Belief In The Occult

Two

"Well there's gotta be something you find fun..." Ramsey muttered, hands on his hips as he stared at the cheerless little thing. According to Varick, his charge was extremely lethargic when mortals weren't around and actually spent a lot of time as a formless black smoke in the crawl spaces of the house.

Kodiak didn't answer him. He wasn't up for it anyway. As much as Varick was trying to get him to raise his energy levels and be more intimidating than mopey, Kodiak couldn't do it. Maybe when he was a few decades older. Or maybe mopey was just this thing. Kodiak would be fine with that.

Now, he barely even let Kodiak be by himself, because he knew the moment the poltergeist was alone he liked to go incorporeal, and that was bad for his growing powers. To get stronger, he needed to be physical except for when he was trying to travel quickly. Varick started letting his friend come around, a loud, obnoxious trickster creature named Ramsey who wore bright colors and clashed really badly with the falling-in abandoned house Kodiak was created in and continued to occupy, much to Varick's distaste.

Ramsey wondered how Kodiak even managed to manifest in the first place. The spirit barely had the spirit to do anything, it was like he was made of eggshells he was so easily crushed. There was hardly room for a single mistake up in that over-worrying head of his yet here he was, lurking all over the place and scaring mortals out of their skin through mirrors. Weren't poltergeists supposed to be full of rage or something? Haunting occupied houses so they could chuck things at mortals any given minute of the day or start spontaneous fires? Ramsey didn't know much about ghosts, he was a trickster and his niece was a demon-spirit hybrid. He knew that sometimes things moved around Kodiak on their own, like what was left of the shutters would rattle, but it was hardly the archetypal poltergeist activity.

"Fun... isn't really my... thing." he replied, sprawled across the sagging couch.

"You're a teenager, right? You look like one anyway, let's go into town and find you something." Ramsey suggested as the idea hit him.

Kodiak needed a breather. "I don't think... I'm supposed to do that..." he whined, worrying about what his absent mentor would have to say about it. "Varick would be... mad if he found out."

Ramsey waved his hands dismissively, his trickster nerves buzzing at the thought of anything related to chaos or rule-breaking, "If he found out, which he doesn't have to. He wants you to perk up a bit anyway, and I see why, you're like a little black raincloud."

"Thanks..."

"You're welcome, now c'mon." Ramsey said, grabbing the ghost by the back of his jacket and snapping his fingers.

The next thing Kodiak knew, he was in an alleyway somewhere in the city in the middle of the night. He had only ever heard of the city referenced as a far-off place, some lights in the distance he could see from the attic window but had zero desire to go near.

Ramsey busied himself with using his magic to make Kodiak look more human, which wasn't too hard, it just took a change of eye color and adding some rosiness into that lifeless little face. "So, what's something mortals your age do for fun?"

"Talk... to mirrors... in the dark." Kodiak answered sarcastically.

"Movie theatre it is!" Ramsey said, looping his arm through Kodiak's and dragging him out onto the sidewalk. "It's a friday night, plenty of kids your age will be out here."

"Physically... I'm only... six months..." Kodiak said, mostly just to be contrary.

"Well then you're very mature for your age mister, here we go!" The trickster grinned, spotting a group of kids looking at the selection of movies playing. "Just remember to talk a little faster, mortals aren't as patient."