Free Torn From the Shadows by Yolanda Sfetsos Page B

as tables holding printers and other office equipment. All of it was bathed in white, blue, and green lightning.
    “Don’t touch anything!” I warned, making my way into the middle of the room.
    With this much energy flowing around us, it was going to make our job a hell of a lot harder. Catchers could cross into the ghost’s zone, and that’s what we had to do now.
    “Are you ready to enter the zone?”
    “Yeah,” Jana said, her breath misting in front of her.
    I took another step and she matched it.
    The phantasms weren’t humanoid anymore. They looked more like blobs of flickering light with three holes near the top—eyes and mouth. They lit up the room, twitching over the printers, phones, cabinets—anything that would conduct their deadly current.
    One more step and we were in. I sucked in a lungful of sharp air and it chilled me to the bone. The cold worked its way around my system, taking my breath away. I caught myself quickly and regained control, but Jana seemed to be having trouble.
    The added zing of the electricity made my nerves twitch. “Jana, are you with me?”
    “Yeah, I’m fine,” she sputtered.
    “We have to strip away their energy. Find their core and the canister will do the rest.”
    Jana clenched her teeth and nodded. “I got this.”
    “Good.” I turned my attention back to the phantasms, to see if I could count how many we were up against. We faced six, each with a varying amount of current flowing through them.
    I filled my lungs, feeling the combination of frost and energy burning them. I’d faced all types of spooks during my life and even defeated demons, so these electrified freaks wouldn’t get the best of me. I just had to remember these phantasms might look like balls of lightning, but at the core they were just like every other spook. I could already see their edges blurring.
    “Hey,” I called, hoping to grab their attention.
    All black, hollow eyes turned to me and the buzzing increased until they sounded like a hive of bees ready to engulf us.
    “You’re trespassing,” I said. “Come to me without resistance, or I’ll come and get you.”
    Three of them shot from the other side of the room like colorful bullets and struck me in the shoulder. I almost stumbled, but I’d already caught one by the tail. I squeezed tightly, then shoved my other hand into where I estimated their chest used to be. As soon as I did, all color faded from the spook and it became a gray, lifeless thing.
    “Catch!” I yelled.
    Jana raised her canister, pressed the switch on the side and caught the phantasm. The mere shadow of a spook was promptly sucked into it like some sort of supernatural vacuum cleaner.
    The other phantasms now whirred around me, moving so fast I came up empty-handed with every attempt I made at grabbing them. This wasn’t going to work. Not when the other phantasms were already creeping closer.
    I closed my eyes, prepared to use my honed senses. Oren’s continuous attempt to help me learn how to meditate without astral projecting might not work how he wanted it to, but it had taught me how to use every sense except sight to feel and react.
    With my senses spiked, I silenced my mind and reached in front of me. My hands plunged into solid matter. I dug my fingers into the phantasms very core and flung one useless husk after another. The satisfying click confirmed Jana had captured each one I flung her way.
    “Three down, three to go.” I opened my eyes, surprised to find two of the power-driven beings hovering in front of me, as if they were giving themselves up to the inevitable. “Jana. They’re yours.”
    She stepped up, canister at the ready. She was a fast learner, and within minutes had not only reached their core and obliterated their power, but had them safely tucked into the canister.
    “Awesome! Well done.”
    She flashed me a quick smile.
    “We’ve got one more—” I was cut off by the slam against my spine. I collapsed onto my hands and knees,