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Walker watched as the damn ghost child escaped his officers yet again. With a snarl, he punched through the screen in anger. That mad ghost, Technus or whatever it was, had promised that this new tech would aid in detecting and preventing escapes. Clearly, it hadn’t helped against the half-human menace.
He huffed a sigh and leaned over from his seat to grab a pen and stack of paper. Best to do things the good ol’ fashioned way it seemed.
Wanted: Technus
AKA: Ghost of All Things Beeping, etc.
$5,000
For fraud, delivery of faulty goods, and too many epithets
There. That was one thing his men could accomplish for now. It would probably help raise morale and boost their confidence to put another law-breaker behind bars after all this. He snapped his fingers and with a fiery green light the paper disappeared.
Now if there was only something he could do about the ghost boy. He had tried nearly every trick in the book to keep the kid in jail, but nothing had stuck. His jail just wasn’t built for halfas who pranced around flagrantly breaking every law in Walker's books. Even when he was able to account for his half-human tendencies, the kid would convince other prisoners to help him out of his human-grade binds.
Walker swiveled in his chair to look at the endless shelves of law books behind him. He had gathered all the rules, laws, and ordinances from nearly every civilization throughout known history, and then some. There had to be something here he could use, something that could account for the damn brat’s powerset.
He stood up and paced down the shelf, a gloved finger hovering over the spines as he read their titles.
“Code of Hammurabi, 1629 Charter of the Massachusetts Bay Company, Condo Law Guidebook Vol. 23-387, The Rights and Responsibilities of Tree Ownership,...” Each volume he passed was met with little grunts of consideration and dismissal. He continued down the line, walking deep into the stacks of shelves holding these precious tomes of law and order until something caught his eye. Stopping, he teased the book out of place, hand brushing appreciatively over the cover as a thought formed.
“Oh, now this, this might just work.” He smiled, and flipped open the cover to inspect the contents. On the first page, the title stood out boldly against the rest of the text.
‘Truancy and Attendance Laws of the Isles of Illumination’
With a wicked grin, Walker turned on his heel, taking the thin book back with him to his desk. He had some reading to do.
Two weeks later, Danny found himself surrounded by Walker’s goons.
“Really, twice in a month? Walker must be working you guys to the bone!” He called out, narrowly avoiding a baton blast. “Does he at least give you overtime or something?”
The police ghosts didn’t bother responding, too busy trying to predict Danny’s erratic movements. One of them hit a lucky shot, and the boy froze in his tracks, held in place by the ghostly binds. Danny grit his teeth at the sensation, more out of frustration than pain. Would he have to worry about Walker literally every time he set foot in the Zone? He could escape the guy’s prison well enough, sure, but it was such a pain in the butt. Plus, he had to be home for dinner soon, or else Jazz would be on his case again.
“Well well, looks like we got ourselves a serial delinquent here.” The familiar twang gave away Walker’s identity as he flew in from the shadows. “You know what that means, boys.”
Danny huffed out a laugh, and before he could blink Walker was inches from his face.
“Don’t think you want to be disrespectful today, boy,” he said, the words dripping with smugness. “The Headmistress won’t take much of a liking to that.” With a gesture, Danny found himself being thrown into the back of a glowing van, the thing immediately jumping into motion and racing through the zone at breakneck speeds. The last Danny saw of Walker’s face was a wide, creepy grin.
Once the van came to a hovering stop, the doors were thrown open once more. Danny realized that in that short amount of time he’d been taken to a part of the Zone he’d never seen before. Just like outside the portal, there were purplish islands floating around, though these were covered in connected buildings.
There were a variety of styles, ranging from red brick to what seemed to be marble, with every style of building different from the last. They were all linked, walls flowing into each other with no regard for building material or features. Out in front of it all stood a severe looking ghost, her arms crossed over her chest. She was ridiculously tall, sporting a meticulously kept bun with not a hair out of place, and an electric orange pantsuit that screamed authority.
One of the police ghosts reached into the van and grabbed Danny by the arm, hauling him onto the island’s surface.
“Afternoon ma’am. We found this kid skipping class,” the goon said, before roughly pushing Danny forward.
“Hmm. Good to know, thank you officer,” the woman said, nodding once. “Now, if you can release my pupil, I’ll take custody of him.”
Danny blinked. Class? He stretched to see behind the lady while the officer retracted the spectral binds, and his face paled. He had nearly missed it, considering the more eye-catching architecture around them, but there at the entrance to the maze of walls was a little red wooden building. A placard was affixed to the front, with one phrase repeated in several languages.
The Academy of Illumination
The Headmistress placed her hand on Danny’s shoulder.
“Alright young man, it's good the nice officer found you when he did. Class is about to start, and you don’t want to fall behind your fellow students, do you?”
Danny tried to intangibly jerk away. He would fly as fast as he could, maybe finding some recognizable landmarks so he could guide his way home. There was no way he was going to find out what ghost school was like.
Somehow, the headmistress kept her grip on his shoulder. Squeezing it in warning, he felt a small shock run through his body as she began to walk him to the door.
“Ah ah ah, I won’t have disobedient students in my school, young man. Come along now, let’s get you to class.”
Wide eyed, Danny was led into the school, the door closing behind him with a resounding click. He wasn’t sure how he was going to escape this one by dinner.