Regular people always said she was crazy. Most changed the subject when her name was brought up. They never told Greg the real story about his grandmother. So he didn't know what to expect when at the age of thirteen his deadbeat parents dropped him off with his Grandma Midge.
What followed was years of adventure. They crisscrossed the globe together. From the snowy Arctic to the sandy deserts, but they didn't travel for the sightseeing, they did it for work. Greg found out all those years ago that his grandmother was in a very peculiar line of work. She pursued evil spirits. Grandma Midge hunted them down and sent them back from whence they came.
She was damn good at it, too. The older woman managed to stay in great shape on the road, moving from place to place and always staying one step ahead of the bad guys. She was turning sixty by the time Greg came to her. It was a good thing because the youth and energy he brought to the table contributed to their success on the hunt. They were a team and worked together seamlessly.
Midge kept him safe during the steep learning curve that came with this life. She delighted in teaching her grandson the business. She taught him that the spirits they stalked used to rule the world. Back when fear and frustration reigned supreme. Back before humans put them on the run.
Greg learned how important the Old World was. Specifically the great civilizations that were once established around the Mediterranean. The ones that grew more powerful and more organized than any others before. They did it by developing the magics that kept evil spirits at bay. By creating techniques that could ward off those spirits. This allowed humans to flourish and the great societies to be born.
In time, humanity forgot about those spirits. And in a way we became victims of our own success. Spirits made a resurgence. They fought a bitter war against humanity in the Dark Ages, only to eventually be beaten back again by a new line of hunters. Spirit stalkers like Midge who kept them on the run and out of the news up until the present day.
Midge and Greg were on the trail of a new spirit. They'd tailed it across the states. It was a real nasty bitch that could possess humans and control them. They'd gotten close, made the spirit desperate. It couldn't stay in any one place for long. Every day brought them closer to a showdown and it with a one-way ticket downstairs.
The spirit had a human protecting it. A misguided idiot the spirit fooled into worship of it. Greg spotted him at a convenience store near Dallas. They knew the spirit had to be close. Greg and his grandmother followed him to a vacant house where the spirit had been staying in the body of a young woman.
The spirit and her lackey managed to slip away, but not without Midge and Greg right behind. The grandmother and grandson hunting duo caught up with them on the highway and ended up a high-speed chase.
"Faster!" Midge said to her grandson at the wheel as she sat a revolver on her thigh and hurriedly flipped through a book of spells.
"Exorcism spell. What about the guy? Got anything for that?" Greg asked, steadily gaining on the fleeing truck.
Midge brandished the gun. "A pistol."
Greg laughed. "We don't kill people," he said, executing a sharp turn after the truck and looking out for any police cars.
"I raised a real softie," Midge looked over at her grandson lovingly. "We need to be prepared, darling. Let's just get the bitch before it kills again."
"Hear, hear." Greg smiled.
They cut their conversation short as the truck skidded to a stop outside an abandoned warehouse in the factory district. They watched the spirit in the body of the woman make a run for it straight to the warehouse. Midge flung her car door open and hopped out with the spellbook by her side.
"Take care of the bonehead," she said. "I'll get the bitch." Greg's grandmother pursued the spirit into the factory with remarkable agility for an old broad.
Greg popped out of the car where the spirit's human protector was waiting for him. Greg noticed with a sigh that he sure was a big son of a bitch.
"Your grandma teach you how to fight too?" the man jested. Jokes from a guy that spent his days brown-nosing dirty spirits.
"Yeah," Greg replied, "she taught me how to take down bigger opponents."
"How?" the guy grinned.
"I'll show you how." Greg delivered a swift kick to the man's most vulnerable spot. "By not playing fair." The guy buckled over. Greg ached for him. "Don't worry, I'll fetch you an ice pack after my grandma takes care of your ghoulish girlfriend."
Greg hightailed it inside the warehouse and followed the commotion to an upper level. By the time he got there the woman was knocked out on the floor and his grandmother was standing over her.
"There you are, Greg. You missed all the fun," his grandmother said.
Greg examined the woman. "Is she all right?"
"She will be. And the guy outside?" Midge put the spellbook in her back pocket.
"I wouldn't want to be him right now, but he should be okay."
"Good work. Let's get going before the cops show up," she smiled.
"Good idea. Give me the spellbook and I can mark this spirit off the list," Greg held out his hand for it.
She looked at his hand and grinned. "When did you know?" she asked. "Was it when I said good work? Is it always onto the next case with you two, Grandmommy never telling you good job?"
"No," he answered. "It was when you called me Greg. Grandma never calls me that. I'm always her sweetheart or her darling. Especially if she was happy, which she would have been if she'd just sent your ass packing. Guess I'll have to do that for her."
His grandmother's head shook. "Well see about that, darling." She sprung off the ground at Greg. He dodged quickly and wrestled her off her feet. He knew the spirit would be weak after just possessing a new body and so also knowing his grandmother was still in there somewhere, Greg took great pains not to hurt her. The spirit fought viciously. Greg narrowly evaded his grandmother's sharp nails as he managed to incapacitate it.
Greg carried his grandmother's body out and found the man was still there. "Where is my mistress? Tell me!" he begged, still holding his crotch.
Greg remembered the young woman lying unconscious in the warehouse. "She's, uh, she's up two flights of stairs inside. Get her to the hospital." The guy ran awkwardly into the warehouse after her.
The young man took his grandmother back to the motel where they'd spent a few nights hunting this thing. That's where the spirit awoke tied to a radiator. Greg pulled up a chair with the spellbook on his lap.
The spirit inside Midge grinned. "Aren't you just grandmother's good little soldier."
"I'm good enough to know how to handle you." He opened the spellbook.
"I've got to tell you I was flattered when I heard the great Midge Bannon was on my trail."
"I bet," Greg replied as he thumbed through the book.
"I really thought I'd given you two the slip outside Tulsa. I racked up a hell of a body count at the border to keep you occupied."
"I know. Grandma drove all night to get there in time to do a resuscitation spell. We saved every one of them."
"You're lying!" The spirit scowled.
"Grandma got the rock for the spell off the Acropolis in Athens herself. We keep extra ground up and ready in the car just in case a stupid spirit with a death wish like you goes on a killing spree. You don't know the name Midge Bannon for nothing."
"She's a legend," the spirit deftly conceded. "But legends get old. I'm inside her right now and I can feel it. She's on the wrong side of sixty. Not as fast anymore in mind or body. She's lucky she's got you to pick up the slack. I'm jealous. I've had a lot of slaves, but none so capable and obedient as you. A true grandmomma's boy."
"Shut up." He'd heard enough. He knew it wasn't really her saying them, but it still hurt to hear some of these things coming from the mouth of his loving grandmother.
The spirit couldn't keep quiet for long. "Other boys your age are off in college. They're making friends and bedding coeds while you're on the road with your grandmother chasing phantoms."
"Found the spell. Your next words better be goodbye."
"Wait!" Midge's eyes widened. "Your grandmother's more fragile than you know and I'm more powerful than you think," it said quickly. "Exorcise me and I'll kill her. I'll leave a lifeless body in my wake."
"Now you're the one who's lying," Greg challenged.
"I can do it! She'll be at her weakest during the exorcism. I'll be able to turn her brain to jello," the spirit threatened.
