GHOSTS

By David Brashear

Cissie King-Jones took a deep breath. She’d asked around campus to try and determine Connor Kent’s location and finally someone had pointed her toward the chem lab. She now stood in the hallway outside the door.

She reached out toward the knob and clenched her fist when she saw her hand was trembling. “Calm down,” she whispered to herself. “Why do you do this to yourself every time you talk to him?” She didn’t answer herself, but she knew what the truth was.

She fought to regain control of her emotions, then firmly grabbed the doorknob and twisted it. She stepped inside and called out, “Connor?” when she didn’t see anyone. No response. “Where could he be?” she muttered as she turned back toward the door. Suddenly she stopped. A Bunsen burner was still running and beakers of chemicals sat on the desk before the workstation.

“Hello?” she called again as she slowly walked toward the workstation. She rounded the table and discovered Connor collapsed on the floor. Cissie fell to her knees and started screaming for help.

“How is he?” Rick Flagg asked later. He was standing in the Academy’s infirmary with his arms crossed. Before him Connor was lying asleep in a bed while Karin Grace listened to his heart with a stethoscope.

She straightened upright and removed the stethoscope from her ears. She draped it around her neck as she walked away from the bed with Flagg. “He’s had some sort of reaction,” she said in a low voice. “We’re running blood tests to try and figure out exactly what’s happened.”

Flagg nodded slowly. “Keep me informed,” he said briskly before turning and walking out of the infirmary. Karin watched him go before she glanced up at a small security camera mounted in the ceiling. It was easy to miss if you didn’t know it was there.

“Did you have something to do with this?” she asked it.

Across the campus Merlyn was seated in his office. The feed from the camera was being fed onto his desktop monitor. “No, I did not, my dear bother,” he said softly. “But I will discover who is responsible.”

Donna Troy climbed the fire escape to the roof of the administration building. The note that Cissie had left for her had concerned her. The paper was tear-stained and the handwriting was almost manic.

She stepped onto the roof and looked around. “Hello?” she called when she couldn’t see anyone. She finally spotted what appeared to be a person sitting behind an air conditioning vent and started in that direction.

As Donna approached, she heard sobbing. She rounded the vent and saw Cissie crying. “Cissie?” Donna asked.

Cissie looked up. Her eyes were red and her cheeks were tearstained. “Donna,” Cissie said. She jumped to her feet and grabbed hold of Donna, burying her head in Donna’s shoulder.

Donna held her close. “It’s okay,” she said in a gentle voice. “I’m here.” She let Cissie cry herself out for a moment or two. “What’s wrong?” she asked.

“It’s Connor,” Cissie sobbed. “I’m the one who found him.”

Donna helped Cissie to sit down on the roof before taking a seat beside her. “Have they figured out what happened yet?” she asked.

Cissie shook her head. “It was horrible,” she said. “He’s so strong and then to see him just lying there…” Her voice trailed away. “I thought he might have been dead,” she said finally in a voice just above a whisper. “And I thought that if he’s that strong and he’s in that condition… what chance do I have?”

Donna put an arm around Cissie’s shoulders and pulled her close. “You’ve got to remember one thing, Cissie,” she said. “There’s a big difference between you and Connor. Connor left the rest of us and went off on his own to try and stay with Cheshire. You’ve got friends. If anybody’s going to get you, they’ve got to deal with all of us.”

Cissie looked up at Donna and smiled, then her gaze shifted to something behind Donna. Her mouth opened wide and her face went pale. Donna turned to see Connor’s former roommate Billy laughing to himself as he approached them. His eyes were wild and dark circles were deep under them. His hair was wild and he was only wearing stained and torn pajama pants. A knife was clutched in one shaking hand.

“You need to get out of here,” Donna said while forcing confidence into her voice.

“What about you?” Cissie asked.

Donna never took her eyes off the slowly advancing Billy. “I’ve got this. Now get moving.”

Cissie nodded once and ran for the ladder that led down the side of the building. Billy took a step toward her and Donna stepped between the two.

“Forget about her,” Donna said. “You’ve got me to deal with.”

Billy cackled and charged at her with the knife raised high.

Karin Grace studied the report on the screen in front of her, searching for an answer as to why a completely healthy young man like Connor Ellis had simply collapsed for no reason. After ruling out any cardiovascular or neurological issues, she’d decided to run a toxicological scan on a sample of his blood.

“What?” she whispered as she leaned closer. An unfamiliar list of chemicals had shown up as present in his bloodstream. “I’ve never seen these mixed like this,” she muttered. “What have you been up to, Mr. Ellis?” She began jotting down some of the more unfamiliar chemical names on a scratch pad. She had some research to do. Hopefully it would lead her to her answer.

Bart Allen groaned as he walked across the grassy quad. As if things weren’t bad enough, he was also pretty sure he’d just failed a history exam. He didn’t notice that someone had come alongside him until they spoke.

“How are you doing?” Roy Harper asked, causing Bart to jump.

“I’m okay,” Bart muttered. “Are you and Connor going to change that?”

Roy took a deep breath and exhaled it slowly. “Listen, I wanted to apologize to you about what happened in that lab. I knew that Connor was going to be in a weird state of mind and I shouldn’t have let him get under my skin like he did.”

“What do you mean?” Bart asked.

“It’s that perfume Cheshire wears. It’s like some sort of drug. After we broke up I was sicker than I’ve ever been.” Roy’s voice dropped to a point where Bart could barely hear him. “It’s like I was addicted to her. I still wake up at night sweating and wishing I could just be around her again. At least the physical symptoms stopped. Maybe that’s what caused Connor to black out.”

“Wait, what?” Bart asked, stopping dead in his tracks. Roy took another step or two before he noticed that Bart wasn’t beside him anymore, causing him to backtrack. “What happened to Connor?”

“I’m surprised you haven’t heard,” Roy said. “Everybody’s talking about it. Cissie found him on the floor in the chem lab after I’d left.”

“Is he okay?” Bart asked.

“He’s in the infirmary,” Roy said.

“I need to go check on him,” Bart said. “I’ll talk to you later.” Bart hurried away from Roy and started across campus, leaving Roy to watch him go.

Donna dodged to the side and Billy’s knife chewed through the air where she’d just been standing. “Power!” he giggled maniacally as he spun around faster than Donna would have previously thought possible.

“You need to calm down now,” Donna warned. “Don’t make me put you down.”

Billy cackled. “There’s nothing you can do to stop him,” he warned. Another slice with the knife and Donna was too slow to dodge. A thin trickle of crimson began to flow down her arm. Donna clenched her wounded bicep and Billy licked the blood off the blade of his knife.

Rage filled Donna’s vision as she looked at the young madman opposite her. Billy simply grinned widely at her and brandished the knife in her direction again.

Donna snapped. Before she knew what she was doing, she darted forward and grabbed the hand that held the knife before she twisted it. The knife fell to the ground as Billy’s arm turned with sickening snaps. Donna released him and Billy staggered back a step or two while studying his broken arm and crushed fingers with disbelief.

Billy’s gaze snapped up and fixed on Donna. “You hurt me,” he said in a dreamlike tone, as if he didn’t believe that this was real. He looked at his arm again before he glared into Donna’s eyes again. “You hurt me,” he growled.

Donna tensed. Whatever was coming was getting ready to happen.

Billy grabbed up his knife, screamed and charged, flailing at Donna with his good arm. Donna’s eyes narrowed and she threw a punch that dislocated Billy’s jaw and sent him sliding backward across the roof. Her eyes widened again as she saw him sliding toward the edge of the roof and the now-empty quad below.

Donna ran to the edge faster than she’d thought possible and grabbed Billy’s arm as he dropped off the roof. Her grip fastened around the wrist of his broken arm and he jerked to a stop with a scream. He looked up with eyes filled with hate and started slicing at her again with the knife that he’d somehow managed to hold on to.

A startled Donna drew back and tried to assume a defensive posture. As she did so, however, she released her grip on Billy’s wrist. He laughed madly as he plummeted off the roof. Donna realized what was happening and ran back to the edge of the roof as Billy landed in the quad below. She looked down and saw him lying there, unmoving.

She cursed under her breath as tears began to fill her eyes. “I’ve killed him,” she whispered while backing away from the edge of the roof in horror.   Donna fell to her knees as tears began to fill her eyes.

Charlie and Duela held hands as they walked into the Academy’s infirmary. They quietly walked to Connor’s bedside and looked down at him as he slept. “I can’t believe this,” Duela said in a low voice. “He’s the strongest one out of all of us.”

Charlie clasped her hand tighter. “I know,” he replied. He raised his voice a bit and rested a hand on Connor’s shoulder. “You need to get well,” he told his sleeping friend. They looked up as Bart rushed in.

“I just heard,” Bart said. “How is he?”

“Sleeping,” Charlie said. “Doctor Grace told us that he should be okay. It was some sort of odd allergic reaction.”

“Cheshire,” Bart groaned as realization hit him.

“What about her?” Duela asked.

Bart sagged into a nearby chair. “Roy told me everything. Cheshire uses some sort of pheromone perfume to attract guys to her. We’d figured that was what she was using to get Connor so hung up on her so fast. He must have had a reaction to it.”

“That makes sense,” Charlie said.

Duela glanced at Charlie. “Then we need to keep him away from her.”

“Agreed,” Charlie said. He looked back at Bart. “We’ll let the others know what’s going on.”

“Thanks,” Bart said. “I’d like to stay with him for a little while. Things weren’t good the last time I saw him.”

“Sure,” Charlie said. “We’ll try and get in touch with everybody else.” Charlie squeezed Bart’s shoulder before he led Duela out.

Bart sat there in silence and just studied his sleeping friend for what felt like hours.

Bart opened his eyes and found himself in the quad. He looked around and saw that he was alone. The grass was cool under his feet.

His disorientation cleared quickly and he realized what was happening. “Danny, is that you?” he asked.

“You must leave,” the unseen voice said urgently. “Merlyn’s plans to exterminate your group near fruition. If you wish to live, you must make your plans swiftly. Time is short.”

Bart’s eyes popped open and he jerked upright. He’d dozed off while sitting in the chair beside Connor. He leaned forward and rubbed his eyes. Even though he was awake, he could still feel the urgency in Danny’s message.

But with Connor out of commission, what did he do now?

Merlyn sat behind his desk and picked up an envelope that had just been delivered to him. He slit the flap with a silver letter opener and slid out the paperwork that it contained.

Merlyn read the papers and smiled. At last the authorization that he’d been waiting for had come through.

Time to end this.

NEXT ISSUE: Bart finds himself in the driver’s seat as he begins preparing the team for their greatest challenge yet – escape. But Merlyn is standing in the way, and he’s making his own preparations as well.