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“He’s just grumpy it’s past his bed time” Georgie giggles raising her hand to hover over her mouth. She’s sitting on the dirty floor of an abandoned building next to Melonie. In front of them is a spirit box that has been silent for some time.
“I Am not” Jon detests from his perch on an old waste basket across from them
“Actually, I’ve- Yeah, I’ve never seen you awake past 10pm before” Martin adds shifting his weight slightly on the floor where’s he’s sitting next to Jon.
“Doesn’t mean I have a bedtime” Jon detests once more, “that just means I have a good routine.”
The spirit box crackles to life for the first time of the night. (Morning?) speaking out the word as clearly as it can. “past”
Melonie quips in while jotting down the word on her note pad, “See even he agrees it’s past your bedtime”
Jon grumbles something under his breath while fidgeting with his cane, tossing it from hand to hand.
The spirit box crackles out again this time something that sounds an awful lot like “them”
Melonie thinks aloud as she writes “‘Them’ Them who?”
“Oh!” Martin squeaks out raising his finger “I wonder if that’s their pronouns”
“I mean it could be but that would mean it would have died in the past few centuries, the term nonbinary isn’t that old” Georgie adds
“You can’t just assume a ghosts gender identity!” Martin protests “a lot of cultures had roles that used gender neutral terms”
“It’s a spirit box it doesn’t have a gender it just scans radio waves at high frequencies, besides name one of those cultures that resided in modern England.” Jon quips brushing off the knowledge given to him about the topic.
Martin takes a second to think of a response for his partner but before he can think one up he’s luckily (not that he would admit it!) cut off by the spirit box making a one syllable sound with a “th” sound at the beginning
“There that proves it! It’s a nonbinary ghost then.”
Jon lets out a sigh, “Oh Alright but it’s still not a real ghost-“
“Of course it’s a real ghost, I wouldn’t have made a living off of a ghost hunting show if they weren’t real, Jon”
“Hey I do too-“
“You also worked at the hot topic down the way”
“That was fresh out of uni! Not all of us could have been the first mate of space pirates”
He straightens his back up and brings a hand to his chest putting on an act. “I’ll have you know I was the captain and we were immortal”
“Yeah until you all died, tragically! ” Melonie says throwing up her hand for theatrics. Smirking with delight at the way Jon’s face twists with offence opening his mouth to speak before Martin can stop them before this escalates further.
“Lighten up Jon, it’s just good fun.” He assures kindly
“Yeah take the stick up your arse and-“ Melonie says less kindly while Jon replies to stop this slander
“I do not-“
They were cut off by the spirit box once again with a three symbol crackle that sounds like ‘Agenda’.
“Did that just say Agender?” Martin asks grateful for a topic change… or circle in this case being back on the earlier topic.
“Sounds like it” Georgie chirps out, “quite the inclusive group here between the five of us!” She smiles
“Ok so the ‘ghost’ is agender great, me too, doesn’t matter,” Jon puffs out quickly trying to get to the point “what are we supposed to even be doing? I would prefer to be back at our flat by at least a slightly reasonable time”
Melonie exaggerates an offended look specifically for Jon “you don’t even know what we’re doing here!? We’re investigating a statement!”
Jon quickly throws a glance at the other two who are doing quite well at suppressing their laughter “wha- why is Georgie here then?”
Martin finally cracks at holding back his laughter “it’s not- it’s not a statement, Jon. She’s just messing with us.”
Then Georgie and Melonie join in on the laughter while Jon pretends not to be amused at their antics with him.
The box lets out more sounds, sounding suspiciously like “must die”
Silence settles over the group, most shifting in their spots while looking uncertainly at each other before Georgie pipes up.
“Well that’s unsettling” she says in a questioningly high tone. It reminds Jon slightly of a certain red clad soldier from long ago.
“Maybe it wants vengeance, or, or talking about whoever killed them.” Melonie shakes her head swaying her faded blue hair slightly, eyes going wide “I mean a ghost can’t actually harm us right? It’s just that a ghost!”
“Maybe it just said ‘musty’? It is quite damp in here.” Martin tries to reassures the group.
“I mean…It sounded quite like ‘must die’ to me.” Jon adds saying what nobody wanted to say.
The box says one final word,an almost perfectly clear “you” from the speaker freezing the group to where they sit. Except Georgie who promptly reaches for the box and flicks it off.
“Alright, perhaps we should call it a night?”
“Y-yeah” Martin breaths out unsteadily.