“Let me try,” he said. He’d been feeling his telekinetic oats lately. It was the one ability that he felt most proud of. He’d grown up a fan of the X-Men comics, and always assumed he was a real-life mutant. TK power was his entrance to the X-Men, should they ever come to life. He already had a superhero name picked out for himself—Kinetico. It was lame, but it was the best he was able to come up with when he was a kid.

Jessica stepped back. The bushes and trees chittered as he tried to force a path wide open. Leaves cascaded to the damp floor, but he couldn’t get them to break.

“Hold on,” Jessica said, running back to the house.

Eddie tried until his head began to pound and the periphery of his vision darkened. It felt like an ever-expanding bubble was about to burst in his brain when Jessica returned carrying a sickle.

“I saw this by the back patio. Sometimes brute force trumps mind power.”

A wicked gleam of determination flashed in her eyes as she hacked away at the underbrush, grunting with each blow. The vegetation gave way under the sickle’s singing arc. Jessica slashed, back and forth, up and down, carving her way through to the clearing. At one point, Eddie asked if she’d like him to take over for a bit. The muscles of her arms must surely be burning.

“I’ve got it,” she said, focused on the way forward.

He had to keep a good distance between them, unless he wanted the point of the sickle in his eye or arms. Jessica was covered with splintered wood, leaves and gnarled twigs.

“I see them!” she shouted, hammering the final obstacle with renewed fervor.

Jason and Alice lay in the center of the clearing, unconscious.

Jessica dropped the sickle, her body coiling, ready to run to them.

Eddie lashed out, managing to grab hold of her shirt collar. “Wait,” he said.

“Wait? Are you crazy?”

She made a fist as if to cold-cock him should he make the mistake of holding her back one more second.

“I’ll get them,” Eddie said. “There’s something else going on here.”

“What? Tell me.”

Eddie stared at the horde of EBs that had backed away from the children the moment Jessica broke through the brush. They formed a deep semi-circle around Jason and Alice, a still wall of silent expectation.

What did you do to them? Eddie asked psychically.

They replied with an unsettling silence.

Why did you bring them here? And why did you try to keep us away? Come on, answer me.

The reply came as a soft whisper that tickled the center of his brain. “We had to make them see.”

It didn’t make sense to Eddie, but when he pressed them for more, they refused to answer.

“Now I know where all of the EBs have been,” he said, his gaze locked on the spirit children.

“We have to get Alice and Jason.”

Jessica stepped around him, sprinting to the unconscious kids. Eddie jogged behind her.

She lifted their heads onto her lap. Alice’s hair was a tangled mess. Jason looked as if he’d been through a wind tunnel. “Alice, Jason, are you all right? Can you hear me?” Her thumbs stroked their cheeks, hoping they would respond to her touch.

The EBs pulled into one another, the edges of the semi-circle contracting.

“Are they all right?” Eddie asked, tensing, trying to decipher what the EBs were up to. He’d never felt so disconnected from the spiritual realm. He felt like a helpless voyeur. Their collective strength had formed an impenetrable wall he somehow had to bust through.

Alice’s eyes fluttered open. “Ms. Backman?”

“Yes, Alice, it’s me. Are you hurt?” The words poured from her breathlessly as she pulled the little girl to her breast.

“I don’t think so. I’m so tired.”

Jessica checked her head, feeling for any bumps.

The EBs coalesced into a blinding ball of light so intense, so pure, Eddie could feel it burn the back of his eyes.

“Ms. Backman?” Jason croaked. He pushed himself into a sitting position, rubbing his eyes. “What happened?”

An electric charge burst from the EBs, scorching the ground at Eddie’s feet. Alice squealed.

“What was that?” Jessica shouted, holding the kids tight.

Eddie shook his head. “I don’t know. I’ve never seen that before. It’s like…spirit lightning. Holy cow.” Looking down at his arms, he saw all of the hairs standing pin straight. The back of his scalp tingled.

“Jess, you have to get the kids out of here,” he said as calmly as he could muster.

She didn’t need to be told twice. She scooped one under each arm and ran as fast as she could to the path she’d hacked open.

Eddie felt the EBs surging.

What are you doing? You’ll hurt them!

His telepathic words fell into a dark vortex of palpable indifference.

“The bad man hurt us!” the EBs screamed.

In that instant, Eddie felt their pain, their anger, their fear. It was like a laser momentarily piercing the center of his being.

They can’t control it.

Who is the bad man?

His brain seared with the morphing image of a man. It came and went so fast, he couldn’t retain any of the man’s features. He went from young to old and liver-spotted in a spark’s flash. There was something familiar about him, especially when he was in younger form.

The air in the clearing filled with the scent of burning wires. Any second now, those EBs were going to take another shot, either at him or Jess and the kids. He sensed unfocused confusion and anger coming from the EBs. It was as if they were all throwing a tempter tantrum at the same time. There was no history to fall back on to know if it would have a physical effect, psychic, or none at all.

I don’t want to find out, Eddie thought.

He pulled all of his senses inward, as he would grab his family into a storm cellar before a tornado. His flesh prickled as he invoked an image of what he planned to do to stop them. It was going to take everything he had, but there wasn’t any time to weigh the pros and cons. If there was any chance they were going to direct their energy towards Jess, Alice and Jason, he had to do it, no matter the personal consequences.

Last chance, kids. Stop now.

His chest hummed as if a freight train was fast approaching.

No!

A brilliant flash of sharp, concentrated radiance exploded from the EB collective.

Eddie’s conjured psychic wall burst into being, absorbing the blow and caroming back to its source. It hit the EBs like a guided missile.

He thought he heard Jessica shout his name. He felt his body lift into the air, his feet no longer in touch with terra firma.

Stay numb, stay numb, stay numb.

Tumbling across the clearing, the physical pain pulled him to the here and now so he felt every bump, every burn, every scrape. He stopped within the entrance to the passageway exit like a nine-ball shot into a corner pocket. Something tugged at his collar, constricting it around his throat. He heard voices but couldn’t decipher the words. As his vision came back into focus, he watched the EBs separate from their collected mass, the wraith children turning their backs to him and disappearing into the darkening gaps between the trees.

A crashing wave of vertigo swept over Nina. She grasped for the nearest solid holding to keep from falling. The great room had grown dark, splotches of dying light on the wall creating a kaleidoscope that made her head spin even more.

“Are you all right?” Paul asked.

Knowing the cameras were rolling, she collected herself, careful to make the most of the moment. Holding a hand to her head, she rolled her neck and said, “I can feel the children, Paul. They’re in the house now. So many of them. All that pain and suffering they’ve been carrying with them for twenty years.” Reaching within the folds of her loose and layered blouse, she pinched a chunk of flesh on her wrist between two sharp nails. The tears came right on cue.