Too Ghoul For School by Barry Hutchison

Author:Barry Hutchison [Barry Hutchison]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780857639615
Publisher: Nosy Crow
Published: 2017-03-23T04:00:00+00:00

Denzel woke with a start. Or, more accurately, a scream.

He spent a panicky few seconds thrashing and kicking, and it was only thanks to some impressively fast reflexes that Director Quinn managed to avoid a flailing fist to the face.

“Ah, there you are,” she said from the bottom of his bed, once he’d stopped trying to beat up thin air. “We were starting to worry you were never going to wake up.”

Denzel’s hands shot to his hair. He was relieved to find nothing holding on to it, and let out a breath he seemed to have been holding even in his sleep.

“How long was I out for?” he asked.

“About nine hours,” said Samara. She was sitting in a chair near the head of the bed. She smiled as Denzel noticed her, then unscrewed the cap on a bottle of water and passed it to him. “You went down pretty hard.”

Denzel took a gulp of the water, then pressed the cool plastic against his cheek. “Did Knightley shoot me?”

“She shot near you,” said Quinn. “Too near, obviously. She has been reprimanded.”

“Right. OK. I suppose that’s fair enough, then,” said Denzel. He cricked his neck, then smoothed down his hair. “What was that thing? The old woman, I mean.”

“Not really an old woman, for one,” said Quinn.

“Yeah, I guessed that,” said Denzel. “You know, with the way her head turned into an octopus, and everything.”

“Well spotted,” said Quinn. “If you want to get technical about it, it was a Corporeal Four-Dimensional Non-Mortal Entity.”

Denzel went through all those words in his head, trying to figure out what any of them meant. One phrase jumped out. “Four-Dimensional?”

“It means they’re fully formed in the physical realm, and are also capable of tactile interaction,” said Samara.

Denzel nodded. “Right. And in English…?”

“Three-dimensional Corporeals look like they’re really there, but can’t touch you,” Quinn explained. “Four-dimensional ones can.”

“And you don’t want to know about the five-dimensional ones,” said Samara. “Trust me.”

“So … it’s a ghost?” said Denzel.

“Yes,” said Quinn.

“But it’s solid?”

“Yes,” said Samara.

“Then, I mean… How is it a ghost?” Denzel asked. “I mean, the other ones – the things that looked like sheets? They’re ghosts, I get that. But that old woman looked just like … well, like an old woman. To start with, anyway.”

“In some ways, she was an old woman,” said Quinn. “Or as close to one as it’s possible to be, at least, without actually being one. If that makes sense?”

“Not really,” said Denzel.

Quinn smiled her not-quite smile. “Even our equipment can’t always detect a Corporeal. We have no idea how many are out there, living among us. Well, not living, obviously. Existing. Luckily for you I was observing. I wanted to see how you’d do out in the field.”

“And how did I do?” Denzel asked, although he could probably guess.

“You’re alive,” said Quinn. “That’s a pretty positive result. There’s no saying what the Corporeal might have done to you, had I not intervened.”

“She didn’t really seem to be trying to hurt me or anything,” Denzel said.

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