The Peculiar Alchemist

33 || The Disloyal Helper

Being a ghost was a strange experience.

It was very different from being alive, and was mostly painless and dull. Sammy could recall everything about his life until the moment he died so vividly. He was twenty at the time, that was nine years ago, and when he was twenty, he was nothing but a stupid dumb kid who thought he was untouchable.

There were many silly fights he got into, many reckless impulses he gave in to, and many stupid decisions he somehow survived. However, the thing that killed him was his own bad luck coupled with his stupidity.

Everyone knew dark alleys were to be avoided, especially at night, but Sammy was an idiot and thought he was being smart when he decided to take a shortcut walking into one. How was he supposed to know that he was cutting his life short instead of cutting the distance of his route?

All he could remember was a well-dressed man, polite and pleasant as he spoke, but he was no ordinary man and every time Sammy tried to remember his face, he'd end up with a blurred image of it in his memory. The fact of the matter is, he never took a good look at the man's face, not after what he had seen.

On top of that, there were three dead men on the ground.

He knew they were dead because of all the blood and the way their bodies were shriveled up and gray. Anyone would have been afraid, anyone would have turned around to flee the scene, but Sammy's whole body became immobile. It just stopped.

It felt as if something made him stay in place, tearing him away from himself. From his body. A few moments later he was staring down at his own body which dropped lifelessly on the floor. The dead men were nowhere to be seen, but there were bloody footprints that told him that they had walked away somehow.

Now, in the present day, he knew that he met a necromancer, but he wasn't a necromancer he saw again in the nine years he spent as a dead ghost. That's the reason why he stuck close to necromancers. He wanted to find that man again and ask him a few things about that night.

But that happened too long ago, now he had something else to wonder about.

For some reason he was tracing a wall with his finger, ruining something that was drawn on it as he did so. Something probably significant but he couldn't remember what, didn't remember why he was even doing it. Not even how he was able to do it. It felt as if he had a physical body again, was human again.

Sammy was following a command, he knew that, and these gaps of memory he was dealing with were identical to the ones he had when he first died. It could be the same man again, but Sammy couldn't tell for sure.

The moment his command was fulfilled, it felt as if his humanity was dissipating along with his physical body. As if it was nothing but a delusion. He really couldn't remember anything as he stared down at his own hand. He was a ghost again.

It was funny how things slip one's mind.

"What are you doing here?" Vincent asked, sounding surprised, making Sammy look at him and then look around at the place he was standing in. It was not a place that was familiar to him, the room Vincent summoned him in was very different.

"I actually don't know." Sammy told him honestly.

Vincent sighed glancing at the window. "It doesn't matter. Just stay out of the way, I have visitors."

Tilting his head curiously, Sammy stayed silent wondering who these visitors might be. Vincent sounded upset for some reason, but when he opened the door to welcome them in, Sammy couldn't help but be surprised. He did not expect both Toby and Kellen to walk in.

"He was following me." Toby grumbled gesturing at Kellen who gave Vincent a curt wave and a lopsided smile, but Vincent returned it with a frown.

"You're not welcome here." He told Kellen as he crossed his arms, but Kellen merely stepped closer giving him a look of feigned obliviousness.