In the Night's Time, when The Void was young and glutted with delicious fear, the simple contentment of feeling safe was often enough to stave away malfortune and mischief.
As humanity's tribes became towns, it was our cooking hearths and blacksmith's fires which pushed The Void away from the fortified ramparts of our prosperous hamlets. Life within those guarded walls, while savage and dirty by contemporary standards, was a collective experience in which townspeople looked out for one another and strangers helped their countrymen. Those who trafficked with The Void were found out and hanged at crossroads - so their dark souls would remain lost, unable to find the way home.
But The Void learned to adapt.
Eventually Mankind's avarice tore down the city walls. A desolate urban sprawl resulted -- a seemingly benign cancer devouring the wild, becoming the wild. As modern day cities began to bloat, a fractured web of airport concourses, concrete highways and subway stations followed. These were the avenues by which The Void infiltrated the cities of Man. These are our modern day crossroads. Today's lost souls who exist in perpetual commute are truly pathetic creatures.
I felt the woman's presence nearly immediately after passing through the subway's gate. She was standing on the platform, looking anxiously in the direction of the oncoming track. Jumper was my first thought.
Jumpers populate subway platforms, bridges, cliffs, ledges of tall buildings. They pace back and forth until, for example, a train pulls up and they repeat their suicide for eternity. More than a few sleepy conductors have been startled awake at the sight of such a figure falling beneath their train, only to find no carnage -- just an empty track. Jumpers tend to look pretty nasty. All severed limbs and blood splatter ...or just flat.
There wasn't any gore. Also suicides tend to have a different flavor, for lack of a better word. This ghost wasn't a jumper.
I decided to go speak with her. She was a pretty fabulous presence to say the least. She wore a fierce lady's power suit, totally 80s, a sensible haircut and shoulder pads which said she knew how to sit with the boys at the board table. But a chain of anxiety kept her bound to that platform. I named her Miranda. Yes after that Miranda.
So how can jumpers see a train coming and jump into it, but Miranda had been standing there for twenty years? Well -- it's all about purpose. Entities interact with our world to fit the needs of The Void. The more ghosts waiting for the G train, the more freaked out we feel -- which feeds the fear. Ever been in a subway station late at night? The footsteps you hear? The feeling you're being watched? Depending on how juiced by The Void they are, spirits learn any number of tricks to give us clean living types the heebie-jeebies. The rules are pretty simple actually.
As we waited for the train, I learned Miranda was running late for a crucially important meeting. Late, indeed. I'd say girlfriend lost the promotion. She had also forgotten an important document which she needed for the meeting. And there we have it.
The majority of spirits are searching -- its like that dream where you know there's something you've got to find, but you can't put your finger on where it is, or even what it is. Discovering the object, recovering the object or sometimes destroying it usually helps to release a bound or lost soul. Even in death we are so fixated on material belongings. Particularly malevolent encounters take some heavier firepower before you can kick their teeth in. For a passive entity like Miranda, all it typically takes is a little affirmation and distraction. Souls (and people) are fairly easy to manipulate.
Down the tunnel I saw train lights approaching. I grabbed a discarded newspaper from a nearby bench, opened it to the business section, returned to Miranda and told her I found her papers. Affirmation. As she began to look it over, I reminded her the train was here. Distraction.
And it was. Her smile was genuine. The train doors opened. We stepped in. She was able to say "Thank..." And then I was alone.
Miranda had made it to her meeting.
I hated the job - who wants to play fetch for a billionaire - begging at the table for any scrap to be tossed in your direction? Not me. 
