Green Cheese #17, Heavenly Hash #19 + malt + chopped nuts
Story: Blaze Mafia Family
Title: Are You Scared Yet?
Prompts: Green Cheese #17: star chart, Heavenly Hash #19: heavenly bodies + malt (Roisin’s easter egg: is ‘guest’ really the best word for them?) + chopped nuts
Rating: R for excess language
Words: 2636
Characters: The Blaze Family
Summary: Dang! I missed the deadline by minutes! The Ghost Story and a spectacular failure of a pocky chain. Considering how many people have bit the dust at the hand of the Blazes, it’s a wonder that they haven’t more experience with exorcisms. Although, if this is how they deal with them, then I imagine the ghosts told their friends to stay away. XD This is smudging.
“Make sure we send someone with a high tolerance for...” Firebird stopped abruptly.
Paul looked back at her. “What?”
“Why is it so cold here?”
He paused, unsure whether she was serious. “Are you under a draft?”
Firebird gave him a look. “This is not a draft.”
Paul moved over to Firebird and shivered. It was twenty degrees colder here than it was three feet to the left. “AC must be on the fritz.”
Firebird sighed and moved on, “Get the boys to call somebody in. I refuse to get frostbite every time I need to find a file.”
- - - - - - - - - -
Romeo glared at the contract he was trying to write. “Quit fucking about, Luka,” he growled, not looking up to the door where he would certainly see his idiot brother flicking the light switch on and off with a stupid grin on his face.
The lights continued to flicker in silence, which was unusual for Luka. He’d keep being an annoying prat, but never quietly.
Romeo looked up and did a double take. There was no one there and the light switch wasn’t moving, but the lights were going on and off like someone was.
“What the hell?”
- - - - - - - - - -
The pain came out of nowhere. One minute Soul was sharpening his favorite knife and the next his entire left forearm was burning like he’d thrust it into a fire. He hissed, grabbing his sleeve and jerking it up.
“What are you bitchin’ about?” Felix glanced over at Soul then he jumped up.
“What the fuck?!”
Five long scratches appeared right in front of their eyes. Deep red gashes that oozed blood and anger.
“Holy shit!” Felix yelled, scrambling to get some bandages to stop the bleeding.
Soul stared at the wound. “I’m pretty sure that’s not normal.”
- - - - - - - - - -
“It’s a ghost.”
Firebird looked away from the wall she was glaring at to her uncle. “A what?”
“A ghost.” Nicky motioned to the wall that a jarring tapping noise had been coming from for the past half hour. “And an annoying one at that. Probably some schmuck we killed that’s too stupid to even know he’s dead.”
“The tapping has gotten to you,” Firebird stated.
“Have you got a better idea?” Nicky asked.
“Several, actually.”
“Well, none that would explain all the crazy shit that’s been happening here. It’s a ghost. I’m calling a priest.”
- - - - - - - - - -
Father Jacob came by the next morning. He didn’t have a lot of experience with hauntings, but he did have experience with the Blazes seeing as how he was one of their top earning bookies.
He listened to everything that Nicky Nails told him while Firebird made derogatory side remarks from her desk. When it was over, Father Jacob tapped the ash off the cigar Nicky had given him and shrugged. “Sure sounds like a ghost to me. If it’s hanging around here, I’m sure this ghost is too afraid of what will happen at his judgment to cross over.”
“How do we get rid of it?” Nicky asked.
“You have to get the soul to move on,” Father Jacob patted his coat pockets. He pulled out a silver flask. “Some holy water and a few Hail Mary’s should do the...oh nope, that’s my whiskey, not my holy water.”
The priest pulled out another flask. He took a swig of it then crossed himself. “Yep, this is the stuff. I’ll just mosey around and bless the idiot back into the hands of the Lord.”
“Watch where you’re throwing that, Father,” Firebird grumbled. “Try not to get water stains on the woodwork.”
- - - - - - - - - -
“Boss!”
Firebird hurried to the desperate cry of one of her soldiers, Paul one step ahead of her in case of danger.
“What the fuck?” Paul said, stopping so quickly that Firebird had to put a hand out to stop from running right into him.
She peered around Paul’s back and did a double take. All the furniture in the south office was shaking wildly though there was no real reason for it.
“Well,” Nicky Nails said from her left. “I guess I shoulda known better than to think Father Jacob was holy enough to get rid of a ghost. Probably blessed the damn place with second rate whiskey.”
“It didn’t work because it’s a structural problem, not a supernatural one,” Firebird snapped. She looked around at her men. Not a one, not even Paul, looked like they believed her.
“It’s not a ghost!”
- - - - - - - - - -
Firebird took a moment to close her eyes and get a firm hold on her control before she called out delicately, “Soul?”
Soul came back to the open doorway of her office. “Yeah?”
“What are you doing?”
They both looked at the large bundle of smoking herbs in his hand. “Smudging.”
“And what exactly is smudging?”
Soul shrugged. “Don’t know. Dad told me to do it.”
- - - - - - - - - -
Blaze.
The name whispered throughout the room, riding on a cold breeze that ruffled the papers on Firebird’s desk. Paul straightened from his spot in the corner and Firebird paused in her writing.
Blaze.
“Oh good lord,” Firebird grumbled. “What now?”
As if on cue, the breeze picked up into a strong wind going straight to the corner by the door. The wall started glowing bright blue before a shape started forming out of it. It convalesced into the barest shadows of a face.
“Holy shit!” Paul said, moving in front of Firebird, though he had no idea what the hell he was going to do should this...thing try to attack.
The face glared at them both, then its mouth opened and it spoke.
Are you scared yet, Blaze?
“Holy shit!”
Firebird eyed her bodyguard with distaste. “Paul. Don’t tell me you actually believe this party trick is a ghost.”
Paul motioned frantically at the light in the corner, twisted into a gruesome glare. “It’s right there! What the fuck else could it be?”
“There are a dozen other perfectly good explanations for this subpar intimidation tactic, none of which have anything to do with bedtime boogie monsters,” she sniffed, dismissing the whole debacle and going back to her work.
The wind picked up, whistling high enough that it sounded like a shriek. The light in the corner lit up bright then cut out like a light switch, the face gone in a second. The only sound left in the stunned aftermath was the quiet scratching of Firebird’s pen.
“Holy shit!”
- - - - - - - - - -
“Oh yes, an otherworldly presence is very strong here.”
Firebird paused on her way from the office kitchen to look over the homeless woman accompanying Nicky Nails. Her kinky red hair flew in every direction like a nest on her head, and her clothes had to be at least a decade out of date.
Her eyebrows raised of their own accord when the woman suddenly turned towards her office. “This way, I think. You said that someone actually had an encounter with the soul here?”
“Yeah, Paul did. The ghost took form and talked to him.”
“Oh, that’s interesting! It’s a powerful soul then. Have you tried conversing further with the ghost? Talking out your problems with the soul is actually very helpful, and can prove very effective in helping understand why the soul isn’t moving on.”
“Uh...no,” Nicky said, barely containing the laughter in his voice. “We haven’t had a talk with it yet.”
“Perhaps I can do it now,” the woman said.
“You have my blessing. Paul’s in the office, you can just go right in.”
“Uncle Nicky?” Firebird called out. “May I speak with you a moment?”
Nicky motioned the crazy woman towards Firebird’s office then turned to his niece. “What?”
“Who is that woman and why are you giving her free reign of my office?” Firebird snapped, not in the mood to be delicate.
“Delilah St. Harcourt. She’s a psychic. Joey recommended her.”
Firebird was at a loss for words. She stared blankly at her uncle. “You called a psychic.”
“She should be a sight better than Father Jacob. Ghost removal is her specialty.”
“Oh good lord!” Firebird threw her hands up in frustration then visibly reigned herself in. “Alright, fine. Let’s say she is a psychic and that there really is a ghost here. You don’t think there might be some trouble with letting that woman have a conversation with a guy that we most likely offed!?”
Nicky snorted in derision. “Who’s gonna believe a psychic?”
“If you don’t believe her then why did you call her!” Firebird whisper-yelled.
The door to Firebird’s office banged open and the psychic came stumbling out, Paul’s grasp on her arms the only thing keeping her up.
Nicky hurried over. “What happened? Did you talk to it?”
“I can’t go in there,” the woman gasped. “There’s so much negative emotion in that room. Anger. Terror. And the strongest lust for power. So many lives have been decided in that room.“
“How odd,” Firebird said, looking pointedly at her uncle. “I can’t imagine why she would ever get that feeling from a Blaze office.”
- - - - - - - - - -
Firebird stopped Tommy the Angel and Handsome Willy in the hallway. “What is this?”
Handsome Willy motioned to the south office with the paint brush he was holding. “Nicky Nails said the psychic said that if we painted the door red it would scare away the ghost.”
“And garlic. Ghosts hate garlic,” Tommy added.
Firebird stared at the two men like they were from another planet. She shook her head in disbelief. “I can’t decide which part of what you just said was the most stupid.”
Tommy and Willy shuffled on their feet, uncomfortable.
“You’re not painting anything,” Firebird motioned around the building. “Do you know how much I paid to have this place decorated? Red doors and garlic do not go with the motif.”
She turned around and marched back into her office, growling over her shoulder, “There’s no ghost!” before slamming the door shut behind her.
Tommy stared at the Boss’s office for a long moment, then said, “I guess it’s a good thing we didn’t tell her about the salt.”
- - - - - - - - - -
Blaze.
Firebird sighed. This again. It seemed like every time she was left alone in her office for the past three weeks, this stupid scare tactic started up. The air picked up and the distinct feeling of another presence weighed down on her.
She glared in the general direction of her office then went back to work. If she ignored it long enough, whoever was pulling the strings here would get bored and quit his second rate practical joke.
Blaze. Are you scared yet?
Always it asked that. She continued writing.
BLAZE!
All of a sudden Firebird’s pen flew out of her hand and hit the couch across the room. Her eyes narrowed but she still didn’t look up, determined to not let the idiot win.
The eery blue light appeared right in the middle of the desk, convalescing quickly into a see-through mask of a face.
Are you scared yet, Blaze?
Firebird’s patience snapped. She slapped her hand on her desk, right through the face. “Do I look scared to you?” she snapped.
The ever-present glare on the glowing face slipped, the eyes widening a little. Firebird knew that look. Whatever this was, it was scared of her. She could work with that.
Firebird leaned close to her desk. “Get. Out.”
Just like that, the light flashed bright and disappeared, the atmosphere lightening instantly. Firebird leaned back in her chair, thinking this new development over.
Good news: This thing was trying to shake her because it was obviously scared of her. That meant she had the upper hand here.
Bad news: There’s no way that thing was a trick of the light or some advanced parlor trick. It couldn’t react that quickly to her, nor could a trick show such emotion.
Worst news: Nicky was going to hold being right over her head forever.
- - - - - - - - - -
Firebird looked over the main floor of the Blaze offices. All of her soldiers were jumpy, talking in low whispers if at all. No one dared to go towards hre office, or even in that half of the building. It was easy to see: her men were scared.
“Unacceptable,” Firebird growled. It only pissed her off all the more when she saw a couple of the soldiers actually jump at the unexpected noise.
“Fine,” she snapped. “It’s a ghost. I’ll admit it. But ghost or not, no one is allowed to make such a fool of my family.”
“What are you doing?” Paul asked.
“I’m taking that hoodoo homeless woman’s advice. If the ghost wants to have a chat, then I’m going to have a chat.” Firebird pulled open the problem office door and a burst of cold air blew through them. It only made Firebird angrier. “I’ll only be a moment.”
- - - - - - - - - -
As soon as the door shut behind Firebird, all of the Blaze soldiers were falling over each other so they could get closest to the room. The wind picked up immediately, whistling under the door. They couldn’t hear what was surely the ghost talking, but they heard Firebird’s response loud and clear.
“No I’m not scared of you, you idiot. Why would I be scared of a stupid schmuck I already had killed once?”
The whistling wind and rattling furniture blocked out most of the conversation, but they managed to catch little snippets of it. Like when Firebird took the ghost to town for daring to hurt Soul or when she threatened to hold a séance so she could contact every Blaze soldier in the history of her family and sic them on the pesky ghost.
The wind increased in intensity until Paul was sure that the door should have whipped out of the frame. Blue light glowed underneath the door, an eery color that everyone would forever associate with this terrifying moment. Nothing could be heard over the dull roar of the wind and sharp banging of furniture.
Then, with no warning, it stopped. The wind died and the light slowly faded away. The men backed away, unsure of what was about to happen next.
The door jerked open and Firebird glared out at them, trying her best to put her hopelessly wind-blown hair back in order.
“What are you all doing?” Firebird barked at them, obviously still in a mood.
Paul had learned a great many things during his time in the military, the most important being when to know when to fight and when to retreat. This was a retreating moment.
“Nothing at all. We were just leaving.”
- - - - - - - - - -
“Are you sure it’s really gone?” Romeo asked.
Soul looked up from his full glass. He didn’t drink much but insisted on getting a beer every time he went to the bar as the social norm dictated. “There hasn’t been anything at all. Firebird got rid of the ghost for good.”
Nicky Nails snorted. “Christ. As if the girl didn’t already have a big enough ego. She’ll be unbearable now.”
Luka laughed and lifted his glass. “To Firebird. Only our boss could argue a ghost into the afterlife.”
Title: Are You Scared Yet?
Prompts: Green Cheese #17: star chart, Heavenly Hash #19: heavenly bodies + malt (Roisin’s easter egg: is ‘guest’ really the best word for them?) + chopped nuts
Rating: R for excess language
Words: 2636
Characters: The Blaze Family
Summary: Dang! I missed the deadline by minutes! The Ghost Story and a spectacular failure of a pocky chain. Considering how many people have bit the dust at the hand of the Blazes, it’s a wonder that they haven’t more experience with exorcisms. Although, if this is how they deal with them, then I imagine the ghosts told their friends to stay away. XD This is smudging.
“Make sure we send someone with a high tolerance for...” Firebird stopped abruptly.
Paul looked back at her. “What?”
“Why is it so cold here?”
He paused, unsure whether she was serious. “Are you under a draft?”
Firebird gave him a look. “This is not a draft.”
Paul moved over to Firebird and shivered. It was twenty degrees colder here than it was three feet to the left. “AC must be on the fritz.”
Firebird sighed and moved on, “Get the boys to call somebody in. I refuse to get frostbite every time I need to find a file.”
- - - - - - - - - -
Romeo glared at the contract he was trying to write. “Quit fucking about, Luka,” he growled, not looking up to the door where he would certainly see his idiot brother flicking the light switch on and off with a stupid grin on his face.
The lights continued to flicker in silence, which was unusual for Luka. He’d keep being an annoying prat, but never quietly.
Romeo looked up and did a double take. There was no one there and the light switch wasn’t moving, but the lights were going on and off like someone was.
“What the hell?”
- - - - - - - - - -
The pain came out of nowhere. One minute Soul was sharpening his favorite knife and the next his entire left forearm was burning like he’d thrust it into a fire. He hissed, grabbing his sleeve and jerking it up.
“What are you bitchin’ about?” Felix glanced over at Soul then he jumped up.
“What the fuck?!”
Five long scratches appeared right in front of their eyes. Deep red gashes that oozed blood and anger.
“Holy shit!” Felix yelled, scrambling to get some bandages to stop the bleeding.
Soul stared at the wound. “I’m pretty sure that’s not normal.”
- - - - - - - - - -
“It’s a ghost.”
Firebird looked away from the wall she was glaring at to her uncle. “A what?”
“A ghost.” Nicky motioned to the wall that a jarring tapping noise had been coming from for the past half hour. “And an annoying one at that. Probably some schmuck we killed that’s too stupid to even know he’s dead.”
“The tapping has gotten to you,” Firebird stated.
“Have you got a better idea?” Nicky asked.
“Several, actually.”
“Well, none that would explain all the crazy shit that’s been happening here. It’s a ghost. I’m calling a priest.”
- - - - - - - - - -
Father Jacob came by the next morning. He didn’t have a lot of experience with hauntings, but he did have experience with the Blazes seeing as how he was one of their top earning bookies.
He listened to everything that Nicky Nails told him while Firebird made derogatory side remarks from her desk. When it was over, Father Jacob tapped the ash off the cigar Nicky had given him and shrugged. “Sure sounds like a ghost to me. If it’s hanging around here, I’m sure this ghost is too afraid of what will happen at his judgment to cross over.”
“How do we get rid of it?” Nicky asked.
“You have to get the soul to move on,” Father Jacob patted his coat pockets. He pulled out a silver flask. “Some holy water and a few Hail Mary’s should do the...oh nope, that’s my whiskey, not my holy water.”
The priest pulled out another flask. He took a swig of it then crossed himself. “Yep, this is the stuff. I’ll just mosey around and bless the idiot back into the hands of the Lord.”
“Watch where you’re throwing that, Father,” Firebird grumbled. “Try not to get water stains on the woodwork.”
- - - - - - - - - -
“Boss!”
Firebird hurried to the desperate cry of one of her soldiers, Paul one step ahead of her in case of danger.
“What the fuck?” Paul said, stopping so quickly that Firebird had to put a hand out to stop from running right into him.
She peered around Paul’s back and did a double take. All the furniture in the south office was shaking wildly though there was no real reason for it.
“Well,” Nicky Nails said from her left. “I guess I shoulda known better than to think Father Jacob was holy enough to get rid of a ghost. Probably blessed the damn place with second rate whiskey.”
“It didn’t work because it’s a structural problem, not a supernatural one,” Firebird snapped. She looked around at her men. Not a one, not even Paul, looked like they believed her.
“It’s not a ghost!”
- - - - - - - - - -
Firebird took a moment to close her eyes and get a firm hold on her control before she called out delicately, “Soul?”
Soul came back to the open doorway of her office. “Yeah?”
“What are you doing?”
They both looked at the large bundle of smoking herbs in his hand. “Smudging.”
“And what exactly is smudging?”
Soul shrugged. “Don’t know. Dad told me to do it.”
- - - - - - - - - -
Blaze.
The name whispered throughout the room, riding on a cold breeze that ruffled the papers on Firebird’s desk. Paul straightened from his spot in the corner and Firebird paused in her writing.
Blaze.
“Oh good lord,” Firebird grumbled. “What now?”
As if on cue, the breeze picked up into a strong wind going straight to the corner by the door. The wall started glowing bright blue before a shape started forming out of it. It convalesced into the barest shadows of a face.
“Holy shit!” Paul said, moving in front of Firebird, though he had no idea what the hell he was going to do should this...thing try to attack.
The face glared at them both, then its mouth opened and it spoke.
Are you scared yet, Blaze?
“Holy shit!”
Firebird eyed her bodyguard with distaste. “Paul. Don’t tell me you actually believe this party trick is a ghost.”
Paul motioned frantically at the light in the corner, twisted into a gruesome glare. “It’s right there! What the fuck else could it be?”
“There are a dozen other perfectly good explanations for this subpar intimidation tactic, none of which have anything to do with bedtime boogie monsters,” she sniffed, dismissing the whole debacle and going back to her work.
The wind picked up, whistling high enough that it sounded like a shriek. The light in the corner lit up bright then cut out like a light switch, the face gone in a second. The only sound left in the stunned aftermath was the quiet scratching of Firebird’s pen.
“Holy shit!”
- - - - - - - - - -
“Oh yes, an otherworldly presence is very strong here.”
Firebird paused on her way from the office kitchen to look over the homeless woman accompanying Nicky Nails. Her kinky red hair flew in every direction like a nest on her head, and her clothes had to be at least a decade out of date.
Her eyebrows raised of their own accord when the woman suddenly turned towards her office. “This way, I think. You said that someone actually had an encounter with the soul here?”
“Yeah, Paul did. The ghost took form and talked to him.”
“Oh, that’s interesting! It’s a powerful soul then. Have you tried conversing further with the ghost? Talking out your problems with the soul is actually very helpful, and can prove very effective in helping understand why the soul isn’t moving on.”
“Uh...no,” Nicky said, barely containing the laughter in his voice. “We haven’t had a talk with it yet.”
“Perhaps I can do it now,” the woman said.
“You have my blessing. Paul’s in the office, you can just go right in.”
“Uncle Nicky?” Firebird called out. “May I speak with you a moment?”
Nicky motioned the crazy woman towards Firebird’s office then turned to his niece. “What?”
“Who is that woman and why are you giving her free reign of my office?” Firebird snapped, not in the mood to be delicate.
“Delilah St. Harcourt. She’s a psychic. Joey recommended her.”
Firebird was at a loss for words. She stared blankly at her uncle. “You called a psychic.”
“She should be a sight better than Father Jacob. Ghost removal is her specialty.”
“Oh good lord!” Firebird threw her hands up in frustration then visibly reigned herself in. “Alright, fine. Let’s say she is a psychic and that there really is a ghost here. You don’t think there might be some trouble with letting that woman have a conversation with a guy that we most likely offed!?”
Nicky snorted in derision. “Who’s gonna believe a psychic?”
“If you don’t believe her then why did you call her!” Firebird whisper-yelled.
The door to Firebird’s office banged open and the psychic came stumbling out, Paul’s grasp on her arms the only thing keeping her up.
Nicky hurried over. “What happened? Did you talk to it?”
“I can’t go in there,” the woman gasped. “There’s so much negative emotion in that room. Anger. Terror. And the strongest lust for power. So many lives have been decided in that room.“
“How odd,” Firebird said, looking pointedly at her uncle. “I can’t imagine why she would ever get that feeling from a Blaze office.”
- - - - - - - - - -
Firebird stopped Tommy the Angel and Handsome Willy in the hallway. “What is this?”
Handsome Willy motioned to the south office with the paint brush he was holding. “Nicky Nails said the psychic said that if we painted the door red it would scare away the ghost.”
“And garlic. Ghosts hate garlic,” Tommy added.
Firebird stared at the two men like they were from another planet. She shook her head in disbelief. “I can’t decide which part of what you just said was the most stupid.”
Tommy and Willy shuffled on their feet, uncomfortable.
“You’re not painting anything,” Firebird motioned around the building. “Do you know how much I paid to have this place decorated? Red doors and garlic do not go with the motif.”
She turned around and marched back into her office, growling over her shoulder, “There’s no ghost!” before slamming the door shut behind her.
Tommy stared at the Boss’s office for a long moment, then said, “I guess it’s a good thing we didn’t tell her about the salt.”
- - - - - - - - - -
Blaze.
Firebird sighed. This again. It seemed like every time she was left alone in her office for the past three weeks, this stupid scare tactic started up. The air picked up and the distinct feeling of another presence weighed down on her.
She glared in the general direction of her office then went back to work. If she ignored it long enough, whoever was pulling the strings here would get bored and quit his second rate practical joke.
Blaze. Are you scared yet?
Always it asked that. She continued writing.
BLAZE!
All of a sudden Firebird’s pen flew out of her hand and hit the couch across the room. Her eyes narrowed but she still didn’t look up, determined to not let the idiot win.
The eery blue light appeared right in the middle of the desk, convalescing quickly into a see-through mask of a face.
Are you scared yet, Blaze?
Firebird’s patience snapped. She slapped her hand on her desk, right through the face. “Do I look scared to you?” she snapped.
The ever-present glare on the glowing face slipped, the eyes widening a little. Firebird knew that look. Whatever this was, it was scared of her. She could work with that.
Firebird leaned close to her desk. “Get. Out.”
Just like that, the light flashed bright and disappeared, the atmosphere lightening instantly. Firebird leaned back in her chair, thinking this new development over.
Good news: This thing was trying to shake her because it was obviously scared of her. That meant she had the upper hand here.
Bad news: There’s no way that thing was a trick of the light or some advanced parlor trick. It couldn’t react that quickly to her, nor could a trick show such emotion.
Worst news: Nicky was going to hold being right over her head forever.
- - - - - - - - - -
Firebird looked over the main floor of the Blaze offices. All of her soldiers were jumpy, talking in low whispers if at all. No one dared to go towards hre office, or even in that half of the building. It was easy to see: her men were scared.
“Unacceptable,” Firebird growled. It only pissed her off all the more when she saw a couple of the soldiers actually jump at the unexpected noise.
“Fine,” she snapped. “It’s a ghost. I’ll admit it. But ghost or not, no one is allowed to make such a fool of my family.”
“What are you doing?” Paul asked.
“I’m taking that hoodoo homeless woman’s advice. If the ghost wants to have a chat, then I’m going to have a chat.” Firebird pulled open the problem office door and a burst of cold air blew through them. It only made Firebird angrier. “I’ll only be a moment.”
- - - - - - - - - -
As soon as the door shut behind Firebird, all of the Blaze soldiers were falling over each other so they could get closest to the room. The wind picked up immediately, whistling under the door. They couldn’t hear what was surely the ghost talking, but they heard Firebird’s response loud and clear.
“No I’m not scared of you, you idiot. Why would I be scared of a stupid schmuck I already had killed once?”
The whistling wind and rattling furniture blocked out most of the conversation, but they managed to catch little snippets of it. Like when Firebird took the ghost to town for daring to hurt Soul or when she threatened to hold a séance so she could contact every Blaze soldier in the history of her family and sic them on the pesky ghost.
The wind increased in intensity until Paul was sure that the door should have whipped out of the frame. Blue light glowed underneath the door, an eery color that everyone would forever associate with this terrifying moment. Nothing could be heard over the dull roar of the wind and sharp banging of furniture.
Then, with no warning, it stopped. The wind died and the light slowly faded away. The men backed away, unsure of what was about to happen next.
The door jerked open and Firebird glared out at them, trying her best to put her hopelessly wind-blown hair back in order.
“What are you all doing?” Firebird barked at them, obviously still in a mood.
Paul had learned a great many things during his time in the military, the most important being when to know when to fight and when to retreat. This was a retreating moment.
“Nothing at all. We were just leaving.”
- - - - - - - - - -
“Are you sure it’s really gone?” Romeo asked.
Soul looked up from his full glass. He didn’t drink much but insisted on getting a beer every time he went to the bar as the social norm dictated. “There hasn’t been anything at all. Firebird got rid of the ghost for good.”
Nicky Nails snorted. “Christ. As if the girl didn’t already have a big enough ego. She’ll be unbearable now.”
Luka laughed and lifted his glass. “To Firebird. Only our boss could argue a ghost into the afterlife.”