Read Online Ghost of a Dream by Simon R. Green - Free Book Online Page B

side-tracked, JC. The real problem is the Ghost Caller. It was dangerous enough when it was first placed aboard the train; by now it could have accumulated enough power to blow a hole clean through the Space/Time continuum. If the stress of the return activates the machine, we could be talking about a mass psychic summoning. One last call for all the dead that ever were.”
    “I am leaving now,” said Happy. “Try and keep up.”
    “Stand still! Show a brave face, Happy,” said JC, sternly. “There are civilians present.”
    “Oh, don’t mind me,” said Laurie. “I told you, no-one with any sense stays here once it gets dark.”
    “See!” said Happy. “See!”
    “We should get danger money,” said Melody.
    Happy stopped and looked at her. “It would help,” he said finally.
    “Hold it,” said JC. “We have company.”
    They all looked around, to find the ghost of Dr. Todd had joined them out on the platform. He stood on his own, some distance away, staring unblinkingly into the dark tunnel-mouth. JC calmly strode forward to join him, looked into the tunnel opening, then right into the ghost’s face.
    “Why are you here, Dr. Todd? You’ve failed to prevent the train’s return, so why are you still here?”
    The ghost looked straight through him, as though he weren’t there, and said nothing at all. JC glanced back at Happy.
    “Are you sure you aren’t picking up something from him? Anything at all?”
    “No thoughts, no personality…it’s as though he’s so far-away, I can barely see him. Something really bad happened to Dr. T; and I don’t think it was only the head injury. I think part of it is still happening. There’s a definite connection between the ghost, the missing train, and the Ghost Caller. I can sense it, feel it; this whole setting is soaked in information. And JC…I can’t feel Dr. Todd, but I can feel something that I’m pretty sure is the Ghost Caller. It’s not simply a machine. It’s close now, closer than it has ever been, ready to break through…And I think it needs Dr. Todd to be here when it arrives. He’s not here through his own free will; the Ghost Caller holds him here.”
    “Why?” said JC. “What’s the connection?”
    “I don’t know!” said Happy. “I’m getting a headache trying to process all this. It’s something to do with the price Dr. Todd paid for the creation of the Ghost Caller.”
    “No-one move,” Melody said quietly. “But look around you. The fog is rolling in.”
    They all looked carefully up and down the platform. A shimmering grey fog had descended on both ends and was creeping slowly and remorselessly along the platform towards them. It rose out of everywhere at once, curling and coiling thickly on the still evening air, pulsing with its own eerie light. The tunnel-mouth was already lost to sight. In a few moments, the fog was already so thick that none of them could make out the opposite platform. The pulsing mists spilled along the railway tracks, covering them up in a thick grey tide, and soon the Ghost Finders and Laurie and the ghost of Dr. Todd were surrounded by a grey sea of impenetrable fog, filling the station with its own sour and bitter light.
    Laurie stepped back, into the main station building, as though he felt safer inside, in the candlelight. Dr. Todd drifted back before the fog, to stand with the Ghost Finders. He still stared unblinkingly through the thick grey mists, at where he believed the tunnel-mouth to be. The fog was cold and wet and intimidating. It felt like being trapped underwater, cut off from the rest of the world, every sound eerily muffled. The foggy air smelled of smoke and coal dust and times past. It grew slowly, steadily thicker.
    Happy suddenly put both hands to his head and pressed hard against his ears to keep out some terrible sound only he could hear. His face screwed up, and he stumbled away from the others. JC yelled for him to come back, but Happy couldn’t hear him. He disappeared