Ghost Girl

Sal "the Squid" Mariano glanced nervously up and down the Portland waterfront.

"If I'm seen talkin' to a cop - "

"Stop," replied a young Italian woman tersely. "I left the badge at home."

She followed his gaze... no one else was around.

"Just one citizen chatting with another.

"Talk."

Mariano had gained his nickname by having his hands in everything near the water. But like his namesake, she thought with a chuckle, when you got him out of the water he was rather weak.

"L-look, I dunno," the Squid said, retreating a few steps. "They hear that tape - and they will - the Org'll have my head. They'll call in Death Warrant, maybe even Omerta."

He shuddered.

Oh, no. She was not going to let this fish get away.

"I'm not wearing a wire," she hissed as she stepped closer. "It's just you, and me."

She looked around to be sure.

"No one even knows I'm out here... "

She turned back toward him -

Just as his fist crashed into her face!

"Agk!"

She stumbled back into the wall of a warehouse, only to have another punch crash into her jaw.

With a low moan of pain, she sank to the dock, barely conscious.

"Stupid bitch," he grunted as he dragged her body into the warehouse. "Like I'd ever... uf!... give the Costanzas up... "

He dropped her unceremoniously onto the cold floor.

"To a f@%&in' rookie."

He kicked her hard in the side.

She grunted softly.

Oh, God - she'd never been hit like that...

"Like you were gonna take me down," he snarled, kicking her in the head.

She moaned, as blackness swirled around her.

The Squid brought his steel-toed shoe thudding into her chest.

The young woman whimpered in pain, stubbornly trying to hang on to consciousness.

Her vision faded in and out. She could make out... drums. Metal drums. Chemicals.

Where's... Mariano... couldn't even... turn her head...

Then he appeared, looming over her... leering.

"Get rid of her," came a voice out of the ether.

"I will," the Squid's garbled voice came floating to her ears.

"But first... "

He unbuckled his belt and started unzipping his trousers.

"Gonna teach this bitch one final lesson."

"Viola," a voice said softly.

"Hmm-mm?" the young woman half-answered, rolling over on her pillow.

"Viola," the voice repeated.

"Gunnff!" she grunted, tugging at her bedcovers.

"Viola Fioralba."

Her eyes snapped awake. That - that sounded like -

"Viola - it's me."

"Domenica!?" she gasped, bolting upright in bed.

She rubbed her eyes - it was still the middle of the night, and the room was in total darkness.

She reached for a lamp.

"No!"

Viola froze.

"Don't look at me!"

Someone was here. Though she could not see, she could feel her presence.

"Domenica?" she offered timidly. "You - you've been gone... seven months... "

"That long, huh?" came her friend's voice dejectedly. "Explains why there were people in my apartment."

Viola's eyes travelled slowly around the room, looking for any sign of her visitor.

Where was she?

"How... how did you get... in here?"

For a moment, there was silence.

"I teleported."

Viola blinked. She had never known Domenica Spettro to joke.

"... really?"

"Yes. Really."

An uncomfortable silence followed.

"Vi, I'm so sorry - I didn't have anyplace left to go, and -

"I - I'll leave - "

"No! No... stay."

Viola frowned. This was odd. Her voice said it was her friend, but she wouldn't let her see her?

"I feel funny, talking in the dark."

"You couldn't stand to look at me."

"Are you... all right?"

"Yes, of course I'm... "

Viola could practically hear her lip trembling.

"No. No, I'm not all right.

"The night I disappeared? I... he beat me, Vi. Beat my face in... "

Her voice dropped to a whisper. "Had his way... with me... "

"Oh!" Viola exclaimed, clutching tighter at the covers.

"Then he threw me in vat... of acid or chemical waste or something," she said, her voice cracking. "I was still conscious enough... to hear him sealing the drum.

"Boom. Boom."

"Oh-h-h!"

Wait.

Wait. She was... here now, so-o-o...

"What... happened then?"

"I died."

There was a pause.

"I guess.

"I mean, the injuries alone should have killed me.

"Then, I should have drowned in that barrel.

"And then I should probably have starved to death, over seven months.

"But yesterday - I woke up."

"Jeez Louise, Domi," Viola breathed.

"Yeah."

"You... were still in the drum?"

Her visitor smiled in the dark as she heard Viola grab her rosary beads.

"Not... exactly.

"It had broken open... burned open, actually. I woke up with fire, everywhere - thought I had been sent to hell, for a few seconds."

She paused.

"Fire - that should have killed me, too."

"Wait, wait... yesterday? There was a huge fire down on the docks! I saw it on TV!"

"Probably it. The drums were exploding, the building, everything was on fire. I was sure that this time, I was going to burn to death..."

She paused.

"Yet somehow I ended up on a roof, across the river. Several hundred yards away."

She paused again.

"I'm pretty certain... I teleported. But without all the fizzy particle stuff you see on Star Trek."

For long moments, neither woman said anything.

"You don't believe me."

"I don't want to," Viola said, quavering. "It is so... fantastic.

"And... "

Her voice tapered off.

"What?" her unseen friend's voice said quietly.

"You have not the imagination to create the story yourself."

"Heh."

"Domi," Viola said gently, "Please. Let me look at you. Hold you. It has been so long - "

"No!" came the bark from the darkness.

"No," the voice said quietly. "You... you wouldn't like... what I've become."

Viola opened her mouth to object, then pulled up her knees to her chest and rocked softly back and forth.

"Vi... I want you to remember me... as I was. As your friend.

"Remember... remember when my parents wouldn't let me see grandmama at the end? They said they wanted me to have only happy memories of her."

"I... appreciate that," Viola said. "But I'm still your friend."

"I know."

"No matter what you look like."

"Yes. I know," the voice said warmly. "But believe me -

"I have been scarred more horribly than you can imagine."

For long moments, there was silence.

"You aren't going to the police."

"No, Viola. No, I'm not.

"I... can't.

"But... I can't let him get away with... what he did to me."

"You... want to bring them to justice."

The voice darkened.

"I want revenge."

Viola stood with her arms folded across her chest, leaning against the frame to her bedroom door.

She had bought the fabric that her friend had wanted, even allowed her to measure herself in the bathroom.

Alone.

Dealing with her friend in the dark was, she had to admit, slightly crazy.

But so was Domenica's whole story, when you looked at it.

Then again, she had never known Domenica to actually lie - or have the kind of imagination to make up a story like that.

It was so preposterous, how could she expect her to believe it?

Then again, that may be precisely the point. It was so bizarre, it may have to be true.

One thing she had no trouble believing is that is was, indeed, her friend - how could any imposter be so paranoid?

"You can come in now."

Viola opened the door - and gasped.

Standing upside down on the ceiling, but with her hair still falling toward her feet, was a curvacious young woman clad entirely in skintight white, from the soles of her feet to her fingertips. A white mask hid her face; only the faintest outline of eyes could be seen.

And her beautiful dark hair... was white. Not grey.

White.

The white-clad woman spread her arms.

"What do you think?"

"I think you are standing... on the roof."

"You don't say."

She somersaulted gracefully from the ceiling.

"Haven't figured that out yet. I mean, obviously I'm not 'sticking' to walls and such, but I can walk across them as natural as you please."

Viola looked her up and down.

"This... wasn't exactly what I had in mind, when you said you needed clothes."

Remarkable - the costume covered every inch of her.

"I wondered why you wouldn't just borrow some of mine."

"I appreciate the thought. And for everything else you've done for me, Vi."

"Domi, I sure hope you're not thinking what I think you're thinking."

She hopped up on the bedpost and crouched.

"Domenica Spettro is dead, Viola.

"She died seven months ago."

She slowly stood, still balanced on the tiny knob.

"Now -

"There is only Ghost Girl."

Sal "the Squid" Mariano left Mulligan's Bar a happy man.

He hadn't been drinking, but plenty of longshoremen had. And the Mick who ran the bar was too afraid of the Squid not to supply a cut of every drink.

Of course, he smiled as he got into his SUV, that little fire a few months back kind of kicked home his point - it was less expensive to pay 'protection' than to suffer an unfortunate... accident.

Sal didn't have to make personal appearances quite as frequently anymore - in truth, the Organization would have preferred he not make any at all. He was a ranking member now, and it was thought he should act accordingly.

Then, the Costanzas could appreciate how tightly he ran the waterfront.

A little exercise, it was thought, would not do any harm.

High on a hill overlooking the city, Mariano wheeled his SUV through an automatic gate and onto the driveway of a house that could rightfully be called... a mansion.

He sauntered around to the rear of the truck, and reached for the door handle.

"Hello... Squid."

His head jerked up to see a woman, clad entirely in white, perched upon the back of his SUV.

Mariano yelped and fell back, reaching for an automatic -

But the white-clad woman leapt from the top of the truck and slapped the gun from his hand.

"Ow!"

"Not so tough," she said, "without your little helper, are you?"

"Plenty tough enough, you bit - uurrrk!"

He lunged for her, but she grabbed his shirt and lifted him off the ground with ease.

"I don't like being called that.

"You're under arrest, Mariano. For murder."

"Murder?" he cried. Not that he hadn't committed quite a few, but he was sure he had taken care that they'd never be found.

"Who? Who'd I kill?"

"Me."

She pulled back her fist -

And moaned as a crowbar smashed down upon her skull.

"Ha! Hit the bitch again, Nicky! Hit - "

But his eyes went wide as she hopped to her feet and slugged Nicky, sending him flying - literally - across the yard.

"I told you - I don't like that name."

The other two men, guards from the looks of it, tackled her while Sal sprinted for the driver's seat.

"You morons - it's him I want!"

"Yeah? Well, baby, it's - urrrk!"

She grazed the man's jaw with a punch - but still he tumbled backward several feet.

She paused. That - that just didn't happen. People don't go sailing from a normal punch -

"Uuuggh!"

The remaining fellow pasted her in the face!

She went spinning to the ground.

Like that, she thought, as she sent her legs thrusting like pistons into his stomach.

"Eyah-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-ooomph!" he wailed as he sailed through the air, crashing into a tree.

"H-holy crud."

She looked at her hands.

Evidently teleporting and standing upside down weren't her only abilities.

"I have... super powers?"

She stood in awe for a moment.

Then her head jerked up.

"Mariano."

The Squid was driving like a man possessed, heading down the hill toward the freeway.

'Me'. 'You're under arrest'.

The big tits.

My God, it was that cop he had killed half a year ago!

It had to be.

He hadn't killed many dames - and only one was stacked like -

"Hello, Squid."

Aah! She just - appeared in the seat next to him!

"As I was saying - "

"Gyahhhhh!" he yelled, or something very much like it, as he punched her with all of his might!

The door flung open, and the girl in white flew out onto the road!

Ghost Girl tumbled for twenty yards or so along the road as the SUV roared off.

Shaking, she got to her feet. Nothing seemed to be broken, and what little pain there was, was fading rapidly.

She was getting might tired of being hit from surprise.

Mariano gunned the truck around a curve, nearly sideswiping a Chevy, and plowed through a mailbox before regaining control of his SUV.

"Destroying a mailbox. Federal crime, I think."

Ghost Girl appeared on the hood of the speeding vehicle.

The Squid violently swerved left, swerved right, trying to shake her off!

"I have you to thank for my powers, Mariano," the woman in white growled. "But I also have you to thank... "

With that she grabbed the top of her mask and yanked her costume down to just above her chest!

"For this!"

Mariano screamed!

The truck crashed through a guardrail and into empty space!

"Eep!"

Ghost Girl vanished as the truck's heavy front end pulled it into a dive, reappearing on the street above as the SUV smashed itself to pieces on the rocks below!

She pulled up her mask as she looked over the drop.

The truck was already engulfed in flames.

"Holy crud."

She hadn't... she had just meant to scare him, not...

No, she thought, standing, arms at her side.

The man was an extortionist, a rapist, a murderer.

She wouldn't waste any tears on him.

Unfortunately, she had been seen by those three enforcers up at the house. The Organization would hold her responsible for the Squid's death... and before morning would have her at the top of their eliminations list.

A thin smile spread under her mask.

"Let them try."