Bishops Knife Trick is a song that can heal all your trauma and give you reasons to have new trauma at the same time. It's a slap in the face and a warm blanket with a hug. It's a punch in the gut but a kiss on the forehead. It's just...yeah.
Trigger Warnings: Swearing, Death, Gore, Unreality, Murder, Being Watched?
Masterpost, Next
Please tell me if I have missed a trigger, and I will be sure to add it, if you want to be mentioned when I post a new part, ask, and if oyu want me to tag this with anything else, tell me.
This is a new series,hopefully shorter than Knockin' On Heaven's Door, it physically wouldn't let me work on it until I had wrote at least part of it. I should hopefully be able to work on it next week, but if not, expect another part of this.
Word Count:2909
I HAD BEEN dead for 6 years when they arrived. Unwilling to leave the hotel after the horrors they saw and the near-death experience they had. I watched as their friend took their last breath, just like I had so many years ago, albeit in a more... bloody way than mine. Almost reminded me of Psycho with the amount of blood that poured out of them, spilling on the yellowing carpet, pooling around both of them. However, this time I wasn't fully fixated on the dying people-not this time. No, I managed to dial 911 and somehow get an ambulance for them (I'm as surprised as you are) and made sure to memorise the perpetrator’s face in case I saw them again. Anyone willing and able to kill is bad in my books. Especially after that, but I refuse to talk about it. There's no point dwelling on the past anymore.
For the event that happened, it was quite a sunny day. Surprising since deaths almost always happen in the rain. (Yes, I'm looking at you authors. Why? Oh, and hi to the audience I suppose. Who knows why you are using my life for your entertainment, but who am I to judge? Still don't like you, but I guess I'll put up with you.) Anyways, where was I? Right, honestly, I didn't mind that day, for the life of a ghost is a lonely one- we are rare. Only people with unfinished business become ghosts. Surprisingly only a small amount of the population. Most say "I want to do X before I die", but most of those desires aren't strong enough to cause them to become a lost spirit. And even then, most leave within a few years, or their unfinished business isn't necessarily needed to be done on earth. The rest of us are doomed to stay in one room for most of eternity, invisible to almost all. Almost being important. There are a few who can see through the veil of death, but it is rarer than ghosts themselves. Imagine my surprise when I found out that 1) they are created, not born, and 2) when one found their way into my room. Are you imagining it? That's you audience. Yes? Ok, now times it by 100. Yeah, I was shocked.
It was a month later I found out. You see I believed that both of them had died. I only saw one of their souls leave, but I assumed the second's wounds were just as severe- severe enough they wouldn't survive. I was wrong. They stumbled in 4 weeks later, discharged but clearly not out of the wars. Way too many bandages were on them, almost excessively. Their entire body appeared to be covered, save for their head and hands, despite only one wound being present. And it was on their chest. They didn't need half of them. But, oh well, better safe than sorry I guess? Who knows. All I know is they were followed by one of the staff members- clearly to make sure they didn't get hurt. However, they ignored their aide to stare straight at me. Yes, that's right. At me. Not through me. In the background the aide started. “Here you are,” he announced. “It hasn’t been changed beyond the clean-up and we made sure it stayed empty the entire time,” he launched into a full blown speech- I could tell he would. I cautiously stepped to one side, sure that they couldn’t see me, and were just staring off to the distance. Their eyes followed keenly. I knew I had to react before they told the staff member. Quickly I put my finger to my lips, saying out loud. “They can’t see me, act like normal.” I saw them nod slightly, before turning to the staff member, pretending to be interested in what he was saying. But the whole time, they carefully cast sidewards glances at me, as if I would disappear if they didn’t constantly look at me, while trying to decipher if I was actually real or not. It appeared they couldn’t decide.
Only once the other human had left did they talk. “Who are you? And how can I see you?” they said tentatively.
“Who I am does not concern you as of yet. And I don’t know how you can see me. Probably something to do with being stabbed made you able to see through the veil – you can see through the divider that separates our world and yours, automatically making me visible to you.” I replied curtly.
“Wait, so are you a ghost or something?”
“Yes, I am.”
“So, I can see ghosts now?”
“Yes, you can see ghosts,” I replied, annoyed “you can also see angels and demons in their true form, though why anybody would ever want to do that, I don’t know.”
“And you saw me get stabbed?”
“Who d’ya think called the ambulance sweetie?”
“And I’m gonna ignore how you managed that. Despite saving me, you don’t want me to know who you are.”
“Of course not. You might get attached and do something stupid “to be with me” or worse, I might get attached and have to watch someone else die. No way am I letting that happen. I can’t do that again. I don’t think I’d last. Plus, the first thing is a fast track to hell- it wouldn’t work. The only reason I’m still here is unfinished business. You have none. And you have the rest of your life to live out. I don’t want to infringe on it."
“Fine, keep your secrets then. I’m staying here and talking to you anyway, whether you like it or not.”
“Great, just what I needed. A companion. I have been fine for the last 10 years, I think I’ll be fine for 10 more, or however long it takes for my spirit to disintegrate.”
“Don’t be like that. I might not be that bad.”
“Fine, you have one chance, don’t waste it. You have a month to earn my trust. If you don’t, you leave me and this place alone. If you do, I might let you stick around for a while. Deal?”
“Deal.”
The first day was relatively annoying. For some reason they decided to pester me until I gave them some information about myself, whether on accident or on purpose to shut them up. That and gushing about how they have always wanted to meet a ghost and asking me to explain how everything in the new world they discovered worked. I didn’t mind telling them that much. Why wouldn’t I when they would have to get used to it, and fast? Despite being a minority, they would soon see us everywhere. Well, us and angels and demons. God forbid they meet a Guardian. That’s why I don’t mind. They opened up a world of just new, unfamiliar and dangerous things. I kinda owed them an explanation of what was going on. How the world truly worked. I started with two concepts that most people already knew of: heaven and hell.
“So, what do you know of heaven and hell?”
“Just the religious speculations people came up with. Heaven is said to be a safe haven of angels you reach when you die- if you have done good deeds that is. Hell is supposed to full of demons, and where you get tortured for eternity for all the bad things you have done to others. I always hoped it would be the other way round cause everyone says I’m going to hell.”
“First, none of that is really right. Second, what do you mean by you’re going to hell?”
“Because I’m a demigirl and a lesbian, everyone says I should be in hell.”
“Well, we’re all going to hell- only those of pure heart or are naive enough to be manipulated go to heaven. There are few exceptions to that rule. The rest of us end up in hell for having too much personality. It’s better for us anyway- you don’t want to go to heaven. It is a dictatorship, ruled by one person with a hive mind to enforce their laws. Highly corrupt, anyone who even slightly misbehaves or shows opposite ideas to the leader has their soul removed and their shell is sucked into the hive mind- an army of ruthless soldiers with no feelings or general consciousness. All actions are controlled by the leader. Hell is much better. It is more of an anarchist government type thing, with no rules. What you can do is only limited by the strength of your moral code. Only those who are deemed the worst of the worst are punished- mostly the ones likely to disrupt the relative peace too much or are general pieces of shit. For example, genocidal maniacs, and the likes of Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk. From what I’ve heard, there is a special place in hell for those two to suffer. Plus, demons can come to earth, whereas the angels are trapped in heaven from the second they step foot in there by the guardian angels and the border guards.” I rambled on, forgetting who I was talking to, and the fact that most readers and listeners prefer to have shorter paragraphs.
“Wow,” they said once they managed to recover from the information overload, “So, technically I was right about the role reversal.”
“I guess.”
“Oh, yeah, I forgot to introduce myself, I’m…” they started before I cut in.
“Ruby-May Johnson, but you prefer to be called Bee. You are 30 years old, and have been single all of your life. You were born on the 19th of May, which is likely where your double-barrelled name came from. You are an extrovert and sister to Lily August Johnson-Kennedy, who died in the attack.”
“How do you know all that?”
“Your passport says a lot. The rest are assumptions from watching and listening to you before, I had nothing better to do, so I watched you.”
“Right, OK. You still not willing to tell me about you?”
“Nope.”
“Alright. What should I call you and refer to you by? I’ll go first. I’m a demigirl, I like she and they pronouns, but prefer they to she. With relationship terms, I prefer the gender neutral terms, but I’m still fine with the female ones.”
“Ok Bee. Try not to refer to me. Nobody else knows I exist, and I'd prefer to keep it that way. If you have to use she/her or you’ll get she/hurt. If you need me, use Spectre. Everyone else does.”
“Thank you Spectre.”
“It’s late, sleep now.”
“No, I wanna know more.”
“No,” I announced, forcing them into their bed, “I refuse to tell you any more until you have slept.”
“Fine, but only because you leave me no choice,” they agreed begrudgingly, “Good night.”
“Good night,” I replied, making myself invisible to all- including veil-seers- and turning off the lights.
“Wait! Please stay until I fall asleep. And, can you turn the light back on.” I heard, their voice cracking slightly.
I made myself visible, flicking on the lights before inquiring, “Autophobia, nyctophobia or somniphobia?”
“A bit of all of them.”
“Ok, I’ll stay. I’m pretty sure in the bottom draw of the dresser, there is a night light if you want it.”
“Really? And yes, thank you.” They climbed out of bed, making their way towards the dresser grabbing the night light and pushing it into the wall. It illuminated the room nicely, I remembered that from when I had to use it. I simply answered her first question: “Yeah, I know what it’s like. Now, sleep. You are safe as long as I’m here- I will be watching you and making sure you don’t get hurt.”
“Thank you.” Bee whispered, closing their eyes and falling asleep.
“Sweet dreams. I hope.”
The second they fell asleep I turned invisible and ventured as far out of the room I was able to go. Here, the barrier between the possessed areas of the world were thinner, allowing me to talk with the nearest spirit to me. Or at least, what I believed must be the nearest spirit. And he probably wasn’t actually a ghost, but good enough for me. I called out to him, knowing he would most likely be there. “Ashton, are you able to talk?”
“Yeah, sure, nice to talk to you again Spectre. How long has it been? A month or two at least. Anyway, what did you need?”
“What, no, I don’t need anything,” I said. You know, like a liar.
“You only talk to me if you need something, whether information or more physical, you cannot fool me.”
“Fine. I managed to somehow end up with a veil-crosser.”
“Seriously? Cool. How did you manage that?”
“I called an ambulance.”
“You know we’re not meant to interfere.”
“It was them, they struck again. I couldn’t let it happen again.”
“I understand, but you still know the rules. If anyone found out you’d be doomed to stay there forever, unable to interfere anymore. You’re lucky that I’d be a hypocrite to tell them, if I was anybody else…”
“I know. And I need help. What can they do that I need to know about, and what do I need to teach them?”
“Firstly, you need to teach them about all of the aspects of death.”
“How am I meant to do that when I don’t know all of them myself? You refused to tell me more than angels, demons, ghosts and veil-breakers.”
“There are more, I’ll get my human to take the book to your room, and see if I can get him to talk to them, and teach them a bit. As for abilities, they depend on the person, you just need to wait for them to figure it out themselves. They only find them when they need them the most. It works on instinct, don’t force it.”
“Ok, thank you. It should be helpful. How are you getting on with yours?”
“Turns out he can give us temporary physical forms.”
“Is that how I could call the ambulance? Usually I can’t touch anything.”
“Probably.”
“Tell him thanks, if it was him. Also how is the asking out thing going?”
“Badly, I have tried so many times and it never worked. He’s just really oblivious.”
“Himbo?”
“Yes.”
“Ask him out straight. Well, since you’re gay, it wouldn’t be straight, but you know what I mean. Tell him outright that you want to date him.”
“I’ll try.”
“Keep me updated, I want to know if he accepts.”
“I will. I suppose I’ll speak to you later then?”
“Yes, of course.”
“Bye then.”
“Goodbye.”
I stayed in the bathroom a few minutes before making my way back into the bedroom. The first thing I noticed was that they were still asleep. “Good.” I thought, “At least they won’t be sleep deprived.” Then I noticed it- the door was ajar a crack. “Strange.” I thought. “I was sure I made them lock it.” That’s when I saw it. A singular eye, peering at them through the door, filled with a malicious intent I noticed instantaneously. I shivered. Bright blue with red streaks running through it- easily distinguishable and recognisable. It was the same eye I had seen 1 month ago, and again 10 years ago. They were back to finish the job. Gently, I used whatever power I could muster to push the door closed and lock it, leaning on it to make sure they couldn’t get in- I knew whoever it was had the keys. Quickly I remembered something Ashton had given me a while ago in case of a situation like this. Carefully, I fished a small silver charm with wood beads in white and yellow out of my pocket, and tied it around the door handle. Hoping it would work, I stepped away form the door. Their key turned in the lock, unlocking it again. I prepared for the worst, standing by the telephone- next to the door in case I could apprehend them.
“Bang! Bang! Bang!” screamed the door as they tried to force their way through the door, quickly realising it wouldn’t open by the handle, after trying the key in the lock a few times. Despite it being just wood, they were failing miserably. Glad to know Ashton’s charm worked. For he believed it was a protection spell, given to him by a god looking like a crow, but at the same time, he could tell it wasn’t really a crow. Why wouldn’t a god choose a crow to parade around as- I mean, it’s jet black, sleek and pretty, and supposedly very clever. As I always say, who am I to judge? At least I knew the charm worked, and we had something to protect us until I could convince Bee to but some more security stuff for the doors and windows- especially the hinges that have a pin to lock them so it doesn’t pivot. Those would be a godsend. Then we’d only have to worry about the strength of the glass and the door- easily fixable with the charm. With that plan set, I sat in the corner, next to the bed, and with a clear view of the door. I sat, planning out a security plan for next time, before eventually losing consciousness- something I didn’t know ghosts could do.
Room 39 of a hotel in New York is cursed- and haunted. And there is a murderer on the loose. What could be worse?
We follow our unlikely protaganist through a story of friendship, created by circumstances, and a need to resolve a 10 year old case. I mean, it's the only way they can pass on fully. Will they find their way out, or will they be forced to roam the earth for all eternity?
Links under cut.
TW: Death, Unreality, Murder, Swearing, Gore, Being Watched?,most likely main character death, will add more as I find them, request TW's if you want to
