Plain: Book 2

Who Isn't Afraid of Empty Hospitals?

"How'd they manage to keep using this place for those haunted walk-throughs with this much asbestos?" asked Takigawa, as he looked over the map we had been handed and compared it to the peeling wall paper around us.

"Asbestos is harmless if left alone," said Naru, pushing up a monitor into the newly snapped-together shelf. "So best you don't go scratching on the ceiling or taking a hammer to the floor."

"What's asbestos?" I asked.

Naru answered without breaking the rhythm of plugging together his tech. "It's a building material that was used from the 1940s to the 1970s. Easy to make, cheap, and with a high heat tolerance that made it a good fire retardant. It was used in mostly insulation, but due to its initial safety, it was used in many other building materials, including tile and ceiling coverings."

I slipped the box of microphones onto the table as I listened, frowning. "So...what's so bad about it then?"

"If disturbed from its place," said Monk, "it breaks apart into super-fine fibers that can permanently damage your lungs, including give you nigh incurable lung diseases."

I gulped and put a hand to my throat, as though I could feel tiny dust floating down my bronchial tubes. I took in the water damaged corners of the ceiling boards, the questionably stained linoleum, and the peeling green wall paper.

"And we're going to sleep here?"

"You don't have to," said Naru. "There is a hotel nearby, and there's always the van."

I looked over at Lin, who was busy setting up the monitors with Naru and hooking them up to his laptop. He had been the one to sleep in the van last time. But, since there wasn't supposed to be any babies during this case, I guess I could sleep in the van.

But I shook myself. "I should stay here to help. Who knows, maybe I'll get one of those, you know, visions of mine on the place."

"Suit yourself."

"It'll be like a party!" crowed Takigawa as he wrapped an arm around my shoulders and hugged me close. "We can stay up late telling ghost stories and eat snacks and then try to sleep as we hear every creak and pop this old building's got to give."

"Oh yay. I sure love my job." I really did love my job, but the van was starting to sound more appealing by the second.

"There's nothing to be afraid of," Naru picked up another tote by the doorway and snapped it open to the wires inside. "We're here to debunk the haunting, one that has yet to really make a mark. Any reports up till now have only been the bored and possibly drunk imaginations of teenagers. All the accidents that occurred here have a reasonable explanation and the foundation is built on sturdy bedrock. So, like I said, don't go knocking down walls and you'll be fine."

That being said, I still eyeballed the wilting wallpaper and water-damaged ceiling tiles. The electricity had been turned on before we arrived, leaving the halls and rooms with a washed out, yellowed sort of coloring. Garbage had been left in the corners, along with strips of black plastic that could have been used to build the seasonal 'haunted hospital' exhibit.

Sometime after setting up base, Takigawa kicked aside a wad of it on our way to set up a camera and sensors along the west wing. "Naru has a point. If kids have been able to walk through this place every Halloween without anything happening, it's probably fine. Guess now all we have to look forward to is how he's going to prove it isn't haunted."

"Probably his reputation," I said, flinching as a large brown spider scuttled out from the disturbed plastic.

"Sounds about right. 'Here's the tests, I'm awesome, have fun.' Hey, ten bucks says Ayako will try to purge an earth bound spirit anyways."