Chapter 2

I must look a sight. A dazed, acting dream demon who is clearly out of his element, floating inactively in front of crowd of extremely large, extremely intimidating men. The inmates, for that was what they obviously were, didn't seem to notice my presence, however. They were muttering amongst themselves, and I could pick out a few comments of: "Did it work?" and "I knew this was a bust!" here and there.

Weird. Apparently they couldn't see me, which wasn't a promising sign at all, seeing as I was supposed to be entirely physical. But, before I could have a meltdown about this little, worrying fact about my humanity, an unwanted presence returned to my psyche.

I told you I'd be back after you're summoned Pine Tree! I groaned out loud at Bill's voice ringing out annoyingly in my head; Is this gonna be a regular thing Bill?

You bet, kid! This time I actually face palmed, yelping as an unwanted blue flame made its presence felt with the slap as well. I scowled as I heard Bill's obnoxious laughter echo through my mind, Okay! So why are you here, Bill? I spat out telepathically, folding my arms over my bowtie again.

I said I'd handle the actual deal-making didn't I? He did say that, I guess.

But…Oh, here we go, I decided that I'd just give you a little help with it instead.

WHAT?! That wasn't part of the deal Bill! I replied angrily.

Technically, it can be part of the deal if I want it too. You did say you'd do anything I wanted, I could practically feel him smirking in my head. It was not a pleasant experience.

Fine! Fine. Just – stop bringing that up okay? I felt my frown deepen as I let out a resigned sigh, what do I do?

That's the spirit, kid! Lesson one in handling summonings: make an entrance!

Now how the heck was I supposed to do that? Oddly enough, the answer came to me sooner than I expected it to, if I expected it to come to me at all. It was almost as if the knowledge was there already, and I should have known what to do all along. In fact, I felt stupid for not remembering in the first place, and that fact mildly disturbed me. I brushed it off as another of Bill's disturbing personality side effects though, not wanting to contemplate any other possibility.

Also, while all these emotions were flowing through my triangular frame, Bill was strangely quiet. I didn't miss him, though. My mind was on other things:

I do have to admit; my entrance idea was pretty awesome. Or Bill's was. Whatever. If it was Bill's idea, the demon-guy actually has a complicated, but totally cool, imagination. He's pretty smart too…liKE I aM. I mean, I know I'm intelligent, c'mon. I found that first journal siNgLe-hANdEdlY. Sure, Mabel was there, but it was me – ME – who was responsible for all our mind-blowing adventures this summer. If I hAdN't uSEd MY bRilLiANt sKilLS of deduction on even oNe of the occasions I had, we wouldn't Be wHeRe wE were now…

And I wouldn't finally have a fORm capable of expressing my smarts – and all around general AWESOMENESS – to the world. Yeah! I mean, it's aBoUT tImE pEOple regret ALL tHe tiMes they oVErLoOkED me jUSt beCaUsE of my age, or sOCiAl ineptness.

I'lL sHOw ThEm JuST wHat ThEY mIsSed OuT oN.

Roger was fed up. He was one of the few inmates in this particular cell at the Rorschach Rehabilitation Centre who had not been keen on the idea to turn to the unknown for help. Eventually though, seeing as the men who were desperate enough to do so far outnumbered the few who weren't ready to compromise what was left of their sanity, he'd had to relent and had sat in a corner of the large cell, hugging his knees to his chest while the others set about scratching into the floor with their chalk.

He had to admit, though. He was very relieved when nothing had happened after the ritual was over and done with. He was never a religious man per se, but he didn't want to mess with what could possibly be out there. And in any case, he'd rather turn to the Heavens for help, than what seemed to be the opposite. Still, he felt sorry for his fellow inmates. Yes, they wanted to break out of prison, but they weren't necessarily bad guys. Petty criminals, the lot of them were. No murderers, rapists, arsonists, or anything of that sort; heck, Roger himself was in for large scale tax evasion.

The orange-clad man looked up from where he'd been focussing on his hands, which were still wrapped around his knees, to gauge the others' reactions to their failure. Sure enough, they were squabbling like kindergarteners on a playground, pointing fingers and blaming everyone else but themselves for the ritual-gone-wrong. After a while of studying the rowdy group for a few moments though, Roger felt the need to rub his eyes. His vision had gone really weird for a second. He could have sworn he saw the room begin to lose what little colour it had left in its already monotonous walls. When he removed his hands from his face however, he saw that he had indeed been correct.

The multi-coloured chalk marks on the walls left by the inmates who had practiced their drawing skills before creating the summoning thing, had drained to various shades of grey. Roger gulped. He was hoping against hope that what he thought was happening was simply a figment of his imagination.

He was wrong.

A creepy, nasal cackle suddenly filled the room, shutting the shouting inmates up immediately. Collectively, the cell's occupants looked up in the air above the chalk, where the silhouette of a triangle had appeared out of nowhere through which could be seen galaxies and planetary bodies in motion. It was as if they were looking into another dimension through a polygonal doorway and the inmates stared, slack-jawed in their rapt attention at the paranormal rift. The cackling grew louder and a few of the men shuddered at the sound, only for all of them to jump backwards a second later when a large eye blinked into existence on the triangular gap. It had a single, slit pupil that stared eerily back at them as the cackle built into roaring laughter so loud, that all human ears were reflexively covered.

Roger had gone white as a sheet and, unbelievably, was walking towards the crowd while the others were shrinking away from what was clearly their mistake to have summoned in the first place. Suddenly, the laughter cut off as unexpectedly as it had begun, and the cell was left in silence as the triangular silhouette peeled itself away from its place in the air, and seemed to become a solid, two-dimensional pyramid. A top hat was now floating above its head and four limbs had sprouted from its sides, two of which it used now to pull at a black bowtie that had appeared just underneath its eye. The one that was now staring at them with what seemed to be a sneer. If eyeballs could sneer.

"Alright boys, I have a proposition for ya."