Work Text:
Where were you the first time you were possessed?
The assignment title seemed to glare at Alya from the page where it sat, bold Times New Roman text mocking her with its high line contrast. She had known she would get an assignment like this sooner or later, but she had hoped it would be, well, later.
Ghosts possessed people to make mischief, and they especially preferred possessing children. It was rare that someone turned thirteen without ever hosting a ghost, but, as Alya’s teacher seemed to have forgotten, it did happen occasionally. Much to the detriment of Alya’s future essay grade.
She sighed as she turned the rubric over in her hands again, hoping irrationally that this time it would have an alternate essay topic on the back.
No such luck.
When she was fourteen and practicing the skill of making new friends, Alya had often had to confess her lack of ghostly experience. She’d wished desperately to have her explanations cut short by her first ghostly usurper, popping in with a bang and a dash of comedic timing. Talk about an icebreaker!
That would have made a great first possession story. If Alya hadn’t been so committed to journalistic integrity, she would have put it to paper at once.
Of course, deep down, she didn’t really want to be possessed. No one did. (Or, at least, no one she’d ever heard of.) It was scary to have your autonomy taken from you, and it was anyone’s guess whether your fantôme du jour would be a mostly harmless poltergeist or a battle-crazed nightmare. Overwhelmingly, it was the former. But there were enough provisions in place for the latter to be an ever-present concern, not unlike a car accident or a bout of the flu.
Point was, Alya didn’t want a ghost committing any atrocities with her hands. At the same time, her non-possessed-ness was a big, blazing blemish on her otherwise social, relatable, understanding self-image.
And it was about to be a big, blazing blemish on her report card.
“Oh, please let today be the day,” she muttered to herself, feeling stupid and a little insensitive. No—it was her teacher who was being insensitive, assigning something conditional as if it was universal. Alya just wanted to relate to her peers. It wasn’t as though she thought other people were lucky to have been possessed; it was just hard being the only person on the outside of the experience.
Assuring herself of this, Alya redoubled her efforts, wishing valiantly for even the tiniest crumb of ghostly visitation. “C’mon,” she whispered, fingers forming creases in the assignment rubric. “Come on!”
After many moments of wishing, though, Alya had to give up. The clenching was making her jaw hurt, and she wasn’t going to sit around wishing all day. She’d have to write an essay about the first time she saw someone else being possessed, and hope her teacher would be merciful.
She slapped the crumpled rubric onto her desk and opened the drawer. Then she watched her hands slam it shut again.
No way. Was it finally happening?
Alya tried to reopen the desk drawer, but found she couldn’t make herself move. This was weird. She’d expected possession to feel more out-of-body. “The lights aren’t on, but somebody’s home,” she tried to say, but the words never left her lips.
“That’s pretty funny,” said a voice in her head that definitely wasn’t her own. “Here. I’ll jot that down for your essay.” Alya’s hands picked up her pencil and scrawled the words in unfamiliar handwriting.
“Who are you? Am I really possessed?” Even though she couldn’t speak the words aloud, Alya got the sense that the ghost could hear her. She’d read mixed reports on host-to-ghost communication, but they jumbled together in her head. She was winging it.
The ghost giggled. “I’m Trixx,” it said. “Kinda weird to hold your head open for a ghost and then be surprised when one makes an appearance.” It sat Alya’s body in one of her bean bag chairs.
“Well, I didn’t think it would actually work.”
“Of course it worked. When you—”
“Wait a minute.” Alya had just remembered something. “I’ve heard of you. You’re part of the, the, what’s it called—the Ghostly Court.” Members of the Ghostly Court were ghosts that had been dead for eons. They weren’t the most frequent haunters, but over the course of history they had come to be well-documented. Trixx, as the name suggested, was known to be mischievous but rarely caused true harm. Alya considered herself lucky: there were far worse members of the Court out there, and this would make for a great essay as long as Trixx left her body between now and Tuesday.
“That’s me.” Trixx used Alya’s hand to scratch an itch on the side of her head, then repositioned her body more comfortably in the bean bag. “Unless there’s some other Trixx I don’t know about. And there had better not be,” it added.
“What’s it like being a member of the Court? Who was the last person you possessed? What does possession feel like from the ghost’s point of view?” Alya couldn’t ask her questions fast enough. Even if Trixx wreaked havoc in her room, she could at least make the most of it by conducting an impromptu interview. Though, come to think of it… “Aren’t you supposed to be, you know, making mischief?”
Trixx sighed. “I mean, I can break something if you want,” it said. “Truth is, I’m only here to establish an alibi.”
That sounded juicy. “An alibi? For what?”
“For… stuff,” Trixx said. “Actually, I guess I can tell you. It’s not like mortals can enter Court, and I’m pretty sick of having no one to appreciate my awesome plan. Ooh! Do you have any snacks? I love snacks.”
“Focus.” Alya felt silly for scolding a ghost, but she wasn’t going to let her nerves get in the way of this opportunity. “I’ll tell you where the snacks are when you tell me your story.”
“I like you,” Trixx said with a giggle. “I’ll tell you a little piece. I’m staging a Ghostly Court coup.”
Alya gasped, though her mouth didn’t cooperate. “What? Why?”
“Nuh-uh! Snacks first; pay up.”
“The kitchen’s to your left down the hallway.” Alya tried to ignore the sensation of her body moving without her input. She hoped Trixx would exercise some restraint.
“So,” Trixx said, using Alya to grab a bunch of grapes out of the fridge, “Ghostly Court coup. Yeah. Well, let’s just say one of the rulers isn’t making the best decisions.” Alya’s hand popped a grape into her mouth. “Yum!”
“You’re going to have to tell me more details.” Alya was not too proud to beg for this story if she had to. “Wait—is this going to mean more people get possessed? Should I be trying to warn people?”
“No,” Trixx said, the most serious it had sounded so far. “If this goes well, it’ll actually mean fewer possessions. See, one of the rulers, Tikki, is a little… over-ambitious. Some might even say power-hungry.”
Alya knew about Tikki. She and her co-ruler, Plagg, presided over the Ghostly Court—whatever that entailed. Ghost politics weren’t generally known to mortals. Alya was getting a once-in-a-lifetime scoop. No, once-in-an-era.
Trixx continued: “I probably shouldn’t be telling you this, but, basically, the more times a human gets possessed, the more likely they are to become a ghost. And the more ghosts there are, the more possessions occur. You see?”
Alya couldn’t nod, but she tried to anyway. “So the Ghostly Court’s power is self-sustaining.”
“Yeah. Exactly. You can kinda guess where I’m going with this.” It continued using Alya’s body to eat grapes, savoring each one.
“Uh, Tikki wanted to increase the number of possessions and therefore the number of ghosts?”
“Bingo! She wanted us to… what’d she call it… exponentify. Or something. Anyway, we all think that’s a stupid idea. So we’re overthrowing her. These grapes are so good.”
Alya ignored the grape comment. “Who’s ‘we’?”
“Oh, me, Plagg, pretty much everyone else. I planned it, and I did a bunch of prep work, so I had to get outta there before things started really kicking off. Plagg should be able to handle it, though.”
“Wow,” Alya said. It was a lot to take in.
“Yeah. Well, it’s nice to get that off my chest. Anyway, guess I’d better go see how things are shaking out.”
“Wait!” How could she get Trixx to stay a bit longer and answer more questions? “It’s over already?”
Trixx finished savoring the last grape. “Probably. Ghosts are pretty easy to kick out of Court, once you’ve done all the setup.”
“What setup?”
“That I can’t tell you. It’s been nice chatting, though.” Trixx scanned Alya’s room. “Hey, does your family have ghost insurance?”
“Yes.” Wait. “Why?” Wait. “Why do ghosts know about ghost insurance but humans don’t know about Ghostly Court stuff?”
Trixx laughed using Alya’s body, which was the strangest sensation yet. “You’re hilarious! I need to break something so it looks like I did a real possession. You know, to throw off the scent. And I need to do it quick if I want to get back in time to see the fireworks.”
Alya thought about it. “How about this,” she offered. “I’ll smash something for you, but you have to come back next week to tell me what happened with the coup.”
“Won’t your essay assignment be done by then?”
“It’s not for school,” Alya said. “I want to know what happens.”
“You,” Trixx said, “are so weird. Fine. Make sure you break something important, and try to do it in a way that’s funny. And do it fast! We’re building me an alibi, here!”
“Got it,” Alya said. And just like that, her body was hers again. Trixx was gone, as fast as it had arrived.
Alya grabbed her phone and headed to her closet to dig up her old snowglobe collection. She had a disaster to fake, and after that, she had to write the possession essay to end all possession essays.