Target Acquired

Warning: Descriptions of Gore

It was a sweltering summer day- not that Glen could feel it. He slumped onto the grimy sidewalk, laying like a lazy seal in the sunlight as groups of teenagers and tourists marched through his body. Contemplating existence, he drowsily batted away a construction worker with particularly nasty shoes, his arms passing through the guy's knees. It tickled.

Glen always wondered what would happen if he grabbed someone's shin bone and pulled it out. Would it shatter into a million shards, digging into flesh and jutting out like knives through the skin? Or would it stay in one piece, bursting a hole out of the limp tube of a leg it used to hold up? Blood would probably go everywhere, right? There would probably be a lot of screaming too. Maybe that person would even die from bleeding out? Then, he wouldn't be so bored all the time...

Contemplative, he eyed a nearby jogger, who shivered and glanced around nervously.

...Nah.

Glen didn't want his favorite spot to get covered in blood. Plus, it would be majorly awkward if the jogger actually died and became another ghost, wouldn't it? He would just be pissed off. Besides, even if he was lonely, he probably shouldn't kill people. That's what his mom always said. Or was it his dad? Glen gave up on pursuing the thought. He couldn't remember anyways.

He shifted his eyes away from the hurriedly escaping man, his interest fading.

He felt like he was going crazy.

....

It had been a while since Glen realized people could hear him. Or it felt like a while, at least. After the initial embarrassment had faded enough for him to not scream every time he thought about it, he was pretty excited. He could finally talk to someone! He could finally learn about what had changed while he was dead! Maybe he could even find a way to break out of the barrier.

Glen's eyes gleamed as he thought of various ways to escape. He had already failed to dig a hole in the barrier, and he wasn't able to phase through the ground, so he wasn't sure if going under it would work. Don't even mention going over it. Glen still hadn't gotten over his first attempt to fly.

If having basically no powers wasn't bad enough, Glen's intangibility only worked on certain things too, which made it pretty much useless. For instance, he couldn't phase through the ground, but he could go through rocks and pebbles. He couldn't pass through buildings and streetlights, but he could pass through cars and of course, humans.

The absolute worst part of his predicament, however, the most horrendous tragedy known to plague ghost-kind and the cruelest punishment that Glen had ever experienced in his entire existence, was that his most beloved cats hated him with a passion. If they were human, he would have had a bounty put on his head. It was as if he had offended the mother of the entire species. If they could, they would have called the church to exorcise him, then watched gleefully and adorably as he melted into a puddle.

It was one of the only times Glen truly felt deep, venomous hatred for the truck driver who killed him. Even though every cat was his fluffy baby, he couldn't touch them at all! He couldn't even go near to admire their beauty without them flipping out like their souls were about to be taken!! The only thing he could do to keep them from avoiding his little area, was to fill up on fluff from afar. TT _ TT

Tears of blood ran down his face as Glen enviously watched Milky, the stray cat he had been trying to woo for weeks, sit on a random fucker's lap.

Hehehe. He knew where that person lived.

...

Perhaps his Milky would be willing to approach him if he possessed a certain someone's body. He would have to try it out later.

Firstly, though, Glen had to find someone to help him break the barrier. They had to be alone when he decided to make contact, of course. Preferably in high school, too. Although he was much older at that point in time, Glen was still a junior in high school when he died. Mentally and physically, he was eternally seventeen, so it would be awkward trying to chat up an exhausted office lady who might just attribute his voice to pre-existing mental issues.

Glen scanned the much thinner crowd from the top of his favorite street lamp, squinting as he tried to find a good target.

"The man with the stroller? Hmmm. He looks like he's already stressed enough. How about the lady with- never mind, she's not alone. Oh. Wow. That's bold to do in public. Is that her husband or her boyfriend?" He averted his eyes, but a loud shout broke through the crowd and drew them back. Another man had grabbed the lady's hand and pulled her away. When the first guy tried to grab her back, he was knocked down with a flying tackle and wrestled to the floor. A chanting crowd quickly gathered around the two.

"... I guess he was her affair then." Glen had seen a lot of these types of fights. They used to be his source of entertainment. Now they were just boring. And super cliche.

He ignored the sounds of fighting and the occasional "don't fight over me!," locking his sights on a thin but needlessly tall teenage boy. He walked with a slight slouch, his short blond hair sticking up in some places, but generally neat overall. There were few people around him, but he kept his eyes glued to the sidewalk, like he was afraid to make eye-contact with anyone shady. The poor child had no idea that he had already been targeted by the shadiest of them all.

Glen licked his lips and grinned.

"Perfect."