LotS/The Story/Number of the Beast/Intro

"Do you believe in ghosts?"

Long, thin strips of soft azure light frame the corridor at its corners. They skirt the edges of floor and ceiling, pulsing down the long passage, till perspective promises a union that will never come. Blue beams fired at the gathering darkness. Brave. Defiant. Hopeless. Their illumination only makes the gloom deeper and heavier, a billowing cloud that flits between their impotent blasts.

"What?"

Shadows smother your footsteps. The jumpsuit's cushioned soles rustle instead of clicking or thudding, like the wind whispering through memories of half-forgotten trees.

"You heard me." Lucy Prakash leans forward, over the little fire. Tongues of dark and light flicker on her dusky features. The effect is almost demonic, transforming a young, girlish face into something from the abyss. Her eyes bore into Talia's. They're threaded red from sleeplessness and alcohol, ablaze with shocking intensity. "Ghosts."

Talia takes a long drink, tilting the broad bottle up between them to break the stare. Firelight tries to penetrate dark glass and darker beer. Her gaze flicks to the right behind its shield, meets yours, and asks the unspoken question. Has Lucy taken something stronger than Novocastrian Brown Ale? If she has, you're all in trouble. The base's commanding officers may turn a blind eye to a group of pilots sneaking off into the woods for a quiet (or sometimes not so quiet) drink, but if one of you comes back with recreational chems in their system...

The door on your left shifts and slides open. It's a monstrous noise in the quiet corridor, the hiss of a hydra or a vampire awakened in his crypt. No brightness spills out to warm and comfort you. There's only more low-power lighting, this time silver circles embedded in the ceiling. They illuminate objects without challenging the darkness that drowns them. The bunk hasn't been slept in. There are no personal effects scattered on the table or desk, no clothing or equipment anywhere in the windowless room. The air carries a faint whiff of cleaning agents -- a lifeless, unwelcoming, medicinal smell. That makes five chambers so far, all untenanted.

"What about you, [Player's name]?" Her bright, glaring, insistent stare latches onto you now. "Do you believe in ghosts?"

"No."

Yes.

The realization slips into your brain like an assassin's blade.

"I saw one! On the Western Star, when we boarded it."

You and Talia share a look. The Western Star was a charnel house, a ship of horrors. Those raiders didn't just kill everyone onboard -- they left a message for whoever found them, and for anyone else who'd ever think about trying to escape instead of handing over creds and cargo. You weren't there, but even the clean, unembellished descriptions in the official report painted a gory picture. Grasping arms stuck to the ceiling. Torsos impaled on spikes, above tangles of decorated entrails. Bloody genitals pinned to the wall like trophies.

All Sian personnel who explored that vessel were sent for psych evaluations and counselling sessions.

"There was a girl," Lucy says. Fire shines in both her eyes, windows to a burning soul. "A child. She ran away, down a corridor. I called out -- told her I wasn't going to hurt her. But she didn't stop. So I went after her, running through the blood and... and... everything. She ducked into one of the cabins. But when I went in, there was just... what they'd left of her. She'd been dead for weeks."

The passage swallows you down its black gullet, towards whatever terrors or revelations fester in its guts. A door opens on your right. It's a recreation room. Triangular arrangements of pool balls rest on green felt, numbers shimmering above their spheres. Cues fill a rack like the weapons of an ancient army. Smaller tables hold ziggurats of magnetized mahjong tiles, each one perfect, waiting to be desecrated and divided beneath the eyes and voices of raucous players. The holo-units are blank and blind. Even the vending machine's stopped blaring its promises of refreshing beverages. Only faint green lights beneath its black bulk show that the refrigeration systems are still functioning. There's the same chemical odor from the cabins, the scent of recent cleaning. Another sterile tomb, empty and unused.

"Maybe she was psionic," you say. "Powerful ones can leave a kind of residue behind..."

"No! I read her file afterwards. She wasn't psychic, it wasn't a hologram, and I'm not crazy. She was a ghost."

Eddie Dang murmurs something about it getting late. Lucy takes the hint and lets him lead her back to base. The rest of you wish her good night, then drink in silence till you're sure her aural implant won't catch your words.

"Should we... tell someone?" Susan Liu asks. "Her psych councilor?"

"Who flew with her on her last mission?" Talia looks around. The fire describes dancing circles on the base of her bottle.

"I did," Jhang Li-Chin says. He lifts his bottle up like he's a schoolboy trying to get the teacher's attention. The black liquid inside sloshes just below the neck. He never was much of a drinker.

"How'd she fly?"

"Same as always."

"Nothing crazy? No shooting at ghosts?"

He shakes his head. Talia looks to you, and you both nod.

"Then let's keep it to ourselves," you say. "If we tell psych, they'll ground her."

For some moments the only noises are the crackling of burning twigs, the rustling leaves, and beer splashing its way from bottles to mouths.

"You think she really saw something?" Jhang says.

"Maybe," you say. "But there's no such thing as ghosts."

There are. Or at least there were.

That inescapable thought follows you through the silent gloom. Because you've seen Tor'gyyl, a planet that once held the things man knows, the things he's dreamed, the things he's forgotten, and those in which he no longer believes.

Ghosts...

With a lost world in your brain and shadows pressing in on all sides, with orange eyes shimmering among your memories and crushing blackness flooding empty passages and lifeless rooms, that word flits around you, wearing a white sheet and rattling chains.

You shake your head and smile. The movement is almost alien, and your mouth twitches into an unfamiliar shape. Ghosts don't pilot Sian vessels or leave folded jumpsuits on chairs. And someone brought you aboard this craft from the...

The Silver Shadow. What happened to Barracuda and Ali?

You quicken your pace, running into the darkness, following the blue beams or leading their assault. You have to find out what's going on...