Phantasos Read online

  PHANTASOS

  A PARANORMAL THRILLER

  ROBERT BARNARD

  PHANTASOS: A PARANORMAL THRILLER. Copyright © 2015 by Robert Barnard. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without prior written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  Portions of the cover art were provided by Gerd Altmann.

  Mount Marshall Publishing, 2015.

  Summary: A terrifying series of events are set in motion after a mysterious arcade cabinet is delivered to the Planet X Arcade in Grand Ridge, Oregon.

  ISBN: 978-1517716486

  For you-know-who.

  Table of Contents

  One

  Two

  Three

  Four

  Five

  Six

  Seven

  Eight

  Nine

  Ten

  Eleven

  Twelve

  Thirteen

  Fourteen

  Fifteen

  Sixteen

  Seventeen

  Eighteen

  Nineteen

  Twenty

  Twenty-One

  Twenty-Two

  Twenty-Three

  Twenty-Four

  Twenty-Five

  Twenty-Six

  Twenty-Seven

  Twenty-Eight

  Twenty-Nine

  Thirty

  Thirty-One

  Thirty-Two

  Thirty-Three

  Thirty-Four

  Thirty-Five

  Thirty-Six

  Thirty-Seven

  Thirty-Eight

  Thirty-Nine

  Forty

  Forty-One

  Forty-Two

  Forty-Three

  Forty-Four

  About the Author

  Also by Robert Barnard

  One

  THE BRAKES ON THE BOX TRUCK hissed and whined as it carefully backed into the unloading zone behind the Planet X Arcade. Two dopey looking men in overalls and white hats hopped out, shuffled to the back of the truck, and dropped the loading ramp. The men vanished into the cargo hold, then shortly after reappeared with a massive wooden crate on a dolly. The crate stood nine feet tall and four feet wide, and looked impossibly heavy. The deliverymen struggled to maneuver the top-heavy beast from the cargo hold of the truck to the rear exit of the arcade.

  Todd stood behind his arcade, hands on his hips, watching the deliverymen struggle but not offering to lend a hand. You’re twenty minutes late. Idiots.

  “Hey, guy. Where do you want this heavy mother?” Dope number one asked with a grunt.

  Todd held the door open, waved his hand. “Right back here is fine.”

  Dope number two nodded, spit to the side, wiped his face on his shoulder, then jammed the handles of the dolly forward, aiming for the open door.

  Inside, the arcade was brightly lit, not at all how it looked during business hours. In the afternoon, after school let out, it would turn into a dimly lit labyrinth of pulsing neon, with carpets illuminated by black lights. Rows of arcade cabinets crowded the room from wall-to-wall, their glowing monitors guiding customers from one game to the next.

  But now, in the early morning, humming fluorescent lights revealed the Planet X arcade for what it really was. The once magnificent emporium of joy and beeps and blips had turned into a bit of a dive. Dust and cobwebs flourished in the nooks and crannies beneath and behind the machines. In the rear corner of the room, a nasty clump of mold was beginning to grow. The carpets were stained, bubble gum permanently stamped into the fibers, cigarette burns dotting the paths between machines like a trail of breadcrumbs.

  Danny was wiping down the glass top of a prize cabinet when the deliverymen came in. He watched as his boss led the men and their colossal crate towards a spot in the middle of the room.

  “A little further, a little further,” Todd said. “Okay. There. Perfect, stop.”

  Dope one and dope two sat the crate down in the middle of the arcade and pulled the dolly back. Dope one grumbled something indiscernible under his breath; to Danny, it sounded like cursing. Dope two pulled his cap back, wiped the sweat from his brow, then cracked his knuckles and waited.

  Todd nodded, reached into his back pocket, and pulled out his wallet. He plucked a couple of dollar bills from the bi-fold, then returned the wallet to his pocket.

  “Thanks fellas,” Todd said, handing a single dollar to dope one and dope two.

  Dope two said, “Gee, a whole buck. Thanks, guy. You sure are swell.”

  “Come on,” Dope one said, leading his partner to the rear exit. “Let’s get outta’ here.” Dope two turned to Todd before exiting and said, “Hey, good luck with it pal.” The two left the arcade, slamming the door behind them.

  By now, Danny had dropped what he was doing at the prize counter and strolled over to where the towering behemoth stood. He crossed his arms, his elbows covering the Def Leppard logo on his faded white t-shirt.

  “What the hell is this?” Danny said.

  Todd, who had grabbed a crowbar from the back, was already prying the crate apart with excitement. “This, Danny, is the future.”

  Like a kid tearing open a present on Christmas morning, Todd pulled the wooden crate apart. The sides of it collapsed to the floor under a heaping mess of straw and packing peanuts. In a few short moments, the prize inside was revealed.

  The arcade cabinet stood there, a giant black monolith gleaming beneath the fluorescent lights.

  “I thought…” Danny paused, collected his thoughts, tried not to get angry. “I thought new machines weren’t in the budget, Todd.”

  “They’re not.”

  “So explain this to me, please.”

  “We didn’t buy it, buddy,” Todd said, and he slapped Danny on the shoulder. “The manufacturer is trying out some new, radical technology. So, before they invest piles of money into producing a million of these things, they want to test it out in a few arcades. Just to make sure they function correctly, and the kids like it. They called me last week to ask if they could test it here, can you believe that? Danny, they’re paying us to put their machine in our arcade!”

  Danny looked the cabinet up and down at length. “Something doesn’t feel right. I don’t like this. I wish you would have ran it by me first.”

  “This is a surefire bet, Dan.”

  Danny walked a slow circle around the cabinet, stuffed his hands in his jean pockets, lurched forward, and groaned. “Where’s the monitor?”

  Todd’s eyes lit up. “There isn’t one.”

  Danny gave Todd a puzzled look, thought: What the hell do you mean there isn’t one? Then he waited for his friend to explain, because clearly he was eager to.

  Todd tapped the top of the arcade cabinet. “There’s a pair of goggles in here that drop down after the player pays. Two words, bud: Virtual. Reality.”

  Danny examined the coin-slot on the machine. “Holy cow—it costs a dollar per play! No one is going to pay to play this thing, Todd. This is a mistake.”

  “Not a mistake, Dan. No, not a mistake at all when the manufacturer has already mailed over a check for five hundred smackers.”

  Danny shook his head, then glanced around at the arcade cabinets that filled the room. There was Pac-Man, coated in a thick yellow lacquer, brightly co
lored pastel ghosts decorating the machine. Beside that was the other crowd favorite, Donkey Kong, painted top-to-bottom in eye-popping fire engine red, a cartoon ape grinning from the side.

  This new machine, whatever it was, stood in stark contrast to the games around it, and Danny didn’t like it. It was a dark tower. It looked menacing and stuck out like a sore thumb.

  “Who paints an arcade cabinet all black?” Danny asked. “A bit grim. And where will we even put it? We don’t exactly have the floor space.”

  “I sold the Centaur to an arcade over in Portland. They should be here in an hour or two to pick it up, then we’ll move some things around. We’ll make it fit.”

  “The Centaur, really? You didn’t tell me you were going to sell that!” Danny clasped his hands together. “That was my favorite pinball table. I would have put money into the shop and taken it home had I known we were getting rid of it.”

  Todd said, “Please, I’m the one who pays you. I know what you make. You wouldn’t have been able to afford it.”

  Danny glared at his boss.

  Todd was getting tired of having to cheer up Danny; the guy was ruining his moment. “I thought you’d be excited about this, like I am. This is good news, Dan. Don’t be such a grump. The kids will be lining out the front door to play this beast. It’s the dawn of the nineties, man. Kids can play Nintendo at home now. But this machine? No. You can’t replicate this on the living room television.”

  Todd wiped his hand across the top of the machine, brushing away some loose pieces of straw.

  “God, even the name is rad,” Todd said, and he turned to Danny, still sulking. “It’s Greek, I think. I have no idea what it means. It probably translates to ‘money-maker.’”

  Todd stood, fists on hips, super-hero pose. He was proud.

  “Phantasos,” he said, reading the word slowly as he stared at the backlit marquee on the top of the machine. The word was stenciled in a white, futuristic font—the only pop of color on the entire cabinet. He added, “What a trip,” and then he marched away towards the arcade’s office and told Danny to get back to work.

  Two

  SUMMER WAS SO CLOSE; A TEASE, a blank slate, an eleven week long open invitation of sleeping in, and slumber parties, and camping. No book reports due, no algebraic word problems to hand in. Two and a half months of nowhere to be with nothing to do. Bliss. Inches within reach.

  The windows of Mr. Crandall’s English classroom were pulled open wide, allowing the scents of summer to dance carelessly inside. The aroma of dandelions and grass clippings drifted inward, suspended by a gentle breeze.

  Benji could almost taste the freedom of summer vacation. He watched the hands on the clock above Mr. Crandall’s desk tick by, each minute hand pass slower than the one before it.

  2:28 PM. Seventeen minutes until escape.

  The young boy sighed, pulled in a deep breath of sweet, balmy air, and reached for his backpack. While the other students chitchatted, read paperback novels, or listened to their Walkmans, Benji was left to his lonesome.

  His best friend, Alley, was a grade behind him. Alley—short for Alec—was the little brother that Benji never had. Alley’s family moved in across the street from Benji seven years earlier, so the two had practically grown up together.

  His only other good friend was Alley’s older sister, Lauren. She was on the other side of the building in her last class of the day, U.S. Government.

  So, with no friends around to talk to and nothing to read, Benji’s choices were limited. He could either watch the last minutes of junior high pass by painfully slow, or…

  He tugged at a zipper on his backpack and pulled out a handheld video game that looked less like an electronic device and more like a big, grey brick. Gameboy—the ultimate boredom eraser. Mr. Crandall was notorious for his anti-video game stance, but surely he wouldn’t mind. Not today, at least; it was the last day of school, for crying out loud.

  Benji flicked a switch on the hunk of plastic and watched the small, monochrome screen flicker to life. Tetris, his preferred game of choice when there was time to kill. A few minutes of Tetris, and the next seventeen minutes would fly by in no time—

  “Mr. Bauer, what do you have there? What do you think you’re doing?”

  Mr. Crandall looked up from behind his newspaper. It never ceased to amaze Benji how a teacher could always tell if you were misbehaving—even if they weren’t looking at you. It was as if some psychic, extrasensory ability alerted Mr. Crandall to the boy’s rule breaking.

  “I thought—”

  “Thought what exactly, Mr. Bauer? That, because it’s the last day of class, some magic wand has been waved? The rules don’t apply any longer?”

  Benji gave his teacher a blank stare.

  “You know the rules. No electronic devices. Put it away.”

  Benji rolled his eyes and scanned the classroom, making note of the several students who were listening to their Walkmans. To talk back to his teacher would be a bit daring; but, it was the last day of junior high, after all. Benji would never again have to sit through another one of Mr. Crandall’s dull lectures, and he doubted the teacher would give him detention, or make him stay after class. Benji was well aware that the teachers were as anxious for summer to start as the students were.

  Considering all of this, Benji bravely said, “Rodney Frye is listening to his Sony. Why aren’t you telling him to put it away?”

  Rodney, never a fan of Benji’s to begin with, caught his accusation just barely over the heavy guitars of his Powerslave cassette and shot him a dirty glare. Don’t drag me into this, twerp.

  “Fine, Mr. Bauer. If that’s the direction you’d like to take this.” Mr. Crandall folded his newspaper flat and placed it atop his desk. He stood up straight, a prison warden, and knocked on the chalkboard a few times to get everyone’s attention. The students hushed their conversations, turned forward, and listened.

  “Attention, class. As you’re all well aware, I have a zero-tolerance policy regarding video games in my classroom. They rot the mind, and—mark my words—if left unchecked, they’ll be the downfall of your generation. I’d like to thank those of you who have been respectful of this policy, but Mr. Bauer here thinks he has stumbled upon some great injustice.”

  Benji gulped and looked at the clock. Fourteen minutes left. Why are you doing this to me?

  “You see, class, it’s in Mr. Bauer’s opinion that if electronic games are banished between my walls, then all electronic devices should be forbidden. So, pack them up.”

  The students looked around at one another in collective disbelief.

  “You heard me, pack them up. While you’re at it, pack up your papers and books as well. I want to see clean desks. We can ride out the last few moments of the year in idle silence, and you can thank Mr. Bauer for that luxury.”

  The room filled with groans, grumbles, and murmurs. All around him, Benji’s peers shot him dirty glances.

  Rodney looked particularly pissed. He yanked his backpack off the floor, tossed it on his desk, and—

  Crack.

  Rodney’s backpack clipped his Walkman, causing it to slide from the edge of his desk, hit the floor, and shatter. The room went silent; students sitting by him watched as his Iron Maiden cassette slid across the tiled floor, spools of brown tape dragging behind it. Rodney extended a fat, meaty hand to pick up the pieces, and his freckled cheeks flushed red. The room erupted into laughter.

  Benji watched in horror. Rodney was never a friend, never an acquaintance; quite the opposite, he was a bully. A brutish, dimwitted boy who was quick to anger. From across the room, Benji could see the gears turning in Rodney’s plump head, as if he was peeking into his skull with an x-ray machine.

  Benji thought: This was all my fault. He will blame me for this, and it will be hell.

  When class was dismissed, Benji sprinted to his locker. A quick, clean sweep of the locker and he’d be on his way home, pedaling furiously away from school and the awful
Rodney Frye.

  “Benji,” a thin, frail voice called from behind his locker door.

  Without looking up, Benji said, “What’s up, Alley?” He flung papers and folders into his backpack, stuffing it tight, until it was bursting at the seems.

  Alley took a step back; Benji sounded upset and he didn’t want to be in his way. “What’s got you all kirked out?”

  “I gotta get out of here quick. Rodney Frye wants my ass.”

  “Why?”

  “I broke his Walkman.”

  “What—why, how?”

  Benji exhaled, then slammed his empty locker shut. “Where’s your sister?”

  “She took the bus.”

  “You should catch a ride with her, Alley. I need to get out of here fast.”

  “But…” Alley looked down at his shoes. “We always ride together. Besides, the bus already left.”

  Benji ran his fingers through his hair. “Is your locker clean?”

  “Yeah, I cleaned it yesterday.”

  “All right, then let’s hightail it outta here.”

  Students poured out of the front entrance of Grand Ridge High School, a raucous crowd. Cheers were yelled, papers were tossed high in the air; truly, there was no sweeter moment than the first few minutes of summer vacation. Grand Ridge stood as a prison behind them, and it had just released all of the inmates.

  “No more pencils, no more books!”

  “No more teachers dirty looks!”

  “Who wants to grab some ‘Za at Merloni’s?”

  “Anyone wanna split a bean with me?”

  “We’re free!”

  Benji couldn’t join in the excited chorus of students; he knew that Rodney was a slow mover, so a head start on him would mean the difference between a relaxing bike ride home and having his ass beat on the first day of vacation.

  Benji dropped to a knee beside the bike rack near the front parking lot and fumbled with his lock. Swarms of students passed on either side of him.