9. Chapter 9

Chapter 9

Captain Engell dealt with the financials for the school and taught a few classes when he wasn’t in Anchorage doing his regular trooper job; lucky him, he was our instructor for the morning session.

The atmosphere was tense; we were obviously divided between those who thought Thorsen was a hero and those who thought he was a pillock. I was pleasantly surprised to find myself surrounded with plenty of people – peds and supernats – who were willing to offer me their support and send a clear message to Thorsen that his behaviour would not be accepted.

I watched Engell as attentively as I could, given the depth of boredom his material inspired in me. He was probably in his early forties, dark-haired and muscular; if he’d retired from the MIB, he didn’t look like any retiree I’d ever seen before. His eyes were dark and brooding and, despite the unholy level of tedium in his class, there was something that felt inherently dangerous about him. As he stalked around the classroom, it felt like being in the zoo next to a tiger which, frankly, felt like a bad idea.

Engell was teaching us a mini-clinic on forensic accounting. If he was , or had been, MIB, he was surely the most boring of the lot of them. My eyes nearly rolled up in my head as he spoke and I struggled to keep them open. His teaching style left much to be desired – he even made Polk seem animated – but he seemed knowledgeable. Most importantly, he didn’t bully Jones.

An hour into class, when most of us were struggling to stay awake, the same podium fell over again with a bang and jolted us all awake. The poltergeist didn’t stop with that, however; all our papers, pens and pencils were sent flying directly at the hapless instructor. Engell ducked behind his podium; the clatter of instruments striking it and the board behind him was like the noise of a hailstorm.

‘Someone shut the damned window!’ he shouted. Danny hastily stood, but he waited until the poltergeist had dissipated before sliding closed the fractionally open window.

Engell stood up. If he knew about the paranormal world, his slightly stupefied expression didn’t convey it. Either that or he was a pretty good actor.

‘Are you okay, sir?’ Thorsen asked with surprising concern. Maybe even he could show some empathy now and again, though the cynical part of me suspected he was brown-nosing.

‘You wouldn’t think the wind could come through with such force,’ Engell muttered. ‘I only opened it a little for some fresh air.’ Nobody pointed out that the trees outside were wholly still. He was bleeding from various superficial cuts so we took a quick break whilst he cleaned himself up, then he continued his lousy lecture like nothing had even happened.

When the lecture finished, we were divided up and taken to either the gun range or the obstacle course. My squad and Sidnee’s were at the range.

Unlike the revolver that Gunnar had started me with, the academy used Glock 17s. It was a commonly used police gun, though I hadn’t shot one before. It was a different experience because the safety mechanism was built into the trigger. The advantage was that it was far faster in an emergency since all you had to do was point and depress the trigger fully to get it to work.

Since I’d been practising regularly with Gunnar, I was a decent shot and sailed through my turn. I had started to really enjoy shooting because it was the one exercise where your skill wasn’t dependent on your physical strength; with a gun in my hand, I didn’t have to hide anything.

Sidnee wasn’t keen on shooting but she’d been around Gunnar since she was seventeen so she knew how to do it. She aced her turn, too.

We rotated through our shotgun and rifle time. The academy used Remington 870s and Colt AR 15s, which were fun to shoot. We had the same models back at the Nomo’s office though I’d yet to see them out of the gun safe since the werewolf incident.

It was bizarre to think how far I’d come from being a Brit who’d never held a gun to being comfortable firing a variety of weapons. I was proud of me, even if my parents wouldn’t ever be. I squelched the thought: there was no time for self-pity.

Just before lunch we were told about our second squad challenge. Squad challenges were designed to be fun, team-building exercises that earned us minor rewards. They also allowed those of us who were a smidge competitive to let off steam and had the extra benefit of earning us some cohort kudos, as well as some time off campus.

The challenge was scheduled for after lunch. We had to go into Sitka, locate five different totem poles, have a squad photo taken with each of them, then return to the academy. Whoever returned first with the photos won an extra hour’s sleep in the morning and could skip physical training. An hour extra in bed was a small thing to look forward to – but I mostly wanted to make sure Thorsen didn’t win it. Yes, I was that petty.

If the supernats had made up a squad we’d have won easily, but we were split amongst the four squads so it was equal footing. The squads were divided as much as possible between men and women. My squad put together a plan during lunch; it looked like today I was having grilled-chicken pasta salad with a side of sneaky strategy.

As we finished eating, we agreed to go and get our phones. I ran up to my room, flung myself on the bed and reached for my phone in my footlocker. As my fingers closed around the device, the hair on the back of my neck stood on end and anxiety curled in my gut – together with the certainty that I wasn’t alone. Trust your gut.

There was a shadowy figure in the corner of the dorm. It was roughly human shaped, although its features were somehow obscured. My brain tried to fill in the features but failed, and a shiver of fear ran down my spine.

I pushed myself up to a sitting position, feet on the floor, ready to fight – or to run.

As my nerves stretched taut, a series of low moans came from the apparition. My sharp hearing could almost pick up words but I couldn’t quite make them out; it was like there was some weird disconnect between my ears and my brain.

As I continued to sit there, staring stupidly and not responding, the spirit grew agitated. It spoke again more forcefully but I still couldn’t understand it. All traces of fear left my body as I concentrated on its desperate attempt to communicate. Regretfully I shook my head. ‘I’m sorry. I can’t hear you.’

Frustrated, it swirled around the room and under a bed at the far end. The bed lifted three feet off the ground and slammed back down, and a foul scent like rotting eggs and meat filled the air. The ghost rushed towards me and then vanished.

My lethargic heart gave a solid thump as I tried to analyse what had just happened. For some reason my lizard brain hadn’t been afraid. Trust your gut.

Right. Well, the weird thing was that my gut was saying that maybe the poltergeist wasn’t as malevolent as we’d thought…