Orpheus - Haunting the Dead.pdf - Dice

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CORRIDORS
head, dark skin and devil’s goatee. “Damn, but you
were in some kind of serious trance, mister.”
Ed raises a hand to his throat. But there’s no blood.
“I… was I dreaming?”
“You were doing something. But I got you out of it.
Now keep your voice down.”
Ed looks around. It seems that the fog in his dream
vision was real, if nothing else was. A thick mist swirls
around him. He can barely make out the figures moving
in the distance. “Where am I?” he whispers.
“I’m not exactly sure,” the stranger says in low
tones. “I played possum and they dumped me in here.
I could feel them hammering me with some kind of
mind-whack, but I got ways to hold off that kind of
junk.”
Now Ed can hear other sounds. Moans, sobs, groans,
muffled yet near. A man-sized shadow moves near him,
its arms waving slowly in the air. He sees its tattered
shirt and the dark slash across its face. “Oh God,” he
whispers. “We’re on the fifth floor.”
The stranger takes a careful step away from Ed.
“Come on,” he says. “If we move slow and keep our
voices down, they don’t seem to notice us. By the way,
the name’s Green.”
Ed’s eyes adjust to the gloom as they walk. He sees
that they are surrounded by others spirits. Some stand
in place or wander in slow circles, but most are curled
on the floor, their bodies quivering, their faces twisted
into masks of fear. He sees a teenager lying on her back,
her eyes bugging out and her hands clutching at her
throat. A bald man dressed as a waiter is kneeling with
his arms thrown in front of his face, begging an unseen
assailant to stop striking him, his pleas interrupted by
screams of pain. A stout woman is curled into a fetal
position, whispering, “Take it away, take it away, take
it away.” And among the damned souls walk the
smilers, occasionally laying a palm upon a victim,
causing that soul to cry out even more.
HAUNTING THE DEAD
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