot of this was stirred up by the new construction, shaking up the energies and reawakening the ghosts who’d lived and died here. The place was so old, and had changed hands so many times that there was definitely history, and there was something more. He couldn’t explain it, but he could feel it in his bones. They had to continue with this lockdown. Looking over to Nick, he could tell the younger man felt it too just by the way he stood, the way he stared out the bedroom window like he could look all the way back to the past. Maybe they’d get some good footage for the network. Maybe they could find out the reason August and Jamie Sandsburough were still here. “Guys? I think we’ve got ourselves a lockdown.”

Chapter Text

The procession of black cars were just pullin’ up into the drive when Missus Rosenberg ushered us into the house. We’d gotten used to people like this showin’ up, what with the activities and all and the history of our house. They called themselves “paranormal investigators”, which sounded like somethin’ outta House of Usher or Rosemary’s Baby. (Pops and Naddy had been watching ‘em on late night when me and Jamie was supposed to be asleep, but I’d sneaked down to the stairs to watch some.) They was kinda funny when they came, always talkin’ to us, had these flashy devices and little recorders like spies always had for recordin’ secret conversations. They talked to us, tried to get us to talk back. Some of the soldiers would talk back to them, but Miss Berkley always told us not to talk to them unless we was talked to first. They usually didn’t ask us to talk much, they’d just bring toys for us to play with, sometimes they even left the toys. We was allowed to play with the toys if we wanted, some were funner than others. One time one of the “investigators” brought a puppet. Scariest thing I ever saw, I didn’t let Jamie go anywhere near it. It had those big painted eyes and a big red smile like a carnival clown, but somethin’ ‘bout it didn’t feel right. I was mad they brought it into the house, and the peoples left mad ‘cuz they got nothin’ from me or Jamie all night, just a couple soldiers and Mista Steve messin’ with them. 

We all knew what to do by now when visitors came. If they was nice we left them alone, but if they wasn’t, if they was here for trouble, then we made sure they never came back. Most of the soldiers were kinda stuck in their heads most of the time anyway, and they wasn’t really all there when they was. They went kinda fuzzy around the edges, and sometimes they was gone all together. I asked Worston once where they went, I asked him ‘cuz I knew if I asked Miss Berkley or Missus Rosenberg they’d just say “now don’t you worry your head about things like that. These soldiers are just old, and what happens to them is nothing you need to be worrying about”. I wasn’t a baby, I was a teenager. I knew about stuff like death and the afterlife even before they came and killed my family. I saw a kid at my school get taken away in handcuffs because he was black and had backtalked a teacher who’d all but called him the ‘N’ word. I loved Miss and Missus for takin’ care of Jamie and me, but I didn’ need babying like he did. 

“We’re made of energy,” Worston had told me. We’d gone to the back porch ‘cuz there was a scene goin’ on in the livin’ room and Miss Berkley had taken Jamie upstairs. “When we get older, like me and the other soldiers, we run outta energy faster, like the battery dyin’ in the radio. When there ain’t energy to pull from, or when we just get kinda tired of being around, we disappear. We call it a pocket place, like a place between places. We can’t go nowhere ‘cuz we’re stuck here, but we can go to the pocket place and it lets us rest, lets us kinda save our energy, then when we wanna or need’ta come back, we can.” I’d nodded, followin’ him for the most part. I’d felt it too, the sleepiness. Like I was tryin’ to stay awake late at night even though it was way past my bedtime. “Why are we stuck?” I’d asked next. I’d heard the phrase from others who came to see the house and try and get us to talk, but their explanations to each other never made a lotta sense to me. I didn’t really feel stuck, but I knew I wasn’t in Heaven ‘cuz I’d see momma and dad and Jesus and them. I didn’t like to think we was in Hell neither, I’d tried to be good and follow the Good Lord’s rules, and Jamie was much too young to be goin’ to Hell. The worst he’d done was fib about brushin’ his teeth one mornin’ ‘cuz we was havin’ Naddy’s pancakes and then goin’ to the beach and he was excited to go.

“Some people think we’s stuck ‘cuz we don’t kno we’s dead,” Worston had said after a minute, fixin’ the hat on his head. “I don’t think that’s true. I think we all know we’s dead. I think we’s all here ‘cuz we don’t got anybody waitin’ for us, or we’s got unfinished business from when we’s was livin’. Somethin’ keepin’ us here until it’s taken care of.” He’d paused after that, leanin’ back against the wall and scratchin’ at his chest, just under where the sling was. “I also heard that some o’ us is stuck here ‘cuz of how we died. It was like one minute we was up and walkin’ ‘round livin’ life, then the next we’s dead, standin’ over our bodies with no time to come to terms that we is dyin’, our lives are just over. I hear those ‘vestigators who come talk’n ‘bout ‘traumatic deaths’, and I think that’s why people like you and your brother, and the Miss are still here. Y’all didn’ die normal. She lost it in a fire and you and your brother was murdered.”

“Why do you think you’s still here?” I asked him. He just smiled. I loved his smile, reminded me of the old photos I’d seen of Pop back when he was a boy in school, back before he met Naddy and they fell in love. “Me? I’m here ‘cuz I left stuff unfinished. I never got to tell my mama I loved her one more time, I never got to marry the girl I left back in Mississippi, and I watch over you two. Y’all need a barrier between the Miss and the soldiers, and that’s me. I know I’ll see my mama and my girl on the other side of those pearly gates, but who’s gonna watch for you and your brother? Tell y’all the God’s honest truth when Miss B insists on sugarcoating everything.”

“So we’s the reason you’re still here?” The idea that it was me an’ Jamie keepin’ him from his family made my belly twist, like I was gonna be sick or I’d just lied big to Pop and Naddy. Worston shook his head, cap nearly fallin’ off his dark head. “No! No! Nothin’ like that. Honest truth, I’m a little scared the Good Lord won’t let me back through those gates when I finally get there. I killed people. I wasn’t there for a long time, and it weren’t many, but in the end a life is a life, and I can only hope He forgives me ‘cuz at the time I believed I was doin’ it for the right reasons.”

I’d learned a lot from Worston that day, and I decided on somethin’. We wasn’t here ‘cuz of ‘traumatic death’ like them investigators said. Sure, I was shot and the last thing I saw was my dads in a way no kid should see their parents, but Jamie hadn’t. They’d used a pillow all proper and he never even knew. There was no trauma with his death, and it wasn’t that he didn’t know he was dead, that was the first thing we’d talked about with the Misses. No, I think we’s here with unfinished business. We never found Pop and Naddy, and nobody knows where they’da gone to. I think our business is to find them. I just didn’t know how. 

I thought about this as I headed upstairs. I always hid in Naddy’s and Pop’s room when the people came. ‘Least at first. Sometimes I went down to see them better, watch the soldiers mess with them a little. Sometimes Mista Steve would pause his game to mess with them too. Only his wasn’t funny like. His was mean. I’d saw him push one of ‘em down the stairs once, and he was laughin’ the whole time. Naddy and Pop’s room was up front, and I could see all the way out to the road from their window. I watched the cars stop and the people get out. There was five of them, a woman and four men. I recognized Mista Matthew and Missus Diane, the people who bought our house from the bank. I liked them, they was always friendly, explainin’ that first day that they was gonna restore the house, not try to change it or tear it down, and that they was gonna have people in to help, but that none of them was gonna hurt us on purpose. I didn’t know the big man with the fancy camera and the big beard, but the two men he’d come with looked familiar. One was short with dark hair and dressed all in back, and the other was tall and skinny with really short hair and what Missus Jenny called “scruff”. They looked familiar. 

I squinted to see better, reflection in the window scrunching up before disappearin’ as I leaned closer, tryin’ to see better. The shorter man was staring up at the house, round face takin’ it in with the look of awe they all seemed to have when they came here. The tall skinny one was standin’ next to him, also lookin’ up at the house even when the fancy camera he also carried was pointed at Mista Matthew and Missus Diane. It couldn’t be… could it? As the two men moved just a little closer to each other, it hit me, and I’da screamed if I coulda. They looked a little different, but there was no denyin’ it. Pop and Naddy were standin’ out on the front lawn. 

______________________

I told Jamie we was gonna play a game of hide and seek and that he had to go find Worston and get him to help him hide, maybe go play in the back. I didn’t want him seein’ the new people just yet. Not till I was a hundred percent sure it was Pop and Naddy out there. If I was right, we’d go from there. If not, I didn’t want him getting his hopes up. There had been a lot of times early on where every time that front door opened he’d just light up and wanna rush down stairs screamin’ “POP! NADDY!” at the top of his little lungs, only for his face to completely fall like someone had just said Christmas and his birthday had both been canceled forever. No, I had to play detective first. Just like Nancy Drew. 

I watched them talk for a long while, then Missus Diane led them to the big oak tree, and I watched the short one and the tall one look at it for a good long time. Then they went to the little stone Missus Diane had put where Naddy burned like a sparkler. She’d ‘splained that when all the fix’n to the house was done, she was gonna make it a memorial, so that nobody’d ever forget them. I watched the one that looked like Naddy crouch, put his hand on it, and I felt somethin’ warm in my belly, like I’d just drunk a big cup of Missus Jenny’s hot cocoa at Christmas time. It only made me hope harder that I was right, and that these men was somehow Pop and Naddy reincarnated. When I saw them headin’ for the house, Missus Diane and Mista Matthew walkin’ ahead with the big man with the beard, I saw the short one stay back. The tall one who looked like Pop was standin’ kinda wobbly, and I could tell from where I was that he didn’t look too good, like somethin’ was wrong. I watched the way the short one hesitated, like he wanted to reach out, but he didn’t and then they was walkin’. I headed downstairs to get a better look.

I followed them through the house, watched the way the familiar ones interacted with the house. I could tell Missus Diane probably knew I was there. Her eyes would shift like she was tryin’ to find me even as she was talkin’ about the interactions she and the workers had had with the other in the house. I learned that the big man’s name was Aaron, and that the tall skinny one was named Nick and the short one was Zak. Even if they hadn’t been familiar, I think I woulda liked them. They seemed nice, they respected the house, seemed really interested in all us still here and our stories. They talked about spending the night, bringing equipment to come back and try and talk to us. I liked that idea. More time to study them, see if they really was Pop and Naddy or if they was just look-alikes. 

When we went upstairs, I kept an eye out for Jamie, but it seemed he was well and completely distracted. They went by the bathroom where Miss Sarah was swingin’ gently, kinda flickerin’ in and out. I could tell they didn’t know she was there, but they talked about puttin’ another camera to try and see her when they came back and then Mista Aaron put another big black X in tape on the floor like he’d done down in the kitchen. Then they was in the hall and I was havin’ to hide on the stairs to get outta the way ‘fore I could follow them back down the hall and to mine and Jamie’s room. Soon as Mista Zak and Mista Nick stepped into the room, they got this look on their face, like the way the soldiers did when they was rememberin’ stuff from long time gone. “So this is where they died…” Mista Zak’s voice sounded sad. He was lookin’ ‘round the mostly empty room, takin’ in the peeling paint and holes and everything time had done to our house. When we’d lived here, the walls had been a pretty green like the springtime leaves on our tree, but they’d been painted a bunch of times and now was a faded, moldy shade of yellow. 

I watched Mista Zak close, watched his blue eyes (same color as Naddy’s had been) travel the room, marking where our beds had been, where my homework desk had been, where Jamie had used to play with his toys. He watched like he knew our room, like he’d been there before. That thought made hope rise up inside me. If I was right, then this was Naddy’s soul. This was the reason we never found them. Mista Zak’s eyes looked wet when he blinked and turned back to Missus Diane, the look of familiar gone. She started tellin’ them ‘bout the writing on the wall. I covered my ears so I wouldn’ have to listen. I didn’t like havin’ to hear it over and over. I wish I could just forget what they’d done to my family, the words they’d written in Pop’s blood, but it was all burned into my memory. No matter how many layers of paint people put on those walls, I’d always see those words. I watched Mista Zak snap his fingers when Missus Diane told them they couldn’t take a blacklight and see the words themselves, and it made me wanna laugh. Mista Zak was funny, it was like he knew and wanted to make everything happy again. 

Missus Diane went on tellin’ them ‘bout the games she’d heard me and Jamie up to. Normally we’s tried to keep it kinda quiet when there was people around, but we knew Mista Matthew and Missus Diane didn’ mind much that we played a little loud, long as we didn’t break nothin’. It used ta be real bad back when Mary, Josiah, and Elijah was still here. They was young, not really as young as Jamie, but still young, and they didn’t really know they was dead. They knew there was somethin’ different, that they wasn’t like other kids, but they didn’t really knows they was dead. When they was still here, they’d play a lot at all hours, even when there was people livin’ here. They liked to play with people’s stuff, too. Once there was a pretty lady livin’ here with lotsa pretty jewelry, and Mary would decide it was alright to play dress up with her stuff even after Miss Fennel told her not to. The Pretty Lady would always gripe and complain whenever she couldn’t find somethin’ ‘cuz Mary hadn’t put it back right. She blamed the housekeeper who worked for them, a lovely hispanic woman who would always leave us little treats before she left for the day. Pretty Lady didn’ believe we was still here though, she thought that the housekeeper was nuts and draggin’ all her “Mexican Wish-wash” into her house. 

Missus Diane was finishin’ tellin’ the investigators about the different encounters they’d had in the house, and I watched Mista Zak look at the men he came with. Mista Aaron was still lookin’ at him all excited like a giant puppy, but Mista Nick was lookin’ out the window with one of them ‘far away’ looks on his face. Like he was rememberin’ somethin’. I know Mista Zak and Missus Diane caught the look too, but they didn’t say nothin’ about it. Instead Mista Zak turned to the camera and said “Guys? I think we’ve got ourselves a lockdown.” After that he started makin’ arrangements with Mista Matthew about their “lockdown”. They’d come back at six that evenin’ and Mista Matthew would lock them in for the night and come back for them at six the next morning. They’d use the hours here to “gather evidence” about who all is still here, try and find proof to show the nonbelievers. The idea of them coming back made me wanna jump up and down in excitement. They was gonna come back! I’d get to watch them a little more! Gather my own evidence to see if it supported my hypothesis! 

Mista Matthew walked them back downstairs, but Missus Diane stayed, eyes shiftin’ around the room like she was waitin’ on something. She didn’t have to wait long. Soon as we heard the front door close, she was reachin’ into her pocket and pullin’ out a piece of paper. “August, sweetie, I know you’re here. We need to talk, so can you make a noise for me so I know you’re listening?” Curious now, I stepped further into the room and knocked lightly on the wall, the sound echoin’ in the room. That was a trick one of the soldiers had taught me. If you gather your energy, like you’re gettin’ ready to jump real high or hit a ball that’s comin’ your way, then you can make stuff move, or knock on stuff enough to get a sound out. Missus Diane turned toward my general direction and held out the paper for me to see. It was a kinda fuzzy picture of all of us, the one they put in the paper after we died. “I know why you’re following us around, August. Mister Bagans and Mister Groff do look a lot like your dads. I bet you’re thinking that they’re your dads reincarnated, don’t you, sweetheart…” 

Uh oh , I thought. I’m in trouble now… It wasn’t the first time she’d called us out on somethin’, some of the soldiers would get a little rowdy and if Mista Steve had a game that wasn’t goin’ too good he could sure kick up a mess, but it was the first time she’d called out me. “I think you might be right, sweetie,” Missus Diane continued, startlin’ me outta my thoughts so bad I almost missed what she said next. “See, sweetie, these men who came today, they’ve got a TV show where they go to places where ghosts are said to be for a living and they gather proof that they’re real and they’re there. Mister Mathew and I watch it a lot, and there’s a special connection between Mister Nick and Mister Zak. We were watching it one night when I realized there was something familiar about them. So I went to the library and I found the newspaper from when y’all were killed and I found this picture. I think this is why you and your brother are stuck here, August, and that’s why I called them. I want to help you, August. I want to help you and your brother find peace.”

My eyes burned. Nobody had ever been this nice to me. She thought like I thought, that this just might be my Naddy and my Pop and we stand a chance of bein’ a family again! I couldn’t help it. I ran over and threw my arms around her tiny waist, feelin’ her shiver at my touch. “It’s okay, sweetheart,” she continued, hands kinda awkwardly hoverin’ over my back. Realizin’ I was makin’ her feel uncomfortable I stepped back, rubbin’ at my eyes furiously. “August, honey, I want you to be careful, though. Matters of the heart are tricky, especially if your two daddys’ souls are buried deep in the souls of these men. Just, be patient, alright? It may take a little time to put the right wheels in motion. And August, I’d like you to do me a favor. If you and your brother leave, whether the two of you cross over or you attach to those men and leave with them, I’d like you to leave me a little sign. Can you do that? Just leave me a little sign so I know you’re safe, sweetie.” I nodded, even though I knew she couldn’t see me. Missus Diane’s cheeks were wet and she was wipin’ at them with her sleeve. “You be a good girl, sweetie. Watch out for your brother, and I wish you the best of luck finding your peace.” 

I took another step forward, close to Missus Diane. I leaned in and gave her a soft kiss to the cheek, jus’ like I was taught. “Thank you, Missus Diane,” I whispered in her ear, and watched the tears streak her pretty face. “Oh honey…” her voice went all broken at the end, and then she was hurryin’ out the room and down the stairs. I would be forever grateful for Missus Diane and her husband for everything they’d done for us the past few years, but now it was time for me to step up. I was tired of bein’ stuck, of lettin’ the memories of Pop and Naddy grow more and more faded. It was time to do somethin’ about it. Takin’ a deep breath, I sat down on an old stool someone had left and started plannin’.

Chapter Text

Diane’s eyes were still red when she reached the front porch, her husband still chatting idly with the paranormal investigators, answering questions and just making general smalltalk. Diane had talked to him in the car and asked if, when all was said and done, he’d walk them out. She had something she needed to take care of. As she closed the door behind her and he took in her red, puffy eyes and the remnants of tears clinging to the underside of her chin, he felt concern heating him from the inside out. None of the ghosts in the house had ever been outwardly violent toward them, save maybe the odd occasion with whomever inhabited the attic--a location he’d made sure to note to the investigators--but he couldn’t help but wonder if something had happened up in the Children’s Room. “Everything alright?” he whispered to her as she came to a stop at his side, the three investigators chatting to each other about other places they may but cameras or a person and hadn’t noted her return. She nodded, wiping at her face once more with a tearstained sleeve. “Yeah, yes I’m fine. I just had to have a little chat with August about something. It’s alright.”

The dark haired one named Zak looked up, offering Diane a large smile, and the woman felt a pang of sadness deep in her heart. He looked so much like the pictures she’d found of Nathan Sandsburough. When they’d found out the house they were buying as a fixer-upper was the Sandsburough house, she’d done all the research she could, finding every news article and encounter story related to it, anything she could find on the family who’d lived there. She’d learned that Nathan Sandsburough had been a college graduate with a degree in Psychology and Social Working, and that Zane Priors-Sandsburough was studying Art History. They’d met at the birthday party of a mutual friend and had instantly hit it off. Within the year they’d exchanged rings and moved in together. Two years later, Nathan was called to handle the case of August Masters and her little brother Jamie. 

Robert Masters and his wife Valerie had been high school sweethearts and married right after graduation. They had August a year later. When drafted to help fight in the Vietnam War several years later, Robert Masters joined the U.S. Army. Not long after he left for deployment, Valerie found out she was pregnant. Just two months after Jamie Masters was born, Robert Masters was killed in a Guerrilla attack. Overcome with grief over the loss of her husband, Valerie Masters slowly began to lose it, and just days after August Masters’ eighth birthday, she threw herself in front of an oncoming subway train. The moment Nathan Sandsburough had laid eyes on eight year old August, sitting in the child welfare office with her little brother swaddled on her lap, he’d been gone. Arrangements were made the next day for the two children to be moved to South Carolina with him. 

Diane’s heart had broken for the poor children, losing both biological parents in such a short period of time, and then to finally have a loving family for several years, only for that to be ripped apart as well by hatred and lack of understanding. The idea that those two children might still be bound to this earth, and the house that held so many memories both good and bad had metaphorically sealed the deal for Diane. The house was full of so much history, and had they not bought it she shuddered to think what may have happened. She’d read about what could happen to spirits when the item they were attached to was destroyed. Many were lost, never to find peace, and she couldn’t let that happen to August and Jamie. 

It had actually been chance that they stumbled across the Ghost Adventures show. Matthew had been flipping through channels and come to a stop on an episode, and so much of what the family they were interviewing was going through reminded them of what they encountered at the Sandsburough house that they’d decided to give it a try. They were hooked within minutes. Diane was embarrassed to admit that it had actually only been about eight months ago that she’d made the connection between Zak Bagans and Nick Groff, and Nathan and Zane Sandsburough. When she’d told Matthew, he’d understandably looked at her like she’d lost her mind, but in the end agreed to see if they’d be willing to come and take a look at the place. “Now don’t go gettin’ your hopes up,” he’d warned her after sending off the email. “They probably get hundreds of these a day, and a lot of them probably come from bigger places than just a little house with a past in the booneys of South Carolina.” She’d let him be skeptical, secretly watching their inbox in the following weeks, sure that if her hunch about the show’s creators was right, they’d get an email back. And sure enough, a month after they’d sent out the offer, there was an email in their inbox signed The GAC. 

Now, watching the young men interact with one another just during this generic interview, she could see it. There was a connection between Nick and Zak that went farther than just friends, even if it wasn’t directly obvious to others. But there was definitely something there, something that didn’t happen when either of them interacted with Aaron, though it was clear all three of them were indeed close. It was in the eyes, the way they’d look at one another when the other wasn’t watching. It made Diane all the more sure that her suspicions had been correct, and she wished August the best of luck. 

“Alright,” Zak spoke up, pulling Diane back to the present and away from her thoughts. “We’re going to head out, try and gather a little more background footage for later and then hit the hotel to get our equipment set up, but we’ll see you back here at six so you can lock us in?” Matthew nodded. “Sounds about right, Mister Bagans. Now y’all sure you wanna do this? It’s not too late to back out now…” Diane was about to elbow her husband in the ribcage for the implications when Nick Groff spoke up, a smile that mirrored Zak’s on his own slender face. “Yes, sir. We’re sure. You’ve got a place with a lot of history here, and we’d love the chance to explore it’s unseen side too, maybe help put a few of these spirits to rest while we’re at it.” Oh yes, Diane thought as she shook each of their hands and watched the three men pile back into their car, there is a lot of history here, a history you’re about to find yourself engulfed in. Good luck, Zane Sandsburough, there’s a little girl in this house who’s waited a very long time to see you.

As the car backed out of the drive, Zak Bagans studied the front facade one more time, eyes drawn to the upstairs window. As he watched, a small hand pulled back the tattered curtain briefly before letting it fall back in place, like it had never been disturbed to begin with.

______________________

Nick had been silent since they’d left the Sandsburough House that morning. After they’d said goodbye to the Reinses, they’d driven back into town and to the local museum where the curator had agreed to talk to them about the history of the property they were about to be investigating. The curator was able to show them around the museum, explaining to them how the Boden Mansion had been built by Joseph Boden as a wedding present for his wife, and how it had been his wife’s idea to open the bottom floor parlour to injured soldiers. They were shown photos from the time, both of Joseph Boden and his family as well as the makeshift infirmary. There were old relics like guns and bullets and trinkets from when the family lived there, as well as the obituary articles from the deaths of Abigail Boden and their youngest children. 

The history lesson continued with how the mansion was purchased by the Williamses, who hoped to turn it into a co-ed boarding school, something that was practically unheard of at the time, only for it to burn down only a few years after it opened. “It’s my belief that that fire was no accident,” the curator had told them. “I believe it was something dark, something left over from all that death the house saw back during the Civil War. That much blood and pain, it’s bound to bring up something…” The curator had gone on to talk about how the property had been eventually bought and a modest two story built upon it, but the family moved out after only a few years. “The story goes that the family was constantly hearing noises, like footsteps in the halls and on the stairs, voices in empty rooms, sometimes there’d be gunshots in the yard, it just drove them nuts, and they sold the house.” 

The property changed hands many times over the next few decades, until in the mid-1940s it was purchased by an older woman who planned on turning it into a bed and breakfast for people traveling through on business. The idea worked for several years, nobody staying long enough for the restless spirits to drive them away, until the night Sarah Jones and Steve Roberts checked in, and never checked out. Sarah Jones was a twenty-two year old young woman from Virginia, who’d been engaged to a young man named Dylan. After the bombing of Pearl Harbor, Dylan had enlisted, leaving behind his fiancée to go fight. He died in a German Air Raid not three months after that, and his distraught fiancée made her way down to South Carolina. 

While they listened to the curator’s recounting of the tragic tale of Sarah Jones, Nick had studied the small photo hanging up on the wall. A petite young woman with long auburn hair and a bright smile was wrapped in the arms of a handsome young man with a buzzcut and wearing the green fatigues of that time period, obviously Dylan. She looked so happy in that moment, it was hard to believe that just a few months later she’d travel nearly four hundred miles to check into a tiny Bed and Breakfast with the plan to end her life there. “The coroner at the time had done an autopsy at the parents wishes,” the curator continued, drawing back Nick’s attention. “They’d suspected maybe she’d been taking some form of drug, unable to comprehend how their daughter could have taken her own life when she’d always seemed so cheerful. Depression wasn’t really well known back in those days, and there just ain’t fixing a broken heart. Anyway when the coroner started, he discovered that she was several months pregnant at the time of her death. Not quite far enough along to show, but she definitely would have known.”

The same night Sarah Jones checked in, a man by the name of Steve Roberts had come back from a night of gambling, leaving the game much wealthier than he had arrived. He‘d made his way up to his attic room and gone to sleep, his winnings sitting on the nightstand. Very late that night, probably around midnight or later, one of the men who’d been at the poker game and lost all his money to Roberts broke into the B&B, made his way up the room Roberts was sleeping in, and slit his throat before taking the money and running. He was never caught. “Oh wow,” Zak had said, eyeing the photo in the yellowed newspaper describing the events that had transpired that night. It showed a photo of the forty-eight year old victim, a large white man with bushy beard and a steely look in his eyes. “So you’re saying there’s a murdered gambler in the Sandsburough house too?”

The curator had nodded, motioning them a little further down to where a slightly blurred photo of a family had been blown up to poster size, small placards describing the different people situated underneath it, along with a glass case showing off small toys and a worn, purple leather journal with a rusty lock in the shape of a heart. Nick had found himself drawn to the photograph, taking in the people. The time stamp at the bottom showed it to be just months before they died, the four of them out in front of the big oak tree. August Sandsburough was standing in front wearing a pale blue sundress, her light brown hair pulled back in braids. A little boy who could only be Jamie stood next to her, clutching her hand in his with a huge grin showing a missing tooth on his face. He was dressed in blue shorts and a white button down shirt and matched with the shorter of the two Sandsburough men, whom the placard labeled as Nathan Sandsburough, the one who was burned at a stake like a Catholic Heretic. Nathan was short with dark hair brushed back and an easy going smile on his face. He had one hand on August’s shoulder, and the other wrapped around the tall, slender man at his side. Zane Sandsburough. His hair was close cropped, not unlike Nick kept his hair, and his smile was a little shyer but no less warm. He wore a pale blue short sleeved button down and a pair of white pants, and his free hand was buried in Jamie’s pale blond hair. There was something familiar about the two men, something Nick was unable to put his finger on, like a half finished memory just escaping him. 

Zak had questioned the curator a little more about what kinds of experiences people had had in the house, and the curator had not disappointed. “Oh yeah, we get lots of people come through wanting to get a look at the house. Most of the locals know to leave it be. We’ll get people try and bring stuff like toys for the kids, playing cards, cigarettes, you name it they’ve tried bringing it to leave at the house. Anyone who's lived there can tell you there are ghosts. Just passing by the house on a sunny day and you could see the children playing in the yard with one of the housekeepers. You’ll get singing, you’ll get talking, I’ve heard full blown conversations going on like between a nurse and one of the soldiers. If you boys are getting locked in for the night, you’re in for one hell of a time. I will warn you, though. If you go to the attic, don’t go provoking Steve Roberts. He was a mean sonofabitch in life, and his spirit just got meaner.” 

The three had thanked the curator for his information and left, heading back to their hotel to catch a nap and make sure all their equipment was ready for that night. While Zak had joined Aaron in his room to look over the equipment, Nick had returned to the room he’d be sharing with Zak to try and sleep. He couldn’t seem to be able to make his brain shut off, though. Every time he closed his eyes, he could see an image, almost like a memory clear as day. He was standing in a lush green field, warm spring breeze carrying with it the scent of jasmine and something Nick could only describe as nature. Several yards in front of him, a young girl with wild light brown hair ran from a little boy whose hair was the color of cornsilk, keeping her pace just slow enough for the child’s short legs. The children’s delighted shrieks echoed through the air as they ran in circles, until the girl seemingly tripped, going down in a tangle of skinny limbs and yellow floral sundress under the childish heft of the little boy who’d been chasing her. “Got you, Auggie!” he cried, stubby fingers digging into his big sister’s ribs until her screams were causing the birds to take flight.

“Pop help!” She cried out between gasps and snorts, and somehow Nick knew she was talking to him, but he didn’t move, too content to watch the siblings rolling around in the grass. He felt a chuckle bubble up out of his throat as he watched the little boy flop down on his sister’s chest, hair in disarray with bits of grass tangled in it. Tilting her head back, she smiled up at Nick, blue eyes scrunched against the sun. Nick felt a presence behind him right before a firm arm snuck it’s way around his waist. He looked over to see Zak standing next to him, looking younger and more at peace than he’d seen the older man in a long time. Gone was the hair gel and gothic black clothing he often favored for investigations, both because it stood out well under night vision and also because it added that layer of stereotype to the job, much the way you imagine a Psychic Medium to wear headscarves and lots of costume jewelry. Instead Zak was dressed in a pale green polo that complimented his eyes and a pair of tan cotton pants. His hair was finger combed back away from his face and he was smiling gently at the two kids still flopped out in exhaustion. Evidently feeling Nick’s eyes on him, he turned that smile to the taller man, and Nick felt a warmth settle deep in his bones, like he was well and truly home… 

There was a hand on his shoulder, shaking him gently. “Nick, Nick! You awake, buddy?” He blinked his eyes open, brain taking a long moment to orient as his gaze took in the room. Confusion. Where was he? He was just in the glade behind the house, watching the kids playing… Finding the arm on his shoulder, he followed it up, up, past the edge of the tattoo and the black t-shirt to the familiar face of its owner. Nathan , Nathan was here, that was good… wait, no not Nathan. Nathan never wore black… The man with Nathan’s face frowned, brows scrunching in a way that was so familiar, but so foreign. “Nick? You okay buddy? You were sleeping pretty hard and I wouldn’t wake you, but we’re about ready to head back for the lockdown. You okay?” Zak, this was Zak, and he was Nick. What the hell? Nick blinked a few more times, brain clearing with each as he sat up, feeling a loss as Zak’s hand fell from his shoulder. He was in his hotel room, they were getting ready for a lockdown. So why had he… 

Realizing Zak was still waiting on an answer, the crease between his brows deepening with each passing second, Nick tried to muster up a grin for the other man, not really sure if it had worked or not. “Yeah, yeah I’m good. Let me just wash my face real fast, try to wake up a little more. Sorry, man, I must have crashed harder than I thought.” The frown on Zak’s face lessened slightly, but the older man still didn’t look completely convinced. “Yeah, man, no problem. Just, you sure you’re okay? I mean, Aaron and I could probably handle this investigation on our own if you need to just stay here…” The idea of not going back to the Sandsburough house sent an irrational pang of anxiety through Nick and he quickly shook his head. “No, no I’m fine. Just give me, like, two minutes, I’ll meet you guys downstairs.” Leaving the dark haired man in the bedroom, Nick all but bolted for the bathroom, shutting the door tight behind him before turning on the sink faucet, leaning his weight against the countertop as he stared at himself in the mirror. 

Jeez, no wonder Zak had looked worried , he thought to himself. He looked pale, eyes blown wide like he’d just seen a ghost (pun not intended). The last few dregs of the dream still lingered, sending confusion bubbling through him. It had been so real, like he’d actually been there in that field watching August and Jamie play. When she’d called him Pop, he’d felt the swell of love and pride deep in his chest, and then Zak had been there and it was like everything was complete, the puzzle was all put together and everything. When he’d woken up, he’d genuinely had no clue where he was, but he’d known everything was going to be okay because the man he loved was there, only that was the problem. He wasn’t Zane Sandsburough, and Zak wasn’t Nathan, so why had he thought he was? And while yes, he did love Zak, it was in a brotherly way, built on years of the two of them knowing and working together. So why had he felt something more when he’d seen Zak over him on the bed?

Deciding now was not the time to be dealing with this dream analysis, Nick quickly splashed cold water on his face, rubbing at it with a towel until his cheeks were pink and he looked less like a startled goat and more like a human being. Tossing the towel aside, he checked that his clothes weren’t too wrinkly after being slept in (they weren’t) and then he was pulling open the bathroom door, heading down stairs to meet the others. Time to get this show on the road!

______________________

The soft click of the lock echoed briefly in the stillness, the three men left staring at each other as the crunch of Matthew Reines’ retreating footsteps faded. After what felt like hours, Zak finally spoke up. “Alright, Aaron, why don’t you go ahead and set up the X-Cameras in the bathroom and the kitchen, then head on to the attic and see if you can contact Steve Roberts. Nick, you see if you can contact anyone in the living room, see if any of the soldiers are feeling talkative. I’ll take the children’s room…” The men nodded, Aaron grumbling good naturedly about being the one stuck up in the attic with the vengeful dead gambler but taking up the tripods and cameras and beginning setup before all the light completely vanished. As his footsteps sounded on the squeaky staircase, Zak turned to Nick, watching the younger man fiddle with the strap on his handheld. He had to admit to himself that he was worried about the younger man. He’d been strangely quiet ever since that morning, and it had taken Zak a good ten minutes to wake him earlier. 

Breathing deep through his nose, he walked over to the cameraman, drawing his attention with a light hand to the arm. “Hey, Nick, you okay?” The New Englander looked up, brown eyes meeting Zak’s with a cocked brow. “Yeah, why wouldn’t I be?” Zak shrugged, still not removing his hand. It felt natural, and Nick had yet to make a move to dislodge him. “You just seem kind of distracted today. Ever since this morning you’ve just been really quiet. You sure there’s nothing wrong?” Nick nodded, offering him a smile, the kind that just quirked up at the corner of his mouth and always made Zak think he was up to something. “Yeah, Zak. I’m okay. There’s just something about this house, it’s kinda had me in my head all day.” The older man nodded, content for now with the answers he was given. He understood. There was something about this place, something almost familiar. It could definitely draw you into your own head if you weren’t careful. 

Leaving Nick with a parting squeeze to the arm, Zak turned and made his way up the creaking stairs, skipping the fifth from the top with the practiced ease of one used to jumping missing or questionable stairs before slowly making his way down the hall and toward the children’s room. He could hear Aaron above him, trying to get the ghosts believed to haunt the attic to respond and had to wonder if he was having any luck. Zak gave it an hour and then he’d call everyone back down and change locations, see if different people got different reactions. The moment he stepped into the room, he could tell there was a presence. He dug his digital recorder out of his pocket. “Hello?” he called out, starting to rove slowly around the room. “Are there any children here? Are there any children from the boarding school?” Coming to a stop near the window, he played back the recording to see if something came through. 

“ Hello?..... Are there any children here?..... Are there any children from the boarding school?....” 

“...gone…” 

Zak nearly dropped the recorder as what sounded like the voice of a young girl came through the device. He hit record again. “Gone? Gone where?”

“....Crossed over….” This time Zak could swear the voice was coming from right beside him and he quickly spun in the direction he’d heard it coming from, but as expected there was nothing there. He’d set up his camera on a tripod before coming in, and he knew he’d have to check it for any anomalies, but before he could do much else, there was a very human scream and then Aaron was thudding his way down from the attic. Zak stuck the recorder in his pocket, messages temporarily forgotten as he went to check on the other man. “Aaron, man, what happened?” The bearded man was out of breath, one hand clutched to his chest and the other still holding his camcorder. Zak could hear Nick below them, slowly making his way through the dark in the direction of the stairs. When it had fallen so dark, Zak didn’t know. “I was just doing some EVP up there, trying to get someone to respond. All I was getting was static, man, and then something just, like, grabs my neck, man, and I could swear I heard laughing.”

By that time Nick had made it upstairs, catching the last of Aaron’s recount of what happened to him up in the attic. “You serious?” He asked from behind his camera, eyes shining wide in the light from the screen. Aaron nodded, finally able to straighten and take a full breath. “They were right, man. They were right. Whatever’s up there in the attic, be it Steve Roberts or something else, it ain’t friendly.” The three fell into a brief silence, then Zak recalled the recorder in his pocket. “Guys, you gotta listen to this.” Ushering the men back into the children’s room, he pulled it out and let it play through. 

“ Hello?..... Are there any children here?..... Are there any children from the boarding school?....” 

“...gone…” 

“ Gone? Gone where? ”

“....Crossed over….” 

He watched their faces as the recording played through. When the first response came through, Aaron gasped loudly, an expletive escaping him that Zak knew they’d have to beep out later, and Nick’s eyes went wide. “Dude,” he whispered when the recording ended, “this was an actual intelligent response. That sounded like a kid … You don’t think…” Zak nodded, knowing exactly where the younger man’s train of thought was taking him. “I think it might have been August Sandsburough. Not only does it sound female, but I just got this, this feeling… it’s hard to explain. But I think she’s here right now, in this room.” The three men glanced around the room as if searching for the slightest hint that the thirteen year old was in the room with them. 

“Aaron, pull out the spirit box. If she is here, maybe we can get her to talk with us some more.” The bearded man nodded, pulling out the miniature white noise machine and turning it on, the small space filling with the sputtering putputputput the device gave off. Nick was also readying the SLS Camera to help them see if anyone did show up. “Hello?” Zak called out over the white noise. “August? Are you with us? Can you come talk to us, sweetie?” For several long minutes there was nothing but white noise, then a sudden childish cry came from the static. “... Daddy!...”

______________________

I followed the one they called Zak up the stairs. I felt a little bad for Mista Aaron, he was goin’ up to the attic where Mista Steve was. Mista Steve did’n like peoples comin’ in when he was tryin’ta play. ‘Specially when they came askin’ questions. I kept quiet on the stairs, makin’ sure not to let them squeak when they wasn’t supposed to. He climbed the stairs real easy, and I couldn’t tell if it was ‘cuz he did it lots, or if it was a bit of my Naddy comin’ out to remember that stair was squeaky an’ he didn’t wanna wake me or Jamie. When we got to our room, I watched him set up one of them fancy cameras on the three legged stand before walkin’ out to the middle of the room. I watched him him shiver like he was cold, then he was diggin’ one of them little devices that looked kinda like a phone outta his pocket and holdin’ it out. 

“Hello?” he started, makin’ his way around the room. I stepped into a corner to get out of the way. “Are there any children here? Any children from the boarding school?” A little part of me was sad. Lots who came came askin’ about all the children here. They asked about me an’ Jamie, sure, but I think what got most peoples who came was that me an’ Jamie supposedly had Pop and Naddy, that we was okay, but them children from the school? They ain’t got nobody. They was too young to even know what was goin’ on, they didn’ know they was dead for a long time. But now they was gone, and Mista Zak needed to know ‘fore he spent any more of the night tryin’ ta find’em. Takin’ a deep breath, I stepped toward the little device. “They’re gone,” I said, glad when my voice didn’t crack. 

Mista Zak came to a stop near the window, just feet from where I stood. If I’da been brave enough I coulda reached out and touched him, but I didn’. For the first time, it hit me. What if I was wrong? What if this wasn’t Naddy and Pop, it was just a coupla nice men who looked like ‘em? What if Naddy and Pop was gone, and Jamie and I was stuck here because God didn’t want us? I shook my head. No. God still loved us, he gave us people to take care of us, and he sent these people, these people who had our Pop and Naddy’s souls in them. I saw him with Mista Nick downstairs, saw the way he was touchin’ him. It was just like Pop used’ta do to Naddy when somethin’ was goin’ wrong. I knew it in my heart it was them. 

I watched Mista Zak walk around a little more in the quiet room, heard Mista Aaron walkin’ around in the attic,  and then the man with my Naddy’s soul stopped, right by the window where I did my homework at my little wooden desk. He pressed a button on the little recorder and the quiet room was filled with his voice, tinny and funny soundin’ through the little speakers, like when someone comes in over the radio. I heard his voice askin’ his questions, and then there was a pause before my answer came through. It was weird hearin’ my voice through the recordin’. I’d done it before, back when Pop and Naddy would wanna make home movies, or the time my teacher recorded our school play, but I ain’t heard my voice in a recordin’ since we died. It was all quiet like, like I’d whispered it instead of talkin’ aloud, but you could hear it, and most of it sounded the way it should. 

Mista Zak almost dropped the little recorder device, and I laughed. It felt good to laugh again. “Gone?” he asked the little device, “gone where?” He was close, real close. He’d gotten excited when he heard my voice on the little ‘corder and had come real close to my little corner, but his back was to me an’ I could see the tips of somethin’ black on his back, like a tattoo. Mista Henry’d had tattoos, but Pop and Naddy never had. I leaned in close, like I was gonna talk to the back of his head. “They crossed over,” I said, and watched him jump and spin around, eyes searchin’ all over like he was lookin’ for somethin’. His mouth was openin’ and closin’ like a fish, but before he could say somethin’ like I could tell he wanted to, there was a scream from upstairs and then runnin’ footsteps. Mista Aaron musta met Mista Steve , I thought. Leavin’ Mista Zak to find out what Mista Steve did this time, I made my way nice and quiet downstairs and toward the back where Miss Berkley was watchin’ Jamie. I hadn’t wanted him to see Mista Zak and Mista Nick jus’ yet. 

Jamie was playin’ with a little stuffed bear someone had brought for us. It had gotten old, an’ it’s fur was turnin’ kinda green in places, but Jamie loved it, had named it Winnie like Winnie the Pooh an’ always curled up with it to nap. “Hi Auggie!” he greeted when I stepped into what used to be our little playroom/ Pop and Naddy’s office. I smiled, crouchin’ next to him. “Hi, Mini Bean. What are you and Mista Winnie up to?” Jamie held out the bear in his stubby little hands. “We’s on a ‘venture to look for Piglet. The pirates tooked him so’s we gotta go find him!” I nodded along all serious like. “Well that does sound like an important mission. You sure you and Mista Winnie are up to it? I hear Pirates be nasty business, ‘specially when they be takin’ little pink piggies…” I heard Miss Berkley huff out a laugh from where she sat in an old rocker. Jamie’s face got scrunchy like he was thinkin’ hard. “I think we could take ’em, Auggie. Pirates ain’t so tough against a Tigger.”

I watched Jamie play for a long while, ears listenin’ for any sound that the men upstairs had started movin’, but the only things I heard was some soldiers in the livin’ room. I wondered if any of them had talked to Mista Nick while he was down here. “Auggie?” Jamie asked, tuggin’ on my nightgown. I turned to him. “What is it, Mini Bean?” 

“Who are those men in our house?” I shoulda known Jamie was gonna ask about them. “They’re ‘vestigators, like the ones who came and left you Winnie. They’re here ‘cuz they wanna talk to us, get proof so they can show others.” 

“Oh,” Jamie said, lookin’ down at Winnie an’ playin’ with one of his fraying ears. “Do I gotta talk to them?” I shook my head. “No, Mini Bean, you don’t gotta talk to them if you don’t wanna.” Jamie nodded firmly, like he’d just been told he was the new president and it was up to him to save the world from the alien invaders. “August, child,” I looked up at Miss Berkley. “Yes, ma’am?” Her soft face was pulled in a frown like she was worried ‘bout something. “Child, I heard a scream from up there. Is everything okay?” I nodded. “Yes, ma’am. Mista Aaron went up to the attic to try an’ talk to Mista Steve.” The older woman nodded in understandin’. “That poor man. August, did you make sure he was okay?” 

I shook my head no, a little embarrassed that I hadn’t stuck around long enough to make sure he was okay. I knew Mista Steve could be nasty. There was a young lady long time ago who got grabbed, and the man with her was pushed down the stairs. They left and never came back. “August, will you go and check on him, please? If Mister Steven has done something harsh again I’ll have to have Beaumont have another talk with him. The last thing we need is some think-they-know-it-all to come in and try to get rid of him, only to make things worse.” Nodding with a “yes ma’am”, I stood, ruffled Jamie’s soft hair, and made my way back up the stairs. They’d moved from the hall back into our bedroom, and I could hear our recorded conversation from earlier as I got close, skipping the missing step as quiet as I could and started down the hall. I was almost to the wide open door when the house was filled with the sound of TV snow, only much louder, like when Pop had sat on the remote and the volume went way high. 

“August? Are you with us?” I heard Mista Zak calling my name as I peaked around the doorframe, but before I could say anything, I felt a hand on my nightgown that made me jump like a startled rabbit. “Jamie!” I hissed when I turned and saw my little brother right behind me. “What are you doin’ up here?” He was chewin’ his bottom lip like he always did when he was worried, one hand tuggin’ on his ear. “I was worried ‘bout the man who went to the attic. I wanted to make sure he was okay.” My heart melted into goo. The little boy had such a big heart, it made me sad to know nobody else would know. “Oh, sweetie, that’s very nice of you, but you didn’ have to come.” Jamie nodded, slippin’ ‘round me to get toward the door. “I know, but I wanted to. I’m a big boy now, Auggie.” Realizing what he was about to do, I lunged forward to grab him, but it was too late. He’d turned to the room, saw the men standin’ in there with the static machine. I saw his face jus’ light up like a Christmas tree an’ he was runnin’,clingin’ to Mista Zak’s leg with a cry. “Naddy!” I ran in after him. “Jamie, no!”

Chapter Text

Zak stood frozen, eyes wide and glowing eerie silver in the night vision camera. “Guys, there’s straight up something on my leg right now. Like, it’s super cold right here by my knee.” He was keeping his voice level, but Nick knew he was freaking out on the inside. It wasn’t the first time one of them had been grabbed, but it was the first time it was something of this magnitude. In the camera’s screen, he could actually see where Zak’s pants were compressed against his leg, as though by a small body. Trading the night vision for their SLS Camera screen, Nick about dropped it in surprise. “Holy…. Zak, there is literally a tiny figure clinging to your leg right now.” Zak’s outline was bathed in green on the device’s screen, and there was a very defined little stick figure, maybe topping three feet in height, clinging to Zak’s leg. 

Nick felt Aaron walk up next to him, leaning over to get a better look at the screen. “Holy--” The younger man cut him off with an elbow to the side and a jerk toward Zak when he received a dirty look. “Cow,” Aaron finished, eyes wide when he realized what Nick was getting at. If this was the spirit of Jamie Sandsburough, there was no way in Sam Heck they were gonna swear in front of the kid. “Zak, try and talk to him,” he told the older man, motioning toward the Spirit Box. Zak nodded. “Jamie? Is this you clinging to my leg?” It was nothing but static for a long moment, then another childish call of “ ...daddy!... ” followed almost immediately by another voice, this one sounding like the voice over the recording that they believed to be August Sandsburough saying “ ...Jaime, no! C’mere!... ” 

Nick’s attention had been on Zak in the dim lighting, but he was quickly drawn back by Aaron’s rapid slapping to his upper arm. “What?” He snapped, only to have the SLS Camera screen all but shoved in his face. “Man, look !” Nick looked down, and felt his knees just about buckle. Another stick figure had entered the room, this one coming up nearly to Zak’s shoulders. “Guys, what’s happening? What’s going on?” Zak’s voice had a slightly unsteady tone, and Nick honestly couldn’t blame him. Even from where he stood he could see the goosebumps running up and down the shorter man’s bare arms. “Zak, another figure just appeared, standing about three feet to your right.” Zak turned his head in the direction indicated, and in the night vision camera they caught a white mist like anomaly hovering just a few feet from where Zak stood, and right where there was still a very prominent stick figure on their SLS Camera screen. 

“Guys, you’re catching this too, right?” The other two men nodded to Zak’s inquiry, too stunned by the appearances to do anything other than nod. “Are Jamie and August Sandsburough in here?” Zak asked, eyes still on the white mist. They received a reply almost instantly. “... Yes…”  Nick could tell Zak was shaken up. Everything they'd heard so far pointed toward at least one intelligent entity, and a child at that. Investigations involving children were always difficult. For lives to be cut short so young, and often under extremely tragic circumstances, it was hard. They didn't know they were dead or what had happened, just latching onto the first souls they could find. 

       “Do you know what happened to you, August?” Nick asked, eyes glued to the little stick figures on the screen. The one they'd identified as August seemed to be motioning toward the tiny figure that could only be Jamie, who still clung to Zak’s leg. “... Yes …” August replied again, voice coming through the static clearer than anything they'd received yet. The implications behind that simple response made Nick hurt inside. August had only been thirteen when she'd died. Even when many would have classified her as a teenager and thus prepared for the real world, and while they had certainly come across far worse circumstances in other lockdowns, it was still the fact that she was still a child in so many ways, but still evidently knowledgeable about what had been done to her family that made him just want to pull them close and protect them from the world. She would have grown up to be a strong young woman, a part of him thought. 

Aaron’s voice brought him back from wherever his train of thought had been taking him. “August, can you do something for us? Can you raise your hand and wave for our cameras?” While Aaron watched the figure on the screen wave one arm in a way that could almost be described as excitedly, Nick focused on Zak. The shorter man stood stock still, head turned toward the mist-like anomaly and one hand hovering just above his waist, as though resting it on the head of the small figure. Thoughts swirling around in his head, he set his camera on the floor, handed the SLS Camera off to Aaron, and made his way slowly toward Zak. He felt eyes on him, but chose to ignore them, instead focusing on the older man’s compressed pant leg. “Nick, what are you…” Zak started when Nick was no more than a foot away, but the younger investigator shushed him with a hand wave, crouching down where he recalled the child-sized stick figure to be. 

“Hi,” He started, focusing on the spot just off of Zak’s left leg, where he imagined Jamie’s young face to be. “My name’s Nick, are you Jamie?” The Spirit Box buzzed in his ears, long since turned to background noise as he listened for a reply from the child. “It’s alright, Jamie. Me and my friend Zak here want to help you and your sister. Would that be alright?” After a long moment of nothing but static, a young voice came through, clear as if it had been spoken directly into his ear. “... Pop? Daddy?...” Nick heard Aaron shift behind him and Zak suck in a breath, and he felt his throat close just a little. It had occurred to him that he and Zak bore some striking resemblance to Zane and Nathan Sandsburough. Did Jamie think the two investigators were his dads? A part of him warmed at the thought, that Jamie felt comfortable around them, as though they really were his dads. “We’re going to help you find your dads, is that okay, Jamie? Is it okay that we help you?”

There was another long pause, as though some communication was going on that the Spirit Box couldn’t pick up before a soft but affirmative “... yes…” came through. Nick smiled. “Good, Jamie, thank you. I need you to do me a favor, though, can you do that? Can you let go of my friend Zak? Can you let go of his leg and take my hand?” He held out a hand palm up, breath shallow with anticipation. He could practically feel Zak trembling with exertion from not moving for so long. A part of him was afraid that when Jamie did let go, the man might just collapse. 

Nick kept his focus on the space in front of him, imagining that if he squinted just so, he could make out a young, round face with flyaway blond hair and large brown eyes, lips tinged a faint blue under tiny baby teeth that were chewing on them in thought. His thinking look, a part of Nick’s mind whispered. ‘Could always tell he was thinkin’ by if he was chewin’ on his lip. Nick felt his brow furrow. How on earth would he know that? Must have read it somewhere, some biography of the family or whatever… Before he could ponder it any longer, however, he felt a cold presence envelop his hand, could feel the pressure of a small one against his palm, squeezing his fingers as though afraid of letting go. He suppressed a shudder, not willing to risk scaring the child away and knowing that was exactly what Zak had been thinking when he decided to make like a statue for the past thirty minutes or so. “Dude,” he heard Aaron say, but kept his gaze on where he imagined the child’s face to be. “It’s holding your hand, Nick. The figure is holding your hand!”

Not it, Nick thought. He. He could imagine the little boy in front of him, still dressed in his pajamas, just like one of his dads had put him to bed that night. Dark blue with little red trains all over them. He’d still be holding onto Zak’s pant leg with one hand, too afraid to let go just yet, but the other would be in Nick’s, lip still caught between his teeth, top front missing, taken by the tooth fairy in exchange for a silver dollar. Curling his fingers around the cold presence, he let his gaze slide over to the other side of Zak, where he could see the white mist that made up August Sandsburough, imagining it taking shape before him, forming the thin frame of the pretty thirteen year old in the museum photographs. Her hair would be pulled back in a braid for the night, her pale pink nightgown with the white and yellow lace hanging just past her knees, a coin sized hole in it right above her heart. She’d be watching them closely, making sure they didn’t try to harm her brother. She was the protective big sister, something that would never change regardless of how old she got. 

His throat burned. “Alright, Jamie,” he said, doing his best to keep his voice light and even. “We’re going to go over to your sister, alright? I’m going to pass you over to her, and I want the two of you to go play. Can you do that for me, Jamie?” There was another long pause before the answer came through again. “ ...Okay...Play with us?...” Nick’s heart squeezed, but he offered the empty space in front of him a smile. “Maybe a little later, okay Jamie? There are some others that me and my friends need to talk to first.” He waited a moment or two to see if another answer was forthcoming, but when none was, he stood, knees protesting from the prolonged crouch position they’d maintained and then slowly walked toward the mist that was August, the cold presence in his hand not leaving. As they neared the white mist, Nick felt the hairs on his arm stand on end. There was definitely something dropping the temperature in the room. 

“Hi, August. I know you heard me talking to your brother just now. Do you think you can take him and go play?” All of the sudden, his entire side went numb, as though an electrical current had passed through his body. There was a pressure against his arm, barely there but unmistakable all the same; a small hand wrapped around his upper arm. “... Thank you, Mista Nick… ” the female voice said in his ear, and then the cold was gone. The room became dead silent. “Dude…” Aaron started, and Nick could hear the shock in his voice. “She said your name, Nick, she touched you. They were both touching you for, like, a long time.” Nick nodded, turning back to look at the other men. “They gone?” he asked, motioning for the SLS Camera. Aaron nodded. “Yeah, it looked like they were holding hands and then they just disappeared.”

Satisfied with the answer and trusting Aaron to take care of the cameras, he walked over to Zak. The older man hand let both hands drop to his sides, but he still stood as if glued to the spot. “Zak?” he questioned, keeping the same tone he’d used with the children. “Zak, buddy, you alright?” Wide blue eyes turned to him, and Nick was a little startled to see hints of wetness in the deep pools that normally all but glowed with excitement. “That was…” Zak’s voice cracked and fell before he could finish his sentence, and Nick quickly closed the space between them to pull him into a tight hug, giving him a chance to regain his composure before continuing the investigation. He heard Aaron shuffling behind them, likely going over the footage and making sure everything was still in working order while also pretending to give the men privacy. 

Zak held tight to the taller man, body tense as he buried his face in the crook of Nick’s neck, gelled hair stabbing him lightly under the jaw, but Nick didn’t mind. He was trying to ignore the part of his brain telling him just how right it felt to have the man in his arms, fighting back the way his body wanted to respond because now was not a good time. “That was… I just felt…” Zak’s voice was relatively steady, even if his shoulders weren’t, and Nick flattened a palm over the middle of his back, just below the large tattoo he’d gotten early on in their friendship/collaboration. “I don’t even know, man. It was like, he was hanging on to me and I could practically see him clinging to my leg, smiling up at me like I was the most important person in the world, and for a moment I actually felt like I was his dad. All I wanted to do was just swing him up into my arms…” 

Nick nodded against the dark head pressed to him. “I know what you mean, man. It was just, like, this energy in the room, but it’s okay now. We’re going to help them. That’s what we do, Zak. We try to bring them closure.” With a nod and a quiet sniff, Zak was pushing away and tugging on the hem of his shirt, nodding to Nick’s look of concern as he regained his composure. “Come on,” he said, turning some of his attention toward Aaron. “Let’s go upstairs, I want to see if we can get anything else from Steve Roberts.” He turned and led them out, Aaron following with a “as long as he doesn’t try to rip out my throat again” and leaving Nick to pick up the rear, grabbing his camera off the ground and following, ignoring the raised hair on the back of his neck.

______________________

I watched Mista Nick with Jamie. Jamie hadn’t understood why Mista Zak had acted funny when he gave him a hug. When he did it to Naddy, Naddy would swoop him up way up high like a plane and spin him ‘round a little till he got dizzy, but Mista Zak just looked like Naddy. He weren’t Naddy jus’ yet. Mista Nick, though, he knowed how to do it. He talked right to Jamie like he could see him, held his hand an’ everything. When we left them, I took Jamie out into the hall. He was lookin’ up at me with big, confused eyes. “Auggie, why was Naddy an’ Pop actin’ funny? Why didn’t Naddy pick me up like he always does? What’s wrong with them?” I pulled him into a big hug. “They ain’t Naddy an’ Pop, Mini Bean,” I told the top of his head. “Then who is they?” His voice was all muffly when he spoke, and I just held him tighter. “They’re investigators, like them who came and messed with Mista Steve way back when. Their names are Mista Zak, Mista Nick, and Mista Aaron. I know they look like Naddy and Pop, but they ain’t, least not yet.”

Jamie looked up at me, chin squishin’ into my chest and his eyebrows all scrunched together. “Whaddya mean?”

“I mean that I think they have Naddy and Pop’s souls, and that’s why’s we ain’t been able to find them. I think their souls is in Mista Zak an’ Mista Nick in there.” Jamie’s eyes was big as saucers as he pushed away from me and peeked back around the doorframe. I looked with him. Mista Nick had Mista Zak in a hug, the kind only people who really care about each other can give. I saw Naddy and Pop give each other one all the time, an’ it only made me surer that these was them. Jamie ooh’d. “Auggie, it is them!” We watched the embrace continue. I knew they was talkin’ but I didn’ know what ‘bout, an’ as they parted I wrapped an arm ‘round Jamie. “What we gonna do, Auggie?” He asked. I squeezed him a bit tighter. “We’s gonna get’em together, Mini Bean. We’s gonna get our Naddy an’ Pop back together.”

Chapter Text

We crouched on the stairs watchin’ as they came out of our room and started upstairs. We wasn’t gonna follow them, but I did wish them luck. Mista Steve could be down right nasty when he wanted. ‘Soon as Mista Nick disappeared from our view, Jamie was turnin’ to me, practically vibratin’. “So we’s goin’ with them, Auggie? We’s actually gonna leave the house an’ go with them?” I nodded. “That’s right. When they go to leave, we’re gonna hold on real tight and let them take us with.” I’d heard about ‘ttachments and such from the TV and other visitors. It’s when something from a place like this follows you home. They’re usually not nice, I heard one person talkin’ ‘bout how they’d wake up with scratches, or that they’d get stuff broken until they had to call someone to come get rid of it. We wasn’t gonna do that, though. I didn’ wanna cause trouble like that, I just wanted to get my Naddy an’ Pop back so we could finally go into the shiny light. I loved it here, an’ I loved the people who’d taken care of Jamie an’ me, but I was tired. I felt all draggy, like Worston had described some o’ the old soldiers who were never quite there. 

I’d foun’ out about the pocket space he described by accident, an’ it kinda reminded me of that episode of Star Trek where Capt’n Kirk has to wear the funny space suit and keeps disappearin’ in an’ out on his crew. It was weird, like a funny version of home where I coul’ still see everythin’ and everyone, but they was all fuzzy an’ couldn’ see me. Like an alternate reality. I kinda liked it, it was quiet an’ peaceful, but it scared me. I didn’ wanna get stuck in there, an’ I was ‘fraid that if we couldn’t find Naddy an’ Pop, I was gonna slip in an’ never come out again. I was gonna be gone forever, jus’ like Capt’n Kirk. 

After a long time, they came back down the steps. Mista Nick had a red mark on his neck, an’ I’d bet everythin’ that it was from Mista Steve, but they seemed okay the rest’o the way, so I didn’ worry. ‘Stead we went back down stairs, Jamie an’ I squishin’ to the wall so’s they wouldn’ walk through us. It always felt weird when someone did that. Mista Aaron went down first with Mista Zak followin’, but when Mista Nick went to join them, he seemed to forget the one step was broken an’ tripped, almost fallin’ down the stairs. I screamed. I didn’ want him gettin’ hurt, I wanted to reach out and grab him tight, but I knew I couldn’. I’d seen others manage to do things to people, but I wasn’t strong enough! I reached out anyway, feelin’ the way my hand passed through his flailin’ arm, an’ then Mista Zak was there, catchin’ him ‘fore he could splat his head all over the steps. They stayed like that kinda frozen, Mista Zak holdin’ up Mista Nick whose legs was all tangled together. “You okay?” Mista Zak finally asked, an’ I could see him kinda shakin’, like he was scared by the fall too. Mista Nick nodded, standin’ up on the solid step now under his feet. “Dude, that was weird. It felt like something grabbed me, or like tried to.”

Mista Zak frowned. “Like grabbed you as in with intent to push you?” he asked, but Mista Nick shook his head. “No, no. The fall was my fault, I was thinking about stuff, but it was like it tried to grab me to keep me from falling. Like it was trying to catch me, and I swear I heard a scream.” Mista Zak nodded. “I heard it too. It sounded like a female… You don’t think…” Mista Nick’s only answer was a nod, and then they was lookin’ ‘round like they was lookin’ for somethin’. “Hey guys!” Mista Aaron called from another room, drawin’ back their attention. “Guys, I think I got something in the living room.” I watched the men with my two dads’ souls separate and follow Mista Aaron back down the stairs. I took Jamie’s hand an’ followed an’ when we got to the livin’ room I saw Mista Aaron standin’ in the middle of the floor with his fancy camera pointed toward an old, kinda moldy couch. There was a man sittin’ right in the middle.

Mista Budreau was a big, burly black man who reminded me of Mista Henry. He was dressed in a bloody an’ torn up Confederate uniform, an’ was missin’ a leg. He’d lost it to a cannon ball, and then he’d gotten an infection that spread all the way through his body. He didn’ let one leg stop him, though, he’d go aroun’ talkin’ with the other soldiers and he told the best bedtime stories. Jamie an’ I stopped at the bottom of the stairs an’ I gave him a wave. He smiled an’ waved back. I heard Mista Aaron gasp. “Woah! Guys, it just waved!” He was starin’ down at his little screen, the one he was holdin’ in the room with me an’ Jamie. I sneaked up behind him for a look. Everythin’ was all funny, like one of the paintings we saw when my school took us on a field trip to the modern art museum. I could see the couch, all blurry an’ grey, an’ sittin’ right in the middle where Mista Budreau was sittin’ was a stick person missin’ his head. This was what they saw us with!

I looked from the little screen to Mista Budreau. “I see you, Mista Budreau,” I giggled. The big black man’s face stretched into a big smile. “An’ how are you, Miss August? Who ya got wif ya?” On the little screen, the stick figure followed Mista Budreau’s arms as he motioned ‘round to the three men in the room with us. ‘Fore I could answer, though, Mista Zak spoke from behind me and made me jump. “Is there someone in here?” he asked, eyes on the screen. “Can you wave for us?” Mista Budreau looked at me with that twinkly look he got right before he told us a story. “What do ya say, Miss August? Should I?” I nodded, hidin’ another giggle behind my hand. Mista Budreau liked to mess with the ‘vestigators who came. I watched him raise his arm an’ wave for the fancy camera. Mista Zak gasped, eyes all wide an’ excited like Jamie’s at Christmas time. “Do you think you can talk to us? Do you think you can talk into this recorder right here?” 

The big black man looked at me and raised an eyebrow. “Go ‘head, Mista Budreau,” I told him. “As you say, Miss August,” he replied. “So who be these fine gents ya brought wif ya? Possible courtiers?” I knew I’d be blushin’ if I could. “Mista Budreau, no! This is Mista Aaron, Mista Nick, an’ Mista Zak,” I pointed to each of the men in turn. “They’re ‘vestigators here to talk to us.” The old soldier nodded at me, sittin’ further into the couch. “Well, if they be here ta talk, then let them talk!”

______________________

Three men gathered around the SLS Camera screen in the middle of the near-black living room. The little digital display showed that it was nearly time for Matthew and Diane Reines to let them out, but Zak didn’t feel they’d even so much as cracked the surface of everything going on in the house. He cast the occasional worried glance toward Nick, who had his eyes glued to the stick figure on their screen, but with one hand holding his arm where he said he’d felt someone try to grab him. He was so focused on their younger companion that he nearly missed the wave of the stick figures hand upon Aaron’s request. A cold brush against his arm drew his attention back. Thinking maybe it was Aaron, he caught the movement on the screen. It was a rather large figure, full adult size, he figured, but one of his legs stopped right about where the knee would be. A soldier maybe? A victim of wartime amputation? He seemed to hesitate at Aaron’s request before one arm raised to offer them a (hopefully) friendly wave. 

Zak pulled out their digital recorder in excitement and stepped a little closer to the couch. “Do you think you can talk to us? Do you think you can talk into this recorder right here?” Pressing the record button, he held it out toward where he suspected the figure to be and waited. He held his position for a long time, giving the spirit ample time to talk to them. He could hear Aaron and Nick behind him, breaths even and steady so as not to add any contamination. There was something cold near his back, making his hair stand on end, but he couldn’t tell if it was an entity or a draft, so he ignored it best he could. After several long minutes, he decided it was time to see what the recorder had picked up. Turning back toward the other two, he hit the play button.

“ ...Go ‘head, Mista Budreau…” the first voice to come through was young, female. He listened harder. “... As you say, Miss August…”  this one was deeper, clearly male with what might have been a heavy accent. Zak met Aaron and Nick’s eyes. This was two people having a conversation! “Holy Sh… ucks.” Nick started, quickly correcting himself when he realized there was likely the spirit of a child in the room with them. Zak remembered the cold brush against his arm, the presence at his back. Was that the little girl they heard on the recording? Was it August? Had she followed them back downstairs? Could it have been her they’d heard scream when Nick almost fell? The thoughts sent a chill down his spine. “Guys, I just realized something…” 

“What is it, Zak?” Nick asked, eyes wide in the dark as they reflected back the light from the cameras. Something curled inside Zak, but he quickly forced it back down to examine at another time. “Demonic figures often take the forms of young children so they can disguise themselves as what is stereotypically innocent…” Now he had Aaron’s attention too, camera momentarily forgotten as he stared at Zak with his mouth gaping open. “You think the entities we suspect are August and Jamie might actually be demons or dark energies?” Zak just shrugged. “I’m saying it’s a possibility. Remember the museum curator told us that something dark burned down the Bowden Mansion when it was a school? And there’s definitely something up in the attic… I’m just saying we should be careful is all.”

The men were silent for a long while, then Nick was shaking his head. “I don’t think the kids are dark, Zak. I can’t explain it, but I just have this feeling… there is something dark in this house, but it’s not them…” The younger man had a distant look on his face as his voice tapered out, like his train of thought had just been sidetracked. Just then the voices came back through the recorder, bringing their attention back to the matter at hand. The recorder hadn’t caught everything that must have been going on between who they assumed to be August and a man she called Mister Budreau, but they were more than a little shocked when they picked up what it did catch. 

“ ...is Mista Aaron… mista Nick… mista Zak…”

“Dudes! She just said our names!”

“Hush!”

“... investigators here to talk…” 

“Well, if they be here ta talk, then let them talk!...” 

That last sentence didn’t so much seem to come from the recorder as from the room itself, deep and echoey as it bounced off the walls and floor. All three men turned as one to face the couch, where they could now make out a divot in the cushions, as though an invisible man was sitting there watching them. Which, if what they’d just heard was anything to go by, there in all likelihood was. Nick pulled out the Spirit Box. “Is your name Budreau?” he asked, holding the device ready just in case. For now, however, it was unnecessary. “... I am…” came the ghost’s reply. “Were you a confederate soldier? Did you die in here when it was a hospital?”

“ ...I did…”

“How did you die? Were you shot? We noticed you were missing a leg on our camera, did you die during surgery?” 

“... No… infection…” 

“Infection! Dude he just said he died from infection!” Aaron was practically vibrating with excitement and Zak couldn’t blame him. This was a powerful, intelligent entity they were talking to. This was fantastic! Chancing a glance down at the SLS to see if anything else had appeared, he spoke up. “We heard you talking to August earlier. Is she in here?” This time the pause was long, as if the spirit wasn’t sure how or what to answer. Or maybe he had used up his energy? He was just about to have Nick turn on the Spirit Box when Mister Budreau spoke up again. “ ...Behind you… ” 

Zak felt the hair on the back of his neck stand on end at the implication. He watched as Aaron turned slowly to point the camera behind them, visibly bracing themselves to see the small stick figure, but the space was empty, the camera registering no anomalies other than the expected ones. “What the…?” Aaron turned the camera back toward the couch, but it was empty as well. After a quick pan, they realized they were completely alone. “Dude! I think we just got punked by a dead confederate soldier!” Aaron’s indignant comment served to break the tension that had started to build and the three men broke out in bouts of laughter, Nick and Zak leaning heavily on each other as they watched Aaron double over, trying not to drop the camera as he guffawed loudly. Zak was semi-brought back when the alarm on his watch started beeping. Checking the time, he was startled to see that it was only an hour until sunrise. “Alright, guys. The Reinses will be here soon, we should probably go ahead and start packing up our gear.”

______________________

While the three men worked on collectin’ all their cameras, I caught Mista Budreau in the back playroom on his way to the back porch. “Mista Budreau! That weren’t nice of you to tell ‘em I was hidin’ behind ‘em when I weren’t!” The big man just grinned. “I’m sorry, Miss August, but I just couldn’ resist! You saw they’s faces! Way too serious! I ‘ad to do somethin’ or I swears they’s was gonna wet they’s pants!” Mista Budreau laughed one of them big belly laughs that made him sound a bit like Santa. Mista Budreau’s laughs were contagious and ‘fore I knew it I was laughin’ too. “Okay,” I managed to say when I finally stopped laughin’ so hard. “I’ll admit, it was funny to see their faces. But that still weren’t nice!” I tried my best to put on my serious face, but I knew it wasn’t gonna work this time. Mista Budreau was still grinnin’ at me with his big white teeth, like any second he was gonna start laughing again. 

Jus’ then, I heard the sounds of footsteps and shufflin’, an’ when I stuck my head out I saw Mista Aaron coming down the stairs with a camera stand an’ a big black bag that musta held the camera. Was it almost time for them to go? I sneaked up behind him and caught a look at his watch. Little after five, hadn’ Mista Zak said Mista Matthew was gonna come unlock them around six? Nuts! I had to find Jamie an’ get him ready to go! Wavin’ to Mista Budreau, who shook his head at me ‘fore disappearin’, I ran up the stairs and into Naddy an’ Pop’s old room. Jamie was playin’ on the floor with his old bear but looked up when I came runnin’ in. “Is it almost time to go, Auggie?” He asked, climbin’ to his knees an’ pullin the bear close. I nodded. “That’s right, Mini Bean. They’re all packin’ up righ’ now, so we best be goin’ down an’ waitin’ on them or we’ll miss ‘em!” 

Jamie’s eyes went wide. “No, no! We can’t miss them, Auggie! We can’t!” I reached out an’ took his hand, squeezin’ it real tight. “We ain’t gonna miss them, Jamie. I promise.” With that promise, I turned an’ led him, bear in hand, down the stairs and over to the door where we took a seat, watchin’ the three men packin’ up their equipment tiredly. I felt sleepy just lookin’ at them, but I didn’t dare close my eyes in case I slept too long an’ they got away. This could be our last chance to get our family all in one piece again, an’ there weren’t no way I was gonna let it go by. I saw the way Mista Nick an’ Mista Zak was almost kinda circlin’ each other, like they didn’ wanna go too far away. Even if I was wrong and they weren’t my Naddy an’ Pop, there was somethin’ between them that they wasn’t doin’ nothin’ about. It was up to me to fix it. 

Time passed in that blurry kinda way it did. I watched the three men put their stuff together, run some last sweeps, through the house. Jamie was nappin’ against my shoulder an’ I was fightin’ to keep my eyes open when finally it came. I heard a crunchin’ on the driveway an’ quickly nudged Jamie awake. “Come on, Mini Bean! Mista Matthew is here to let’em out so we gotta be ready to go with!” The little boy sat up an’ rubbed at his eyes with chubby little fists. “We’re goin’ now, Auggie?” I nodded, standin’ and swingin’ him up into my arms ‘cuz I knew it’d be easier to carry him than tryin’ta walk. I stepped toward the kitchen when I heard steps on the front porch. I’d been hit by a door before an it wasn’t a good experience. I watched Mista Aaron pick up the bags an’ greet Mista Matthew as he opened the door for ‘em. Mista Nick had an arm slung over Mista Zak’s shoulders an’ they was leanin’ into one another as they started for the door. I took a deep breath an’ held Jamie tight. If we was gonna do this, it was now or never…

I took a step forward, hand out to snag the back o’ Mista Nick’s jacket when a han’ came down on my shoulder. I jumped. “Where do the two of you think you’re going?” I turned to see the stern face of Missus Rosenberg glarin’ down her pointy nose at me with Miss Berkley right behind her, hands all twisted up in her apron like she was nervous. “We’re gon’ follow them…” muttered Jamie sleepily, turnin’ his face into my shoulder. I met the Missus’ stern gaze. “I think they have my Naddy and my Pop’s souls in them, so we’re going with them to try and get them together.” Missus was shakin’ her head ‘fore I even finished. “This is foolish! You will not be going! You are children, what would you know of souls and matters of the heart? What if you’re wrong? You’ll be stranded who knows where and bound to wander lost! You will stay here where it’s safe! And you will put that foolish idea out of your head this instant.”

I opened my mouth to protest. I was not a child anymore! But before I could get a word out, a voice behind me spoke up. “Oh, shut yer own, ya prune.” I turned to see Worston leanin’ against the wall. I was shocked at his tone, nobody spoke to the Missus like that, not ever! “Excuse me?” Missus sounded real angry now, but Worston didn’ seem to care. “You heard me, missus. Ye’ve been treatin’ ‘em like they’s children, but they ain’t no more. August is a grown lady, she’s been ‘round a long time now. Had they not been killed by them damned yanks she’d be a full grown woman with children o’ her own. Now if she wants to go with these men ‘cuz she thinks they’s important, then there really ain’t much you can do to stop her. This is somethin’ she has to do.”

Missus looked like she wanted to protest, probably somethin’ like how I am dead, so I am still a child even though I ain’t. Mother Earth came an’ visited an’ everything. Or maybe she’d say Jamie needed to stay ‘cuz he really was a child. I didn’ like that thought, I didn’ wanna leave Jamie behind. I knew Miss and Missus would take care o’ him real good, but I didn’ want him thinkin’ I’d left him too. I watched Missus face, ready to argue if I had to, but then her face kinda crumpled up an’ she sighed. “August, I’ve known you a good long time, and I know that if your mind is really made up, there’s no stopping you. So I’m just going to say this. Please be careful, child. Please be careful and take good care of your brother. And if you find what you’re looking for, I wish you all the happiness in the world, dear, and maybe I’ll see you on the other side.” 

I nodded, steppin’ forward so she an’ Miss Berkley could hug me an’ Jamie real tight, an’ I felt my throat get all pinchy like I was gonna cry. “I promise,” I told them. “Thank y’all for takin’ such good care of Jamie an’ me all these years. I’ll never forget you.” As I stepped back an’ shifted Jamie a little on my hip, I saw Missus Rosenberg pull a little lace hanky from her pocket an’ dab at her eyes. Then I turned to Worston, who was grinnin’ wide at me. “Well, well, then, Little Miss August. It’s been a right pleasure knowin’ you.” I smiled back. “Corporal Worston, the pleasure was mine. You taught me so much, an’ I wanna thank you for all of it. An’ I hope you get to move on real soon.” Worston shook his head, standin’ up straight. “Oh, Miss August, you was the reason I was stickin’ round. You needed someone willin’ to tell you straight an’ send you off on your way. Now you are, an’ it’s mighty high time I be makin’ my own way. Been keepin’ my momma waitin’ long enough, now ain’t I?” 

Like a door openin’ up in the wall behind him, a big pretty light lit up the space, an’ I could see a pretty lady standin’ ways back on the other side. Worston looked back an’ saw her too. The smile on his face was brighter than the light, an’ he looked whole again. No more bandages an’ blood, just the handsome man I imagined had left his home an’ his girl to go fight for what he believed in. “That’d be pretty Miss Adalaide,” he told me. “I best not keep her waitin’ any longer. I wish you the best’a luck, Miss August. You’re a strong young woman, an’ I know you’ll find what you’re lookin’ for. Pleasure knowin’ you both…” and with those words, Corporal Worston was steppin’ into the light, an’ then he was gone. I wanted to linger, but I didn’ know how long it had already been an’ I didn’ wanna risk them leavin’ us behind, so I bid the Miss and Missus who’d taken care of us so good a goodbye, an’ then I was takin’ Jamie out the door an’ onto the porch. 

To my relief, they was all still standin’ there, Mista Zak talkin’ to Mista Matthew about what had gone on while Mista Nick an’ Mista Aaron put their stuff in the back of their van. The sight of Mista Matthew’s kind face reminded me of a promise I’d made, an’ if there was one thing my momma had taught me ‘fore she died, it was that you keep the promises you make. Sittin’ Jamie down on the steps for a minute, I fast ran out into the garden that had kinda started growin’ itself over the years. I didn’ dare search long, but I was careful to choose just the right flower. Then I found it. A little cluster of yella’ jessamine peakin’ from the weeds. I don’ know how it got there, it wasn’t season for it, but there it was. Snatchin’ it up, I popped back into the kitchen to lay it on the shiny countertop before goin’ back to get Jamie. I knew we had to hurry real quick, Mista Nick was sittin’ in the driver seat an’ Mista Aaron was gettin’ in the back while Mista Zak finished up last words with Mista Matthew, so I grabbed up Jamie an’ quick jumped into the back seat with Mista Aaron. A couple minutes later an’ Mista Zak was climbin’ in too, and then we was off, leavin’ our little home behind. I prayed to the Good Lord that what I was doin’ was the right thing.

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Diane took a deep breath as she stepped through the front door. All was quiet in the mid morning stillness, the only sounds being the creaking of floorboards under her feet and the birdsong emanating from deep in the branches of the old oak out front. She’d been woken up by Matthew leaving that morning to come let the investigators out of the house, and had opted to get the coffee and breakfast started for when he returned. Eggs were ready and she was already on her second cup of coffee by the time her husband walked back through the garage door. “They get through the night, alright?” she asked, setting her mug down. Matthew was bent over getting out of his boots, but looked up to give her a nod. “Yep, they were all in one piece. Zak and Nick looked a little shell shocked, but that Aaron was practically bouncin’ up and down like a big kid, so I guess they got some good stuff while they were in there. Wonder if they ran into August last night…” 

Diane nodded, taking another sip before rising to get her husband together some breakfast. He nudged past her to wash up in the sink, landing a kiss on her cheek as he did so. “I reckon you want to go by the house after breakfast?” She nodded, smiling at how well her husband knew her. There was little doubt in her mind that the three men had interacted with August at least once during the night, but the real question Diane had was whether or not August and her little brother would still be there when she went later. Husband seated with his plate heaped and mug full, she rejoined him after topping off her coffee and the two ate their breakfast in comfortable silence, sounds of the news drifting in from the TV in the den. 

The house had an almost empty feeling to it, like some kind of weight had been lifted from it. She took it as a hopeful sign as she made her way through the bottom floor, noting that the men had left everything where they found it and nothing seemed misplaced. As she carefully made her way up the stairs, her thoughts drifted toward August. No child deserved what had happened to her family, and she could only hope the young woman found the answers she was looking for, and that they brought her peace. Reaching the top of the stairs, she started in the master bedroom, finding it empty save for a bit of disturbed dust in the middle of the room. It made sense, they never really had a lot of activity in this particular room. It always felt sacred, like it was a place you just avoided out of respect. She reckoned the men probably came in briefly to get a read, but didn’t linger when they realized there was nothing there. Leaving the sadness of the room behind, Diane walked over to the children’s room. 

There was definitely a feeling of emptiness in there that had not been there before, she noted, walking through the mostly empty room and studying the patterns in the dust on the floor. There were large footprints walking along the walls, probably one of the men wandering with his recorder, but then they were leaving, only to return with two more sets of large footprints. He’d gone to get the others, but there were more; smudging the large boot prints were much smaller prints. Child’s prints. Barefoot and quick, two pairs were running into the room in two opposite directions, the smallest coming to a halt perpendicular to one of the sets of large prints. Diane’s hand went to her mouth as her eyes burned with tears. “Oh, you sweet precious babies…” She knew what must have happened. Jamie must have seen the men and thought they were his dads and come running in to see them, and August must have followed… The woman sniffed hard to keep back the tears and quickly turned to head downstairs again. 

The kitchen was her last stop before she left for the day, having told Matthew she just wanted to check and make sure none of the men had left anything and then she’d be back home. As soon as she stepped through the doorway, though, she knew there was no way she could keep the tears from falling. Resting on the middle of the counter was a small cluster of slightly wilted jessamine. One hand still to her mouth as the tears ran hot down her face, she reached out and gently ran her fingertips over the delicate petals before picking it up and holding it to her nose. The soft fragrance tickled her senses. “Oh, sweet August…” she whispered into the silent house, “I hope you find everything you’re looking for and that it only brings you peace…” With one more sniff, she tucked the delicate cluster into her breast pocket and left the house, locking the door tight behind her. The entertaining presence of Jamie and August would be missed by all of them, but it was completely worth it if the two children could finally be at peace after so many years.

Chapter Text

The ride back to their hotel was quiet, Zak spending it leaned against the passenger side window and alternating between staring out at the dawn lit landscape flying past them and the younger man sitting silent behind the wheel, attention focused completely on the road. Zak had to admit to himself that the worry he’d had regarding the other man at the start of this investigation had only really intensified through the night. They’d experienced some pretty crazy stuff during their career as paranormal investigators, but this night had seemed to take the cake. Zak hated to think about children being stuck on earth instead of being able to cross over into the afterlife, but normally when they came across them they never really knew they were dead, just living like they were in a loop without a clue as to what had happened to them. Jamie and August, though, they’d gotten some genuinely intelligent responses from them. They knew what was going on around them.

Standing there in the children’s room, his leg encased in absolute cold had completely thrown Zak for a loop. Sure they’d been touched before, been grabbed or scratched or tugged on, but never before had something latched on like that, had responded so perfectly to requests. He could still even now feel the small arms that had clung to his thigh, the small face that had pressed into his hip. It was definitely something he’d never felt before, and then there had been Nick. Nick, who’d crouched down and talked directly to Jamie, had actually held out his hand to coax the little boy away from Zak as though he was a tangible, visible form instead of the spiritual energy he was. Nick, who’d handed the wayward child off to his big sister before turning back to make sure Zak didn’t make a fool of himself by falling flat on his ass all because the spirit of a dead five year old had thought he was his dad. 

But then had come the near mishap on the steps and Nick had nearly fallen, and Zak had felt his heart jump into his throat and lodge itself right behind his tonsils as he reached to catch the younger man. All he’d been able to think was “not him, not again…” but for the life of him he couldn’t think of where those thoughts had come from. All of them had had some close calls and near spills during investigations. It came with the territory of searching old, creepy places in pitch darkness. So why had this time on an old flight of stairs been different? Nick really hadn’t been in any serious danger unless he’d fallen wrong, so why had Zak all but panicked? And then there had been the scream, and the feeling that Nick had experienced, like someone was trying to grab him. To save him from falling. Nick had spent the rest of the night rubbing at that spot on his arm like he could still feel the failed grip on his skin. He’d seemed so lost in thought, Zak had wanted to ask what had his attention so far away, but the time had never felt right. Whatever Nick had been thinking about, it felt private, personal. Like it was something to be said away from the cameras and Aaron. 

By that point they’d pulled up at their hotel, so Nick pulled them into a parking spot, they each grabbed some equipment, and then the exhausted investigators trudged through the lobby and into the elevator that would take them to their rooms. They’d managed to get a decent place this time with two adjoining rooms so that one of them (usually Nick) didn’t have to sleep on a couch or the floor, so Aaron took the equipment to his room to check everything over before catching some Zz’s and Nick and Zak headed for their room. Nick didn’t even bother to change, simply shedding his shoes and jacket before face planting on the comforter, soft breathy snores escaping him barely a minute later. Zak just rolled his eyes, pulling the comforter out from under the dead-to-the-world man and covering him before exchanging his own clothes for his sweats and an old tee and climbing into his own bed. Investigations were always exhausting, and he couldn’t blame Nick for crashing so quickly after this one. As his lids started to fall shut, the last thing he saw was Nick shifting his face toward Zak’s direction, and he could swear he felt the foot of the bed dip just slightly, but then he was falling into the dark, following Nick into the arms of Morpheus.

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There was a body underneath him, all hard planes and lean muscles slick with sweat as soft pants and moans filled the air. He sped up his thrusts, the tight channel around him clenching with each push and pull, the tight ball of heat growing in his stomach as he felt the body beneath him growing taut, close… he leaned down, laying kisses along a knobbed spine that arched under his lips. His gut grew tight, drawing in on itself like an implosion. There was a name on the tip of his tongue… And the dream was changing. It was cool, almost chilly as a wind cut through the thin shirt he wore. He shivered in the sudden temperature change, mind still reeling from what had just been happening. He was standing at a railing overlooking steel grey water. The sky was overcast, and he could smell the threat of rain that was no doubt coming. He was at the wharfs, he realized, looking around. Through the clouds he could just make out Liberty Island. Another gust brought with it a mist of chilled sea water and sent a violent chill down his spine. He hugged himself a little tighter.

“Hey!” A familiar voice cut through the chill and sent warmth coursing through his veins like he’d just downed a hot toddy. He turned to see Nick walking over to him, dressed much more warmly than he was in a jacket and raincoat over his usual t-shirt and jeans. He was carrying something over his arm while one hand was taken captive by a small figure in a neon green raincoat and matching rain boots. Behind them both was a slightly taller figure in a red coat and boots with little black polka dots all over them, light brown hair tumbling out from under her hood. “Dude, what are you doing? You must be freezing!” Nick dropped the tiny hand, which immediately latched onto the hem of his coat as he shook out the bundle he’d been carrying. “C’mere.” Not even waiting for a response, Nick was stepping into his personal space and wrapping the jacket he’d been carrying around Zak’s shoulders, enveloping him in warmth and a scent that he could only define as Nick. “You’re gonna catch your death if you keep forgetting your head,” the New Englander said with an easy smile, but there was something off about his accent, a lilt to it that didn’t sound normal. Maybe he was coming down with something?

As he fit his arms through the sleeves, the small figure in green looked up, wild blond hair sticking up above a pair of wide blue eyes and a big, gap toothed smile. “Naddy forgot his jacket?” the little boy asked, drawing another smile and a fond look from Nick. “Yeah, Mini Bean, Naddy forgot his jacket like a silly monster.” The small round face scrunched up in thought. “Naddy, don’ be a silly monster.” It was said with such conviction that Zak couldn’t help but smile. “I’ll do my best, kiddo.” The little boy nodded before turning and running back to the girl in red, the two of them taking turns jumping in puddles and playing hopscotch with the tile patterns, their laughter floating over to the two men on the chilly gusts that didn’t seem quite so cold anymore. Nick turned back to him, fingers reaching out to tug up the zipper on Zak’s jacket and pull the hood up over his wind-tossed hair. “Only silly monsters don’t wear coats, Nate,” he said, leaning close until his breath was ghosting warm across Zak’s cheeks. He knew they were red, but whether it was from the cold or the taller man’s proximity he couldn’t say. There was something in those light brown eyes that tightened Zak’s stomach. Unconsciously, he leaned forward…

Knock, knock, knock! Zak sat bolt upright in bed, heart racing and sweats uncomfortably tight as he fought to get his bearings back. He’d just been in New York, Jamie and August were playing in the puddles and Nick… no, not Nick? Zane? The name felt right on his tongue, but it couldn’t be. Zak shook his head, the repeat of the knocking helping to shake some cobwebs loose. He’d blame it on the lockdown. They were always an emotionally draining experience, this one even more so with the intelligent responses they believed to be August Sandsburough coming through for them. On the other bed, Nick groaned and rolled over, bringing one pillow up over his head. The sound shot straight through Zak, bringing back the trendles of the dream he’d been having before suddenly being in New York. There had been something so familiar about the distinctly male body that had been beneath him, the way they seemed to fit together like puzzle pieces… His sweats grew even tighter, but now he could hear Aaron on the other side of the door, knocks becoming that much more impatient. With a sigh, he pushed himself to his feet and padded over. Better to see what the big man wanted and not risk the wrath of a sleep-deprived Nick Groff. 

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Jamie an’ me curled up at the foot of Mista Zak’s bed an’ he was out like a light soon as he curled up, arms wrapped tight around Winnie and one thumb tucked into his mouth. Normally I’d scold him, he was too big for suckin’ on his thumb, but I thought tonight would be okay. We’d never been on our own before, though didn’ really feel alone with Mista Nick an’ Mista Zak justa few feet away, what with them lookin’ like Naddy an’ Pop so much. I curled up with Jamie, but I didn’ sleep. I stayed up an’ watched them sleep, watched the ways they was alike to Naddy an’ Pop. Mista Nick slept on his belly with one arm under his pillow an’ the other hangin’ off the edge like he was reachin’ for somethin’. Mista Zak, though, Mista Zak slept kinda like a mummy. He slept real tight, arms around him an’ on his back but his head was turned toward Mista Nick. I hurt inside with how much they reminded me of how Pop and Naddy slept at night. 

I don’ know how long I watched them, listened to their breathin’, but the familiar sound got to me an’ ‘fore I knew it I was wakin’ to a knockin’ on the door. I sat up, doin’ my bestest to not wake up Jamie, an’ I watched Mista Zak blink open his eyes. He looked confused, like he didn’ know where he was, but then he looked at the door, then over to Mista Nick who was still sleepin, an’ I saw it kinda come back to him. I wondered where his mind had took him. Maybe he’d still been in a dream? I knew he’d been dreamin’. I’d saw it before I fell asleep, saw the way he kinda twitched around. I wondered what he’d been dreamin’ about. 

Mista Zak groaned all quiet an’ carefully got out of bed to see who was still knockin’. 

Chapter Text

Zak stumbled over to the door still half asleep, yanking it open to catch Aaron in mid knock. “What?” he half-whispered gruffly, pushing the man out of the way so he could close the door behind himself. “Dude…” Aaron’s eyes were huge under his brows and Zak could swear the man was about to start vibrating. “I think we may have hit the motherload with our footage from this lockdown.” Just like that Zak was wide awake. “You serious?” Aaron was nodding so fast the younger man was afraid he was going to give himself whiplash. “Dude, we got something on every camera. Even the one in the bathroom where Sarah Jones hanged herself! No camera glitches or anything!” Before the younger investigator knew it, he was being grabbed and all but hauled into the adjoining room, forced down onto the bed and a laptop unceremoniously dropped in his lap. Four individual screens were showing on the screen just waiting for the play button to be hit. Each was labeled either children’s room, bathroom, kitchen, or living room. “There wasn’t a lot on the camera from the attic, mostly the audio and the footage of where he grabbed Nick, but man, wait until you see the rest of this!” 

He reached over and hit play, the footage rolling for the bathroom first. Zak grabbed the headphones so he could up the volume without risking waking Nick. He’d show the younger man the footage later. Eyes glued to the screen, he listened to the dead silence, seeing only the greenwashed stillness of the small hall bathroom. Then it happened. The soft electronic buzz through the headphones was broken by a sudden wail, loud enough to make Zak wince even as the startled jolt shot down his spine. The wail died out as quickly as it had come, dissolving into quiet sobs that he had to strain to hear. “My baby…” he heard waft through the headphones. “My poor baby… my baby…” The voice was clearly female, soft and heartbroken even through the speakers but surprisingly audible. He looked up at Aaron. 

The bearded man had been hovering by the bed watching Zak watch the footage. “I know, man,” he said, reading his lead’s expression. “She doesn’t really say much more than that, just kinda repeats herself, but dude, you need to see the kitchen footage.” He reached down across Zak and clicked on the tiny box labeled “Kitchen”. The grey-green lit room soon filled the screen and Zak watched for whatever had made the big man so excited. He wasn’t disappointed. There was a loud bang before the headphones were suddenly filled with static through which he could make out half formed sentences of “...nurse get my tools…” and “...deep gunshot wound…” and pained cries and wails. He leaned in close to the screen, nose nearly touching the thin panel of glass as he watched shadowy figures take form. Nurses in period dress and doctors in long jackets bustled in and out of existence, their forms blurry but distinguishable against the dim of the kitchen. Half formed soldiers were wheeled or led in, sometimes on their own two feet, sometimes on crude stretchers, sometimes on the shoulders of friends. 

The scene played on, Zak unable to tear his eyes away from it. He knew that sometimes events left echos behind, a scene to be repeated over and over again even when no real ghosts existed from the event. If he was right, that’s exactly what this was. An imprint from the time the Sandsburough House had been the site of a field hospital. The scene came to an end, the figures fading out into balls of light and then nothing at all, and Zak felt a wave of something go through him. He couldn’t imagine what it must have been like back then, to be stuck in a place where such tragedies play on repeat like a broken record. He had to wonder if August and Jamie ever bore witness to that. It was one thing to see it through the lense of a camera that couldn’t fully capture every frame, but it had to be a complete other to actually be stuck in the same plane of existence as that, to see it all in full. A sharp pain bloomed in his chest at the thought, but he quickly rubbed it away and handed the computer back to Aaron. 

“Holy shit, man,” he said. The bald man only nodded, eyes still wide in the watery light. “Aaron, have you even gone to sleep yet?” Zak asked, realizing for the first time the bed he’d been sitting on was still perfectly made. The tech shook his head. “Nah, man. I wanted to go over all this footage before I caught some sleep and I found this and knew I had to show you.” The shorter man nodded, purposely taking back the computer, hitting save, and closing it before sitting it on the desk. “Get some sleep, man. We gotta head back to Vegas later to get all this processed and sent to the network and then we got another hunt coming up.” Aaron nodded, action interrupted by a wide yawn that cracked open his features. “You’re probably right. Night Zak…” 

Zak left the man to get himself to bed, quietly sneaking back into his room. Nick was still asleep, arm dangling off the side of the bed. Zak grinned before climbing back into his own bed, hoping to catch a little more sleep but knowing it was unlikely to happen. What he’d just seen and heard had been amazing. They hadn’t gotten anything like that since that documentary they filmed back in ‘06. The network was gonna flip! The issue would be editing, though. With so much material it was going to be hard to edit it down to their allowed time slot. Maybe he could get them to let the crew have a two hour time slot. Make it like a special or something. The whirling thoughts in his head began to slow and he felt his eyes droop again. Maybe he would be able to catch a bit more sleep after all.

Chapter Text

Nick trained his camera on the looming corpse of the Mayville Sanitarium in front of them. It had been just over a week since the Sandsburough House lockdown, and Nick was unable to shake the strange feelings he’d left with. When they’d gotten back the first thing they’d done was work on editing before sending the footage back to the network for review. The bigwigs had been thrilled with what they’d managed to collect, mentioning the possibility of a two hour special, but Nick hadn’t been paying attention as well as he knew he should have been. His mind was back on that house, on everything they’d seen. Everything they’d heard. He’d found his mind wandering more and more often over the last week, back to the dark presence in the attic that had attacked both him and Aaron, the soldier on the couch, but mostly he found it wandering back to Jamie and August. August had been a full consciousness. She’d been able to talk to them, she’d known she was dead. It bugged him that they weren’t able to help, to find out what was keeping them there. Was it the dark force in the attic? Was it something else?

He’d talked with Zak about it some, the dark haired man offering up his spare bedroom so Nick wouldn’t have to fly all the way back out to Boston only to turn around and meet them in Oregon for their next investigation. Aaron had headed back to California with the promise to be back in time for the next investigation, leaving the two alone to their thoughts. After the first few days, though, he was grateful for the scheduled investigation coming up because it meant he could focus more on research and avoid the slight awkwardness that had fallen between the two of them. Nothing had changed, necessarily, they still hung out; chilled on the couch watching the game or whatever mindless thing was on TV, they’d order pizza or take turns cooking, but it was like there was something hanging over them, something that hadn’t been there before the Sandsburough house. 

Yanking himself back from his thoughts, he turned his attention and his camera onto Zak, who was getting ready to roll the intro. Like a lot of the hospitals and sanitarium they’d found themselves in over the years, Mayville had been functioning as far back as the mid-1800s all the way up to the early 90s when radical changes in treatment of the mentally disabled, and the discovery of the inhumane methods and number of “accidental” deaths in the sanitarium had forced it to close its doors. A combination of brick wall and wire topped fencing had kept out a majority of riffraff and troublemakers, but even they couldn’t prevent time and weather from taking their toll. Moss and ivy had claimed a good third of the building’s structure and what windows that hadn’t blown in Oregon’s winters were covered in webs of cracks, or fogged like old eyes that had developed cataracts. 

Despite its age, the foundation itself was still remarkably stable, the building’s caretaker explaining to them that they used to house night tours in the early 2000s before one too many sinister occurrences nearly cost a young woman her life. “Avoid the South wing,” he’d warned them as he’d led them around. “An earthquake back in ‘08 put some good sized cracks in the walls, and the last geological inspector we had out said there were some signs of a threatening sinkhole. Nothing yet, thank God, but I don’t want you fellows risking it. Plant a few cameras near the entrance by all means, we’ve had a few reports of noises and sightings through the years, but promise me none of you will try actually going down that way. ‘Sides, most of our activity is over towards the East wing. That’s where a lot of the baths and operation rooms were, and the ground floor near the back of the wing is where they kept the morgue and the crematorium. North was for the mostly bed-bound or catatonic, West for what we would consider the down right crazy. We used to get a lot of reports from that way too. According to records, the South was where the kitchens and the staff stayed. There were a few exam rooms that direction, but I think most of what people report seeing that way are shadows of staff who were likely killed by patients, or they’re just downright paranoid from the rest of the damn building.”

Now, looking up at the daunting hospital with the sun fading behind it, Nick felt the excitement and apprehension of another lockdown swell inside him. Sharing grins, the three men marched up the steps and through the wooden double doors of the sanitarium. The building was still wired with electricity, which they only kept on long enough to place their X-cams--two in the South wing as far in as they dared go, heeding the promise they’d made to the caretaker to keep their investigation out of its depths and one in a bath where the caretaker had said people tended to report wet footprints and dripping sounds even when the pipes had been dry for decades--before readying their flashlights and throwing the breaker, plunging them into dimness that was quickly fading the farther in they went. 

“Think we should split up?” Aaron asked, camera trained on the hall leading to the North Wing, “try and cover a bit more ground to see where we need to focus the rest of the night?” Nick could see his point, the building was huge, and splitting the wings up between the three of them would allow them to spread their focus, but for some reason the idea of splitting up this time unsettled him. He kept his mouth shut, though. If he couldn’t even rationalize it in his own head, there was no way he’d be able to make the guys understand it. Instead he cast a glance at Zak, watching thoughts play across his face in the last trendles of sunset before the dark haired man was nodding. “Yeah, sounds like a good idea. Just for about an hour or two, each of us covers a different wing to see what kind of activity we can stir up and then we’ll re-group to decide where we need to focus on.”

That decision made, they decided to send Aaron to the North Wing since he’d been the one to have to deal with the Attic attack last time, Zak would go to the West Wing where the more clinically insane had been housed, and Nick would check out the East; maybe try laying in one of the baths or on an exam table to see if he could get anything to react. Assignments sorted, Nick cast one more glance at Zak before heading off, the sounds of two other pairs of boots fading off into the distance until only the sound of wind through busted windows and the occasional mouse or bat in the shadows. Fighting back the thoughts that the squeaks were long abandoned gurneys or wheelchairs and the wind whispers trying to get his attention, he gave himself a rough shake and continued on. 

The sanitarium’s bathrooms were set up much the way you’d see in any horror movie, which did absolutely nothing to settle his nerves. The walls and floor were completely covered in cracked and dirty tiles, four old, clawfoot tubs set up two against each wall. Rust like leprosy climbed the sides and snaked down from faucet to drain. The sole window in the room was fogged over, glowing slightly from the streetlamps beyond and casting a wobbly pool in the middle of the floor. Panning his camera over the room, Nick tried to imagine what it might have been like to be stuck in a place like this. The caretaker had told them that morning that it hadn’t been uncommon for patients to be trapped in the tubs for hours. Canvas covers with a hole for the neck would be pulled over the tub and tied out of the patient’s reach, trapping them in water that could be anything from over 120 degrees to nearly as low as 40. The idea had been that extreme temperatures could reset the brain, or allow the patient to sweat out whatever was causing their maladies. 

Choosing a tub nearer to the window. Nick climbed in and tried to make his gangly frame comfortable, camera angled to where it could capture as much of the room as possible, including the other baths. “Is there anyone here? Maybe a nurse? Or a patient who’d been brought in to take a bath and maybe never left?” He fell silent after that, eyes trained on the little green display. Another rat squeaked from out in the hall and the sound of his breath seemed to bounce back on him from off the sides of the tub. He tried to open himself up, to imagine himself one of the patients who’d been brought in for a bath, subjected to the hot water treatments doctors thought would draw out his maladies. Closing his eyes, he settled back against the lip of the tub, and for a second he swore he could feel the canvas cinched tight near his neck, the steam clogging his nose and throat. 

Drawing in a stale breath of cold night air to chase away the phantoms, he opened his eyes, surprised to see the screen displaying a quarter till. Figuring he’d spent enough time in the tub, he clambered out, joints creaking in displeasure at having been cramped for so long. He paused briefly at the doorways of a few more bathrooms,  figuring maybe something had heard him after all and just appeared in a different room before moving on to where the exam and operating rooms were. Since the sanitarium hadn’t been abandoned on a moment’s notice, a lot of the equipment had been cleared out, leaving faded patches of tile and rusty bolts to show where they had been, but the fifth room he came to surprised him. A rusted metal exam table dominated the floor of the room, a large cabinet against the wall had one door nearly falling off its hinges, and the sink looked like someone had rather violently taken a baseball bat to it. An old, high backed wheelchair was pushed into a far corner, and the floor was littered with debris and broken glass from the small window too high up on the wall to offer more than the barest idea of outside. 

The air felt heavy from the moment he stepped into the room, like something was holding its breath. Glass and dead leaves crunched under his boots as he made his way into the room, camera panning over the walls, the shelves, the old metal cabinet. Rusty hinges protested loudly as he pushed at it to see if maybe some jars or anything had been left behind, but all his camera found was dust and spiders and rat poop. A squeaking behind him had him spinning quickly, nearly falling back into the shelves. Was the wheelchair a little farther from the wall than it had been when he’d walked in? Heart hammering behind his ribs, Nick steeled his resolve and climbed up onto the exam table. It wobbled enough beneath his weight to have him nervous, but didn’t collapse, so he took it as enough of a sign and laid down. 

The chill from the metal sank into his skin and he had to fight off a shudder. His camera screen showed that he only had another half an hour before they were scheduled to meet back up. He could make it that long. Besides, it was an exam table, not a morgue freezer. Plenty of room to move should he have to. Another squeak echoed through the room and he fought off the urge to flinch. Instead he took out a spirit box and turned it on, leaving it next to his hip. “Is there anyone here?” He called out again, voice barely audible over the putputput of the spirit box. “Is the doctor whose room this used to be still here? Or the owner of the wheelchair in the corner?” There was no sound but the white noise of the box, but through the camera’s screen Nick could see the door to the hall move a couple of inches. It was no dramatic slamming like they’d come across before, but it was something. He propped himself up long enough to prove that it couldn’t have been a rodent bumping into it, and no wind was stirring the air around him, which if anything seemed to have gotten heavier since he’d turned on the box. 

Sitting up fully, he swung his legs over the side of the table, feeling the cold in his muscles as he turned off the box and hopped down. More glass crunched under his feet, but in the brief stillness that followed he could have sworn he heard another crunch, like another pair of feet shifting somewhere else in the room. Hairs on the back of his neck standing on end, Nick tried to make it obvious he wasn’t rushing out of the room. If someone or something had been in there, they clearly didn’t feel like talking. They’d have to go over the footage in more detail later to determine if the camera had picked up anything out of the ordinary, but for right now the only thing he wanted to think about was getting back to Zak--to the others. 

The feeling of eyes on him followed him all the way back to their meet-up point, seeming to track him from every open doorway and balcony entrance he passed. Aaron was already waiting, shaking his head at Nick’s questioning look. “I caught a couple things that might have been screams or cries, but not much more than that,” he said. “Guess it wasn’t known as the catatonic wing for nothing. Any luck on your side?” Nick shrugged. “I tried a couple of the bathrooms and didn’t directly get anything more than a sense of claustrophobia. I finished up in an exam room. Caught some noises that might have been something, and the door moved a bit, but we’ll have to go frame by frame to make sure it wasn’t just a rat. It was definitely creepy though, heavy like something was there but just didn’t want to talk.” 

Before Aaron could comment on the movement from the door, footsteps echoed through the hall and Zak was coming into view a moment later. His eyes glowed white in the nightvision on their cameras and he had a massive grin on his face that they could practically see in the near-dark around them. “Guys, you are never going to believe what’s down there.” Without even giving them a chance to update him on what they’d found, Zak was turning and leading the way back down the West corridor. Shrugging to each other, Nick and Aaron followed. When they drew even with Zak, he began filling them in on his experiences of the last couple hours. “Almost as soon as I turned the spirit box on I was getting mumbles and what sounded like screams. I couldn’t make out much of anything, but it was definitely something more than just the background static. I also got a lot of slamming doors and moving furniture on audio. Some of it could have been wind, there are several broken or missing windows down here, but I went back and checked some of the rooms where the doors were slammed and a lot of their windows were still intact.”

He came to a stop roughly in the middle of the wing, nothing but darkness and doorways stretching out in either direction. “This is roughly where I was getting a lot of feedback on the spirit box. I figure Aaron, you can pull out the SLS camera, Nick, you handle the spirit box and the recorder, and I’ll see if maybe I can draw something out again.” Aaron nodded enthusiastically, switching out his handheld for the SLS, but Nick hesitated, the feeling of unease that had been gnawing at him since he’d stepped into the Wing starting to climb up his spine. Something didn’t feel right about this hall. Maybe it was called the Crazy Wing for a reason. Catching Zak watching him with concern, though, Nick shook off the feeling the best he could and pulled out the spirit box. 

The hall was once again filled with static as both Nick and Aaron trained their cameras on Zak. “I know you’re here,” he called out. “I heard you earlier. I just want to talk. I know this place used to be a hospital. Anyone here who can tell me what kind of place it was?” Static ran for a long moment before something came through. “… Bad…” The three men froze. The voice was distinctly male, and it sounded gravely, dark, even despite the distortion from the white noise. “Bad?” Zak repeated. “Do you mean this was a bad hospital? Did bad things happen here?” 

“...Experiments… “ The voice repeated, followed by something that almost sounded like a chuckle. Before any of the men could question that statement, the box lit up again. “ ...Doctors… torture… You’re Next…”  

The last statement was followed by a loud cackling that seemed to come both from the box and the air around them, like whoever was talking to them was mocking them. Nick felt his spine stiffen, but before he could do more than share a concerned look with Zak, something else came through. “... [looks] scary…” All the air in the hall fled. That had sounded like a child.

Chapter Text

I wasn’t poutin’. I ain’t pouted since I was Jamie’s age, but I was gettin’ frustrated. It had been a week now since we’d left home, and I didn’ feel like we was any closer to gettin’ Mista Zak and Mista Nick together like they was supposed to be. When we left home, we took a plane all the way back to Nevada where Mista Zak lived. We’d only ever been on one before, and Jamie was too little to remember, so the experience had been both exciting and terrifying. Since the flight had been kinda full and I’d never liked tryin’ta go through people, Jamie and me spent the time in the Pocket Space so we wouldn’t be in nobody’s way. 

Mista Zak’s house was nice. It was small like ours, but it was full of cool pictures and lotsa books and creepy looking things, like props from a scary movie or something. I didn’t even have’ta try nothin’ to make him ask Mista Nick to stay instead’a goin’ back where he lived. Mista Zak did that all on his own and I felt hope bubble up inside my chest. They didn’t really talk much about what had all happened back home, like they was avoiding it or something, but even Jamie noticed how close they kept. They slept in different rooms at night, and Jamie an’ me slept on the couch, but during the day they kinda revolved around each other, like they didn’ wanna be apart for too long. Some nights they’d sit together on the couch and watch movies or TV. They didn’t touch much, but every so often one’ah them would put their arm across the back of the couch, almost behind the other’s head. 

The whole thing was so sweet, but so frustratin’! It was like they was dancin’ with each other, but too scared to actually get closer. Like they was fightin’ their feelin’s or something. I came real close to doin’ somethin’ more than a couple times to try and push them more together, but I’d promised Missus Rosenburg I wouldn’ do nothin pushy. Nobody liked bein’ pushed when they wasn’t ready. But then we was gettin’ back on another plane and I heard Mista Aaron sayin’ we was goin’ to a Sandy-Sano- Sanit ar ium in Oregon. I’d read about Oregon in my history books an’ was excited to see it for real, but the way they was talkin’ about this Mayville hospital place made me nervous. Mista Nick an’ Mista Zak had talked about it a couple times, and I heard enough to know it was some kinda haunted hospital and they were gonna be doin’ another ‘vestigation, but I didn’ like it. Nothin’ good comes from creepy ol’ hospitals. Naddy an’ Pop had started watchin’ somethin’ called Bedlam one night, an’ it was set in some creepy hospital. I didn’ get more than a few minutes into it before it was too scary an’ I ran back upstairs. I think they still knew I’d seen some, though, because they didn’t ask me why when I crawled into bed with them that night ‘cause of nightmares. 

Just like back home, they went by the hospital in the daytime and got a tour from the caretaker. It was a big place, full of shadows even with all the lights on, an’ I kept Jamie an’ me real close to Mista Nick an’ Mista Aaron, since Mista Zak was up talkin’ with the caretaker an’ we didn’t wanna be in his way. The caretaker told them about what the different parts of the hospital was for, and warned them to stay away from the south part ‘cause it wasn’t safe. Mista Aaron would stop occasionally and put a little black taped X on the ground in places they wanted to put some of their stand-still cameras before they continued on. I was just startin’ to get bored when the tour was comin’ to an end and they was makin’ plans to come back that night. 

When the time finally came for us to go back, a big part of me wanted to leave Jamie back in the hotel room with some cartoons. I had a bad feelin’ about that place, an’ I didn’ want him bein’ around if something went bad-ways, but I knew in my heart I couldn’t leave him behind. We’d made it this far together, an’ I’d just have to keep doin’ my best to keep him safe. When the three men made their plans to split up, I took Jamie an’ we went with Mista Nick. The caretaker had said the East was where they got a lot of activity, but I still thought maybe that was the safer since Mista Zak was goin’ down where they said the crazies had been kept. If anythin’ was gonna happen, I didn’ want Jamie around that when it did. 

We watched Mista Nick layin’ in one of the old bathtubs, could see shadow nurses flicker in an’ out an’ old patients thin as skeletons starin’ out with blank eyes. They was just like some of the soldiers back home, nothin’ more than memories, an’ it made me sad to think they’d just been left and abandoned there. Nobody wanted them, nobody thought about them, an’ they’d just been left to fade away. When Mista Nick had finished with the bathtub we followed him down the hall to where the doctors had kept their exam and operation rooms. The farther down that hall we went, the more uneasy I felt. I could see the shadows moving in the empty rooms, an’ I held Jamie just a little closer so he wouldn’ see. Some of these were so much worse than the soldiers back home. I caught glimpses of bloody faces and mummy bandages, people shaved bald with burns over half their skulls, and by the time Mista Nick picked a room to go in, part of me didn’ want us stayin’ out in the hall. I wanted to stay with him cuz he felt safe, but one glance inside the room told me we’d be better off in the hall. 

The room felt heavy, dark. There was a skinny woman in an old hospital gown sittin’ in the wheelchair mumblin’ to herself. What hair she had left was long an’ all tangled like spanish moss an’ her skinny arms were covered in scratches an’ red marks. She seemed oblivious to Mista Nick’s questions, but I couldn’ tell if she was a shadow or if she was just stuck in her head. Every so often she’d shift in her chair, the old metal letting out sharp squeaks like mice, an’ I wondered if Mista Nick could hear them too. Settin’ Jamie down against the wall where he couldn’t see nothin’, I leaned against the doorframe to watch. Mista Nick took a few minutes to wander around the room with his camera before he climbed up on the metal table and laid down. Almost as soon as he did the feel of the room shifted. It felt heavier, like the sky before a big thunderstorm. The woman in her wheelchair squeaked once more before goin’ still, her mumblin’ stopped like she was holdin’ her breath, waitin’ on somethin’. 

She didn’ have long to wait. Almost as soon as Mista Nick turned on his white noise box, somethin’ came outta the wall right behind the door, pushin’ it outta its way. It looked like a doctor, but not a doctor. He was dressed in white scrubs that were covered in bloody handprints and streaks of dirt. The mask over his mouth had speckles of red that spread up onto his grey face and his eyes were big as dinner plates and all crazy lookin’. He walked into the room, but then stopped in the middle’a it, like he forgot what he’d come in for. The woman in the wheelchair whimpered just once, all soft like, an’ I felt my heart climb up into my throat. Was this one of the bad-man doctors that the caretaker had talked about? One of the ones who used to do experiments on the people who lived here? 

I ducked back out of the doorway when his eyes started roamin’ around the room like he was lookin’ for somethin, an’ when I felt brave enough to look back in, Mista Nick was climbin’ off the table. The doctor man was still in there, standin’ over by the old cabinet. When Mista Nick got down, the doctor took a step forward like he was gonna reach out an’ try an’ grab him, but then he was fadin’ out like a bad picture. If Mista Nick looked a little more rushed walkin’ back down the hall, I wasn’t gonna blame him. Whatever had gone on in that room had stirred up somethin’, ‘cause as we walked back down the hall, shadows started appearin’ in the doorways, empty eyes trackin’ us. Some o’ them even looked startled, like they hadn’ expected Mista Nick to come outta that room. I thought I heard a nurse mumble “brave fool” as we passed, but when I looked back at her she was turned away like she was goin’ back to work. 

Mista Aaron was waitin’ when we got back, an’ the two men took a second to catch up on what they’d seen. I wish I coulda told them what Mista Nick was missin’, but I was also glad he’d missed it. But then Mista Zak was turnin’ up and we was followin’ him down the hall with the crazy people. 

I picked Jamie up an’ held him against me tight, pushin’ his face into my neck so he wouldn’ see. This hall felt bad, dark. Like there was somethin’ lurkin’ an’ waitin’. It made a sick feelin’ curl up in my stomach, an’ I only felt more an’ more uneasy the further down the hall we went. Mista Zak was talkin’ about hearin’ slammin’ doors an’ mumblin’s when he tried to get someone to talk to him. Lookin’ round, I was kinda glad nothin’ I was seein’ had tried talkin’ to him. Others stood in the doorways; some with wide, blank eyes like they couldn’ tell if we was real or some hallucination, some with wide grins and glints in their eyes that didn’t spell good things. Some looked like they could still be alive, others with bloody clothes or dark lines against their wrists or necks. I fought off a shudder so I wouldn’t make Jamie worry an’ moved a little closer to Mista Nick an’ Mista Aaron. 

The white noise box was out again an’ Mista Zak was callin’ out for someone to answer.  As Mista Aaron focused on his stick figure camera an’ Mista Nick held out the box, someone stepped out from one of the rooms. He was tall, almost tall enough to have to duck through the door, and skinny as a skeleton. He had long, stringy black hair an’ his neck was sittin’ at a funny angle, kinda crooked an’ off-center-like. He leaned toward the microphone Mista Zak was holdin’ and grinned with sharp teeth. “This place was bad,” he said, drawing a round of nods from the others standin’ in their doors watchin’. All the microphone picked up was “ bad”, but it was enough for the men. 

“Bad?” Mista Zak repeated, eyes starin’ just off from the tall skinny man. “Do you mean this was a bad hospital? Did bad things happen here?” The skinny man’s grin widened like a halloween mask. “They performed experiments on us,” he said, chucklin’ like it was some kinda joke. “These doctors, they liked to torture in the name of medicine. And you know something, little ghost hunter? You’re next…” He threw his head back and cackled loudly, the sound echoin’ up an’ down the hall an’ sendin’ the watchers scurryin’ like startled cockroaches. I felt Jamie shift in my arms, clinging to my nightgown as we stared wide-eyed up at the man with the funny neck. “He looks scary, Auggie…” he mumbled. I nodded, pressin’ a kiss to his hair. I hadn’ thought it was loud, we’d been real good about bein’ quiet aroun’ the microphones, but a second later I heard it. The microphone popped and crackled, and a soft “... looks scary …” came out in his unmistakably childish voice. The three men froze.

Chapter Text

Zak felt his heart climb into his throat. That had sounded like a child. “Guys, the caretaker never said anything about this sanitarium also housing children, did he?” Aaron shook his head, eyes glued to the SLS camera screen, scanning around to see if they could find the source of their conversations. “No, man. This was an adult only hospital. Maybe it was just, like, some patient with the mind of a child?” Zak nodded, wanting so hard to believe that’s what it must have been, but one look at Nick told him the taller man was thinking the same thing he was. This hadn’t been a childish patient. This had been something else. There were two options he could fathom: 1) a child had somehow followed them into the sanitarium/gotten stuck in there at some point, or 2) something distinctly evil and possibly not human was taking on the voice of a child. 

“I say we go ahead and get out of here. Nick, do you want to set up one more camera here to see if something comes up while we’re gone? Then I say we head down to the morgue. If this place was as bad as we were hearing, maybe we can get some more answers of what went on here.” Nick nodded, accepting the collapsible tripod Aaron offered out and setting up one of their spare handhelds. When it was set up and facing the direction they’d been getting their responses from, the three men turned and made their way down to the morgue. 

The air felt heavier down there, the ground forming a steady slope that Zak almost didn’t realize was there until his boot sent a piece of rubble skittering into the dark ahead of them. There were no windows this far in, no light except that from their cameras, and it almost felt like it was closing in on them, trying to claim them for itself. Somewhere in the shadows, something was dripping steadily, and Zak did his best to ignore it. A feeling of unease had settled on his shoulders, sinking its claws in painfully as they got closer to their destination. A large, rusted metal door marked their arrival and it screeched and groaned angrily when Aaron pushed it open, leading the way inside. Zak followed, Nick a half-step behind, cameras panning around the room. 

The morgue was small, little more than a drain in the floor, two metal tables, a single column of freezers, and the furnace. It had been decades since the place had seen any death, yet it was like the smell of blood and ashes had soaked into the cement floors and the brick walls, mingling with the stale scent of age and mildew. All three of them gave a collective shudder. “You feel that too, right guys? Like something’s watching us?” Aaron and Nick both nodded, spreading out a bit to focus their cameras on other areas of the room. It didn’t escape Zak that Nick chose the opposite end of the room from the freezers, and he felt a pang of guilt for being the one responsible for that wariness. He brushed it off quickly, though, moving out to the middle of the room where the drain was, the metal glowing white in the green of his camera. 

After a couple minutes of gathering background data, Zak called the other two back towards him. “I think we should try some EVP down here, get out the spirit box and see if we can call any patients.” He didn’t wait for anyone to agree with him, instead pulling out one of the spirit boxes and setting it down in the middle of the nearest metal table. The uneasy feeling was growing more prominent, and even Aaron was starting to look nervous. Zak couldn’t argue with the thoughts screaming at him that this was a terrible idea, but at the same time it was like he couldn’t stop himself. Pulling out a microphone, he turned on the spirit box and let the white noise fill the room. 

“Is there anyone down here? Any patients who’d lost their lives? We heard that the doctors here used to do experiments on patients. Is this true?” For a long few minutes there was nothing but static, but then something came through; a growl like an animal, before a distinctly feminine voice echoed more from the walls around them than the spirit box or the microphone. “... True…” 

Before any of the men could react, Zak felt his entire body go stiff, like something had gripped him tight. He felt cold, like whatever it was had leached all the warmth from his body. It felt dark, slimy, distinctly evil. “Guys?” He called out, but his tongue felt stuck in his mouth. He could feel eyes on him through the dark and hoped it was nothing more than Aaron and Nick. Something damp brushed against the back of his neck. “Guys, something just touched my neck. Can you see anything? Is there something on me?” 

“No, man,” Aaron replied over the static. “There’s nothing, just you standing there. Why, what are you feeling?”

Zak tried to swallow past the blockage in his throat. “There’s something on me, like there’s something dark wrapped around me and I can’t move. I can’t figure out what it is.” Emotions that weren’t his flooded through him; pain, anger, hatred, and something that resembled joy, but in a twisted, sinister way. Like whatever was smothering him was something that found enjoyment in the pain and anger that followed it. His entire body felt numb to the point where it was even constricting his breathing, and Zak felt on the edge of hyperventilating. This was so much worse than the Sandsburough house, so much worse than even Poveglia Island. He could practically feel whatever it was enveloping him, smothering him, trying to worm its way inside of him and take over. He didn’t want to think about what it would do if it succeeded. 

Something bright pierced through the pitch darkness, leaving him temporarily blinded, but when his vision finally cleared he saw that it was Nick who’d turned on his flashlight. The camera he’d been using was sitting on the table behind him, and he was staring at Zak with wide, concern filled eyes. “Zak,” he said, voice deafening in the silence. When had it gotten so quiet? Had the spirit box switched off? “Zak!” Nick snapped again. A quiet whine escaped Zak’s frozen lips. He wanted to respond, wanted to tell them what was going on, but there wasn’t any air left in his lungs. Whatever was on him, whatever was trying to possess him had stolen it. 

“Zak, I need you to focus on me, man. Can you do that? Eyes on me. You are stronger than this thing. Whatever it is you’re feeling, it isn’t real. It can’t hurt you unless you let it. Just like the Island, Zak. You fought it off then you can fight it off now.” 

Zak closed his eyes, unsure how much of his action was voluntary and how much was just the lack of strength to keep them open. He was suddenly exhausted, whatever adrenaline that had been keeping him going most of the night faded from his system and making his bones feel like lead. Nothing sounded like a better idea than curling up somewhere and taking a nap. When was the last time he’d had a decent night’s sleep, anyway? One not plagued with vague dreams and a sense of loss he couldn’t track down? What he wouldn’t give for a nice, long, dreamless sleep. 

Nick’s voice had faded out behind the rushing of blood in his ears. The numbness had spread. He couldn’t feel the cold seeping into his hands, the burning of his lungs as they screamed for air. His knees started to buckle. Why shouldn’t he just take a nap right here? Trying to go anywhere else seemed like too much work. They buckled again, the sudden gravity making his stomach drop. But then he was warm. Warm arms wrapped around his waist, under his arms, clutched at the legs of his jeans, cupped his face. Warmth chased the numbness away, made him aware of how much his lungs were screaming at him. He doubled over in a coughing fit, pulling stale gulps of air in only to choke on them. His body felt like he’d been set on fire, pain radiating from every nerve ending. 

“Breathe, man. You’re okay, just breathe. Whatever it was, it’s gone now. You’re fine, just take slow breaths.” Zak let the words flow over him, body unconsciously relaxing as he took slow, steady breaths. He felt exhausted. Not in the way the thing had made him feel, but in the drained, bone tired way you feel after a bad case of the flu. He leaned against Nick, letting himself be led back against a wall to give himself something to ground himself with. “Shit,” he muttered, feeling Nick’s responding chuckle rumble through his chest before the taller man’s reply came out roughly. “Don’t scare me like that again, man. You hear me? Don’t you fucking scare us.” 

Zak nodded, letting his head roll back against the wall and squinting up at Nick’s face. He could see Aaron behind him, camera abandoned for the flashlight and his own bearded face reflecting his relief, but his primary focus was on those brown eyes blown wide in relief. They shared a look for a long few minutes before Zak blinked and rotated his head towards Aaron. “We get any of that? Network’d freak out if we had two heavily active lockdowns in a row.” Realizing Zak was trying to bring the tense atmosphere back to a sense of normalcy, the bearded man grinned. “Yeah, we got most of it. Your whole fit came through, and we even got some footage from after Nick turned on the flashlight, but then the whole audio and everything got real staticy and shut down, and I can’t tell if something went wrong with the battery, or if maybe that entity thing was responsible. I’ll have to check out the equipment and available footage when we get back to the hotel.”

While Aaron talked, Nick had walked back to where he’d left his camera, leaving Zak feeling cold and slightly lost. “How much longer till the caretaker comes and lets us out?” he asked, trying to mask the hoarseness of his voice. Nick looked down at his watch. “We’ve got just under two hours left. I say we go ahead and head up and start collecting our equipment. The number of cameras we’ve left around, that should eat up most of that time.” Zak nodded in agreement, not having the energy to argue, and not really feeling any sort of desire to continue the investigation. He moved to push himself upright, only to crash right back into the wall when his legs refused to support him. He didn’t miss the look Aaron and Nick shared with each other before the taller of the two was walking towards him, throwing one of Zak’s arms over his shoulder and taking on most of his weight. “Come on, man,” Nick said, voice low in his ear. “Let’s get you out of here.” 

With Aaron leading the way with the cameras and flashlight, they stumbled their way slowly out of the morgue, the door groaning shut untouched behind them, and back up towards the main lobby. Zak was embarrassed to admit how out of breath he felt after just that trek up from the morgue, and was grateful when neither of the others mentioned it, only leading him to an old metal folding chair they'd dug out from a storage closet. Before he could even open his mouth to suggest who should go get cameras from where, Aaron was disappearing into the fading darkness and Nick was offering him a water bottle. “You’re not going anywhere,” the younger man said, tone brokering no arguments. “Aaron said he’s fine going to collect the cameras by himself, the sun is starting to come up so it’s not as shadowy and sinister as it was earlier. You are going to stay right here and drink this bottle of water, and not think about moving until the caretaker comes to let us out.”

Zak hid his grin behind a swig of lukewarm water. Nick was a very passionate person, but he didn’t tend to take charge, leaving that to Zak. It was oddly nice to have both that passion, and that unexpected take-charge attitude directed at him. It made something warm curl up in his chest and settle contentedly. 

_______________________

I could tell there was somethin’ not right about the morgue from the moment we stepped foot on that hall, somethin’ that was evil to the evilest pits. It made me wanna run, to hold Jamie close an’ turn an’ run till I couldn’t run no more. I wanted to scream at the men to not go down there, to go an’ ‘vestigate somethin’ else. But I couldn’t do nothin’ but hold Jamie tight an’ follow. I made him close his eyes when Mista Aaron opened the door, an’ I wasn’t gonna let him open them, not till we was done down here an’ back away from it all. I could see them. I could see the men with shaved heads an’ Y’s carved into their chests, the women missin’ limbs with bloodstains over their bellies, the ones who looked like burnin’ lumps of charcoal and stared out at nothin’ with eyes that looked like boiled eggs. There weren’t no way I was gonna let Jamie see any of them. I wanted to close my eyes too, but I couldn’t. I had to be on the lookout. 

I saw it even before Mista Zak set up his noise box. It was like a livin’ shadow, heavin’ from the corners, pullin’ itself away like an oil slick, like some kinda breathin’ thing. It pulled itself away from the wall and started to take a form. It had the face an’ the upper body of a beautiful woman; long arms and fingers tipped in pointy red nails, an’ its hair was piled up on top of its head the way Missus Abigail wore hers, but where its belly button woulda been was nothin’ but billowy black smoke. It had dark red lips that curled into a sinister lookin’ smile when it’s eyes landed on Mista Zak, an’ in a blink it was behind him, its black smoke wrappin’ ‘round him like a snake, its long arms wrappin’ around his chest an’ it’s nails diggin’ into his skin. 

Mista Zak looked like he was gonna be sick. He stood all stiff like a statue, an’ when he talked he sounded terrified. The thing sneered. “Stop it!” I yelled, an’ the thing must not’ta known I was there ‘cause it looked startled, head turnin’ around like an owl to look where me an’ Jamie stood. “Whatsss thisss?” It asked, voice like a woman, but not like a woman; like a thunderstorm or a leaky balloon, or the way I’d imagine a gravestone soundin’ if one coulda talked. “You’rrre not fffrome around here… Whooo are you?” I ignored the question. I knew enough about old fairy tales that you don’t tell no creature your name. “You can’t take him over,” I said instead, usin’ what Mista Henry used to call my “no nonsense” voice. “You gotta go away an’ leave him alone.”

The creature smiled in the way my teacher used to smile at the stupid kids. “Oh? And whyy iss that?” Its tone was curiosity hiding nasty condescension, its smile polite but eyes starin’ at me for what it thought I was; a little dead girl who was a long way from home an’ way outta her depth. I straightened an’ stuck up my chin. It was half right. We was a long way from home, an’ I was a little dead girl. But there was a reason the bullies at school knew to leave me alone, an’ there was no way I was lettin’ this bitch ruin my chances of gettin’ my family back. 

“You can’t have him because he already has someone inside him. That’s Mista Zak, an’ that tall one with the flashlight is Mista Nick, an’ they have my Naddy an’ my Pop’s souls inside of them, so there is no room for you and you can just go and leave and bother somebody else.” 

If my heart could still beat it woulda been racin’ in terror, but it weren’t, so I knew the thing couldn’ tell just how scared I was that it’d ignore me an’ try anyway. I didn’ know how many souls one body could hold, but I didn’ think it could hold my Naddy an’ Mista Zak an’ that thing all at once. It looked confused, black eyes lookin’ from me to Mista Nick, to Mista Zak still frozen like a statue in its serpenty smoke, but then somethin’ seemed to click an’ it smiled wide, but not that nasty smile this time, a smile like it knew somethin’. It slinked back away from Mista Zak. “You are brrraver than I gave you credit for, child. I conccceed. I will leave you to your quest. But should these men ever return, vesselsss or no, I will have my fun.” 

I nodded, sure that it would never see any of us ever again, an’ watched it uncurl itself from around Mista Zak, meltin’ into the ground under our feet till there weren’t nothin’ left to show it had been there. Not even the others had remained, fadin’ back into the walls or their Pockets until it was just me an’ Jamie an the men. Mista Zak was standin’ with his eyes closed, body tight like he was frozen, but then like a puppet with its strings cut, his knees went out from under him an’ he was fallin’. Mista Nick was there faster than lightnin’ to catch him, arms goin’ under his armpits an’ around to cup at the sides of his face. Mista Zak’s eyes were closed. He was sheet pale an’ I didn’t think he was breathin’. Jamie wiggled outta my arms an’ I let him, us two rushin’ over to check an’ make sure he was okay. Jamie was huggin’ at his legs, little face pinched up with concern. I wrapped my arms around his waist an’ pressed my face between his shoulders. I could feel the icy cold radiatin’ off him an’ willed him to be okay. He had to be okay. An’ then he started coughin’.

Mista Nick was talkin’ to him all quiet, lettin’ him know he was gonna be okay, an’ I could see the tense leavin’ his body. I was reluctant to let go when Mista Nick started leadin’ him back to the wall, but I stepped back an’ pulled Jamie with me. There wasn’t nothin’ we coulda done anyway to help. No, Mista Nick an’ Mista Zak needed this minute for themselves. Instead, I hugged Jamie tight, felt him shakin’ against me like a leaf. That had been close. Too close. We coulda lost everythin’ in that moment. Not just our chance of bein’ a whole family again, but we coulda lost Mista Zak, that thing coulda snuffed him an’ Mista Nick an’ Mista Aaron like a candle an’ we’d’a been stuck here. We’d’a been stuck in this bad place thousands of miles from home. We’d be lost. For the first time since we left home, I was scared. 

They were makin’ plans. It was almost time for the caretaker to come let them out. I felt he couldn’t come soon enough. I wanted outta this place. I wanted to be back in my bed in our little house with Jamie snoozin’ in the bed next to mine an’ Naddy an’ Pop down the hall. I wanted to wake up in the mornin’ to Pop flippin’ pancakes an’ Naddy readin’ the mornin’ paper over a cup of coffee that he’d let me sip out of when Pop wasn’t lookin’. I wanted a sleepy Jamie stumblin’ down the steps in his footie pajamas, the ones with the bears all over them. Pop would slide the last pancakes onto a plate an’ scoop up Jamie in his arms all safe. 

My eyes pricked an’ itched with the memory of tears an’ I blinked hard to make the feelin’ go away. Mista Nick was pullin’ Mista Zak up, an’ Mista Aaron was grabbin’ the cameras an’ the flashlight and startin’ toward the big metal door that led up to the rest of the hospital. Grabbin’ tight to Jamie’s hand, we followed the men. As they started up the hall, I looked back into the dark of the morgue. Things was startin’ to move again, driftin’ hesitantly outta the walls, the floors, the freezers. I squinted hard, sure I could see the shadows in the dark movin’ like the thing was back. Frownin’, I marched back over to the door an’ pulled it shut hard. It screeched an’ groaned at me, but it shut with a final click that echoed out the hall. I was done playin’ games with no-goods. 

Chapter Text

Zak didn’t open his eyes. He could feel the warmth of the sun on his face, tingeing the insides of his lids red. He was relaxed, stretched out on something that shifted beneath him, head pillowed on something soft but firm. Fingers were carding through his hair, blunt nails scratching just there in a way their owner knew would turn his bones to jelly. Somewhere not so distant, the sound of waves crashing was punctuated frequently by the high-pitched, joyous shrieks of children. There was a splash, followed by a low chuckle that vibrated from his pillow and through his skull, leaving it buzzing pleasantly. He felt a grin curl the corners of his mouth and was about to comment on just what was so funny when a mass of boney limbs and sea-soaked fabric landed on his chest, costing him his breath in one groaned oof. Small, chilly-wet hands framed his face, tugged at his shirt, poked at his cheeks, each movement accompanied by more giggles. 

“Come on, Naddy, wake up! Come swim with us! The water’s warm an’ everythin’!” He groaned, trying half-heartedly to swat away the hands that continued their persistent prodding. “Your voice says one thing, but your hands say another! It’s too cold to swim!” He groaned out, fighting a smile as he turned his head away from the prodding and further into his makeshift pillow. The smell of salty air and sun-warmed cotton tickled his nose, but under it was something deeper, comforting. He hummed and buried his face further into it, letting it coax him back towards sleep. It rumbled with another chuckle before speaking up, voice light. “Why don’t the two of you go build a sandcastle and warm up a bit? Your lips are starting to turn blue and you’re both shivering.” 

Jamie whined, but a moment later he was climbing off of Zak’s chest, feet sending sand flying as he ran back to where his sister waited for him, buckets and shovels likely already in hand. Zak squinted open his eyes to find his vision filled by pale blue cotton patterned with tiny sailboats. Turning his head, he looked up to see Nick, one hand back to balance him as he watched the kids building their sandcastle. The sun was behind him, casting an aura around his lanky frame and giving him an almost angelic appearance. The smile on his face was one Zak hadn’t seen before; soft, secreted, but somehow still radiating joy so brightly it almost made his eyes water. 

As though feeling Zak’s eyes on him, Nick looked down, smile quirking up in the corners. “Hey sleepyhead,” the taller man murmured, free hand coming up to resume it’s combing through Zak’s hair, knocking loose bits of sand Jamie’s heels had kicked up. The darker haired man sighed and pushed back into the ministrations, eyes closing again as he settled back against his partner’s thighs. Nick chuckled again, fingertips digging wonderfully into his scalp. The sound mixed with the crashing of waves and squeals from the kids in a sort of lullaby. “Love you, Nate,” Nick murmured, the words almost carried away by the breeze. Zak felt his own lips quirk into a smile, the answering words on the tip of his tongue, sweet like spun sugar. “I…”

_______________________

Zak blinked open his eyes to see Jamie standing next to him. It was dark, why was it so dark when it had just been sunny a moment ago? Was a storm coming? Had he slept so long the sun had set? No, Zane would have woken him up long before then. Maybe he’d fallen asleep too, that’s why Jamie was waking him up. Did they need help with their sandcastle? His vision started to clear, and he frowned. They weren’t at the beach. Hadn’t they just been at the beach? The thick fog of sleep cleared his brain and Zak felt his heart stutter in his chest. He was in a hotel room. They’d just left their lockdown at the Mayville Sanitarium and he’d nearly been possessed. There had never been a beach, never been Zane or Jamie or August. Just him, and Nick, and Aaron, and a big empty hospital full of ghosts. 

He blinked. Blinked again. The little boy with blue lips and sandy colored hair still stood by his bed. Shit. He propped up on his elbows, eyes not leaving the little boy. He was dressed in dark blue footie pajamas with little red trains all over them, a dingy bear clutched to his chest and his bottom lip caught behind pearly baby teeth. His thinking face, he somehow knew instinctively. “Nick?” Zak called, but when there was no answer he sat up fully, eyes not leaving the little boy’s face. “Nick?” Still no answer. Swallowing hard, brain running through a thousand different scenarios, he pulled his gaze from the little boy to the other bed. His heart stopped. Whatever ideas he’d had, this had never been one of them. The taller man was already sitting up, back hunched with his head buried in his hands. His shoulders were trembling. 

A girl was sitting on the bed across from him, her light brown hair pulled into braids and her bloody nightgown pulled over her knees. Zak watched her reach out and rest a pale hand on one of Nick’s trembling shoulders. “Nick?” Zak called out again. “You okay?” Nick’s head remained in his hands, but his voice sounded wet and shaky when he spoke. “I miss them so much…” He sounded broken. Zak frowned. “Miss who, Nick?” There’s a chance he was talking about his parents, but he’d called them just the other day to let them know they were heading to Oregon. He’d put the phone on speaker so Aaron and Zak could say hello, and Mrs. Groff had warned them all to be careful.

Nick finally looked up, face pale and wet in the light filtering through the windows. “Our kids, Nate,” he replied, voice shaking so much that Zak almost missed the foreign accent that carried them. It wasn’t Nick’s usual New England accent, more of the drawl he remembered hearing in their conversations with the Reineses. Nick continued, eyes blown with distress. “God, it’s been so long… they must be so scared …” Something niggled at the back of Zak’s mind but he ignored it. Nick was acting strange, and it was beginning to really worry him. Had he picked up something from the Sanitarium without the others knowing? “Nate? Nick, what are you…” he trailed off. The bed dipped slightly as the little boy climbed up onto the foot of his bed, big brown eyes flickering from one adult to the other. Zak looked from the little boy to the girl sitting across from him. Things finally clicked into place. “Nate… Nate Sandsburough?” He looked at the children, the sense of familiarity that had been bothering him clearing into a family photograph blown up on the wall of a local museum. News articles proclaiming the murder of a family, two men and their children; August, age 13, and Jamie, age 5. 

He looked at August, who was sitting patiently, watching him. Nick’s tremors had slowed and now he sat there staring into nothing, looking drained and lost. “Is that why you’re still here?” Zak asked. “You’re looking for your dads?” August nodded. “When we woke up dead, we kept waitin’ for our Naddy an’ our Pop to show up, but they never did…” 

“And you think Nick and I are them?” Zak’s heart was trying to climb up his throat and choke him. August shook her head. “No,” she replied. “I know you an’ Mista Nick are your own people, but you’ve got a piece of my Naddy’s soul in you, an’ he’s got a piece of my Pop’s soul in him.”

“The two of you need to get together so their souls can finally be together an’ we can all go into the light!” Jamie interrupted, voice full of quiet excitement and the determination of a little kid. Zak shook his head, heart heavy for the child. “I’m sorry, Jamie, but it doesn’t work that way. You can’t just make two people fall in love when they don’t already share those kinds of feelings.”

“Bullshit.” It was said so sharply and suddenly that Zak actually sat back, eyes wide with surprise as he turned his attention to the girl who’d said it. August was staring at him, a no-nonsense frown on her face and her brows furrowed in irritation. “Excuse me?” It slipped out of Zak’s mouth before he realized it, and he was instantly reminded of the time he’d cussed in front of his mother when he was nine. August crossed her arms. “You heard it, an’ I ain’t sorry. I been watchin’ the two of you since you was--were-- at our house for the interview. You two have feelings for each other, feelings just like our Naddy and Pop had for each other, you just can’t pull your heads out of your asses to realize it.”

Beside him, Jamie let out a little giggle before quieting back down when August shot him a look, and Zak had to wonder if she’d learned that kind of language on her own, or if it had come from living with Civil War soldiers for over forty years. “I know you got feelin’s for Mista Nick,” the girl continued, “an’ I know he has feelin’s for you. You’re meant to be together, just like my Naddy an’ Pop were.” The earnest look on her face made protectiveness swell up in his chest. He sighed and rubbed at his face briskly. This was insane. Everything about this was insane, and that was coming from someone who hunted ghosts for a living. But all of this talk about souls and perfect matches, and the fact that the spirits of two dead kids had apparently followed them across the country and were now having a conversation with them?

“Zak…” Nick’s voice sounded completely wrecked, but he sounded like Nick. Zak looked up to find red-rimmed brown eyes watching him. “Zak, we’ve got to find a way to help them.” Zak just shook his head, feeling somehow completely wired, but also like a bone-deep exhaustion had settled over him. “I’m sorry,” he said, his voice suddenly hoarse. “I don’t know how to help you, I’m sorry. I just, I gotta…” He needed to think. Throwing off his blankets, he slipped on the closest pair of shoes, grabbed a jacket off the chair, and was gone. The door swung shut on a quiet “Zak…”

He didn’t know where he was going, only that he needed to move, needed to get out of that room and give himself somewhere to think. It wasn’t until he was a block away from the hotel did he pause long enough to realize how ridiculous he probably looked. He was dressed in sweats and a rumpled undershirt, the shoes he’d thrown on were trailing their laces behind him, and in the dark he’d apparently grabbed Nick’s jacket which was not only a size small on him, but was inside out too. He was sure his hair was standing on end and he probably looked pale with dark purple smudges under his eyes. A glance at the nearest storefront window confirmed his suspicions, so with a sigh he veered off into a little park and found a bench away from the main hub of the street. 

He tied his shoes so he wouldn’t trip later, amazed it hadn’t happened yet, ran his fingers through his hair to try and make it look a little less like he was homeless or off his meds, and turned Nick’s jacket right side out before putting it back on. It was too cold to go without, and it fit well enough; the shoulders were a little tight and he couldn’t fully zip it shut, but a benefit of the other man being taller meant the sleeves were long enough for him to curl his fists into. He sat there huddled on the park bench for a long time, brain spinning like a bad carnival ride. He and Nick were friends, that’s all. They’d known each other for a long time, practically since college. Sure they were close, they’d been through a lot together. But it wasn’t like he was any closer to Nick than he was Aaron, right? He and Nick were just friends, nothing more. 

The thought felt stale, sour. Who are you kidding, you’ve been head over heels for him for years, you’ve just been too chickenshit to admit to it. Zak buried his head in his hands. Who was he kidding? But now that he was really thinking about it, could he really trust his own feelings? It hadn’t escaped him that he and Nick really did bear a strong resemblance to Nate and Zane Sandsburough, but if August was right and they really had the dead mens’ souls in them, could what he felt towards Nick just be the residual feelings of Nate Sandsburough seeping through? He thought about the dreams that had plagued him since they’d left the Sandsburough house. A body wrapped around him, holding him, comforting him, making him feel alive, comfortable moments of someone poking fun at his expense. Sometimes children would make an appearance, but in the end, it was Nick. Always Nick. 

He took a deep breath, the bite of chilly air mingling with the warm spice of Nick’s cologne lingering on the jacket. They made a great team, bouncing off one another in an easy tandem. If what August had said was true, if them getting together was the only way for the children to get their dads back so they could cross over, then where would that leave them? What if what they felt was all because of the souls inside them? Don’t you think, in the end, it’s worth the risk? 

The thought came from somewhere deep inside him. It sounded like him, but also not like him. His breath left him in a shaky sigh and he sat up. Yes, in the end, if it got those two children, two children who’d left the only home they knew to travel across the countries on a hope and a prayer, if it got them their dads back and let them find peace, then it would ultimately be worth it. 

He was about to push himself to his feet and start back for the hotel when the pocket of his borrowed jacket buzzed. Reaching in, he found Nick’s cellphone, Aaron’s name lighting up the display. “Hello?” he answered. 

“ Hey, Nick told me I might find you with his phone. He said you went out for a walk an hour ago and accidentally took his jacket.”

An hour? Had he really been sitting there that long? “Yeah, I just needed to get some air. My head’s still off after last night. What’s up?”

“Hey man, I get it. Just wanted to let you know we were getting ready to go back for our day time filler footage. If you’re not feeling it, though, you can just hang back here. We won’t be long. I just want to get some more shots of the property, maybe see if the caretaker will let us into the morgue.”

The idea of going back down there made his stomach curl unpleasantly, but Zak fought off the feeling. “No, man, I’m good. I’m actually on my way back now, just let me change. Want me to pick up coffee or something?”

“Not unless you’ve got Nick’s wallet in there too,” Aaron’s laugh echoed through the phone, and Zak felt more than a little stupid, once again being reminded he’d fled that room like a bat out of hell in nothing but his pajamas and a stolen jacket. He thought maybe it was just luck Nick had forgotten to take his phone out when he’d ditched it earlier. “Don’t worry about it, man. We grabbed a bite in the hotel diner. Just make your way back.” With that the phone let out a loud beep as the call ended. Zak stuck it back in the pocket it came from and started back for the hotel. 

_______________________

Zak tried to focus on the Mayville Sanitarium, but his thoughts kept straying back to the taller man off to his right. Nick was acting strange. He was acting like Nick, but there was an air about him that wasn’t his normal self. Zak couldn’t even think of how to explain it. Nick had always just been… well, Nick, but now it was like something inside him that had changed after last night. After the events at the Sanitarium and what had happened with the Sandsburough children. He knew his abrupt departure likely hadn’t helped anything, they’d need to talk about it sooner rather than later, but Zak was still trying to wrap his head around all that they’d learned, all that he’d figured out about himself. 

He’d arrived back to an empty room, a note on the dresser telling him that Nick and Aaron were in Aaron’s room getting a few cameras ready. They weren’t going to take much. They’d decided on the way back after the lockdown to delay their flight out by a day so they could go back and get a little more footage of the Sanitarium in the daylight, see if anything had changed after all that had happened. Zak had made a quick jump through the shower before throwing on a clean pair of jeans and a sweater, trading Nick’s jacket for his own and making sure his phone was in his pocket before he was knocking on the next room’s door and they were off.

Aaron had carried most of the conversation during the ride over, catching Zak up on his review of some of the footage from the night before. As expected, there hadn’t been much of anything from the South Wing, something that could have been footsteps, but not much else. Nick had managed to catch some anomalies in the bathroom and in the exam room, including the door moving on its own. Most of their usable footage came from the West Wing and the morgue, though something had shorted out the footage about half way through Zak’s possession, and they’d somehow lost the feedback they’d gotten from the child. One glance at Nick’s face told Zak that loss may not have been entirely accidental, but he kept his mouth shut. 

They got their outdoor footage quickly, the building no less intimidating, but somehow much less sinister looking in the light of day. The caretaker had agreed to give them an hour inside before he had to start getting it ready for the day’s tours, but none of them had been particularly eager to split up this time. Instead they moved together, opting to move from West to East, skipping the wings they hadn’t gotten much from in the first place. The West wing looked like a tornado had blown through it, debris and rubble littering the floor and some doors looking a breeze away from falling off their hinges. They followed the hall down to where they’d encountered their most talkative spirit, finding little more than their footprints in the dust, though Aaron did zoom in on what could have been prints left by bare feet; too big to be a child’s, Zak noticed with relief. 

As they made their way towards the East wing, all three of them collectively slowed. “I can take care of this side if you want to wait back,” Aaron offered, but Zak shook his head. “No, I’m fine. I’ll be fine. Let’s just get this over with.” The bearded man nodded and offered an encouraging grin before turning and leading the way down the well lit hall. Zak was about to follow when a hand gripped his shoulder. He turned to see Nick watching him with a small frown. “You know you don’t have to do this, right? Aaron and I can take care of it.” It was the first time Nick had spoken directly to him since he’d gotten back to the hotel. Zak grinned. “I know, but why let you too have all the fun?” He didn’t realize how tense he’d been until Nick’s responding smile had it all draining away from his body. Together, they turned and followed after Aaron. 

Zak could tell they were all a little surprised when the morgue door swung open easily before them. The room looked so innocuous in the light of the fluorescent bulbs hanging from the ceiling. Everything looked whitewashed and old, not the sinister glow they’d seen through the screens on their cameras the night before. As Zak walked over to where he’d experienced his near-possession, he half expected there to be scorch marks on the concrete, or some kind of black oil slick, something to show what had happened. But there was nothing. Just scrubbed grey cement and a rusted drain grate. They finished getting their footage, Aaron making a comment about whether or not Nick wanted to climb into one of the freezers for old times sake that earned him a solid punch to the arm, and then they were leaving. In the end, it was all just sort of anticlimactic.

Chapter Text

Zak lay on his back staring up at the ceiling for a long time. He knew Nick was probably doing the same, but he couldn’t bring himself to look over at the younger man. They’d talked. Zak had known it was inevitable, but that hadn’t stopped him from trying to push it off as long as possible. When they’d gotten back from Mayville, they’d eaten quickly before convening in Aaron’s room to divide and conquer their footage and get it ready for compilation. Done with that by early evening, there had been nothing else to do but return to their rooms and try and get some sleep before their flight out the next morning. The atmosphere in the room Zak and Nick were sharing had been uncomfortably heavy. 

Zak’s mind had been running in circles, replaying flashes of dreams and their conversation from earlier that morning. Nick had looked so broken, and it had made Zak feel like he’d been gutted. Neither of the Sandsburough children had made a reappearance since Zak had left that morning, but he knew they were still there, just giving the men privacy to figure out what they were going to do. Zak’s heart went out to them, he couldn’t imagine what the last decades must have been like, wondering if you’d been abandoned by your family, only to have two people walk in who could have been their carbon copies. In the end, he couldn’t let the silence go on. 

“You were right,” he said, and if the sudden noise had startled Nick, the lanky man didn’t show it. He simply put down his phone and looked across to where Zak sat. “You were right, we have to help them. I don’t know how, but we do.” When Zak had braved a look over at Nick’s face, it was to see the other man smiling fondly, and Zak realized Nick had already made his decision, maybe even long before all of this had started. “Love, you, Zak,” he’d said. “I probably have since the day I met you. I doubt I’d have put up with half the mess you put me through if I didn’t.” 

That startled a laugh out of Zak, and he could feel the tension in the room starting to fracture. “If… If what we feel really is just Zane and Nate Sandsburough, and we wake up tomorrow after all of this is over and we don’t feel the same way…”

“We’ll still be friends, Zak. I’ll still be a part of the crew, we can still hang out when lockdowns are too close together to make going home seem like a good idea. You’re not getting rid of me that easily, Bagans.” Nick was still grinning, and Zak felt the last of the tension crack and shatter. Of course Nick would still hang around, what had he been so worried about? Sighing, he dropped back against the mattress and stared up at the ceiling, watching the popcorn texturing shift as he lost focus, tracing patterns that weren’t there and letting his mind go blank. He didn’t know what the night would hold, for any of them, but he could only hope and pray to whatever deities were up there that this would all work itself out in the end. 

_______________________

“Zak…” Someone was shaking him. “Come on, buddy, wake up. We’ve got guests.” Zak groaned and swatted at the hands poking and shaking at him. “Come on, Bagans, up and at’em!” Nick sounded way too cheerful for such a late hour. What was the rush? Their flight wasn’t leaving till 10. “Shove off, Groff,” he groaned, throwing his arms over his face. A stifled giggle was his only warning before fingers were digging into his ribs mercilessly. Zak yelped, jerking away and glaring blearily at his attackers. August and Nick were sitting on the latter’s bed fighting to keep their faces blank, but Jamie was perched on the edge of Zak’s bed giggling hysterically and looking about two seconds away from tipping backwards and falling to the floor. Zak glared half-heartedly at all of them before huffing and sitting up, instinctively reaching out to steady Jamie before the kid could fall. 

“All right, all right. I’m awake.” He rubbed a hand over his aching ribs and shot an exaggerated frown at Jamie, which only set the little boy off into another fit of giggles. Even August couldn’t contain a snort, hiding it quickly behind her hands. Nick just rolled his eyes. “It’s your own fault, really,” he said, face a mask of innocence that told Zak immediately it had all been his idea. “You’re the one who fell asleep early.” Zak’s responding scowl was ruined by the wide yawn that split his face. When his vision finally cleared again, it was to see Nick smiling at him fondly, bringing back the memory of their shared decision. “You tell them yet?”

Nick shook his head. “Nah, man. I was waiting on your lazy bones to wake up.” Jamie’s eyes went wide. “Tell us what?” He asked, bouncing up and down on his knees. Zak tapped his chin in mock thoughtfulness. “I don’t know that we should tell them, now, Nick. What do you think?” Nick imitated his look, hiding a grin behind his fingers. “Hmm… you know, I just don’t know. I don’t know that they deserve to know now.” 

Jamie was still bouncing on the bed, springs squeaking under the motion, and he looked about two seconds away from exploding from anticipation, but August was looking between the two with deep brown eyes, and Zak was reminded how long this girl had been on earth. He could practically see the wheels in her head turning, gears clicking until her face was breaking out in a grin that lit up the whole room. “You did it! You actually did it!” When both Zak and Nick nodded, she let out a little squeal before squeezing first Nick, then Zak in a surprisingly tight, warm hug; so different from their encounters back in South Carolina. Jamie watched his sister with wide eyes before it seemed to click for him too, and then he was on his feet jumping up and down on the bed. 

“We’ve decided it’s worth a try,” Nick spoke up. “ The two of you are worth giving it a try for. We’ve decided that, even if what we feel for one another is nothing more than residual feelings from your dads, we can still remain friends when this is all over.” August’s frown surprised them as she sank back down onto the foot of the bed. Zak thought she’d have been thrilled that they were willing to give this a try, that they’d agreed to test out her theory, but the smile had faded into a look that was almost sad. “You’re wrong,” she said, pulling Jamie down into her lap. “I appreciate you both willin’ to do this for us, but you’re wrong about your feelin’s. You two don’t love each other just ‘cause our Naddy an’ our Pop loved each other an’ you both got their souls. I can feel it. When this is over, you both are still gonna love each other, I know you will.”

Zak and Nick shared a look over their heads, before Nick was crossing the space between beds and sitting down next to Zak. “August,” he started. “I wish more people had your view of the world.” He reached out to touch a hand to her cheek, the girl closing her eyes and leaning into it. In her arms, Jamie yawned. “Come on, you two,” Zak murmured, moving to make room between himself and Nick and pulling back the blankets. Without a word, the four of them settled, Jamie with his back pressed against Zak’s chest and curled like a ball into August, who mirrored his position against Nick. Their bodies were surprisingly warm, their breaths evening into sleep almost as soon as their heads touched the pillows, and Zak had to wonder when the last time they’d truly slept was. Reaching across them, Zak touched his fingers to Nick’s elbow. The younger man smiled before reaching back to turn off the lamp. In the darkness, Zak felt fingers touch his own elbow. Smiling, he closed his eyes and let sleep reclaim him. 

_______________________

The space between them was cold. Zak wasn’t sure if that was what had awoken him, but it was cold and empty, and that worried him. He sat up, the action knocking loose Nick’s arm from where it still rested against his arm, and the younger man was awake in an instant. He sat up too, both men looking around in confusion before their eyes landed on the children. August and Jamie were standing at the foot of the bed with wide smiles on their faces. They looked different, and it took Zak a minute to figure out what. They looked healthier, more alive. There was color in their cheeks that hadn’t been there before, their lips bright pink and their eyes practically glowing. The bloody hole in August’s nightgown was gone like it had never been there. 

Movement behind the children drew Zak’s attention upward and he felt his mouth go dry. Standing behind them were two men who could have been carbon copies of the investigators, though they looked younger, less world-weary. They stood close, arms wrapped around one another while their free hands rested on the children’s shoulders. The shorter one, Nate, was smiling down at Jamie and August, while Zane Sandsburough looked up at the men on the bed. “Thank you,” he said, his voice sounding so much like Nick’s that Zak felt he was in some kind of twilight zone moment. It was his face, but it wasn’t the thick New England accent he’d become so familiar with. He felt Nick shift on the mattress next to him and knew the younger man was feeling the same way. 

“Thank you for taking care of them, for reuniting our family,” Nate spoke up, looking up for the first time, capturing Zak in mirror blue eyes. Zak just nodded, not sure how to respond to something like that. Before he could even think of something to say, the door to the bathroom swung open. For a moment Zak thought maybe it was Aaron, but the light flooding the space didn’t seem to go past the frame, and he realized what it was he was seeing. That was the doorway, the one all four of them had been waiting for for over forty years. Smiling contentedly, Nate Sandsburough swung Jamie up onto his hip and, one arm around his husband’s waist, started for the doorway, pausing just in front. The light behind them left nothing but silhouettes as they looked back into the hotel room. August still stood at the foot of the bed. 

She was smiling; a bright, hopeful smile, but there was something like sadness in her eyes. Why would she look sad? She had her family back. Before he could ask about it, she climbed up onto the bed between them, pressing a warm kiss first to Nick’s cheek, then Zak’s. “Thank you both,” she whispered, “for everything. For taking care of us, for protecting us, but most important, thank you for trusting us.” She climbed back off the bed, half turned to join her family before she looked back at them again. “Don’t go forgetting about me,” she warned, smile teasing, “because I won’t forget about y’all. Not ever.”

And then she was gone, running between her dads and disappearing into the light. The shadows of the men paused long enough to offer a wave to their counterparts before sharing a chaste kiss, and then the light was enveloping them too, fading out around them until the room was once again dark and the investigators were left staring at a plain wooden door. They stared at it in silence for a long time, before in tandem turning to look at one another. Zak saw his own awe reflected back at him in Nick’s pale brown eyes, and he knew the other man was feeling the same strange sense of loss. Without a word, Zak laid back down and pulled the blankets back up over him. A moment later Nick followed, the two men moving closer, filling the space left by the children. Wrapped up in one another’s arms, they let sleep claim them once more.

Chapter Text

Nick was driving. He kept his eyes on the road, but there was a grin on his face that was directed at the comment Zak had just made. One hand gripped the wheel loosely, but the other was stretched out between them, caught in his husband’s hand. Zak smiled, turning to look into the back seats where a seven-year-old girl with curly blonde hair was fast asleep in her car seat, head turned towards her three year old little brother who chewed quietly on the ear of his stuffed bear. Adopted nearly two years ago, April and Julian were growing like weeds, and just as mischievous as the children responsible for making them a family. Facing back to the stretch of road in front of them, Zak settled back in his seat, eyes settling on the dingy bear on their dash, the locket around its neck holding the smiling faces of their own personal angels. Five years and going strong. August would be proud.