The Whitechapel Case [abandoned]

Part 2: The Connections (Chapter 6)

The Whitechapel Case
Fox-Trot-9

PG-13
Horror/Suspense/Mystery (How-Catch-'Em)
Disclaimer: I don't own Ghost Hunt or Death Note.

Part 2: The Connections

Chapter 6

Day 2—The three could tell Ms. Fowler's ordeals had taken a toll on her health. She lay there, strapped to the hospital bed as if she were some animal strapped to a dissection gurney. For a woman in her early sixties, she looked more like ninety-something. Wisps of gray strands hung limp around the balding scalp of her head. Long, deep wrinkles lined her gaunt face, especially on her forehead and around her sunken eyes. Pockmarks were all over her face, reaching toward the back of her head, some on her hands and forearms, and more down to her knees, shins and feet. And she was a ghastly shade of pale as ugly as Noll's was beautiful, almost like a frozen corpse with varying patches of gray over her body and specks of red around the bloodless pores of her forehead and hands. She was sleeping. But even so, she was taking in deep, long gasps as if she were drowning.

For a few minutes, Noll, Lin and Bert stayed silent, just observing the helpless woman in front them. The room was Spartan-looking, even for a hospital room. Except for a few chairs and the hospital bed, there was nothing else. Nothing sharp that could be used to stab and slice people with; nothing heavy enough to smash a person's skull with a flailing hand; nothing small enough to conceal in the palm of your hand to escape from the restraints on the hospital bed when nobody was around. These were measures against Ms. Fowler's use on the staff as well as on herself. And even when the doctor closed the door for their privacy, he left it slightly ajar; he wasn't taking any chances.

For Noll, he had his suspicions about Ms. Fowler's third exorcism. It was too short compared to the previous one, and given the severity of her current condition, it seemed to break the pattern set up by the first two exorcisms. Noll was no stranger to Christian forms of exorcism, particularly of the Catholic variety; he's seen and read about enough of those to know the consequences of repeated exorcisms on the same person. It's like a relapse into getting the flu after recovering from it a few days ago; when the body recovers from the flu, that's when the immune system is at it's weakest. Any relapses during this time will further degrade the health of anyone unfortunate enough get it again. Repeated exorcisms work the same way, getting gradually worse as a spirit finds it easier every time to possess its host, and all the harder for the exorcist to exorcise that spirit from its host.

Therefore, if the first exorcism got off without a hitch (taking only two days), and if the second was much harder (taking eighteen days), then the third... was a failed exorcism. Now it made more sense. Somehow, that third exorcism got out of control, forcing Father Carmyne to cut it short after the death of his assistant. And Alice Carmyne's death must have been collateral, exacted by a spirit having a grudge against a possible candidate of one of the five kids Jason Pickmasters told him about.

Bert said, "Noll, do you think Ms. Fowler was possessed?"

"Of course she was possessed, and I have every reason to believe that she's possessed right now," he went to the old woman's bedside. "Lin, I assume your shiki sense a spirit?"

"Yes, they do, but it's very faint... Noll, wait," said Lin; the kid looked at him. "In the last case, you were possessed by a fox spirit faster than I could summon my shiki. What do you think would happen if a spirit as violent as the one in the video were to possess you?"

"If that happens, I'll just ask the spirit questions."

"I'm serious, Noll. What would happen if you woke her up while she's possessed? That spirit could possess you, me, anyone."