Free Ghouls Gone Wild by Victoria Laurie

to check for broken bones or other injuries. “Yeah, I’m good.”
    I crawled forward and felt his forehead. His body temp had gone back to normal. “That’s weird,” I said.
    “Fever’s gone,” Heath told me. “I felt almost immediately better the moment you dropped the spike back there. It’s as if I never felt sick at all.”
    In the next instant the door to the exit burst open and Gilley came dashing through, bearing about ten magnetic spikes and with crazy wide eyes. “I’m here!” he announced. “I’m here!”
    He looked so comically serious that I couldn’t help it—I started to giggle.
    Heath also began to laugh and pretty soon the both of us were slapping each other and whooping it up. Gilley frowned. “All right, chuckleheads,” he said as he bent down to reach under my arms and pick me up. “Let’s get you both out of here.”
    Once I was standing and trying to collect myself, I reached a hand down to help Heath up, but his laughter abruptly stopped and instead of taking my hand, he made an odd noise and pointed behind us.
    “What?” I asked him. But he just continued to point. Beside me I heard Gilley let out a little squeal and I slowly turned my head.
    About twenty feet away was the clear outline of a prone man lying on the floor of the cavern. “Why do I think that’s going to be really bad?” I whispered.
    Heath stood up. “Hello?” he called to the person on the ground.
    There was no response. Gilley shifted the metal spikes in one hand to under his arm and reached out for my hand. “Let’s just go,” he said softly.
    Heath and I exchanged a look. “We can’t just leave him here,” Heath said. “I think he’s hurt.”
    I squinted in the dim light of the close. My eyesight wasn’t as sharp as Heath’s, because I couldn’t tell if he was hurt or just sleeping. “Maybe one of us should go check on him?” I asked.
    “Rock, paper, scissors,” Heath called.
    “You two cannot be serious!” Gilley said, the quiver returning to his voice. “The guy’s probably just a drunk who wandered down here to sleep it off. I don’t think we should get too close.”
    “Gil,” I said as I shook out a rock and Heath formed scissors. “Heath’s right. We can’t just leave the guy down here with the kind of poltergeist activity we saw just a few minutes ago.”
    Heath sighed heavily, realizing that he was going to be the one to investigate the prone figure. “Wish me luck,” he said, but I grabbed his arm and pulled him back.
    “You’re positive you feel okay?” I asked him.
    He smiled. “I’m fine,” he assured me.
    “All right then,” I said. “Take these.” I took a few of Gilley’s spikes from under his arm and thrust them into Heath’s hands. “Just in case.”
    Heath nodded, then edged away from us. Gilley moved closer to me, and again he took my hand. “I don’t like this place one bit, M. J.”
    “You say that about every bust we do, Gil.”
    “Yeah?”
    “Yeah.”
    “Well then, I don’t like this one the most.”
    “ ’Nough said,” I told him with a smile, then fell silent as Heath reached the figure and squatted down. We watched as he tapped the guy on the shoulder, and shook him a little when he got no response. The prone man rolled onto his back and Heath stood up immediately, then came running back toward us.
    “Out!” he shouted. “Get out!”
    Gilley and I didn’t waste time asking why—we simply bolted for the exit. Once we were through the door, we took the stairs two at a time, winding our way up to the surface again.
    At the top and back on the street, the three of us bent over and waited to catch our breath. “It’s about time you guys came back!” I heard Gopher say. I glanced sideways to see him standing next to the van looking nervous. “I was getting really scared there.”
    I stood tall again and narrowed my eyes at him. “Yeah, we saw you get really scared there, Gopher. Twice.”
    Gopher blushed uncomfortably. “About