#Jesha: if I see you again I'll kill you again. fucking try me

[haunting-of]

Vincent waited on top of a hospital vending machine, of all places.

He smiled, relaxing on his perch for hours as more and more wounded poured in from the streets and into the emergency room, and were then taken out dead shortly after, making more room for more soon-to-be-deceased. 

Clearly, Jesha was getting frustrated with looking for him. Looking for a ghost that was hiding in a hospital that was becoming a morgue would be like locating a ghost needle in a haystack that was also full of ghosts. And they had a short temper, so casualties were inevitable. With casualties came more camouflage.

Just thinking about it was enough fun to keep Vincent occupied and smiling at the thought. More dead left to make room for more alive, and life would leave to make room for more dead, and the dead would go and life would go. 

And if Danel was thinking clearly, this wouldn’t be a safe spot at all. No, Danel would’ve found him by now if he was looking. But Danel was chasing after Jesha (like usual) and was too emotional to stop and think (also like usual).

That was the problem with both of them, they never thought. Never. 

Most of the time, this was a problem, but after a few hours and a couple hundred dead, the stress and dread and anguish and deaths were amassing into an enormous delight Vincent had never experienced at this volume. How delicious, after all, is the pain of a nursing student that has called their 40th death of the night in the perking lot, and then turning around to someone asking, please nurse, am I going to make it?

Vincent soaked it all in, for hours and hours, revelling in the wave of death before, finally at four in the morning, someone who wasn't really anything waded through the cots and bodies. 

Jesha had wizened up and found him, after all.

Pretending to be annoyed at the interruption, Vincent rolled his eyes before looking down at Jesha from his vending machine perch. 

“Hello, Pumpkin,” he said, “I’d say it’s good to see you, but you look tired. It’s kind of embarrassing to be seen with you in public, really.”

“Vincent,” Jesha said. Their eyes were red and puffy, but their voice didn’t waver. “You’ve been up here long enough, I think.”

He laughed in response, in the way he perfected that let the target of his laughter know how ashamed they should be for existing. 

“Hah! Aaw, no, Pumpkin,” Vincent said, “I like it up here. Spacious, comfortable, and out of the way of all the bodies you’ve been making.”

“Get off that vending machine right now. Do as I say.” Jesha’s tone stayed flat.

“What in the world are you playing at?” Another eye-roll to punctuate the question, Vincent situated himself firmly on top of the vending machine. “You can’t talk to your boyfriend that way, Pumpkin. And you can't control ghosts like that, either.”

Jesha, who knew otherwise, raised a hand in the general direction someone would reach to pick out a snack. Without smiling, looking away from Vincent, or trembling, they reached out.

Vincent felt something pull, but he was stuck. What?? From all around, the grounds, the ER, the parking lot, Jesha was… Pulling the ghosts? With intent? For what??

It happened fast, too fast. The smile was obliterated from Vincent's face as all the other ghosts got sucked into a vortex, how was Jesha doing that?? It felt like being at the edge of a black hole and being glued to your seat. 

Jesha didn’t mind that some of the ghosts being pulled were of living patients, or all the hospital staff. They needed a massive amount of death to punch Vincent through to hell.

Vincent realized he was sitting on top of a brand new portal at the same moment all the windows in the hospital shattered. A low, sinking tone was beginning to draw him in, too powerful, too fast to escape!

“Hey!” He shouted, sinking quickly, “You can’t do this! There’s no point, I’ll just... Rrg, I'll find you again!”

Further away now, “I’ll make you fucking pay!”

Moving the ghosts in a different direction, almost like realigning a magnet, Jesha smoothed over the opening to hell.

Vincent was gone, for now.

And despite what he thought, coming back wouldn’t be easy for a bitchy ghost with all the demons around.

They pulled their arm back down, only now letting themself breathe. They started to shake, too. In between the tears that cleaned two streaks down their grubby face, something like smoke escaped their lungs.