The House of Sorrows

Chapter 3: "Peril"

George walked in first, the temperature gauges started rapidly dropping. From 53° to 52° all the way down to 47°. The air was thick with malaise and miasma, the oxygen seemed toxic, uninhabitable, yet they continued on into the darkness that engulfed the room. Lucy had a bad feeling, but she mainly ignored it knowing Lockwood and George would pay no attention to it. Lucy hadn't noticed but she was gripping the hilt of the rapier so tight her hand was white, she had only paid notice when Lockwood reached down and put his hand atop of hers. His hand was warm, like a safety blanket was just thrown over her. Lucy's anxiety faded away. In that sweet moment she looked up at him and her stomach felt like it was turning inside out. It was like the rest of the world faded away, that was until they heard George yell. Lockwood and Lucy both whipped their heads in his direction and saw a tall, skinny man, his arms and legs wispy and mainly transparent. His eyes were deep set and filled with pain, his neck was broken. Lucy could hear the sounds of his last breaths, as he desperately tried to break free of the rope, but was ultimately unable to.

"I'm getting powerful feelings of hate, fear, and despair. He's strong, which is interesting since we haven't felt anything like this downstairs." Lucy said, she didn't want Lockwood to notice how shaken she was by the figure that stood before us.

The man who we presumed was Mr. Beckett (The man who died in the house), stood completely still just staring, Lockwood reminded them of the visitors' powerful ghost lock that will most likely result in Lockwood & Co. trying to kill themselves or the others. Which is not an overwhelmingly pleasant thought.

"Lockwood. I don't like how he's staring, I think he's trying to ghost lock us." George said, while not moving a lot but slowly shifting back towards the main group.

"I know, I'm feeling it. Luce, his attention seems to be on you. You alright?" Lockwood asked.

"..."

"Luce?" Lockwood turned and saw that Lucy's eyes were cloudy, and set, staring right at the shards of glass sitting on the floor.

He jumped in front of me and grabbed her arms, trying to shake her out of it. She stood there, un-phased, the figure still stood completely silent, but his head cocked to look at the shards of glass then back to her. Lucy was in a trance but she could still see Lockwood's face, even paler than usual. His jaw was clenched tight, his eyes fixed on her own.

"Luce, hey, come on, snap out of it!" Lockwood's hands reached up and cupped her face, his touch was soft, and kind.

Lucy was slowly breaking free of the ghost lock when she saw Mr. Beckett lift the shards of glass from the floor, Lucy supposed he got tired of waiting for her to snap and kill someone or herself. So he tried it himself, the fragments of glass slowly rose off the ground and plunged toward all of them. In that moment Lucy woke up completely and pushed Lockwood and George out of the way of the pieces of flying debris.

"Thank god Luce, you had us worried there for a minute." Lockwood said while smiling, and groaning from their rough tumble to the floor.

She smiled and looked at him with a grin.

"I would've figured it ou—" Lucy began, but at that moment the ghost was pummeling toward them.

They rolled to the side and stood in formation with their rapiers. Lockwood used a special pattern with his blade to warn the spirit away. George was helping him, as usual it was Lucy's job to find the source. However the room was mostly empty, other than the extra broken glass, and an abundance of space. Nothing. Where else could it be, she thought to herself. Then she remembered that loose floor board she'd walked over a second ago. She turned around and found the board again. But just as she was opening it the visitor whipped her across the room, she painfully hit the wall and cried out in pain as Lucy felt something drive through her back. Her eyes widened in horror and she immediately knew something was wrong. Very wrong.

"Lucy?! Lucy are you alright?!" Lockwood shouted from across the room while again dealing with the apparition.

Lucy was in and out of consciousness, her whole body ached but her lower back and stomach felt like it was on fire with agonizing pain. She had landed in a corner on the far right side of the room. When she regained her vision after it being blurry from my impact with the wall, she tried standing up but stopped after she heard a wail of pain, which she belatedly realized came from herself. As she looked down she saw that a large portion of an iron rebar had been propelled through her torso. Her eyes shone in shock and fear. The pain was almost unbearable, but she saw that George and Lockwood were struggling to keep the ghost at bay. She tore through the rebar with a cry and grabbed a salt bomb from her belt and threw it at the visitor. While the ghost flickered from contact with the salt she reached for the floor board, it opened and inside was a small wad of photos. Lucy covered the photos with her silver seal and the apparition faded out.