by TheTimeTrust
Pete Glover/Chance strolled through the party, trying to not get stepped on. This diminutive body was hard to get used to, although this was the second time he had needed to possess it.
Kristofer Schanz could have released Pete's body back to him after the mission was over, but he found that hard to do. Plus, there was something nagging at him -- there seemed to be a reason why he should hold onto this body for a while longer. Thus, he found himself walking amongst the partygoers awkwardly. His somewhat reserved life as an overachieving scientist and athlete had never allowed him much time to party, and he was a self-acknowledged health nut who never drank alcohol, coffee, milk, or even any kind of sugar beverages, always preferring filtered water, genuine fruit juices, or vitamin C-enhanced rice milk instead. Potato chips and dip were something he rarely ever indulged himself in. And red meat was a no-no. He kept himself to a strict diet of fruits, vegetables, berries, nuts, whole grain brown bread, and generally anything else found in nature.
Of course, none of that mattered any more, now that he was dead, unless by some freak quirk of fate there were fitness awards in the afterlife.
"Hey, Pete! Pete! Er... uh... CHANCE! Yeah, that's the ticket!"
Pete/Chance turned around, smiling a polite smile at the drunken fellow standing in front of him.
"Whoa! Dude!" said Lance Lorenzo, almost falling over from shock. "You shaved! An' you combed yer hair! I'd hardly reconized ya if it weren't for yer bein' so damn short an' all, ha ha ha jus' kiddin' ya! And, hey... sniff-sniff ... ya got rid of that funky smell of yours! Burp! 'Scuse me..."
"Well, I thought I could use a shower and a shave."
"Yeah, that's fer sure... heh."
"Uh, Lance... don't you think you've had enough to drink?"
"Ha! That's jus' what I was sayin' ta Danny half an hour ago! Sounds funny comin' from you, though, ya lousy drunk! HA-HA-HA-HA I kill myself."
"I really think you should lie down for a while, Lance. You don't look well. You should really..."
And then he saw it.
"Hold on a minute, Lance..."
"Whatever, dude," said Lance, already distracted by a female partygoer. "Hey, Angelina... how you doin', girl?"
Pete/Chance saw with his ghost's vision a spirit hovering along the edge of the wall. As he peered toward it, he noticed that the spirit was watching him just as carefully. He took a step toward it, his ghost eyes (his Chinese friend Kwan would have called them Yin Eyes) still trained on the spectral figure.
The spirit then jumped back suddenly, as if startled that anyone, especially Pete, could possibly see it. It leaped backward through the wall and out of sight.
"Well, that was very strange." Kristofer knew that there were other ghosts like him and not so like him in this building -- most notably on the eighth floor -- and scattered throughout the rest of Puerta Mibela, but this one was unfamiliar and seemed different, somehow.
Some kind of sixth sense told him suddenly that he needed to follow this spirit stalker.
"Oh well, it was nice while it lasted," Pete/Chance said a moment before the body of Pete "the Chimp" Glover collapsed onto the floor right into a cushion next to a barely clothed girl who'd had a few too many drinks that night.
Kristofer Schanz took a look back at the man for whom he was a guardian angel of sorts and made sure his luck gene was still working for him before abandoning him in pursuit of the spirit.
Sailing through the wall, he drifted along in the spirit's wake until he stopped before Kristofer, looked at him with a dark smile for a moment -- made all the more hideous in the dim spectral light, and then he seemed to flick something on his wrist for a moment just before he vanished completely.
Kristofer Schanz hovered in that spot for a great deal of time, merely pondering what this meant.