Part of the scheduling system that Bradley set up involved the program sending an automated email at the start of each day with a schedule of cases to work on. These included both new cases and ongoing ones that they were working on as a whole team or in small groups. That was another thing that it did, automatically assigning the smaller one-off cases to two or three people. So far, it was working smoothly. Gabriella’s favorite part of it was that it showed very clearly where she had downtime during the day. It didn’t always work out to actual downtime, but when she actually had time, she could spend it on her own pet projects. Namely, the local history foundational information and the UFO sightings over the past century.

The local history was a spin-off of the busy work that Robin had assigned her when she first started at the Foundation. It was originally meant to keep her isolated and occupied, she knew that. The strange energy readings weren’t something that the Foundation was actually concerned about, at least not enough to focus on them when other things needed to be done. But Robin had put her to work looking up the history of each place where the energy readings had been found. She was embarrassed thinking back on the start of that work, how eager she’d been to please Robin and how she’d thrown herself into a task that had ultimately been for nothing. But James had been right later on that a general idea of the local history could help them, especially with cases involving hauntings and historical phenomena. And she’d ended up with a decent foundation of knowledge to put toward that. So Gabriella could put aside her shame and make something good out of it.

The UFOs were pretty much wrapped up. She probably only needed another day or two for that assignment. This was another archival program she’d set up after doing some investigating about a UFO case up in Winchendon over the summer. The story itself was a little older, but there had been an uptick in interest about it. So she’d looked into it and then that project had evolved, growing into a reference of UFO sightings along the Route 2 corridor.

This morning, Gabriella was sitting at the computer, checking her email and considering which project to dip into during any free time. She, Graham, and Madelyn were the only ones in the building and the two of them were wrapping up their overnight work before heading home for the day.

She scrolled through her email, noting that nothing particularly interesting was there. There were invitations to a couple of trainings happening this winter, but she was still within six months of her own hiring, so she wasn’t eligible for them. Which was a shame, because that Cryptid First Aid 2 course looked fascinating. Granted, she hadn’t taken part one yet, but maybe Amelia had. She took a lot of these training classes.

The schedule for the day was at the top of her inbox. She clicked on it, then frowned as the table came up empty. This had to be a mistake, right? There was no way that she didn’t have a single case today.

Gabriella closed the window, then reopened the table. Still blank. Okay, but it still had to be wrong. They had so many cases going at all times that there was no way they had a day unplanned. She’d just wait until James got here to confirm it. He’d be here in a few minutes, anyway.

If she did have a whole day unplanned, she could certainly fill it. Knowing James, he’d want to get some things done. The cleaning roster had fallen to the wayside for a little while and everyone was still getting back on a schedule instead of doing tasks as they could. So there was bound to be some cleaning to do. But she could finish that UFO resource and maybe take a crack at some of the other things she’d been looking at. There were cold cases to reconsider, maybe Father McEnerney’s case too? They’d been to two cemeteries so far, with no luck. Today would be the perfect day to hit the last two.

The front door opened, and she looked up to see Bradley stepping inside. He shrugged off his coat and kicked off his shoes without a word. “Hi,” she called as he came up the stairs.

He glanced over. “Hi.”

Then he disappeared into the kitchen. Hopefully, James would be here soon. Even with their previous battles behind them, she still didn’t feel at ease when it was just her and Bradley here. And Madelyn and Graham were both leaving in the next few minutes.

Bradley walked out of the kitchen a moment later with a mug of coffee, then sat down at a computer a couple of seats away from her, opening his own email. After a few minutes, she heard a quiet, “Huh” and knew he’d reached the schedule too.

“Does that look accurate to you?” she asked.

“No,” Bradley replied. “But that doesn’t mean it’s not.”

He started typing something, and she waited a moment to see what he was doing. Not wanting to be too obvious, she stole a glance at his computer to see another program up. It was full of entries, but he still frowned as he scrolled through them.

“I mean, according to the program, apparently it is,” he said, still scrolling. “There’s work to do though, obviously.”

“Obviously.”

She didn’t mean for it to come out as snide as it sounded in her ears. Bradley glanced at her and she felt her ears heat up, but said nothing.

“We’ll see how McManus wants to handle it,” he said.

Then he turned back to his email and ignored her as she sat there. She felt like she should start a conversation, maybe make the silence a little less awkward. Then decided she’d rather get abducted by one of those UFOs than do that.

“Good morning!”

About fifteen minutes later, James was walking into the building holding a tray of coffees. He smiled at both of them as he came upstairs and set the tray down. “I grabbed coffee,” he said, tossing his jacket on the chair behind him. “It’s just the three of us today, so we’re going to be busy.”

“There’s nothing on the schedule,” Bradley said. “And Amelia’s in at noon.”

“Shit, I should have bought her a coffee,” James said, even though it was barely eight o’clock. “Maybe I can run back out.”

Then he paused. “What do you mean there’s nothing on the schedule?”

Bradley motioned him to the computer and James followed. He leaned over Bradley’s shoulder and looked at the screen with raised eyebrows. “That can’t be right.”

“It is according to the scheduling program.”

“The one you made?” James said. “Are you trying to get a vacation?”

“Eat me,” Bradley muttered. “It’s a Foundation program, I just actually opened it for once. But this is what it says. There’s plenty of cases, just none of them are particularly practical to do today.”

“Can you pull them up?”

Bradley rolled his eyes and Gabriella could see the effort he was making not to be a dick right now as he pulled the other screen back up. James leaned forward and took the mouse from him, scrolling through the list.

“That’s right though,” he said. “These are mostly ones that we need the full team on for. Though I guess these two…they’re a little far, though. Want to take a road trip?”

“No.”

“Then yeah, the program is right.”

He went back to the table and got his coffee, setting it down beside the tray. Then he pulled out the other two and passed them to Bradley and Gabriella.

---

Gabriella spent the morning jumping from task to task. James was working in the living room in order to keep an eye out for any new cases that might come in, but nothing did. Meanwhile, Gabriella started the morning wrapping up the UFO project. The closer she got to the end of it, the more she started to despise it. It wasn’t fair to the UFOs, they hadn’t done anything new. But if she had a full day for pet projects, she wanted to start digging into the volumes in James’s office too.

“You know what we should do?”

James’s voice broke the quiet concentration of the room. Gabriella looked up at him while Bradley finished typing something, then looked up impatiently. “What?” he asked.

“Have you ever done that game where you hang a donut on a string and you try to eat it?” James asked.

Gabriella watched as Bradley blinked slowly and once again, clearly swallowed whatever nasty comment he’d been about to make. “No,” he said finally. “No, I haven’t.”

“It’s fun,” James said. “We do it at family Halloween parties. Maybe I should grab a box of donuts and do it for ours. We still need to set a date.”

Halloween was getting closer and they hadn’t solidified anything for this party. Gabriella didn’t mind, she had no problem with small, spontaneous parties. But nobody else had mentioned anything about the party and she was getting a little concerned that it wasn’t actually going to happen.

“I’m good with any night,” she said. “If I’m not here, I’m just at home anyway.”

“Gabs, you should be going out and partying,” James chided. “You’re young, your liver can still handle it.”

That was probably the only part of her that could. If she wasn’t at work or at her mom’s, all she wanted to do was lie in bed and either sleep or watch TV.

“Is there anything you want me to do for the party?” she asked instead of trying to argue.

James shook his head. “Nah, you’re good,” he said. “I’ll try and find a minute to plan it, then I’ll let you all know.”

---

When Amelia got there, she and James decided to switch focus over to Father McEnerney’s case. So right after her lunch break, Gabriella joined Amelia to head down to Cemetery Number Three.

Fairview Hills Cemetery was located about six blocks away from headquarters. It was a small place with a classic black wrought-iron fence surrounding it. As Amelia and Gabriella walked into the entrance, Gabriella noticed that the blue sky had filled with dark clouds in the five minutes it had taken them to get here.

She frowned, gazing up at the sky. “That’s weird,” she said. “It looks like it’s going to storm.”

“The weather said clear skies all day,” Amelia said, peering up too. “Maybe my app was wrong.”

Gabriella had heard the same thing, but apparently, that wasn’t the case anymore. She looked around the cemetery as they stood right inside the entrance. It was small enough that she could see the entire thing from here. The wrought-iron fence surrounded the cemetery, which was probably the size of two city blocks. It was almost a perfect square set off by four thick brick pillars at each corner.

“Alright, so same deal as before,” Amelia said. “Let me get James on the phone real quick, then we’re going to start walking and look for any indication that something is off.”

Gabriella had been to the last two cemeteries, so she knew exactly what they were doing. But she nodded anyway, zipping her plaid jacket against the growing wind as Amelia dialed James’s number.

“We’re here,” she said as he answered. “Walking in now.”

“Got it,” he said.

“Also, can one of you do me a favor and close the window in the pink bedroom?” Amelia asked. “I left it open, but it looks like it’s going to rain.”

There was silence on the other end. “James?” Amelia prompted.

“Wh-yeah, right here. Um, are you sure?”

Fat gray clouds were rapidly gathering above them and Gabriella glanced at Amelia, who looked irritated. “Yeah,” she said. “Yeah, I’m pretty sure.”

“Okay,” James said. “No problem.”

His voice sounded a little off, but Gabriella ignored it as they stepped further down the path. The cemetery was like something off a movie set. Rusty brown leaves blew around their ankles as they walked down the gravel path lined with rounded headstones. It was a little strange to see so many simple headstones like this, but maybe it was an older cemetery. Most of the others they’d seen had more elaborate designs, like angels or that one with an old bearded man on it. However, all the headstones here were identical gray slabs jutting out of the still-green grass.

Thunder rolled overhead as Gabriella and Amelia walked down the pathway into the center of the cemetery. “It’s been a little while, so I assume the ouija board is long gone,” Amelia said. “So I’m not entirely sure what we’re looking for here. Do you know?”

“James did some EMF readings last time,” Gabriella said. “It wasn’t great because of the other energy in the cemetery, but maybe something will come up that’s different enough to indicate an issue.”

“This is ridiculous,” Amelia muttered as they passed a shovel jammed into the soft earth, its handle perfectly upright in front of a completely bare tree..

“I know,” James said over the speakerphone. “But we don’t have a lot to go on. Just tell me if anything seems different from your usual cemetery visit.”

Gabriella was already a little way ahead of Amelia on the path. She passed a headstone with a sparkling vase full of orange flowers set beside it. A small mausoleum was situated a little further down the path, and she paused as she saw a bat fly out of the tiny window.

“Did you see that?” she asked.

Amelia looked up from the EMF detector she’d pulled out. “See what?”

“There was a bat, even though it’s still daylight.”

Amelia grimaced. “Shit, that’s probably rabid. Did you see where it went?”

Gabriella pointed in the direction it had flown, but the bat was gone. Amelia looked, then nodded. “Okay,” she said. “If you see anymore, we’ll report it to the city or something, I don’t know. Okay…”

The EMF detector picked up something with a shrill beep, but there was nothing around them and the reading wasn’t anything higher than they’d get in a standard haunted house. “This place is just too typical,” Gabriella said, stepping off the path and in between a couple of rows of headstones.

A perfectly shaped mound of dirt lay in front of one of the headstones with a small spray of lilies on top of it. Gabriella tried to remember the last funeral she’d been to and whether things had looked this neat at the burial site. Was it Gran’s funeral? She remembered loads of flowers all over the grave, but nothing as subtle as this.

“James, do you have any thoughts?” Amelia asked. “It seems like this one isn’t it. So we’ll try the next one, but we really need to get more information from that kid. It’s not like whatever this is left us a big sign saying, ‘I’m here!’”

James said something, but Gabriella was a little too far away to hear it. She was near the end of the row now and one of the graves caught her attention. Kneeling down in the front of the plain granite slab, she wiped the layer of dirt off of the name, expecting to find a birth date and death date. But instead, the letters RIP were carved across it in jagged strokes.

She laughed and shook her head. Someone must have had a sense of humor or something. “Hey, Amelia,” she called over as Amelia slid her phone into her pocket. “Look at this.”

Amelia came over and glanced at the stone. Gabriella was still laughing, but her amusement was replaced with dread as the color left Amelia’s face.

“Amelia, what’s wrong?”

“We need to leave,” Amelia said, so quiet that Gabriella almost didn’t hear her. “Now.”

Then, before Gabriella could do anything, Amelia grabbed her by the wrist and began to pull her back to the entrance. She cried out in surprise and Amelia shushed her so quietly that Gabriella almost missed it as lightning and thunder crashed above them.

“Hurry!” Amelia said, letting go of Gabriella as she broke into a run.

Gabriella followed right behind her, tearing toward the gates as thunder boomed so loudly that her ears rang. She felt something snake around her ankle – a vine maybe – and nearly tripped, but Amelia took her hand again and pulled her forward, wrenching her out of its grip.

“Get to the exit!” Amelia called over the sound of the wind now roaring around them, her hair whipping wildly around her face. “Come on!”

The exit was just ahead of them and, grateful for the workouts she’d been doing, Gabriella tore through the gates with a final burst of speed, nearly falling as the opposing wind fell away. She and Amelia came out on the other side of the gates and the sound vanished so quickly that the ringing in her ears was almost overpowering.

“What the fuck was that?” Gabriella demanded, out of breath as Amelia hopped into the driver’s seat.

She climbed in and buckled her seat belt as Amelia turned the van on. It rattled to life, and they drove away, peeling down the empty street toward headquarters.

“Call James,” Amelia said.

Gabriella bristled at being ignored, but she called James anyway, putting him on speaker as the phone began to ring. He answered it on the first ring. “You got disconnected. What happened?” he asked.

“That’s the one,” Amelia said. “It’s a mischief spirit. We’ll be back in five.”

A few minutes later, as they made their way back onto the block where Headquarters was located, Gabriella looked up and saw that the sky was blue and cloudless again.

---

CONTINUE TO CHAPTER 11