Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

When she pulled the van up to the haunt, Cordelia took a breath to steady herself. Things have been going well investigating with Luke and Rowan, but she can't help but get jitters every time they arrive at a haunt. Her brother Luke grins at her from the passenger seat, his hands and tail both twitching with barely contained excitement as he drains the last of his energy drink. As soon as the van is in park, Luke is throwing off his seat belt and bolting to the back of the truck where Rowan is with all the equipment. Cordelia takes a deep breath and holds it for a second, before letting it all out at once. Investigation time, she thinks as she lets herself slip into her ghost hunting mindset.

By the time she's gotten to the back of the van, Rowan and Luke are calibrating the equipment, Rowan pulling the sensors out to set up around the house and Luke scowling at the screen. Cordelia quickly jumps into her leadership position.

“Okay, Rowan and I are going to go set up the sensors now Luke.” Cordelia says, grabbing the other two sensors off the wall.

“I see how it is, leave me to fight with the calibration screen” Luke groans good-naturedly.

“You're just so good at it Luke!” Rowan teases as they exit the van. Cordelia, after messing with the sensors a bit, follows after them. She sees that Rowan had gone to set up the two further sensors, so she quickly set up the closer ones and headed back to the van, where Luke's audible groans of frustration could be heard, making a small smile spread on Cordelia's face.

“Having fun?” She teases as she climbs back into the van, and Luke huffs.

“This thing is evil.” He says, poking the screen, which seems to light up with another error message in response. Luke's groan was so loud that when Rowan came back to the truck a few minutes later, they said that they had been able to hear it from the other side of the house.

After another 15 minutes of troubleshooting and manually fixing errors, they were finally ready to start grabbing equipment for inside the haunt. Cordelia put on her ear piece and watched as her heartbeat monitor showed up on the screen. She watched and waited until both Luke and Rowan's GIN designations and heartbeats appeared, watching them for a minute just to make sure the monitor was working. She knows it's a nervous habit, but it helps to watch the steady beeping of the monitor, showing that all her teammates are alive. She glances for another second, before turning to the equipment.

Her first instinct is always to grab the crucifix as her first object to bring in the house. It brings her a sense of comfort, having that extra layer of protection. She grabs the thermometer and EMF reader instead though, knowing finding the ghost room first is the most important thing. She leaves the spirit box and book to Rowan, goodness knows that they're the best of the three of them at communicating with the ghosts.

She spies Luke slipping a lighter and a smudge into his pocket, and she sighs. At least he's remembering to grab them this time if he's planning on being a reckless idiot, per usual. As Cordelia steps inside the haunt, she's surprised to see some things already thrown about.

“Keep an eye out if the ghost is already being this active, especially because the brief specifically said the scouts noticed it was very low on interactions while they were here.” Rowan walked up behind Cordelia, their eyes scanning the room.

“If the ghost is acting differently, it could possibly be a mimic so everyone should stay sharp.” Luke commented, which caused Cordelia to sharply inhale, but she re-centers herself with a few deep breaths.

“We'll be on guard and be extra wary of hunts.” She declared, and the other two nod in affirmation. Cordelia wanders around the lower floors, looking for the ghost room with her thermometer. When she walks into the garage, she spies the fuse box, and opens it to see it flipped off, so she flips the switch on.

“Lights are on!” She calls over the walkie. She hears the creaks of the stairs as either Rowan or Luke head upstairs, and Cordelia exits the garage and starts heading towards the basement. She's halfway down the stairs when she hears a call over the comms.

“Ghost's upstairs! Bedroom at the end of the hall.” Luke calls across the walkie, and Cordelia sighs and turns around on the stairs. Her wings brush the low roof of the stairway as she trudges back up.

“I'll come up and try the spirit box if you want to grab the video cameras from the van Luke?” Rowan comes across, as Cordelia was crossing into the dining room.

“Way ahead of you!” Luke calls, not having to use the walkie as both Cordelia and Rowan had entered the dining room as Luke came down the stairs.

“There's a closet in the bedroom past the kitchen, I didn't open it but it seemed like it could be a decent hiding spot if needed.” Rowan commented, which both Luke and Cordelia nodded at. Cordelia was thankful that Rowan had picked up her habit of searching for hiding spots as soon as you enter in case the ghost hunts early, it helps when everyone is aware of places to hide and isn't caught off guard.

After making it up the stairs, Cordelia sees the door to the ghost room creak, so she points EMF reader at it, but it only reads at a 3.

“I can go in and try the spirit box, but in case our ghost is shy, wanna check this hallway for some hiding spots?” Rowan suggested to Cordelia, who nodded, and walked down the branching path of the hallway, where she finds a hall closet that, upon opening it, definitely has enough room for someone to hide in.

“Closet at the opposite end of the hall from the ghost room Row. Looks big enough for one person.”

“Roger” comes back across the walkie.

“Hey Luke can you grab a UV stick while you're in the van?”

“I don't have enough hands for the UV stick with the tripod and camera, sorry.” Luke relayed. Cordelia immediately started heading towards the stairs.
“That's fine, I'll just come and grab it.” Cordelia walked down, and she reached the bottom of the stairs just in time to watch the front door slam shut.

Chapter Text

“Hunt!” Cordelia proclaimed across the comms, bolting the rest of the way down the stairs and flicking her flashlight off. She scrambled through the flickering lights of the kitchen into the back bedroom.

She spied the closed closet door and ripped it open, slamming it behind her. She pressed her back against the wall, holding her hand over her mouth to muffle any sounds she might be making. Cordelia noticed someone was in the same hiding spot as her, but it's so dark she can't make out who it is.

Cordelia looks closer at the person who is hiding in the same closet as her during the hunt, fully expecting it to be Rowan despite knowing they had been in the ghost room, or Luke, knowing he was in the van. But to her shock, she didn't recognize the person next to her.

They are probably a vex or an allay, she can't quite tell in the dark flickering light of the hunt, but what she does know is that this is not a member of her team, and she feels her anxiety spike, wondering how long a civilian has been in the haunt, at risk of dying to this ghost with no chance of coming back-

“Hunt over! Sound off?” Luke's voice over the walkie cuts through Cordelia's budding anxiety attack and she shoves it to the back of her mind. Active investigation now, spiral later.

“I'm still alive, although the ghost has definitely moved rooms, the temp has increased dramatically in here.” Rowan replies, voice as level as ever.

“I'm alive, and I've got another person with me?” Cordelia says, her words coming out as more of a question than anything else.

“Hi, I'm Will?” the guy says with a little wave.

“What are you doing at a place that's actively being haunted-” Cordelia says exasperatedly as they both leave the closet, Cordelia leading them towards the front door.

“This place was my air bnb! Oh by the way, you can mark off spirit box, the ghost has been talking to me through the radio for days.” Cordelia gave him a look of pure indignation.

“And you didn't leave?!”

“He was pretty chill until today, other than the radio and constantly throwing things at me. He doesn't seem like a very strong ghost, probably because this is an air bnb and isn't regularly occupied. Sorry I'm rambling.” By this point they had made it to the front door, Cordelia was staring at Will, at a complete loss for words, when they ran into Luke, who was standing at the front door, having heard the tail end of what Will was saying.

“Spirit box and throwing things? Sounds like a polty to me, wanna help me make a pile of stuff and see if it explodes?” Luke says, directing his question at Will, who grins and nods his head in excitement.

“There's no way I'm getting my deposit back anyway. Do you think air bnb policies covers for ghost destruction?”
Cordelia grabs the boys shoulders before they can enter the haunt.

“No! Civilians don't belong in a haunt!” Cordelia says, her anxiety coming out as annoyance.

“But he clearly knows stuff about ghosts! He knew that the ghost talking through the radio was spirit box, and about ghost weakness, no normal civilian would know that! No offense.” Luke directed the last part of his sentence at Will, who shrugged and raised his hands in mock surrender.

“Never said I was normal! The ghosts just flock to me, so I've done my research.”

“See! He knows about ghosts!” Cordelia sighs and runs her hand over her face. Why can she never say no to Luke when he gives her those puppy dog eyes?

“Fine. But you're getting the spare comm on him and calibrating Will onto the screens before you go back anywhere near the haunt. And Sol's doing the calibrations.” Cordelia said, using Luke's GIN designation around the civilian. Their faces aren’t covered, but in all honesty Will is acting fairly normal about this, and as she don't intend on seeing him again after this, Cordelia doesn't see the harm. Luke's cheering stopped and he pretended to think about not bringing Will in the haunt at the idea of having to do calibrations again, but in the end he just shrugged and dragged the allay towards the van. Cordelia followed them while talking into her comm.

“Eclipse, come back to the van, we have to recalibrate the walkies and I don't want you in the haunt by yourself.” Cordelia used Rowan's GIN designation, even over the walkie. She wasn't taking any chances with a civilian, who isn't a member of their team, in the van.

“Roger that” came back over the walkie in response, and Cordelia let out a breath of relief. As she entered the van, Will already had one of the spare comms on, and Luke was fighting with the calibrations, but she saw something that made her do a double take.

“You gave him a GIN designation? And not only that, but a celestial one?”

“Well you'll need to call him something in your report, and it makes sense for him to match!” Luke says, grinning both because of his response and because he had gotten the calibrations working. And there it was on the screen, under the three of them, Comet, with a steady heartbeat.

Well, at least Luke had given him a new name. She doesn't think she could've taken it if he had used… she let her thoughts trail off as her arms began to burn, rubbing and scratching at them as subtly as she can.

Of course, Luke, for all that he tends to act dense most of the time, clearly picks up what she's thinking about, as he gently touched her hands, stopping her from tearing at her skin.

“Hey Luna. It's gonna be okay. We'll be super careful in the haunt, no reckless stunts, and we'll listen to your calls. Pinkie promise” Luke says, very seriously reaching out his pinkie just like they used to as kids. Cordelia let her pinkie hook through his, and let out a breath.

“Okay.” She has to trust her brother's word, or else they'll never be able to work as a team, so she trusts him.

“And Lu? If we have to call the haunt early and wait til tomorrow or pass it off, no harm done, okay?”

“Thanks Sol, but I think I'll be good. I just need another energy drink before we go in, and please, keep the recklessness to a minimum? I don't want to revive Will the first time we've met.”

“aye aye captain!” Luke says with a mock salute.

“So we're keeping the stray then?” Rowan says, speaking up for the first time since returning to the truck, which startled Cordelia, as she hadn't heard them get back.

“I happen to be a very well behaved stray thank you!” Will teases, his tone light and his smile large. Luke answers with a smile of his own, bouncing on the balls of his feet.

“Are we clear to go back in the haunt Luna? All the sensors have been accommodated for an extra person now.” Luke says seriously, which is very at odds for his excitable body language, but Cordelia appreciates his attempt at it. He even used her GIN designation after she used his, which is better than he usually does. She glances at the monitor one more time, four steady heartbeats, although hers is still slightly raised, and nods.

“Let's go”

“Woo-hoo! Let's go explode some stuff!” Luke says, excitedly grabbing Will's hand and dragging him after, however to his credit Will looked just as excited.

“I run into a lot of ghosts, but I've never properly investigated them before, I always just pass it on that they're there.” Cordelia, who had been following behind the two excitable boys, scrunched her face in confusion.

“What do you mean you run into a lot of ghosts?” Will shrugged at this.

“They just find me! If I'm going to a place the likelihood of a ghost being there shoots way up, I'm like some kind of magnet.” Rowan, who had been walking beside Cordelia, gives a pondering look.

“If you're actually a magnet and don't just have some horrible ghost luck, that would have some really interesting applications.” Will shrugged again, pulling open the front door.

“That's just what I call it, but I think it's just really bad luck.”
When they opened the front door, even more things were tossed everywhere, the house looking as if a tornado had torn through it. There was a cracked phone on the ground, and Will let out a groan of disappointment.

“Really dude? My phone?” He picked it up and the phone screen lit up, but despite the heavy protective case on it, the screen had a spiderwebbing crack.

“I'm gonna go stick this in your van if that's okay? Don't want it getting any more damaged.”

“We also wouldn't want the redstone interfering with the ghost, so yeah, sticking it in the van is a good call. All of ours are next to the monitor, you can put it there along with any other tech.” Rowan says, and Luke nods and speed-walks back to the van, as the other three investigators turn back towards the rooms. Rowan tilts their head and moves from the dining room into the house, heading towards the garage, their thermometer in hand. Cordelia decided to just wait for a second, when Rowan gets that look on their face, it usually means-

“Ghosts in here! I'm going to double check for spirit box!”

“Okay! Will and I are going to make a polty pile in the dining room, there's a good stack of bins for me to hide behind and still have a view of it.” Luke says into his walkie, as Will came back into the house.

“Will, do you need anything out of this place? Better to move it now before we've made the ghost all angry, anything not super important can be grabbed by the hunters, but I figured I'd ask.” Cordelia says, looking for something to do.

“Yeah actually. All my stuff is in a suitcase with a padlock on it under the bed in that bedroom down the hall” he said pointing to the hallway behind the kitchen where the closet is that they'd been hiding in.

“And my violin is there too, I care more about that than anything in the suitcase.” He added, as Luke started putting stuff in a pile in the dining room and directing Will to do the same. Cordelia nodded, and went down the hall to go grab the suitcase and violin.

“Spirit box! And this guy is not friendly”

“Well I'd figured as much when he hunted and tried to eat our faces-” Luke said, his teasing audible over comms.

“Yeah, yeah. What's the other evidence for a poltergeist, if that's what you think it is Sol?”

“UV and ghost writing, in addition to that spirit box.” Luke replied, as he spread his piles across the dining room floor. Whichever hunter team picked this on up would have their work cut out for them. Cordelia walked back into the bedroom and no sooner had she grabbed Will's violin before a call came across the walkie.

“We've got ghost writing!” Rowan exclaimed from the ghost room.

“Well good news, not only does that support our polty theory, but that crosses off the possibility of a mimic.” That comment from Luke made Cordelia breath out a sigh of relief. Walking out the door with Will's violin in hand. However, as she was entering the van, another call came over the comms.

“Hunt!” Will called, and Cordelia's breath hitched as she turned to stare at the heartbeat monitors. Hers was skyrocketing, but that wasn't the one she was focused on, as she watched the elevated beat of the three other people, her teammates and Will, trapped in the house with a hunting ghost. Her eyes start to water, but she refuses to blink or look away. Her arms burned, and subconsciously her hands began to scratch at them through the fabric of her shirt.

It feels like it's been an eternity, but Cordelia finally hears Luke's voice crackle through the walkie. “Hunt’s over! It's a polty, massive explosion!”

“Yeah it was awesome!” Will adds.

“And I just checked the pile with UV and got fingerprints so that's all three pieces of evidence.” Rowan commented, and Cordelia felt her body go limp, the water gathering in her stinging eyes dripping down her face, and her arms and hands sore from the scratching. She wipes her eyes quickly with her sleeve, attempting to pull herself together before the rest of the team gets back to the van. As the other three rounded into the back of the van, Cordelia was reigning herself in, her eyes still partially glued to the heartbeat monitors.

“You can write up the ghost report in the morning Lu, let's grab some food, okay?” Luke says after glancing at her. Cordelia goes to make a token protest, but a look from Rowan shuts her down.

“And you're picking the place.” Luke adds, leaving no room for arguments.

“You know that means we're just getting Taco Bell right?” Rowan teases, and Cordelia can't help but let out a little laugh at that.

“Maybe I was gonna pick somewhere different this time!” She exclaims, pulling herself off of the ground where she'd been kneeling.

"But are you really?" Rowan asked, giving her a look.

"No! But I might have wanted to!" Cordelia exclaimed, and Rowan and Luke both gave her looks of incredulity, clearly knowing she was not, in fact, going to pick somewhere else.

Will was standing near the exit of the van, clearly feeling a bit out of place and rubbing the back of his head.

“Well if y'all are heading out I guess this is goodbye.” He says, going to grab his phone and violin, but Luke holds up a hand.

“Didn't you say this place is your air bnb? Where are you going to stay?” Will looked down sheepishly, which looked a bit strange with his big frame.

“I was just going to go back inside? I don't really have anywhere else to stay around here. The closet seemed plently safe." Luke shook his head vehemently at that.

“Absolutely not, you're crashing at my place.” Luke says stubbornly, giving everyone a look in case they wanted to think about arguing, but both Cordelia and Rowan know better than to try and tell Luke no when he's set his mind to something.

"since he's staying, we can tell him our actual names, right?" Luke begged Cordelia, who has final say in the matter. She sighs and waves him on, which Luke cheers at.

"I'm Luke, the guardian angel is my sister Cordelia, and Rowan is the one with the butterfly glasses." Luke explains, pointing to each person as he says their names.

"Well you already know that my name's Will." He says, still seeming a bit taken aback by Luke telling him he's staying without any room for argument. Not that it really seemed like he was going to argue, crashing somewhere non-haunted is definitely better than sleeping in a closet, in Cordelia's opinion.

"Lemme know your Taco Bell order so I can place it on the way, I already know what De and Row want.” Cordelia gave Will a slight look, up and down.

“Will? Do you know how to drive?” To this, Will shook his head.

“I lived in the city for most of my life, I've never bothered.”

“GODDAMMIT” Cordelia groans, and Rowan and Luke both snickered at her.

“Cordelia is the only one of us who can drive, you fit right in!” Luke says with a giant grin on his face.

“Come on you lot, let's go get some Taco Bell.” Cordelia says, resigned to always being the driver, even with Luke seemingly kidnapping a new member of their team.