There are five spirits who follow Aile since she was a patient in the IBF basement. They do not all appear at once, usually there are two elders who accompany her sister Stephanie. Stephanie is the youngest of the spirits, and each of the others are from a different period of Chinese history and only a few had even been to the US in their lives.
Over a decade ago, the ancestors of Aile Lang convened to celebrate the ascendance of one of their family’s ancient relatives who had perished during the warring period of the Zhou Dynasty. He was ancient when he died. By then, he was a brilliant and ruthless military tactician who outlived all of his peers and wrote many books to guide the next generation in protecting their city against the chaos that waged around them. His spirit survived for nearly two millennia and he spent considerable time advising his descendants in China. His name was Wêi and his spirit disappeared before a small gathering of other spirits of his long family lineage near the same spot of his birth on Earth, near modern day Shandong province. The energies of his spirit let go of their entanglement, and he was called to the great beyond where he would reunite with the heaven that is all existence. It was the death of a spirit, when he ceased to exist as he did on Earth in any of the realms of matter. But for the ancestors of Aile it was much more than a death, it was a return to the source, to heaven, to the creator of all things.
Very shortly after Wêi disappeared, Stephanie died on a trip to the family’s ancestral home and she was greeted by four relatives who had attended Wêi’s last moments in existence as we understand it.
“It is a shame to die so young,” her relative Fang, who was born during the Tang Dynasty said sympathetically. “You are welcome to walk with me, though before his transcendence, Wêi warned of a peril that will befall the spirit realm of humanity and the future should be difficult.”
Stephanie was just fourteen years old at her death and she cried inconsolably while Fang traveled with her to follow her family back to the states where her body was to be buried. And Fang watched, heartbroken, as Stephanie sat in her family’s home, grieving with them and feeling sorry for her sister who seemed to take the death the hardest.
“You should not torture yourself with the grief of your loved ones,” Fang eventually explained to her when it was clear that Stephanie would mourn forever if she let her. “Your sorrow weighs on them. Even if you can’t physically harm them, they are aware of your presence on some level and your sadness makes it hard for them to know happiness.”
Stephanie was stubborn, but when Aile was institutionalized, she wondered if being happy could rub off on her sister, and she followed her to the facility in Columbia, South Carolina. She wasn’t able to change Aile’s disposition, but she watched as her sister made friends and one of the women had such a bright soul that Fang would often inspect her closely like she was an oddity. Over the course of their friendship, they were transferred to another facility in rural Georgia, and it was there that Fang insisted that the soul of Aile’s friend was glowing more brightly, and Aile began to see Stephanie’s spirit for the first time. She was reluctant to acknowledge her little sister, and when she finally did, Fang convened a group of the Lang ancestors who were happy to have a genuine Wu, or intermediary to the spirit world, in their family. Even though the friend of Aile could not see spirits, Fang was sure that she too was a Wu, because of the way her essence glowed.
“We are here because something bad is happening,” Fang explained to Aile after Stephanie convinced her to acknowledge them. Fang was explaining the disturbance that would result from the resurrection of a man from death, even though she and the other spirits were not aware that this was the occurrence that would disrupt their existence. They could sense change on the horizon and when it happened, some of the spirits disappeared and Fang witnessed the winged man who spoke to the friend of Aile and warned of the disturbance caused by the dislocation of a spirit from the place beyond, the final resting place of all spirits when they give up their form and return to heaven.
Fang arrives at the home where Aile currently lives with a woman named Wendy, who is also Wu, but it has taken Fang some time to warm up to the woman. When Aile left the IBF, Fang tried to talk her out of moving in with the dark-skinned woman, afraid that Wendy would try to use her for her family’s modest wealth. This made Aile laugh, and time in her house has shown Fang that Wendy is the hardest working, most intelligent person she had ever underestimated.
Fang finds Wendy preparing for an early day at work.
“You are beautiful,” Fang says, approaching Wendy from behind as she focused on her hair in the mirror. “I don’t know why you wake so early to look good for your medical work.”
“It’s a whole body presentation ā yí Fang, I have to look and smell like someone you can trust to shock your brain.”
They smile together and when Wendy is done in the mirror, they talk while Wendy eats breakfast.
“There is no luck in the search for the man Kevin,” Fang starts and she seems to hesitate.
“What’s wrong?” Wendy asks.
“Anesuishe and I have spoken, she will find you later, but she is only coming to convince you of what I will tell you. You should not seek out this Kevin. I understand that you think you need him to find your friends who helped you, but you don’t. And maybe you shouldn’t be looking for your friends either.”
Wendy is very confused.
“We spirits have access to feelings, and we can use that access to find our loved ones, or we can train them on others like we have for Kevin. And we all sense it, even Stephanie, the energies of this man do not feel welcoming. They feel hostile. The same for the others.”
“They could all be in trouble…” Wendy starts.
“That is true, but distress feels different. They are feeling something that is not distress.”
“So you know where they are?” Wendy asks hopefully.
Fang shakes her head. “Anesuishe has become a friend to me and we have learned much from each other. Together, we can sense the men you seek, but we cannot pinpoint a location. There are other spirits, Wendy, and they seem to know our intentions. We think we have invited the hostility of bad spirits in our search. Anesuishe mentioned the presence of a familiar bad spirit she had encountered before…”
“Miriro,” Wendy says. She glares off into the distance and Fang stared at her with concern. “We’re definitely finding them now.”
PRL Serials 