"What the fuck is going on here?" Penelope swept in from who-knew-where, but Arielle could have sworn she'd come from the upper-floor balcony. Her eyes were that terrifying blood-red shade, and her hair was wild, her cheeks flushed, her spine rigid.

"Hey, he's—" Arielle barely had a second to open her mouth before Penelope shoved her aside with a quick flick of her wrist. "Wait, stop!"

Penelope whooshed over to float before Benny, hands on her hips as she studied him. She had her back to Arielle, concealing her expression—but Arielle hadn't forgotten her snarl, the ravaging rage warring in her gaze, the dangerous twitch of her eyebrows.

I guarantee that's what she looks like right now.

Benny perked up, blinking at the figure in front of him, but powerless to see it. "There you are." He tried so hard to be fearless, to not let Penelope's burning energy affect him, but his flinches—one, two, three of them—showed otherwise.

"Oh, you were waiting for me, were you?" Penelope growled as she lurched forward and squeezed Benny's middle, her hands pressing into his shirt, his skin hissing from the contact.

"Fuck!" Benny cringed and attempted to weasel out of Penelope's hold, but she was firm, her fingertips digging into the fabric of his shirt, keeping him in place. He fidgeted and flailed and kicked—but Penelope felt nothing, gripping onto him, branding her handprint onto his body.

"Stop!" Arielle skidded over and sought to knock into Penelope, but she fell through her, unable to make contact with her tense arms. "The fuck? I thought ghosts were able to touch one another?" She shook it off and instead slithered between Penelope and Benny, glaring at the former. "Stop! What are you doing? You're going to kill him!"

"Good." Penelope hardened her grip, and a reddish glow gyrated around her, swirling as a gust whipped up her back, through her hair, and up towards the ceiling. "He's not supposed to be here. He's not scared enough, and he needed to leave, but he came back." She looked through Arielle as if she weren't there, proceeding to apply pressure to Benny's upper waist, smirking as he writhed and whimpered in pain. "He can't find out. No one can."

Arielle groaned and rolled her eyes. "Okay, but why are you so obsessed with this? You know you can just... ignore him, right? Let him say his piece and stagger off to the car? He's drunk," she pointed at the liquor bottle on the floor, "and grieving his friend, Kylie. She was killed tonight, did you know?"

To Arielle's shock, Penelope released Benny and slithered backwards. She sneered as she bent and stretched her fingertips. "What?" The red glow faded, her curls returned to their usual spot, dangling over her shoulders, and her face drained of its blushing maroon shade. "How are you aware of this?"

Arielle's chin sank. "We... were talking. Well, he was talking, I... was screaming." She gulped. "You said the only way humans could hear us is if we screamed, right? So that's what I did."

A hand wrapped around her wrist and yanked her into the living room. By the time she tugged her chin up, Penelope was facing her, brows drawn inwards and upper lip curled. Her reddish eyes flickered with a twinge of fury. "Why were you talking to him? Were you encouraging him? What if he captured that as evidence, huh? What if he took that back to his hotel and exposed you? Exposed us?"

Arielle broke out of Penelope's grip with surprising strength and flew backwards. "He wasn't filming or recording." She shook out her wrist, noticing faint handprints on her skin. Penelope was volatile, and she needed to calm down. "When he barreled in here yelling and crying about someone dying... I felt his pain. His sorrow. It reminded me of my pain, my sorrow. When Stella died, when Jade died... I imagined what he was thinking, since it was obvious he had feelings for Kylie, so... it brought back my feelings. My feelings for..."

A chill crept up Arielle's spine. It prodded at every vertebrae, folded around every muscle, seeped deep into every cavity, every nerve, every vein. A powerful surge of energy rushed to her heart and pushed it to throb out of control, as if about to explode in her chest.

Memories poured into her brain—Jade smiling wide, giggling as she skipped down her mansion's corridors. Jade's hips swaying to a booming beat, her gold-and-glitter gown sprinkling luminescent dots around her like a spotlight. Her coated lashes batting as she leaned in to whisper in Arielle's ear, her voice suave and sexy. Her every motion exuding delicious waves of her Chanel scent, and it was like a breath of fresh air, of much-needed oxygen Arielle required to survive. Jade's fingers lacing with hers, her touch like a caress of silk, her presence exciting like ecstasy. Jade's perfect cat-walk, her kiss-blowing as she left a room, her fancy purses hanging from her rounded shoulders, her well-defined ass in a pair of high-waisted, tight jeans.

It was all about her. Jade, Jade, Jade.

"Fuck." Arielle smacked a hand to her forehead as she tumbled backwards, but somehow stopping herself before plowing through the floor-boards. "Fuck, I get it. I figured it out."

Unfazed, still glowering at Arielle as if about to rip her face off, Penelope crossed her arms. "Figured what out? How you'll help me get rid of Benny? Or how much I'll hurt you if you don't?"

Grimacing, Arielle stabilized herself and clasped her hands near her navel. Her lips twitched, trying to twist into a smile; a bittersweet one, loaded with nostalgia and regret. "No, I figured out my unfinished business. Jade. I had to admit to myself that I... loved her. Love her. There, I said it out loud!" She gaped at her feet, at her legs, at her arms, waiting to vanish, to be sucked into another dimension. "I can go now."

Vegetative state, here I come. Fuck this Void place.

But nothing happened. Arielle remained suspended in air, and Penelope fixed her with widening eyes and—dare she think it?—a slight smirk of amusement.

"But... what the heck?" Arielle huffed and squinted at Penelope, waiting for an explanation. "I said it. You told me I had to say it, and I did, I admitted it..."

"Cute." Penelope uncrossed her arms and reached forward, tucking a strand of Arielle's hair behind her ears. The contact sent a stomach-curdling shiver to scatter up and down each of Arielle's extremities, and prompted her to suck in her gut and straighten her spine. "But it's not enough. And it's too late, anyway. Much too late." The redness in her eyes magnified, filling up as if she were bleeding, sparkling as if she were about to cry. As she retracted her fingers from Arielle's ear, Arielle noticed claws in place of her nails—long, sharp, and deadly.

"What the... what do you mean too late?" She shot backwards and out of reach from Penelope's talons, unsure what would happen should she be speared with them. Would that send her to a new realm? To another portion of the Void? To... Terror? What happened when one ghost murdered another? "And... what are you planning to do with... those?" She jutted her chin at the monstrous claws.

Fuck... I need to hide, but I have nowhere to go.

Penelope chuckled. "Oh, these?" She raised her hands and clicked her sordid, sharpened nails together. "Don't worry, they're not for you." She cracked her neck and spread her arms, then took off into the entryway, where they'd abandoned Benny.

He was hunched over, still seemingly catching his breath, muttering to himself; but though Arielle followed Penelope over to him, she had no clue what he was saying. It was belligerent banter, and whatever it was... wouldn't save him now.

She's going to rip him to shreds. But I thought... ghosts couldn't kill?

"Please... is this necessary?" said Arielle, once more attempting to interfere on Benny's behalf.

Penelope didn't bother to turn to her, and used her energy to tug Benny upwards, into a straightened position. "It is."

Benny peered around himself, clearly unsure how he'd been pushed up, and likely wondering how he was able to balance himself. His legs wobbled, his fingertips spasmed, and his face was sheet white. "Huh? You... you're back?"

"I'm back." Penelope's figure fizzled in and out, like a TV searching for a channel. She blurred, disappeared, then reappeared brighter than ever, and the red outline from earlier resurfaced, too. "See me, now?"

Sure enough, from his abrupt reaction—his jaw dropped and his eyes bulged as he gawked at Penelope, unable to remove his focus from her red glare—Benny could see her. "You... you?"

"Me." Penelope lifted her arms, revealing her claws, that Benny gasped at. "Goodbye, Benny."

Benny's mouth opened, and a screech erupted from its depths; but it weakened immediately as Penelope clawed into him. And like with the scratches from the night before, she reveled in every motion, licking her lips with pleasure as she tore into his gut, his lungs, his heart. His insides spilled out and splattered before him. Blood broke free and gushed to the floor, and Benny wavered forwards, then backwards, before collapsing onto his spine, unmoving.

"Shit!" Arielle scurried over, levitating over his immobile form, wishing she knew what to do. Could she gather strength to restart his heart? To pick up his intestines and toss them into his tummy? Could she find something to glue his lungs together?

She sank to the ground beside him and covered her mouth as she gagged. No, she could do nothing. The stench of death overtook her nostrils, and the longer she stared at his organs slipping out of him, at the blood pouring from the various wounds Penelope had caused, she felt sick. Sicker than when she'd tried to go upstairs, sicker than when she'd first learned of Jade's death.

"Shit, Penelope." She sniffled as she crawled from Benny's corpse, away from the stains on the floor-boards and the squishy sound of blood continuing to cascade out of his chest, his abdomen. "That was... too much. Too much."

Penelope peeped at her claws as they reshaped into regular nails. A thick scarlet liquid dripped from them, splashing into a pool a few inches below her feet. "It wasn't. I told you, it was necessary."

Arielle dared another glimpse at Benny, and her breaths caught in her throat as she saw a different part of him, in see-through, sepia spirit form, floating above his body.

He glanced at Arielle. "I'm... dead?"

Before either Penelope or Arielle could reply, he was sucked upwards, through the ceiling.

"Okay." Arielle whisked over to Penelope, ignoring the nausea in her belly and the agony pounding in her temples. "What the fuck was that? Where did he go? Why did you do this?"

Penelope brushed past her and rotated to the stairs. "It had to be done. Your conversation gave him too much insight, and he couldn't live to share it." Without waiting for a retort from Arielle, Penelope zoomed up to the balcony and crashed through the door to the middle bedroom, leaving Arielle alone with Benny's already decaying corpse, and with no inkling what she was supposed to do next.