The Town of Casper

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"I'm not sure why I'm still here. They don't make books about how to go up after you die. Believe me, I've looked." He stated in a suddenly sharp voice, sitting up a bit in his chair. A siren going off a couple blocks away caused him to immediately rise to his feet. Saved by the siren, or so he thought. He quickly
 
She looked at him not sure how to react at his answer. It probably wasn't a nice thing to remain unseen and unheard for all those years, without a way out. There was surely something he still needed to do before leaving, and she was determined to help him find what it was, if he wanted her to. She would just remind for the moment to try to keep her questions as discrete as she could, because he looked really uncomfortable with them. A siren interrupted her thoughts. It seemed to come from a few blocks away, so she just hurried to leave the library and see what happened.

(Not sure if you finished your previous post. Anyways, if you didn't, just do it and I'll then edit or delete this answer :) )
 
((Eh, it's fine. Mom hit a bump and my finger hit post. We can just go with it. It seems you got the gist of what I was attempting to type.))

Leone hurried out after her, listening as the siren moved towards the piers. He grimaced with all the possibilities that could have occurred. Drunks goofing around on railings, coasters derailing, a pier collapsing... Admittably, the last one was a little far fetched, but ever since he read about hurricane Sandy up north, he'd grown to accept the seemingly impossible. He jogged down the few blocks it took to get to the boardwalk. As soon as he passed the last building on solid ground, he saw the black smoke filling the air from one of the bars out on the pier. He took the steps up to the boardwalk two at a time, not hesitating as he saw the crowd surrounding Gull's Tavern. The windows had been blown out, and firemen had already put up a safety barrier between the gawkers and the needed safety personnel. Two ambulances and three firetrucks were already out, spraying water onto the fire and aiding the injured. Something didn't quite feel right about this. There was an unnatural sense that the spirit felt deep inside of him... Something that made him very scared. He concentrated into the flames, trying to locate what was making him want to turn tail and run. And that was when he spotted it. No, her.
Standing in the flames, the chaos of the fire, was a young woman. She seemed eerily familiar, her flaming red hair, fair skin, and lithe frame... But he just couldn't place it. The malevolence of her presence was overwhelming. She wasn't human. Not by a long shot.
 
She didn't know how, but she ended up running behind the spirit. It seemed that there had been a fire. The place was a chaos, sirens everywhere, a big crowd around it, firemen and doctors running around. It had been something serious. Hannah's journalist instict came out and she began pushing people in the crowd away to make her way to the first row. When she did, she had a better look at the events. The place that had blown into the air used to be some kind of tavern. Every window was broken and there were still some flames to turn off. She didn't take long to spot Leone close to her, watching the scene. Actually, he wasn't looking at the whole scene, he was just staring at a woman. The expression of fear on the spirit's face made a shiver run through her spine. Who was that woman? Why wasn't she running from the flames, instead of staying in them?
"What's going on?" asked Leone, she needed to shout because of the noise around them. He looked petrified in fear. What could be so terrible to scare someone that was already dead?
 
"No one else sees her..." He muttered softly under his breath, the words lost to the commotion around them, as he finally tore his gaze away from the woman in the flames to survey the crowd. It was just gawkers, no one in panic over the woman still inside the building. He heard Hannah beside him, and he had no clue what to say. He opened his mouth to try and explain himself, but the flames leaped up and the roof of the tavern caved in, tossing charred debris out onto the wooden pier. The malevolent energy disappeared, leaving Leone standing there, suddenly very aware of his surroundings. The fire was still going, and he could just imagine the damage done to the pier below it. "We need to get out of here." He spoke, loud enough to be heard over the commotion.
It would seem that the firemen had the same thought as him as they began to force people back even more. Carefully weaving his way through the crowd, the spirit came to find an empty bench that gave him a good view of the ocean. His mind was going a million miles per hour, attempting to process everything he'd just seen. That woman... Where did he know her from?
He normally was good at matching names and faces. But he was drawing blank cards when it came to the woman. Perhaps that was the part that scared him. Was his memory finally failing him after over two hundred years? No. He could still remember practically every moment, save for more than a couple dull books at the library. He remembered his torturous years of schooling when he was alive, he remembered that long, dreary carridge ride from Salem to this town for boarding school. He just couldn't place that woman. He was missing something. And it was bugging him. That woman hurt people in his town, and he wasn't even close to knowing who she was. He felt his anger rising up inside of him, frustrated with himself for being afraid, for not being able to identify her. The atmosphere of malevolence that seemed to be attached to her, it had nearly choked him out back there. Apparently the humans weren't affected by it.
 
No one else could see her? So she was some kind of ghost? The thought of it made her chill. Now that she knew she was surely something supernatural, the image of it was a lot more scarier. She instinctively covered her face when the flames leaped. When she looked at the building once again, she was gone. Hannah heard Leone but stood there for a while, trying to either spot her once again or make a little sense of the situation.

When the firemen started pushing the people, she made her way through the crowd and exited it. She looked around, trying to see Leone, but she could only see unknown people. It took her a few minutes to spot him sitting down in a bench. Hannah approached him and stood next to him, watching the ocean. Hannah stayed quiet. He looked too thoughtful to be interrupted and, besides, she didn't know what to say. She did have questions, but, according to his expression, she doubted that he would have the answers. What did just happened? Who was that woman? Did she... started the fire? Anyway, she decided to break the silence with one question that he should know the answer, but he might not want to share.

"Did she... scare you?" asked, with a low tone, keeping her sight in the ocean. She wasn't an expert on body language, but he looked terrified since the moment she appeared. She needed to know that answer because, if she was right about her assumption, it probably was something that everyone should fear.
 
"If you felt the energy she was packing, you'd be scared too. Every dog in this town is probably hiding under it's owner's bed." Leone stated with a frown, his tone blunt and not giving anything away, as he ran a hand through his dark hair. His gaze never left the ocean as he debated whether or not he should tell her about how he'd seen that woman before, somewhere. He didn't know how to answer any question that might come from his admission, and it seemed like the woman was an expert on asking questions. Letting out a soft sigh, the words finally escaped him. "I recognized that woman from somewhere." He sighed, frustration subtly laced in his voice. "I can't remember where or when though."
 
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(Hey! Sorry for taking so long, but I'm finally back ^^)

That woman was definitely something she should worry about. Her energy was enough to literally scare the dead, and, if she did actually start that fire, she was sure that wouldn't be the last thing she'd do. She felt it was the beginning of something greater. Hannah sat next to Leone in the bench and looked at him as he talked. She was really curious about where did he know her from. If he certainly met the woman of the fire before, and if she had the same energy as she did today, it would probably have been a hard thing to forget. So, he either met her on some other shape or something she couldn't understand happened.

"W-we should... do something about her." stated, sounding pretty silly. She had no idea what they could do, or if there was something to be done. She found herself wanting to protect the people on that unknown town, instead of running the heck out of there, which would probably have been smarter.
 
"I can't do much of anything. People can't see me, hear me, or even sense my presence. And that woman... I'd bet if she wanted to, she could completely reveal herself to humans. She's on a completely different level than me." Leone spoke tiredly, his gaze breaking from the ocean to rest heavily on his companion. He was just a ghost. Once upon a time he could do things above the typical human capacity, but that time passed two hundred and fourteen years ago. Now he was just a weak spirit trapped here for some unknown reason. Deep inside he felt the same drive to protect his town, but he had no clue how to do that now.
 
Hannah held her gaze into his. "So, even if this woman keeps showing up burning whatever is on her way, you'll just sit here and watch the ocean?" told him, being more sure every second that the woman represented a threat to everyone in there. She sounded calm, but frowned a little, which showed her disappointment from his answer.
"There's got to be something that I can do, at least. I'm sure there's a way to keep a spirit away from a place. I heard many of them, but, of course, I have no idea if they work."
 
Leone stood up, thoroughly offended by her statement. "I've already died once for the sake of protecting this town. What more do you want from me?" He stated coldly. His eyes were stormy, revealing his inner tension. He started to walk away when she spoke about ways to keep spirits away and stopped dead in his tracks. "If you do something that ends up hurting me, you will regret it." With that simple warning he continued to walk away.
 
Her eyes widened by his reaction. She had probably been more rude than she thought, because she wasn't expecting that. She stood up and followed him. "Hey, sorry, I didn't mean to offend you. You are right, but remember that I don't really know what happened to you." apologized. Anyway, she froze when she heard his threat and her kind mood changed completely. OK, maybe she had been rude, but of course she wouldn't hurt him, so she didn't deserve that.

She could have ignored it, or maybe have a decent talk about it, but she just got angry at his warning. "I will regret it? So, you can't do even the slightest thing against that woman but you can make me regret something? You could help me find out what would hurt her and not you instead of threatening me and run away, you know."
 
"First off, I'm walking. Not running. Second off, if you want to know what happened when I died, I'll tell you. I had to move down here because of what was going on in the little town I used to live in. You ever hear of Salem, Massachusetts? Well, the witch trials up there were just starting, and when there's a kid who can see the goddamn dead running around, you can safely assume that he'd be put on trial. The ghosts of those wrongly accused came to me because I was the only one able to hear them. My parents sent me down here before they had a chance to burn me at a stake. I haven't left here since. One day, I saw trouble brewing among the spirits of the town. A couple of the older ghosts were getting into all out fights, the forces from them causing candles to get knocked down all around town, which caused fires to spark up across town. I had to get away from it all. I wanted it to stop. I didn't pay that much attention to where I was going, but somehow I ended up in the swamp. An old Native American ghost was sitting underneath a big tree, and he told me that we could stop this chaos from happening now and for the future if I helped him. I helped the old guy make inscents and set up a small area around the tree. He did some weird chant and told me to put my hand on the tree. So I did. He put his hand on mine and then the lightening struck. I blacked out after that. When I woke up, apparently seven months had passed and I was a ghost. The only ghost in the whole town. End of story. It's been the same until now, and I don't have an explanation for it." His eyes were shut tight as memories overflowed him. His voice had lost it's edge, and was tinged with tiredness. He took a deep breath, recollecting himself. "And third off, I've seen what strong spirits can do. You just saw it too. If she found out that we were looking for ways to get rid of her, she would come after me first. I don't have enough energy to do things like she can. I'm lucky that I can even move a book. That woman just burnt down a bar. I don't feel all that inclined to fight with that woman and die a second time."
 
She heard his story, paying close attention to it. As he listened to him, her gaze softened. And, by the end of it, she didn't even remember why she had been so angry at him. He sounded perfectly logical. Of course there wasn't anything he could do, just as there wasn't anything she could do. She was no ghost hunter, she was merely an investigator. And, even if they had a slightly chance to fight that woman, it wouldn't be fair to expose their lives - or it would probably be more correct to say existences - at that level of danger.

Hannah sighed with frustration. "You are right, Leone. I guess I was just being stubborn." simply answered to him. He had an interesting and rough story, but there was nothing smart or at least useful she could say about it. "And don't worry, I won't do anything about it, so you won't end up involved or hurt. I need to go back to my town in a few days, anyway."
 
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