Specter Files #1 part 2

New Orleans Hospital.

(Same as last time. This is a video of the Specter Detectors as Transcribed by the Intrepid Amelia Zhang for Lucy -and anyone else who cares- describing their explorations and ghost hunts. This is part 2 of 3 in the first of these files. - read the first one first, and the 3rd one after this. you know the drill! Anything in these parenthesis is my voice.)- A.Z.

The team is still walking through various hallways of Charity Hospital. At one point, Mark stops so that Klaus can point out and peer down an elevator shaft. We can’t hear any of what they are saying, because the narrator is still talking.

“The need for a catalyst to help push a spirit into a ghostly presence is why I don’t think hospitals are likely to be home to many of your specters.” (See, she says ‘your’ specters, she must be an outsider.)“We’re often asked why there are more ghost from the past than modern ghosts. We can come up with several different hypothetical answers. Perhaps the physical body must decay before a spirit can be free of their physical constraints. Perhaps past peoples were more in tuned with their spirituality. Perhaps we are better at defining the voices and washing out the sightings of modern ghosts with other explanations. Psychology and modern technology explaining away the modern ghosts leaving only the only the older stories carried by those who came before modern medicine and recording tech.

My guess, instead, is simply that we are now more equipped than ever to expect death when it comes. And that takes away a potential catalyst which would otherwise help trigger a ghost to appear and linger. Modern medicine lessens trauma and tragedy. It sustains us so our spirits may have time to avoid regrets which would otherwise cause us to linger with unfinished business. It prepares the living, so we are not as shocked or surprised when someone goes. This gives us less reason to hold on. I think there are fewer ghosts today because we’ve gotten better at holding onto life, and knowing when someone is going to go. And I can’t think of any place more likely to prepare someone for an inevitable end than a hospital.”

“With that in mind, I can think of a few places where you might still be able to look for spirits in a hospital.”

Speaking of. In the video, Klaus and Clancy begin working together to push open a set of heavy swinging doors. There’s a switch on the wall which would have operated the doors when the hospital was working. It’s wires have been stripped, and Mark takes the time to zoom in on the corroded hinges. They push through and Sheryl leads them all into the next area.

Here, a set of rooms are spreads across a curved hallway. Open wards, some small, and others large enough to house multiple patients. Mark pans his camera into each room. Some still have a bed or beds. They are all dark, except for the light atop his camera, which he hadn’t turned on until now. Highlights added in post pick out a few orbs, and several suspicious shadows, and Cody mentions them in narration as they appear. But these are things the camera captures, and the Specter Detectors don’t notice as they continue on, unaware of anything really haunting.

Old rotten medical materials are strewn throughout, and there are signs of collapsed roofing, but most of the worst decay seems to have been partially cleared away. Mark focuses on one specific room where different ports and gauges are sticking out of the wall, waiting to provide oxygen and other things to patients who will never come. They step through a door and by a blue nursing desk into a larger open area. “As I thought,” Klaus speaks theatrically. “This is the ER.”

Detritus has been scattered throughout the large open space. It must once have been the lobby, and now it is full of medical carts, those old rolling beds topped with blue mattresses, and the stands used for IV’s. Everything is covered in gray dust and mushy red insulation. (I’ve started noticing more colors, because all of the Specter Detectors have turned their flashlights on again.)

The crew has put on masks to keep out the worst of the dust. Beneath her mask, Sheryl begins to recite. “Welcome to the Medical Center of Louisiana.” Mark’s camera follows her gaze up to the wall, where those words are emblazoned in silver. “Where the Unusual Occurs and Miracles Happen.” She turns to Clancy, (her husband,) “I like the sentiment, but I’m getting a strange feeling from this place.”

They try the trick with the recording machine again, as Sheryl and Klaus stand amongst the gathered hospital beds, and each ask questions. Their voices are muffled by the masks. This time the video doesn’t pause, and Cody doesn’t narrate any thoughts about responses. But they don’t give up. Sheryl notes that the room “has a cold, heavy aura.”

So Clancy takes out the Spirit Box. He hands it over to Klaus, who turns the machine on with a loud Squawk!

The machine, which is designed to capture voices on radio waves, begins to flicker and bleep with static and random syllables. “Now… adjacent…tent…” Those are the words I could pick out as the team let it play for a while on its own. Every now and then there are blips of music or other odd noises.

Sheryl and Klaus eventually start asking questions, “Is there anyone here?” “Is there anything you would like to say?” “Do you know where you are?” “What is your name?”

For the most part, the box only blips out seemingly random syllables and sounds, there are a few words, but nothing which seems to relate to anything. “ball,” “stock,” and eventually something that sounds like “hickleby.” Nothing seems to impress anyone listening, but when Klaus tells the box that they are about to leave, several words spill out in quick succession. “Patients…here…crisis…???ment…” They don’t quite come out that fast, and there are things scattered between them, but it is chilling enough that

Cody gives a quick voiceover, and the scene repeats so those words are highlighted. They decided that the “???ment” is “treatment.”

When the scene picks up to the present, Klaus and Sheryl latch onto two of those words. “Did you say patients?” Klaus asks. Normal radio sounds.

“Were you a patient here?” Sheryl follows up. “Were you looking for treatment?” It’s a good guess at the muffled word. There are a few more sporadic syllables, but no obvious answers to her question. The team prepares to move on.

“What if we leave our Spook Detector here?” Clancy suggests. It’s their signature tool. They set it up at the that had used to enter the room. The boxy Detector on one side of the door by the hinges, the mirror on the other. They each test the sensor by walking through the door. The light changes color and Clancy’s phone buzzes each time. “If anything crosses through this door, we’ll know.”

The scene changes, and Mark is following everyone down another hallway. “Didn’t Sam say something about this area?” Clancy asks. (Sam, again, who is she?)

Mark zooms in on a sign, naming the floor. Before speaking, “She thought we might find something in the ICU.”

Klaus nods in agreement. “The long-term patients would have imprinted a bit more on their life here, and the same would be true for their loved ones. Sam thinks that extra familiarity might help encourage spirits to linger.” Klaus leans into one of the rooms, but quickly leans back out shaking his head in disappointment. The camera follows him anyway. There are two beds inside. The curtain which would have separated them has collapsed on top of one. Tracks in the dust on the floor show that someone else walked through this room in the recent-ish past.

“It’s too bad Sam couldn’t come with us on this adventure.” Sheryl sighs. “Then she could offer all of these insights while we walk.” Mark backs out of the room.

Cody, who has been waiting in the hallway, smiles. “We’ll put some of her narration in this later. Besides, she promised to come with us when we explore the nearby Home for Convalescents. That place has an even spookier vibe.” (It really does! I’ll if you can make it through this, maybe I’ll write about that video!!!)

They explore a few more of the rooms, but are reaching the end of the hall. For a moment Mark takes the lead, to get a tracking shot of his team.

This is when the video pauses. The camera is focused on the four, but the picture zooms in on a shadow in one of the rooms behind them. It’s grainy and imperfect, but the shadow looks like someone leaning next to a patient’s door, crying. Sheryl begins to narrate, talking about how she had felt a deep sadness on that floor. But when the video resumes, in their present, our past, no one notices the spooky shadow behind them. They move on, and the camera swings away from the unnoticed shadow.

The video cuts again. (Cody and Claus have been getting aggressive with edits in their recent videos. The Specter Detectors are working on making a TV show after all.) At this point a montage begins to play, showing the Specter Detectors exploring various hospital floors: walking hallways, switching old lights on and off, being surprised when some lights work, examining various pieces of discarded medical equipment, and walking up a stairway outside of the building, with shots of the dark courtyard and the surrounding city.

The team walks along, randomly guided by their EMF reader, and Sheryl’s feelings. Several times she clutches her chest and points. Klaus probes each place she singles out. The team goes through a couple notable rooms, a cafeteria where the ceiling has been removed to expose duct work and the machinery is rusted out, a MRI room with part of the machine picked over for scraps, even a gym.

Each room is lit only by the team’s headlights, flashlights, and the lights on the cameras. The entire montage is more like something you’d see in one of those urban exploration videos of an abandoned building than a specter hunt, except that you can see flashes of their ghost gear, and the camera pauses to highlight various shadows and orbs.

The whole time that new woman is speaking over the footage. She must be the Sam they are talking about. She sounds young, but she speaks slowly, like she’s trying to put a lot of gravity behind her words.

“If I were searching a hospital for a haunting, I’d check the ER, where the surprise of death might still act as a catalyst, the ICU where patients may linger long after their time has come sustained by their familiarity with the place entrusted with their care. Same for long-term wards. But even when is enough of a catalyzing impact to cause a spirit to remain, rarely do we tie our memories, hopes, wishes, or desires to see our loved ones to the institution where they go to die.”

“I’ll give you an example: Let’s say you hear a story describing a ghost as a victim killed in a car accident. Where would you go to look for her, the hospital where she was taken, the site of her accident, or her home? I know which of those is a distant third in my mind.

So, if you want to find ghosts in a hospital, maybe you need to look for people with stronger ties to the place itself. Perhaps this is why most haunted hospitals have stories of ghostly doctors or nurses.”

The video picks up in real time, and you can hear the team breathing heavily as they climb another set of stairs. “I think the dormitory is this way.” Cody exclaims, reaching the landing first and holding the door open for everyone else. “Some of the hospital workers stayed here while on duty, and I think this might be where the stories of that Christmas Tree came from.”

Sheryl pauses in one of the long hallways to explain the story of a lit Christmas Tree seen in the windows on one of the higher floors for several years. It was a beacon inside an otherwise darkened building. “The tree has never been found. In addition, there are stories about a nurse dressed in an older outfit, the kind they wore back in the 50’s wandering these hallways.” Sheryl closes her eyes and extends her hands. “I’m feeling a comforting presence here more than anything.”

They pull out the spirit box again, but there are no definite answers to their questions. Sam, however, smiles beatifically. “The presence I feel is comforting, matronly, and lonely. She was obviously a woman who wants to help, but cant so much, anymore.”

Suddenly the spirit box breaks out in a rush of syllables. “ope…pa…line…stat…come”

The group pauses. But the noises don’t repeat. They scan around, but don’t seem to notice anything out of the normal. But video pauses, and several rooms down the hallway, it’s possible to make out a glow through the door, as though there is a light on inside the room. When the video starts to play again, it’s focused on Sheryl’s face, as she concentrates on the spirit box and continues to ask questions. But, over her head you can see the room in the distance glowing, glowing, and then the light goes out.

The video pauses again, and Cody narrates what we are seeing. Finishing up by saying, “We didn’t notice the light at the time, and thus, unfortunately we did not get to investigate it because…”

The video begins to play again, the room behind them is dark. Sherly turns off the spirit box, shaking her head. “Whoever is here, they want to talk, but are having a hard time coming through. Maybe we should…”

But whatever she is about to say is lost to time, because Clancy’s phone goes off, startling everyone. They all visibly jump, but Mark jumps the highest. The camera shakes as he lands on the floor.

“That’s the Spook Detector!” Clancy announces. “Something, or someone just crossed the threshold down in the ER! Let’s go!” And he takes off, running back the direction they had come!”

Get ready Lucy! Part 3 is where it gets good!