Stranger? Than what?, Open

[Nintendo Girl]

((Yes, I know it's not July...but I'm looking forward to better months. hehe))

The hot July sun beat down on the withering grass of the Copperton Estate and Rachel Copperton as she sat cross-legged on the hitch of her trailer in cut-offs and a pink t-shirt. It was about eighty degrees out, but there was no shade to be found as it was almost noon. Raymond was on Rachel's lap, napping and receiving a friendly and comfortable stroking of his hair. A loud bang coming from her mother's house signaled Rachel that Raymond was about to take off for another napping spot. Sure enough, his cute little eyes snapped wide-open at the first sound and he raised his head to look back at the house his owner's mother lived in as the door popped open and the woman appeared at the screen. Rachel tried to comfort him by scratching his ears, but it was no use; he jumped off her lap and took off, hissing the whole way. Frankly, Rachel didn't blame him for turning tail; sometimes she was scared of her mother, too.

There was no smoke coming out of her mother's house, but it was obvious one of her mother's experiments had gone wrong as her mother stumbled to the ground outside her house, coughing and sputtering and waving her hand about. How that helped was beyond Rachel, especially since she had a cigarette in that hand, but she let it go. 'Course, it could have just been her mother's smoking finally catching up to her, too. No such luck, unfortunately. She was breathing easier now - and taking another puff on the cigarette.

After a moment, she turned to see Rachel staring at her.

"Well, what do you want?!" she demanded miserably after a moment. She flipped Rachel the bird and went back inside, slamming both doors as she did so.

Rachel sighed and turned her head away from the pitiful house. This was ridiculous. She was going nowhere fast and her mother clearly wasn't dying any time soon. The first job she'd actually managed to land (at a diner in the city) she'd had to sneak away from home to get too, and then her mother had scared off her customers and then scared her manager into firing her. Then, of course, she received a beating. She didn't dare use her powers against her mother, though; maybe she was too battered for that. She'd heard about battered women; maybe she was a battered daughter. She sure as hell felt like one.

Her thoughts were disrupted, though, by the sight of someone coming onto the property from the other side of Rachel's trailer. She didn't know the person, but it wasn't surprising that someone was intruding. There was no fence and people often forgot that there were actually individual properties here instead of one big junkyard in this part of the city. That's what her life was, too - one big junkyard, and her mother operated the crane with the manget attached. She watched the person curiously, though, not saying a word or moving from her position.

[K-Squared]

Where ever he is, Charlie's elsewhere in his mind. He's oblivious to his present surroundings. I suppose it'd be best to say he's sleepwalking. Though he looks perfectly awake, he might even be able to follow a conversation, but he's seeing the stuff of the dream planes right now.

Every few steps he looks back over his shoulder, carefully walking as soundlessly as possible. There's no one there, but the way he's acting, it's as if someone was following him.

[Nintendo Girl]

Rachel watched the man as he approached. He seemed out of it, like he didn't quite know (or care) where he was going so long as he was moving. He kept looking back over his shoulder like someone was following him, perhaps expecting them to sneak up on him and grab him or something any moment. Rachel glanced behind him and saw nothing. There was no one there. She looked at the man curiously. Maybe he was drunk? Her mother always got that way when she was drunk, too; she'd get all creepy and walk outside. She'd be all harried like she was waiting on someone to come get her and hoping no one did. It would certainly make since. But who would drink this time of day? Then again, men were known to do strange things all hours of the day and night. But who was she to talk about strange? She wasn't exactly normal herself, and her mother...well, her mother was another story entirely.

The man seemed to have a bit of good looks to him. His soft, curly brown hair was certainly attractive and so were his features. He was skinny but had some muscle. There were some markings that looked like they might be scars or something on the man's left wrist, which she only saw because of the way his arms swung when the man walked; she couldn't see the inside of his right wrist, though, for his right side was facing Rachel. The man's manner of dress seemed a bit old-fashioned, but Rachel wasn't sure. She didn't know much about fashion and didn't really watch that much TV. She also didn't typically go anywhere, such was the restrictive nature of her creepy, overbearing mother. But the man seemed confident in his stride despite the nervousness that his actions belied. Clearly, he thought someone was following him. Maybe he really was drunk, or maybe he was about to bring trouble down on the Coppertons. That spelled trouble for Rachel especially if he did, for she'd be blamed and probably beaten - if her mother could get her hands on her, that is. She knew how to run, and run fast - but if she wasn't beaten, she'd be punished in some other way, like the theft and burning of her books or the selling of her TV or something. She could live without the TV and she could always get more books, but she was starting to get leery of the man just looking at him - let alone imagining what might happen to her if she was to end up getting involved in something her mother considerered shady. As if she wasn't shady enough herself, of course.

Then there was the matter of Rachel's oddity. That's what her mother called it: an oddity. Rachel was of the mind that her mother was the source of that oddity, but she didn't dare ask the question. All these things and more ran through her mind, though, as she watched the man approach her property.

[K-Squared]

George would have liked nothing more than for Charlie to snap out of it. Something about this part of town had always given the ghost who shared Charlie's body the creeps. Charlie might have the heebie jeebies himself if he were in tune with this phaze of existance in space time.

George did his best to try to nag the other awake. It wasn't working so well as it sometimes did. Charlie's mind was far too engrossed by the demon trying to track him in the dream that occupied reality as he knew it.

The demon for it's part wasn't even aware of Charlie. In Charlie's perception of things though, the demon was just about on top of him. He crouched down and took cover in some bushes, that weren't really there either. "Go away." he whispered to nothings.

[Nintendo Girl]

Rachel just stared at the man. He was apparently trying to hide from something, but there was nothing to hide from and there was nothing to hide in. This man was clearly insane. It was all Rachel could do to keep from grinning madly, let alone busting up laughing, at the poor man with his fractured mind. As it was, her small smile, barely contained though it was, was nonetheless twisting her lips as laughter danced in her eyes. She didn't know who this man was, but she recognized a crazy person when she saw one - and this one was funny.

* * * * *

The TV was displaying a handsome set of rectangular emerald earrings now. She could care less, though. Rachel's mother, after all, was not a woman who like emeralds. Diamonds, though - now those were a woman's best friend. And gorgeous as she was, she deserved diamonds. Her daughter, though - she didn't deserve much more than a jail cell and one meal a day. But that was another matter entirely. She hated kids; why she had to go and have one was beyond her. Of course, when she'd had her, she didn't know much about abortions. She didn't keep up on such things. All she knew was that they were expensive and dangerous. Who knew what doctors put into you when they put you under? Or took out of you, for that matter.

Smoke drifted slowly into and through the air from her cigarette as she shifted her weight, leaning forward on the couch as she was with her elbows on her knees. She used a cane that she didn't really need to flip the channel on the old black and white and saw an old mystery show of some kind - one of those detective shows that never quite goes out of style. Not her style, though, so she flipped it again to see some talk show. They were discussing the latest teen pregnancy rates and why Brittney Spears was aborting a child from someone she'd dumped months ago.

"Bah!"

She used the cane to flip the switch off. As she tossed the cane down, though, she got a sense that something was off. After a few moments, she pulled out some weird apparatus consisting of various crystals of different colors, sizes, and shapes placed around a cracked beech-wood board the shape of a triangle and started chanting some incantations. The further she went, the more excited she got...

* * * * *

Outside, Rachel finally managed to suppress her laughter as curiosity took over and she leaned back against the trailer. She watched the man from her perch on the trailer's hitch and wondered primarily why the man wasn't in a mental institution. He clearly needed to be. What if he hurt someone, or perhaps himself? And how'd he gotten all the way out here, anyway? This wasn't exactly the place most people came to for kicks. Then again, the fast food district wasn't exactly closed-off, either. Hell, they weren't quarantined...but still, it was odd. And yet, so was the man before her.

[K-Squared]

George continued to attempt to exert control, much to Charlie's annoyance. George moved on to trying to persuade Charlie to at least try waking up so the demon would go away.

Annoyed Charlie decided it was worth trying, if for no other reason than to get George to shut up. George of coarse did his best to exploit the opportunity to regain control of Charlie's body, but the lunatic expected it from him.

The mental combat between the two created enough of a perceptual shift for Charlie to realize where he actually was. No demon at the moment, but there was definitely something off kilter with the world. All his hairs on his arms stood on end. He was sure he was being watched. Paranoid people are always sure they're being watched.

Looking around for a moment revealed he did have an audience of one. Charlie stood up slowly and dusted himself off.

[Nintendo Girl]

Rachel's mother was a witch. That was a given. But she often used her knowledge of witchcraft to act as a medium. She could not communicate through normal means with a spirit that was already dwelling in the physical realm, though. For that, she needed something entirely different. A wicked, purely evil smile was plastered across her aged, wrinkled face as she put the crystal board away and headed for her bedroom. She had something special for spirits who wandered into the physical world...

* * * * *

Rachel watched as the man slowly looked about and then stood up. He seemed quite normal as he dusted himself off, but Rachel knew better. This man was insane. Perhaps he was only sometimes insane, but he was most definitely insane. Insane people scared Rachel for some reason. She didn't know why; she didn't have a rational reason, like having been beaten or raped by one. She just didn't like crazies. Maybe that was her mother's fault, too. Then again, it was all too easy to blame everything on her mother. Her mother was a total bitch, and that was on her really good days.

"You might wanna disappear before my mother gets out here. She doesn't like strangers on her property."

She was at least trying to be polite; after all, she didn't know if the man was dangerous or not and she didn't want to have to use her powers against him.

[K-Squared]

Why is it every time Charlie meets a girl she has a crazy mother? (rhetorical)

He just nodded, swallowed hard, and looked around trying to get an exact orientation on his whereabouts. He took a moment to adjust his glasses and then looked north. He could see the back side of the Burrito Barn from here. He shook his head and decided to make his way there.

George nattered in the back of his head about leaving the van parked clear over by Pizza Palace.

"Later." he said as he made his way out of the yard.

[Nintendo Girl]

Ha! Yeah...like his mother was going to let a useable spirit leave that easily. When the screen door slammed open suddenly, Rachel muttered a foul curse under her breath. Her mother stepped out with some kind of long, twisted branch adorned with various fetishes ranging from fingers and toes (obviously human ones) to tongues and crystallized eyeballs. Most of the fetishes were rather grotesque and the end of the wand had a long, slender, razor-sharp, dual-edged blade attached to it.

"Aha! At last, a spirit! Come to me spirit," she cooed in a motherly voice.

Yeah, Rachel thought to herself, like a mother with a thing for mutilation and torture.

"Come to me," her mother said aloud, "and you shall be rewarded for your servitude."

She started uttering a spell and Rachel moved faster than most people knew how. She wasn't about to get involved, but she also wasn't about to get caught watching if she could help it - not when she was in the direct line of her mother's spell casting, anyway. She quickly put the hitch between herself and her mother's soon-to-be-victim as her mother chanted, pointing the large wand right at the man's heart...

[K-Squared]

Charlie just laughed. A madman's laugh, but still this was humorous to him. George was annoyed but not compelled by any thing the witch was doing or trying to do. He did wish he was in control of the body at the moment. Charlie's reactions to things were never predictable. Like for example now, he was laughing and making funny faces.

"Charlie, I really think we might want to skeddadle....." He urged mentally.

[Nintendo Girl]

Yet despite the seeming futility of the spell, it was starting to take hold. An invisible barrier was starting to slowly wrap itself around the spot upon which the possessed body now stood. As her mother continued chanting, Rachel watched the man's back. She couldn't tell what he was doing since she was behind him, but she knew that this probably wasn't going to be good. The tiny hairs on Rachel's arms were starting stand up, as well as the hairs on the back of her neck, though the hair on her head wasn't doing anything just yet. But even Rachel could feel - something - though she couldn't quite tell what it was that she was feeling. But she knew this wasn't going to be good - not good at all...

[K-Squared]

I imagine the recoil might not be so pleasant. George, the ghost, is technically the property of a rather icky demon, even if he isn't around much. George can feel what's going on, but it's more like walking through a cobbweb and having it cling for a while than anything really dastardly.

As for Charlie, well, he started to run and yell while he flailed at himself. Something started to crawl around on him. At least that'd be what it felt like to him. He didn't run in a specific direction, just around in circles. It would look to an observer, much like the proverbial chicken with it's head cut off.

[Nintendo Girl]

Rachel shook her head and sighed. Why did these things always have to happen when she was around to witness them? She'd just as soon have not seen this. I mean, the guy might be crazy - but he didn't deserve whatever it was her mother was doing to him. She would have interfered, too, had it not been for the fact that her powers never seemed to work around her mother. Something to do with her witchcraft, probably, though Rachel had never bothered trying to figure it out.

As for Rachel's mother, though, she was still chanting as she pulled out a small glass bottle with a wired flip-top cork. The bottle was completely clear, but only to the naked eye; unbeknownst to Rachel, any spirit trapped inside would appear as a graysish, slow-moving smoke that filled the bottle. Rachel's mother popped the cork open and began the last length of her chanting...

[K-Squared]

Again George tried to assert control over the body. Charlie was nearly hysterical, and a hysterical Charlie is prone to bad ideas. At the moment Charlie was contemplating how to set himself on fire to get whatever was crawling on him off. George realized that would be bad for both of them.

Charlie continued to flail while he looked about for combustibles.

George wasn't going anywhere, he was firmly anchored in this plane and for the time being in Charlie's body.

Charlie was just going crazy, or rather crazier. Then it occured to the mad man that the source of his discomfort wasn't anything ordinary. Aware suddenly of chanting, it dawned on him, that a witch is a work here. He wasn't exactly sure of what she was doing, but being prone to conspiracy theories anyway, he was certain it could'nt be good.

Charlie sat down on the ground and began to fiddle with something strapped to his ankle.

[Nintendo Girl]

Finally, the chanting was completed. The spell was finished. The magic had been cast. Indeed, nothing tangible could be seen, but it could most certainly be felt. Something lashed out at the spirit inhabiting the body before Rachel's mother, attempting to wrench it from the body it was possessing - attempting, in fact, to rip it out as violently as possible. The magic began to swiftly wrap about the body like a coccoon, sticking like a spider web to the body and pulling at it like acid trying to burn him alive. A spirit could be used for many things, and Rachel's mother cackled madly as she watched the spectacle before her. Then she saw what the man was doing and got angry.

"No, you DON'T!" she said, starting in a mutter and finishing in a shout. She pulled another, much smaller wand with only a single fetish - a shrunken head - out of a rather large and deep pocket of her dress and aimed at the man. She started uttering the incantation of another spell as the first tried desperately to shred the body before her as much as possible to get at the spirit waiting within...

* * * * *

Rachel wondered what the man was doing now. Did he have a gun? Was he going to shoot her mother? Rachel could only hope. Maybe he was a witch, too - though that wasn't very likely - and was going to enact a counterspell of some kind? Whatever he was doing, Rachel knew that this incident wasn't going to go on much longer...