Psychonauts
Chapter II: Basic Braining
"Whoa. What is this place?" All around the two of them, there were bland walls with no wallpaper, a small desk with a broken armchair, a few papers on the desk, and a hard-tiled floor. As Raz and Elton looked around, they noticed that it bared a striking resemblance to an office. It was really dark and not illuminated at all. "Is this a dentist's office?" Elton asked in a semi-frightened tone.
"I don't think so..." Raz answered, trailing off as he spoke. Suddenly, a light illuminated the room, but it wasn't what the two had expected. Oleander's face appeared on the wall in front of them as if it was being shown by some projector. Raz even turned around to look at the wall behind him, but the projection seemed to be literally coming from nowhere. After turning back to look at the coach, it appeared as if Oleander was looking directly into Raz's eyes.
"This is no dentist's office!" Oleander shouted, causing Elton to nearly jump out of his skin. "This is a recruiting office! This is where people would go to be recruited into the army, and that is exactly what the two of you are doing. Prepare yourselves for the worst thing in your lives. Prepare yourselves for the battlefield." Oleander paused for a moment, soaking in both of their reactions. Raz appeared to be intrigued and challenged while Elton was shaking, obviously feeling horrified. "Now, before you begin, I have just a bit of advice for you. This is Basic Braining, not some playground thing. You must use your brain to get through the course, or you will not make it. But I must warn you, simply using your brain is not enough to reach the end. You must also have physical talent as well, or these tasks at hand could be just enough to wipe you out. This is a real-life projection of a battlefield I had once been in, so do not expect it to be calm! It will be loud! It will be dangerous! And most of all, it will be threatening!
"The human mind. Six hundred miles of synaptic fiber. Five and a half ounces of cranial fluid. 15,000 grams of complex neural matter. A three pound pile of dreams. This is your weapon! Do not neglect it!" Raz and Elton began to get less tense after the coach had spent several minutes talking. However, both of them still felt it necessary to prepare themselves for the upcoming challenges. "Now! I want one of you two to punch me square in the jaw. Once you do this, you training will begin. This is a contract, so decide carefully. This is your last chance to back out."
"Um, sir, I would like to back out, please," Elton said politely, trying his hardest not to upset Oleander in any way.
"Too late!" Oleander shouted. "You must continue on." Raz and Elton both glanced at each other, wondering who will be brave enough to hit the coach's projection and to begin the training. After a few moments of neither of them responding, Raz decided to walk up towards the wall, just inches in front of Oleander's projected face. He took a deep breath followed by a wide swing of his arm. This resulted in a slightly larger orange hand appearing over his, which appeared to be intangible, but knocked down the wall easily. On the other side, the battlefield was finally revealed.
There were loud bomb explosions, jets flying by overhead, gunfire, and other loud sounds in the background. Directly ahead, a wide platform was connected to another by a torn up bridge. From the looks of it, it was not safe at all to cross the bridge, but it was surely a part of the training that everyone had to go through. So, as Raz stepped forward to begin, he heard something out of his left ear that stopped him. Out of nowhere, Elton was running ahead of him.
"Charge!" he yelled in what was apparently an attempt at a loud voice. His arm was extended in front of him like a general's would be, but before he even made it halfway to the bridge, he exploded and then vanished into oblivion, resulting in the coach's laughter echoing throughout his mind.
"Whoa!" Raz panicked. "What kind of battlefield is this? He just got killed and he hadn't even touched a thing yet! This is impossible!"
"Slow down, kid," Oleander said. His projection appeared on a nearby boulder just to the left of the bridge. Even though it was somewhat of a distance away, Raz could easily recognize it as Oleander's face. "He wasn't killed. He just got his Astral Projection kicked out of my mind. That is what happens when you fail to complete the course."
"So, if I run over to that bridge," Raz began, "I'll get kicked out of your mind too?"
"Not necessarily," Oleander said, holding back laughter. "He just wasn't paying attention to his surroundings. This is a battlefield, remember? Anything can happen anywhere at pretty much anytime. A jet could fly by and destroy your entire troop of marines. Or maybe, a missile could come flying at you and knock you right out of my brain! It all depends on how you look at it."
Great, Raz thought. I'm in the mind of a crazy person who can pretty much destroy anyone in here with a tiny thought. I'm doomed.
"I heard that!" Oleander bellowed. "And I'm quite surprised that it took you this long to realize that my mind is crazy. By the way, you would be right about saying I can destroy anybody I would like to, so I suggest that you get moving before I kick your Astral Projection out of here too! Now move, move, move, move!" Following his orders, Raz jogged along towards the first bridge, prepared for parts of it to break of dematerialize beneath his feet. To his surprise, however, he made it across the bridge without any part of it crumbling. Once on the other side, just before taking a step forward, there is an explosion from a missile crashing down in front of Raz. To his luck, he wasn't injured, but he knew that any more close calls like that and he would soon run out of good luck.
Raz continued through a few trenches, finding thin, glowing objects as he went. He could easily pass through them without harm, but he was unsure as to what they really were. Soon enough, however, Raz could hear Oleander's voice explaining it.
"Those are figments of my imagination," Oleander explained. "Each one you collect gets you closer to the next Psi-Cadet rank. Basically, they make you more powerful. By collecting more of these, you can unlock new psychic abilities that you didn't even know you had. Right now, you aren't powerful enough to manipulate these powers, but over time, you will get the hang of it." Raz just shrugged it off and continued moving, afraid of what could happen next.
The dark green sky made the course of trenches even hard to follow. Raz had nothing but the light of torches and bomb explosions in the sky to lead his way. And to make matters worse, as he progressed farther through sandbags, ladders, nets, and tightropes (all things found in battlefields), he became aware that all of Oleander's mindscape was elevated over a gigantic muddy body of water. If he had fallen out of a trench or right off a tightrope, he would land in the water. Ironically, it had been a good thing that Raz was in a circus with his family.
Several years ago, when Raz was only about four, a curse was placed on the Aquato family. Raz, being the youngest of the family, was the most vulnerable to it. Ever since the curse had been placed, whenever Raz went near a body of water deep enough to drown him, a mystical hand would literally come out of the water and try to hold him beneath the surface. When he was a child, he even had nightmares that started off as good dreams, but turned horrific because even in his brain, the curse wasn't exempt. Several years after, his parents finally explained to Raz what the curse actually was. The mystical hand that popped out of the water was called the Hand of Galochio, named after the Galochios, the gypsy family that put the curse on them. And now, Raz had to deal with the hand as a barrier in nearly anything that had to do with water, which was ironic considering his last name was Aquato, derived from the Latin term aqua meaning water. So, unlike the rest of the campers at Whispering Rock, Raz's life was actually at risk while participating in Basic Braining.
After finally crossing one more tightrope and climbing up another escalation of ladders, passing through a few figments along the way, Raz made it to a stop in the path. A few steps ahead was where a rocket had apparently crashed into the wooden bridge, and fire was still spewing out of the back end of it. Because of this, it was seemingly impossible to cross, even if the gap was small enough to jump.
"Stupid, stupid, stupid!" Bobby complained aloud. "How does he expect us to get across this? It is impossible! We aren't advanced enough to know how to get on the other side!"
"Well, isn't it simple, Bobby?" Raz teased. "There is probably a secret, more advanced route. A way to get around the barrier without actually needing to use any special Psychonaut powers, seeing as the only thing I can do is a psi-punch."
"What are you saying?" Bobby asked angrily. "That you are more advanced than me?"
"Actually, that wasn't what I was implying, but you made it fit perfectly." Raz was amused with their conversation and could easily see Bobby getting even angrier. Then, suddenly, he became calm for a moment, which worried Raz. Then, he burst yet again.
"This training is stupid!" he started his rant. "This bridge is stupid! The coach is stupid! You're stupid!" Raz gritted his teeth behind his closed mouth. "Even that thing flying towards you is stupid!" Bobby had his attention directed behind Raz, looking at something in the distance. Curious, Raz turned his back to look for what was flying at him. However, when he saw that nothing was there, he suddenly found himself plunging off of the broken bridge. Bobby had pushed him right off the edge.
"Ha! The most classic trick in the book!" Bobby laughed after doing a quick, mocking dance and walked away in the opposite direction. Raz, however, was plummeting towards the ground, when suddenly, he just froze in midair. His eyes were tightly closed so at the moment he had no clue what was going on. Then, as he cautiously opened one eye after the other, he realized that there was a strange, neon glowing plant just inches below him. Next to it was Lili, who had one hand against her right temple as if she was performing a psychic power.
"Oh, hello there," Raz said aloud. He was just floating upside down while Lili stared into his eyes, almost intimidatingly. "I know you."
"No kidding, brainiac," Lili replied. "And what do you think you are doing?" Raz went silent. Was she actually asking him what he was doing while he was floating there, just inches from his imminent (or at least he thought it was imminent) death?
"Well," he began, clearing his throat. "I kind of fell off the bridge. Only it wasn't my fault!" Raz began to stumble over his words. "What I mean is, it isn't like I tripped or anything, because that would just be horrible. No, there was this kid. He pushed me right off the edge." Lili looked at him disbelievingly. "Well, he didn't just push me. He kind of tricked me, not that I am gullible or anything." Again, that same disbelieving look burned into Raz's eyes. "Will you just put me down?"
With ease, Lili turned Raz so that his stomach was facing the ground and moved him so he was no longer floating above the plant. Then right when she took her two fingers off of her temple, Raz fell to the ground stagnantly.
"Thank you," Raz said as he struggled to his feet. "How very polite of you." Then his eye caught on the glowing plant. "Hey, that thing is made of meat. That is the strangest thing I have ever seen."
"Yeah, well, try having it in your nightmares," Lili said, returning her gaze to the plants odd shape. "It is even worse."
"You're having nightmares?" Raz suddenly became interested. "I have been learning how to fix those. Uh... can I see one?" Lili looked highly unconcerned.
"No," she said simply. With that, Raz just shrugged and decided to continue through the obstacle course. After he walked away, Lili took a short glance in his direction before looking back at the plant impassively.
After finding an underground tunnel, Raz passed through it quickly to the ladders on the other side. Once he reached the top, he was returned to the dark green, gloomy world of Oleander's mind. Then, after hopping over a few small blimps in the middle of the air with wooden planks on top as a platform, he reached a large mountain-shaped piece of land that had a lot of flat places all the way up. As he climbed, he finally reached a part that had huge silver cannons sticking out, in which he had to shimmy beneath to get to the other side. As he did, the large bursts of gunpowder and cannon balls nearly deafened him to the point where he could no longer hear the jet fighters in the air or the constant bursts of gunfire in the background.
"Good luck, newbie!" someone had yelled to him from a tall wall (which Raz could still barely hear). The wall was covered with green, wrinkly vines which made it possible to climb. So, Raz dashed over to the wall and started his ascent. To his demise however, parts of the wall disintegrated into large puffs of fire, causing it to slightly crumble in spots and leave gigantic, gaping holes.
Strategically, Raz was able to maneuver around the holes, including the new ones as they formed. Much to Raz's surprise, he finally caught up to the person who called him a newbie, which just happened to be Bobby's pal, Benny. His right foot was tangled in part of the vine that had twisted when another part of the wall exploded.
"Oh look, who is the newbie now?" Raz teased. He imitated Bobby's mocking dance as much as he could hanging from the vine-covered wall and then continued up, leaving him behind.
"Stop, new kid!" Benny shouted after him. "Hey! If you make either me or Bobby look bad, you are going to get the beating of a lifetime! Do you hear me?" Raz just ignored him and finally stepped onto level ground, just in time for the wall to come collapsing down, crushing Benny under the rubble. Of course, Raz knew he wasn't actually dead. He just had his astral projection diminished, so he felt no guilt whatsoever when he laughed uncontrollably. Once he was finally able to breathe again, Raz turned around to see an expansive mine field. Almost instantly, the smirk on his face transformed, revealing the dread behind his expression.
Once he walked up to the entrance of the mine field, there was a wisp of shimmering gold light to his right where Dogen suddenly appeared. Just like he did with the squirrels earlier, he appeared to be very frustrated and angry.
"Aw, what's wrong, Dogen?" Raz asked politely. "Not having a good day?"
"No, not at all," Dogen said childishly. He even pouted and curled his lower lip just like a little kid would. "I keep hitting the mines and exploding. Every time, I get teleported back here. I feel like there isn't even a purpose anymore." At first, Raz thought that was all he had to say, but then he mumbled one last sentence. "Maybe those squirrels were right about me..."
"Oh, don't worry about it," Raz said, putting his arm around Dogen's shoulders. "Mines are never that easy. They can be very temperamental if you aren't careful."
"I bet you could do it in one try," Dogen mumbled under his breath. Raz sighed, realizing that if he didn't at least help him out, then he would never stop being upset with him. So, silently, he came up with a decision, but it wasn't a very easy decision.
"Just follow me, Dogen," Raz said aloud, ready to enter the maze of mines. "I can get you to the other side. Just remember to only step where I step, and nowhere else. Got it?" Dogen nodded in confirmation and then they were off. Swerving in and out of patterns made of mines, they didn't touch a single one. Of course, Dogen came close when he suddenly sneezed, but Raz was clever enough to have hold of his arm. Neither of them touched a single mine, and when they reached the other side, Dogen was about ready to celebrate.
"I did it!" Dogen shouted the moment both of them crossed the other side. "I did it! I did it! Take that, Coach Oleander!"
"Dogen!" Raz warned. "Don't forget, we are in his mind. If he decides he doesn't want you to win, he can make it happen." Instantly, Dogen covered his mouth with both hands before remembering his accomplishment and going back to cheering.
"Woo!" he cheered. "I did it! Oh yeah! Woo hoo!" He jumped as high as he could in the air, but once he came back down, he found yet another mine. There was a small pop of fiery heat before Dogen reappeared at the entrance of the mine field. "No!" Raz could hear him from the completely opposite end. "It's okay, Raz! Thanks for helping me! You can go on, I will figure this out on my own!" Raz stayed where he was for a moment, just in case Dogen decided to change his mind, and then just shrugged it off and continued.
Right away, he found himself in a circular arena with gunshot sound effects and large pipes (like the size of trains) sticking out all around him. In the middle, there was a short flagpole with a ripped up flag at the bottom. Slowly, he raised the flag, afraid of what might happen when he got it to the top. Yet once he did, a giant piece of metal ahead opened up just like a jaw, revealing another room inside. He then noticed that two dents above the opening looked like eyes, so it looked like one big face.
"Interesting," Raz said to himself. He leaped forward and entered through the opening. At first, he was completely confused on where he was. When he looked back, he saw that there was no opening at all. In fact, it didn't even looked closed. It looked like a simple wall that wasn't even open-able. Once he looked forward again, he saw a curved window in the front with a control panel and two cushioned chairs nailed to the steel floor. That was when he realized that he had somehow ended up on a jet in the bile-green sky. "What is this?"
"A jet fighter," a little boy replied. Right away, Raz had no idea where he was. Then he finally noticed him standing halfway between the entrance (which was now a wall behind Raz) and the control panel. "We are on a flying object." His voice sounded a bit throaty and his skin was very pale. He was wearing a green baseball cap, a yellow t-shirt with the summer camp's name on it in red, and tanish-yellowish shorts. "My name is Vernon. Aren't you the new kid? How did you get to here already?"
"I don't know." Raz wasn't exactly sure how to respond. Without warning, the red light right above the plane's actual door started flashing and emitting a loud, ear-hammering alarm. Out of nowhere, the control panel caught fire and the whole interior of the jet started to shake.
"Not this again!" Vernon panicked in his nasal voice. "The plane is going down."
"What are we supposed to do?" Raz asked, very confused. He didn't even seem worried so much as how he had even got on the plane. He was still baffled by that.
"Jump off the plane, soldier!" Raz could hear Oleander's loud and obnoxious orders. "That plane is going to be nothing but scrap metal in the next few minutes, and unless you want to be recycled into my watering can, I suggest you jump!"
"But I don't have a parachute," Raz explained. Nothing but silence. Oleander's voice had vanished again and it was just him and Vernon in the jet.
"Well, as long as we are about to become the coach's watering can, I should tell you my favorite story," Vernon began. "One day, I started to walk my dog. Her name was Lady. So, we started down the first street. Then we took a right. Then we took another right. And then we took a left! Then she found a fire hydrant, which I thought was weird. Then we continued down that street. Then we took a left and found—"
"Not that I'm not interested, Vernon," Raz interrupted, "but I really need to get off this plane. I cannot become scrap metal." Or listen to any more of this nonsense, Raz thought, but quickly dismissed it in case Vernon could hear thoughts.
"But if you jump, you would become a pancake instead," Vernon said. Raz thought through this.
"Would you rather be scrap metal, or a pancake?" Raz inquired. It seemed like Vernon really had to think this through, for he began mumbling random numbers to himself and counting them off on his fingers.
"I think a pancake sounds like a lot more fun," Vernon said as his face lit up. Of course, Raz couldn't hear it in his voice. It was practically monotone.
Raz nodded and then grabbed ahold of the door handle. Once he found that tugging, pushing, and pulling with full effort did absolutely nothing, he just psi-punched it and it came right off its hinges, twirling right toward the ground. From the looks of it, the plane was nowhere near the ground yet, but it didn't matter. Falling from a descending plane at any point would result with death.
Before Raz took his jump, Vernon got sucked out of the plane out of nowhere. He didn't even scream when it happened, just let himself be treated like a rag doll. Raz shrugged and then jumped out of the plane, without a parachute. Before he knew it, he found himself plummeting toward the frigid, hard ground at an enormous speed, closer and closer to his imminent doom.
Once Raz made impact with the ground, many, many emotions flooded through his mind and body. A mixture of fear, shock, anger, and pain was in control of his every thought, just imagining his entire skeleton crushing every one of his vital organs, and then returning to the real world with in ache in every single one of his joints. Yet, there was also a sliver of relief somewhere in the tangle-up. After painstakingly attempting to impress Oleander and do a great job on the obstacle course, he would finally be relieved of the huge duty and find some sort of relaxation being back in the real world again. However, that isn't quite what happened.
Raz knew he was done falling, but the cold of the air as he was slicing through it hadn't gone away, and he never felt something indefinitely hard crush his skull or his rib cage. Perhaps he actually died—not just his astral projection, but also his physical body as well.
With the most ease he could possibly manage, Raz opened his eyes to reveal him laying in a huge pile of white. Had he been in heaven? Was it finally all over, just like that? No, that wasn't the truth. He lifted his head (followed by the rush of his buzzing headache) and found that there was snow everywhere. Somehow, he had landed right into a military camp, and he was in a small rounded arena that was clearly used for target practice as targets painted on wooden slabs were ready to pop out of the snow-covered ground randomly once the start button was pushed.
Right out of the sky, which was surprisingly blue but still dark colored with several clouds covering it, snow fell lightly onto the military base. Once Raz stood up, he noticed that the arena had only one exit, which was closed off by a gate that would only open once target practice was completed successfully, or at least that is what Raz assumed.
"Raz!" someone had shouted from the other side of the arena. Raz raised his head again and noticed Clem and Crystal both jumping up and down excitedly in front of the gate. "You made it!" Raz just nodded with a forced smile on his face.
"Maybe you can beat this game!" Crystal shouted, even though Raz had already walked up to them so that he was a couple of feet away. "We sure can't do it! The coach won't let us through the gate until we beat it." That may have been the first time either of the two had said something without any sort of enthusiasm in their tone.
"They're right, Aquato," Oleander announced. Raz got the chills on the word Aquato as if not expecting the coach to know his last name. "I'll tell you what. If you beat this challenge, I will let you through along with a reward. But you must get enough points." Raz shrugged and walked over to the center of the arena where several slots for targets were surrounding. As he stood there, puffs of smoky breath came out of his mouth, and that's when he realized just how cold it was. Yet, he didn't seem to feel it. Most likely because of the adrenaline from jumping out of the plane without a parachute, or just in general.
"Just stomp on that button to begin!" Clem shouted from right in front of the gate. Once Raz had realized how cold it really was, he decided that the reason they were jumping and wriggling was because they were trying to stay warm. Without any more hesitation, he lifted his right foot, got his hands ready to do a lot of psi-punches, and slammed it down hard on the button. Once the first couple of targets popped out of the ground, Raz transformed into a whole new person. Left and right, he threw psi-punches and psi-kicks—which he technically never learned how to do—and knocked down every target in sight. With this speed, Clem and Crystal were both cheering, completely amazed at Raz's speed and accuracy.
Once the targets started coming up more spread out and at a faster pace, Raz started to have a little bit of a hard time. He was forced to leave some behind so he could keep up with the larger clusters of targets. As time depleted, the targets got more and more spread out, up to the point where Raz was almost completely surrounded by small clusters of targets that he had to hit as fast as possible. Then, out of nowhere, all of them shot right back into the ground and the whole world returned to its silence, besides the continual cheering of Clem and Crystal.
"Great job, soldier!" Oleander shouted. "And now, for your reward!" Without warning, Clem and Crystal disappeared in a hot flash of fire and rubble. Where they were standing was two small spots of blackened snow that was already beginning to be covered by a new layer of snow. "Ha! And now you may continue." Raz's expression reflected absolute shock, but he wasn't complaining about it. Instead, the gate opened and he just passed right on through.
On the other side of the gate, there was a short path that led up to a huge cardboard wall. This wall, Raz could tell, would be very easy to knock over, but the purpose for it was unknown. Why would Oleander need to put a giant wall up dividing a larger area from the arena? Obviously, there was going to be some sort of surprise on the other side. So, he prudently pushed it down to reveal a large snowy battlefield with several sandbags and small barriers scattered throughout. The first barrier was taller than the rest and directly ahead. This was probably because the machine gun had already started firing and there was no way, humanly or psychically, that anyone could have prepared for it.
All around him, Raz could see small bullets flying into the piles of snow and nearby barriers and sandbags. Now what was he going to do? Clearly whoever, or whatever, was firing the machine gun had a lot of ammunition and would not let on. The barrier that was protecting him was just getting showered in a storm of bullets. Raz even thought that if he waited much longer, the thing would start to crumble and shrink in size altogether.
And just as quickly as it started, the gunfire came to a halt, leaving an eerie ringing sound hanging in the air. The loud noise was displaced in Raz's ears which made them hurt slightly. "No way," he said to himself quietly. "This is just a trick. He wants me to come out just to get shot a hundred times." He waited and waited, yet there still wasn't any gunfire. So, Raz decided there was really no other choice. He had to run out into the open and test whatever was shooting at him. So he got down on one knee, put his fingertips to the snow, and prepared himself for a sprint. After a short countdown in his head, he charged forward and, sure enough, the gunfire resumed.
To Raz's luck, the gunfire was trailing him from behind by a couple of inches, so he was able to make it to another barrier. He ducked down behind it and began his wait again. What he had saw was a large metallic dome with a huge turret sticking out of it, spraying bullets all over the battlefield. The dome had two round windows above the turret that revealed red light emitting from the inside. Also, beneath the turret, was a small vent. On top of it, there was an opening but it was being covered by a thin layer of snow. All together—the windows, the turret, and the vent—the whole thing looked like an angry pig without ears, of course at a darker shade though.
Raz slowly made progress going from barrier to barrier until he finally got to the very last one. He looked back at the battlefield and saw a ton of bullet holes along with all of his, and only his, footprints. Without anywhere else to run, Raz dashed out from behind the barrier and the turret shut off. Finally, he didn't have to take any more evasive action.
With slight difficulty, Raz used the turret to climb up onto the structure. He slipped his way over to where the entrance to the turret was and saw that it was also nailed down with limber, so he decided to break through. He built up some pressure and then released it all in a psi-punch, busting through the limber completely, and creating a hole. Suddenly, Bobby popped right out from the turret, chuckling.
"Oh yeah!" he exclaimed as he hopped down to the ground. "Classic Zilch!" The whole time, he was the one shooting at Raz! Which means that wasn't technically part of the obstacle course at all...or was it?
Without further ado, Raz jumped right down the hole and everything became twisted. The center of gravity suddenly turned so that the direction that his back was facing was down. Inside, he walked through the metal room onto a wooden bridge (which covered what seemed to be a large bottomless pit). Here, he raised another flag, opening the jaw of the metallic face ahead. Once he entered, he found himself going down a long slide with half as many figments as there were out in the battlefield. After he twisted around and around, he finally reached the bottom which led to a tunnel with a fence-like floor.
"Now this place just gets weirder and weirder," Raz said to himself as he walked. Once he got to the end of the hall, the tunnel reached a point where it expanded, creating more room for the strangest obstacle yet. To get to the other side, Raz had to cross a spinning compilation of logs and barbed wire. There were thin wooden planks attached to the logs where Raz could walk, but he had to be very careful. It was a lot like a labyrinth, he was going in one direction the whole time, but there were many twists and turns. "When does this thing end?"
"Ha! Ha! Ha!" Oleander laughed aloud. "You are never going to make it through! You might as well just give up now and stay in this blasted wasteland like every other cadet in here!" Raz's face filled with rage as he accepted Oleander's challenge and went through the rolling deathtrap even faster. Once he got to the other side, the tunnel was back to its normal size.
He continued through and grinded down a somewhat long rail which led him right into a large, dark room with a platform in the middle against the opposite wall. To Raz's right, he saw an opened door with bright light shining out of it. So, without a second thought, he walked over to it and a long hallway made of painted white bricks came to a dead end. However, at the end, there seemed to be a window with a small red curtain over it. So he decided to walk down the hallway, each step echoing off of the bare walls. As he got closer, his surroundings felt even more eerie.
At one point, he realized that it wasn't a window at all. There was something else behind the curtains, and it was clearly something important. There was something blue, and it looked like there was writing on it. Just as Raz began to lift the curtain—
"Hold it!" He heard Oleander shout. Raz was no longer in control of his body as he was lifted in to the air and floated right out of the hallway back into the large room. He floated over to the raised platform and found Oleander himself standing right there. "What in the world do you think you were doing?"
"I—I was just looking for a way out," Raz explained. Oleander released his psychic grip on Raz and he fell to the floor.
"Oh," Oleander said. "Sorry. Well, I didn't expect you to get to the end so fast. Heck, I didn't expect you to get to the end at all. You did great out there, kid. And for all of your efforts, you are hereby awarded the Basic Braining Merit Badge." Oleander let go of the badge and it floated over to Raz. It was a green badge with the picture of a brain on it. Raz grabbed it from midair and attached it to the back of the satchel he had, right in the middle. "Now, get out of my mind!"
Raz jumped in fright and was suddenly sucked right into oblivion. The next thing he knew, he was back in the tree-house before he got sucked into Oleander's mind.
Author's Note:
What did you think of this chapter? Clearly, this one took longer than I had thought, but here it is at last! I tried to make the whole obstacle course similar to the one in the game, but I omitted parts of it so that the chapter didn't become too lengthy.
Criticism and reviews are appreciated.
