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JEROME'S
QUEST
- Published 12/03
I
have written a film script of A GHOST AMONG US (volume one)
and am currently working on volume three of the Ghost saga,
THE LAST DESCENDANT.
Synopsis
At the end of A Ghost Among Us, Jerome Kennington, the
ghost who inhabited the three townhouses in Hampstead,
was given one year to locate the soul of his long lost
love, Alicia. Murdered on his wedding night, Jerome had
spent nearly two hundred years in the townhouse before
anyone was able to see or hear him. His pledge to find
his murderer and avenge his own death went unfulfilled
until Dierdre Hall, Charlotte Lewis and Natalie Ladd moved
into the house. A television interviewer, fashion photographer
and painter, the three women were the ones who could see
and hear him, and through them, anyone else who entered
the townhouse they inhabited.
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They and their friends helped Jerome solve his death, whereby
his soul was released into the afterlife, only to return with
the quest of locating Alicia. To aid him in his search Jerome
has a gold locket that will glow when he has located Alicia's
soul. If he can find her before the year is over, he will be
reborn somewhere in her vicinity and they will have another
chance at love. If he doesn't locate her, he will be assigned
a random location for rebirth, and he may never find her again.
Jerome's Quest is the story of the search for Alicia's soul,
and the ensuing problems and complications that search causes.
It begins with the honeymoon of Charlotte Lewis and Paul Harkness,
once a research biologist and now director of The Animal Liberation
Front. Jerome accompanies Charlotte and Paul to Sweden, where
their honeymoon begins in Stockholm. But when Charlotte and
Jerome are in a subway station, the locket begins to glow, and
when they go to rescue an American tourist from some men who
are attacking her, Jerome is attacked himself by a strange being
encased in light and wielding a sword. The shadow-man drags
Jerome into the light with him, and they disappear.
Charlotte takes the American girl back to her hotel and telephones
Robin Herald in London. Robin Herald, lead singer of the rock
band Experimental Monkeys and Dierdre's live-in lover, is also
the direct descendant of Jerome and Alicia Kennington, since
their first and only child was conceived six weeks before their
wedding at a garden party in Richmond.
Robin flies to Stockholm to assist Charlotte and Paul in their
attempts to get Jerome back from where he has been taken. Before
they are able to do this, however, Robin gets drunk the first
night of his arrival and awakens to discover the American girl
in his bed. Unfortunately, Dierdre has followed Robin to Stockholm,
and she discovers her there, as well.
They are able to pull Jerome back into the real world, though
he can't remember much about where he was except a lot of fog
and a landscape that never seemed to vary.
Dierdre returns home to London after telling Robin to find somewhere
else to live. He also returns and gets a room in a hotel, where
he plans to stay until he starts his world tour in a few weeks.
Jerome is also scheduled to accompany him on the tour, and continue
the search for Alicia. Robin is a little worried about Jerome
being pulled back into the shadow world, but none of them can
think what to do in order to prevent it.
Charlotte and Paul continue on to the rest of Scandinavia for
their honeymoon.
Shortly before the tour begins, Robin and Dierdre are reconciled.
But the same night, as they are asleep, the shadow figure encased
in light attacks Robin in Dierdre's bedroom, and the last thing
she sees is Robin being pulled into the light the same way Jerome
was.
Jerome has no idea how to retrieve Robin, or even where he has
been taken. But Robin emerges in 'Limbo', a limbo world very
different from that of Christian myth. Limbo is a place where
souls who are waiting to be re-born but cannot re- incarnate
for some reason go to wait until their roster is cleared. Robin
has been pulled into Limbo by Charles Brent, Jerome's murderer
in Regency England. Brent also has one year to locate the soul
of Alicia, but he is hampered by the fact that he cannot exit
Limbo. He mistook Robin for Jerome, and pulled him into Limbo
thinking to foil his quest. He also doesn't know how to return
Robin to the real world, and takes him into Limbo City to consult
with some experts there.
Jerome is pressed into impersonating Robin on his world tour.
This starts with a sold-out concert at Wembley Stadium, at which
Jerome performs creditably and only attracts a little skepticism
regarding his identity -- his band-members wonder if he has
been taking elocution lessons. After the concert Jerome and
Dierdre attempt to sneak out the back of the auditorium when
Jerome's locket begins to glow again. This leads them to rescue
a teenaged runaway (male) who is being beaten by a pimp.
The boy, Dennis, enlists their help in finding a girl who has
also been trapped by the pimp, and is walking the streets in
his employ. When they find Rita, they acquire a whole group
of runaways. Dierdre has the idea to turn the remaining two
basements of the townhouses (the ones not occupied by The Animal
Liberation Front offices) into a shelter for the runaways. This
causes a lot of problems, some of them the obvious ones, and
some they never would have anticipated.
In Limbo, Robin travels to the haven of the animals with Charles
Brent tagging behind. He is assisted by a number of the animals
themselves, who finally lead him to where Alicia shows him the
way into the real world. Unfortunately, his appearance, nude,
occurs onstage in Vienna while Jerome is impersonating him.
They barely get out of the city without being arrested, and
from that point on they tell everyone they are cousins. Jerome
continues on the tour and appears every night for one number
with Robin, spending the rest of the time looking for Alicia's
soul.
After his return, Robin has trouble becoming oriented to the
real world again, and begins drinking more heavily. He doesn't
like having the runaways in the house during his break in the
tour, and when he and Jerome are in Rome, the locket again leads
them to someone in trouble; this time a young Italian prostitute
attempting to outrun her pimps. They send her back to London
to work for Didi and watch the runaways, but she seduces Dennis
and causes Rita to run away again.
Jerome discovers his powers extend to teleportation, and he
thinks himself back to London in order to help Dennis and the
runaways find Rita, who has again been captured by Jack, the
pimp.
After the tour ends, the whole group accompanies Natalie and
Vladimir to Russia, where they are wed. In the wedding party
is a friend of Natalie's, an artist named Deborah.
Deborah falls in love with Jerome and has a brief affair with
him (necessarily brief, since he has only a few weeks left of
his year). Jerome and Deborah accompany Natalie and Vladimir
on their honeymoon in Russia, and upon their return, Jerome
discovers the soul of Alicia in a London underground station.
She has been born to a drug-addicted mother, and when they take
her home to Hampstead with them she disappears two days later,
leaving Alicia to be raised by Robin and Didi.
Charlotte is by this time four months pregnant, and when Jerome
realizes that she will be his mother, he is called back to the
afterlife to await his rebirth.
SAMPLE CHAPTER
Chapter Eleven: No Way Out
Charles Brent led the way along a path that seemed, to Robin,
to weave in and out of shadows that revealed stranger and stranger
glimpses of worlds he couldn't reach. "Hold it," he
finally said. "Why am I seeing all these people and places
that aren't really there?"
His guide seemed to be considering this. "Well, I can't
see them myself. It must be because you're still alive."
"But what are they?"
"I think they must be different places and times in history.
Somewhere along this path is your world, the one I pulled you
out of."
"Then why did you take me away from it? Now I won't be
able to get back."
"What makes you think it would remain in the same place?
Time is forever moving, or didn't you realize that? If it wasn't,
it wouldn't be time, would it?" Charles started to walk
along the path again, and Robin was forced to follow or lose
sight of him in the shifting shadow-patterns.
"Then how will I find it?"
"We'll have to try to get a message to the central computer,
and put in a request for intervention. After all, a mortal man
shouldn't be here in Limbo."
"Why do you call it that -- that's a Christian term."
Charles shrugged. "What would you have me call it? We have
no other reference point, do we? There's the city, up ahead."
He pointed with one finger, and Robin thought that he, too,
looked very mortal. But the 'city', if it could be called that,
didn't look anything like a place where mortal men might live.
In fact, it resembled nothing more than thousands of strings
of clear Christmas lights that formed the outlines and shapes
of buildings. Robin blinked.
"I don't understand. What is it?"
"The city. I told you. We call it 'Pandemonium', after
Lucifer's city in Hell. I didn't think that one up -- it was
done long before I got here, by someone who's been reincarnated
by now. For all I know it could've been Milton himself. Must've
been a real surprise for him when he landed here. The religious
ones are always shocked; some of 'em never get over it till
they're reborn, then they forget, of course."
They were descending a hill into the 'city'. Robin couldn't
figure out why, when the buildings appeared to have no walls,
he couldn't see anything inside. Instead, he could see right
through them to the street beyond. And the one on the other
side of the street, and the street after that, and on through
the entire city.
"Where do we go in the city to do this thing? Contact the
central computer, I mean. After all, there's nothing inside
the buildings."
Charles glanced back him with a strange look on his face. "What
makes you say that?"
"Because I can see through them!"
"That's odd -- I certainly can't. Perhaps because you're
mortal, and they only have substance on a kind of etheric plane."
"Look, Brent -- can we stop somewhere for a cup of coffee
and something to eat? It's not that I don't want to get home,
but I do have a few questions I'd like to ask you."
Charles shrugged. "Sure; why not? I know of a little cafe
we can go to."
"Hey -- I was halfway joking! You mean you people really
eat?"
"Of course we do." Charles slowed in his progress
down the street. People were turning to stare at them -- Robin
wondered why, and wanted to stare back in turn. They were of
all ages, both male and female. This in itself wasn't unusual,
of course -- it was the fact that they were also from every
time period in earth's history, and they had retained their
original clothes from the moment they died. This only seemed
to cover a few hundred years, however -- apparently whoever
had been there from an earlier era had been reborn. But why
were they staring at him, Robin wondered. Did he look different
to them? "Hey, Brent -- why are your friends staring at
me?" "Because you have an aura, why else?"
Robin blinked. "And you don't?"
"Of course we don't! Are you ever thick -- I'm glad you're
not my descendent. We're dead -- you're alive." He stopped
at a small sidewalk cafe. People were seated at the tables,
eating what appeared to be real food and drinking real liquid.
He indicated an empty table and Robin sat in the white chair.
"What would you like?"
"Coffee and a danish -- do they have stuff like that here?"
Charles shook his head disparagingly. "You still don't
get it, do you? They have everything here -- whatever the inhabitants
can imagine. If I want a high English tea, that's what they'll
serve me."
"You sure this place isn't Heaven?"
"There is no Heaven, unless you count the place where they
run the computers from."
Robin nodded. "That's what Jerome said, but who runs the
computers?"
"Well, I suppose if you wanted to, you could call them
angels. It's not what they call themselves, of course, but Christians
find some comfort in it."
"Do you consider yourself a Christian?"
Charles gave a snort of laughter. "Hardly, son. Nobody
who's dead can call themselves that, can they? Not once they
know the reality of the thing. Besides, I didn't consider myself
one then -- after all, I did engineer Jerome's murder."
"Are you of the opinion Christians never engage in murder?"
"I suppose you have a point." Their food arrived at
the table, and Robin was surprised to discover he could actually
smell his apricot danish.
"This actually seems like real food. I just don't get it."
"Seems is the operative word, here. You perceive it as
food, so that's what it is."
Robin frowned down at the pastry. "So what is it really
-- a cow plop?"
Laughing again, Charles took a bite of his own pastry. "I
like you, son, I really do. I should've known Jeri would produce
some superior offspring. No, it's not really there at
all, but because you perceive it as being there, it will nourish
you."
"You mean it will nourish you. I'm here in my mortal body,
remember?"
"Oh, shut up and eat already! Do you want to get home,
or not?"
Robin bit into the danish; it was fresh and sweet. When he drank
a sip of coffee, it was as fine as any to be found in a four-star
restaurant. "Damned straight I do. If I'm not there by
next week, Jeri is gonna hafta take my place on the Experimental
Monkeys tour. I can just envision that fiasco, and it's not
pretty."
Charles swallowed a bit of his own pastry. "Would you care
to explain that, or is it a secret?"
"I'm the lead singer in a rock band. I expect you don't
know what that is, do you?"
"Of course I do! There are some rock singers here -- they
die too. And the name of the band is Experimental Monkeys --
what does it mean?"
"You did live in an innocent era, didn't you? They use
animals for experimentation now -- to see if drugs and food
and cosmetics are fit for human consumption."
"How would that tell them?" Charles finished his danish
and signaled to the waiter to bring him another. "Care
for another?"
"Please. I can't understand why I'm so hungry. Listen,
I've really got to get home within a day or two."
Charles shook his head regretfully, sipping his coffee. "Best
coffee in the city. Afraid that's impossible, old man. You see,
time runs a little differently here." He pulled an antique
pocket watch out of his jacket and checked the time. When Robin
glanced at the watch, he couldn't make it out -- it appeared
to have two faces superimposed, with hands that ran independently
of one another. "You've been here for two hours, now. Two
days have passed in your world."
Robin blinked. "You mean for every hour that passes here,
a whole day goes by at home? That means the band leaves for
the tour in three days! If I'm here only three more hours, then
they'll go without me -- or they won't go at all. Oh, shit --
we've gotta hurry, Brent!"
"No point, Rob. You know, it's difficult for me not to
call you Jerome. You see, the process of getting you back is
going to be a long and tedious one. You'll be lucky if you don't
end up in the wrong time period entirely. That's what happens
when they try to rush the thing."
"Do you mean I'm not the first this has happened to?"
"'Course not! Happens all the time."
"Then why don't any of the people talk about it when they
get back."
"Some of 'em try -- everybody thinks they're mad. Some
of them keep it to themselves. 'Course with you, all your friends
already know about Jerome, so they'll know you're telling the
truth. A lot of those stories about people being abducted by
aliens are really about people who got pulled through, and somebody
else saw it happen."
The waiter placed another pastry in front of Robin. "How
much time are we talking about here?" He asked Charles.
"A conservative estimate would be a year in real time.
Could get lucky, though -- say nine months."
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