Author's Note: This is the 'penultimate' chapter. Meaning, it's next-to-last. So this chapter is second-last. Penultimate. Next-to-last. I probably should shut up now.

Chapter 10: The Secret of the Machine

Leslie's POV

Whilst we were talking, Elizabeth had picked up Rita's deodorant again. "I'm very tired," said Elizabeth abruptly, looking up from reading the label on the deodorant can. "I feel like I'm going to faint!"

"It's the molecule thing acting up again," Melissa told her.

"But it is worse this time," Elizabeth insisted. "I feel terrible."

"I feel weak too," Will added, looking up from where he was reading another one of Rita's graphic novels.

"I don't," Jack said, but he was obviously lying. (He didn't even bother looking up from Rita's Nintendo DS, where he was still obliterating aliens.)

I suddenly thought something. I knew, somehow, that our visitors had just completed what they were sent to do. "You feel terrible," I said slowly, "Because you are about to leave. You've finished what you were sent here for."

"How do you know?" Melissa asked.

I shrugged. "I just do. I can feel it. It's like when I felt that I needed to come here. The machine wanted us to come."

"The machine wanted us to come?" Aymee asked doubtfully.

"I've finally figured it out," I whispered. "What Rita's machine is supposed to do."

"What?" Rita prompted impatiently.

"Your grandfather knew that your favourite movie was Pirates, am I correct?" I said to Rita. She nodded. "And he left it specifically to you in his will?" Rita nodded again. "I activated the machine without throwing the Pirates DVD at it," I said quietly, "So, it wouldn't have mattered what DVD you threw at the machine. It still would have sent you into the Pirates movie, or vice versa."

"Are you sure?" Rita asked, looking uncertain. "But, I've touched the machine before. Banged my hand against it a few times. Why didn't it activate then?"

"Because," I said, growing more confident with every word, "Your grandfather added another purpose to the machine. The purpose to..."

"To what?" Melissa asked anxiously.

"To bring us closer as friends."

"How can you be sure?" Melissa said to me.

"I can't," I admitted. "I can only guess. But something tells me that this is the machine's purpose. The machine told me."

"Which means," Rita said, "that it was really my grandfather telling us this. Telling us the secret of his machine, and telling us to be closer as friends." She hesitated, and then slowly, she opened her mouth and said softly, "I was really close to my grandfather. He died of a heart attack half a year ago, and I was devastated. I thought he would never be able to speak to me again." She paused and laughed quietly. "But through the machine, I guess he did."

And just as a plump tear rolled down her cheek, there was a flash of white light.

Author's Note: Please review, and remember, the next chapter will be the last!