Dynamite after a vigil suggests that something went badly wrong on Valentine's day and you're dealing with an angry ghost. I hope the dynamite works :) And speaking of ghosts....
Dyanmite The records office was a three-storey brick building not very far from the centre of the town. Collins turned off the shopping parade, trying to ignore that nearly half the shops were either closed already or announcing their closing-down sales, and walked past a shop that catered specifically to ghosts. He looked in at the window as he walked past, noting the cases of ectoplasm powder on the left-hand side, and a selection of odder, less substantial items on the right. He wanted to pause and look at them properly but he kept walking. The memories of his mother’s words rang in his head, and he could almost feel the slap of her open palm against the back of his head for having even looked in the window. She was scathing about ghosts – they either didn’t exist or they were abominations that shouldn’t exist, and God would soon put it all back to rights again. He walked on, his left hand unconsciously rubbing his cheek where she would have slapped him, and for just a moment a new thought intruded: what would she do if she died and became a ghost? Then he crossed a quiet road, turned left and crossed a second road leaving a primary school behind him and was stood in front of the records office, which could have been a nursing home or even another school building. There was a head-height yellow-brick wall running around it, with an iron-barred gate at the entrance which swung open easily when he pushed it. A short path paved with grey square stones ran to the doors, and then he was standing in a beige-carpeted reception area that smelled of hot dust and stewed peppers. “Don’t mind the smell,” said an elderly man, coming out of a back room. “Janine left her bag of vegetables on the radiator. She didn’t realise it was on. We don’t normally have them on at this time of year, you see, because it’s not normally that cold, but there’s been a vicious breeze off the sea lately. So yesterday—” “Sorry to interrupt,” said Collins who was more embarrassed than sorry but had already seen that this conversation would last forever if allowed to, “this is police business.” The elderly man looked affronted but fell silent. Then after a moment a combination of greed and curiousity crossed his face, creasing it into wrinkles. “Go on, officer,” he said, and actually rubbed his hands together. Collins got his thoughts back together. “William Fulton,” he said. “I need what you have on him, please.” “Ah,” said the elderly man, and there was now a note of satisfaction in his voice. His hands kept rubbing one another. “Well, we’re understaffed you know. And that’s not an uncommon name either. You’ll need to go look them up yourself and decide which one is yours.” “Right,” said Collins. His pulse throbbed in his throat as he wondered how you went about doing this. He wiped his palms on his trousers. “Where do I go for that then?” “You have to become a member first,” said the man. “We don’t just let anybody in here, you know. We’re the official records office for the county, so we have to know who you are. Some of our information could be dynamite in the wrong hands!” “Can’t I just show you my warrant card?” “No!” Becoming a member involved the elderly man asking Collins questions, then repeating them when he didn’t hear, or didn’t understand the answers, and slowly, painfully slowly, filling out a form. Collins offered to fill it out for him, and the man snapped at him again saying that it was important that the form be legible. Collins decided that this was something else that the man was determined to see done right and wished he had somewhere to sit. “And that’s your card,” said the man at last. “Swipe it through the card reader at the door on your left, and don’t take any food or drink in with you. And no talking!”
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Dynamite after a vigil suggests that something went badly wrong on Valentine's day and you're dealing with an angry ghost. I hope the dynamite works :) And speaking of ghosts....
Dyanmite
The records office was a three-storey brick building not very far from the centre of the town. Collins turned off the shopping parade, trying to ignore that nearly half the shops were either closed already or announcing their closing-down sales, and walked past a shop that catered specifically to ghosts. He looked in at the window as he walked past, noting the cases of ectoplasm powder on the left-hand side, and a selection of odder, less substantial items on the right. He wanted to pause and look at them properly but he kept walking. The memories of his mother’s words rang in his head, and he could almost feel the slap of her open palm against the back of his head for having even looked in the window. She was scathing about ghosts – they either didn’t exist or they were abominations that shouldn’t exist, and God would soon put it all back to rights again. He walked on, his left hand unconsciously rubbing his cheek where she would have slapped him, and for just a moment a new thought intruded: what would she do if she died and became a ghost?
Then he crossed a quiet road, turned left and crossed a second road leaving a primary school behind him and was stood in front of the records office, which could have been a nursing home or even another school building. There was a head-height yellow-brick wall running around it, with an iron-barred gate at the entrance which swung open easily when he pushed it. A short path paved with grey square stones ran to the doors, and then he was standing in a beige-carpeted reception area that smelled of hot dust and stewed peppers.
“Don’t mind the smell,” said an elderly man, coming out of a back room. “Janine left her bag of vegetables on the radiator. She didn’t realise it was on. We don’t normally have them on at this time of year, you see, because it’s not normally that cold, but there’s been a vicious breeze off the sea lately. So yesterday—”
“Sorry to interrupt,” said Collins who was more embarrassed than sorry but had already seen that this conversation would last forever if allowed to, “this is police business.” The elderly man looked affronted but fell silent. Then after a moment a combination of greed and curiousity crossed his face, creasing it into wrinkles.
“Go on, officer,” he said, and actually rubbed his hands together. Collins got his thoughts back together.
“William Fulton,” he said. “I need what you have on him, please.”
“Ah,” said the elderly man, and there was now a note of satisfaction in his voice. His hands kept rubbing one another. “Well, we’re understaffed you know. And that’s not an uncommon name either. You’ll need to go look them up yourself and decide which one is yours.”
“Right,” said Collins. His pulse throbbed in his throat as he wondered how you went about doing this. He wiped his palms on his trousers. “Where do I go for that then?”
“You have to become a member first,” said the man. “We don’t just let anybody in here, you know. We’re the official records office for the county, so we have to know who you are. Some of our information could be dynamite in the wrong hands!”
“Can’t I just show you my warrant card?”
“No!”
Becoming a member involved the elderly man asking Collins questions, then repeating them when he didn’t hear, or didn’t understand the answers, and slowly, painfully slowly, filling out a form. Collins offered to fill it out for him, and the man snapped at him again saying that it was important that the form be legible. Collins decided that this was something else that the man was determined to see done right and wished he had somewhere to sit.
“And that’s your card,” said the man at last. “Swipe it through the card reader at the door on your left, and don’t take any food or drink in with you. And no talking!”
Greg - dynamite (almost) always works, no matter the problem.
Collins has far more patience than I do. I definitely would have shoved my id in that guy's face and forced my way through. Or tried to.
Collins probably had the better idea of things, now that I think about it...
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