A Turtle's Journey Beyond
Chapter 9: In the Garden...
There were no amusement park attractions in the world that could top this once-in-a-lifetime roller coaster ride. Raphael felt himself warping, twisting and spinning wildly into a total oblivion of unknown realms. After being pulled upward into the night air like a reverse bungee cord, the force sent him hurling back down the gazebo, through its floorboards, and onward in the lower levels of the earth. Or was he beyond the boundaries of his beloved home planet by now? The force, relentless and determined, continued to pull him forward through a deep red cavern of swirling white fog patches. And then, it happened. The transition began slowly and painlessly. A cool blast of wind breezed over and his physical form started to disappear, his body felt lighter than air, and his vision became completely blinded by a tunnel of spectral light. The last thing he felt was AMBER, the unit attached to his head, evaporate into nothingness.
Is this what it feels like when someone has an out of body experience? Or is this what it feels like when someone actually...dies? Raphael allowed his thoughts to drift as the light at the end of the tunnel turned multi-colored, clearing the picture into a side view of what appeared to be a human being's head. Raphael squinted to the figure as it started to form into the face of a man, a dead one to be exact. Unlike Leonardo's first appearance of Margaret's lifeless eyes staring at him, this man had his eyes closed tightly to the bewildered turtle.
"What the-- ?" Raph stared up at the man hanging from the rafters of some glass building he was in. The body quietly swayed from left to right, making the rope and hook creak as it moved. "Oh, jeez..."
"Maaan!" A unknown male voice bellowed through Raph. "What was his problem?"
Raphael blinked rapidly, getting his view to a clear and normal state. He was no longer inside the gazebo, in fact, he was several feet away from it and the forest grounds. The force dropped him off inside a beautiful, white-paneled solarium built right next to the house. From the looks of it, he was standing in the small patio area, the same spot where Donatello found the audio scanning device on the back door knob.
"I've a feeling I'm not in my present time anymore." Raph mumbled to himself.
Judging by the outdated patio furniture in the solarium, the era appeared to be in the 1950's, only a decade or so later from when Leonardo helped Margaret's ghost in 1943. He couldn't say the atmosphere was any worse compared to where he was before. This dimension, despite the sight of the dead man, appeared to be quite pleasant. It was a bright sunny day with the rays shining through the large window panes, and if he listened carefully, he could hear the sound of birds chirping away outside. Raphael looked to the man, then down to the ground. A white glass table laid broken with shards scattered all around the floor, probably from where he stood to hang from the noose. Even the ghost seemed ashamed of it.
"Just look at this place...what a mess."
"So, this is it." Raph said, taking note the man was dressed in dirty overalls. "No doubt that's the guy I have to help. A suicide victim. Wonderful."
With a turn, he looked to the white back door in the brick wall, making it the start of his exploration in this new world. The door, however, refused to open for him. It was soon made obvious that there were some areas unnecessary to wander through, even for his invisible presence! Curiosity, however, got the better of him as he peered through the door's keyhole to see what was on the other side. Naturally, it was a view of the kitchen, except that the scene he saw was far more gruesome. Bloodstains splattered the cupboards and walls and plunged into the tile floor was a nice, large butcher knife.
"What the hell happened in here?" Raph asked his ghost.
"Hmm, looks like someone ran into trouble." The man's voice said thoughtfully.
"Just like in one of the PeeK's activity detection." Raph murmured, taking a second glance through the keyhole. "Not good at all."
The ghost agreed. "Jeez, somebody ought to call the police."
"Yeah, right, so they can cut you down and give you a proper funeral?" Raph rolled his eyes. "I gotta get out of this thing..."
Raphael turned his form and found a double door, the exit from the solarium. The doors opened outward to a huge mass of lush green hedges. He knew he was on top of a hill, but the hedges were so high and so thick, he couldn't see any of the distant landscape. Much as he liked the color green, it almost made him relieved to know the future owners cut it all down to the ground. There had to be some way out of this area, and he quickly found it with no trouble. Only one gray rock path to the left seemed accessible, but it required rummaging through a tunnel made of the mossy, tangled bushes.
"Damn weeds." Raph's ghost said with a growl.
"Ah, can it, you moron!" Raph yelled back. The path soon brought them to a new section of the unusual maze, one that was full of gorgeous flowers, more weeds, and something rather strange. Large, round, beehives, 3 of them to be exact, stood in various parts of the garden.
"Watch out for the bees," The man said, dipping his voice to a whisper, "they know stuff."
"Oh, really?" Raph approached the first beehive and gazed down at it. Seconds before he could leave, a swarm of bees flew out of the hive and swirled in one spot, staring as if they could see him perfectly. All of them began to talk in buzz tone, their words sounding garble:
"We've been...and watching aliens...they're really everything...you've...where are your parents...stopped right up...murdered...they have parents from...and love...the girl doesn't like you...first space craft...where you...does the space ships coming...taking the them...as you...we are one with because watching you...like her...like you...mad...you...totally...you...we're you..."
"You bees are all a bunch of LIARS!!!" The man screamed to them.
"More like a bunch of psychos." Raph huffed. "Chill, man. Remember, they can't harm you. You're already dead." The second beehive was filled with the same swarm of buzzing bees, however, their message left him far more deeply puzzled.
"Watching...all watching...listening...and a freak about that...hey, girl...were you deaf? Then you saw it girl...her...her stashing our traits...the dead...dead parents...why? I know because I'm saying all of aliens, you...and with you...you'll beat her...fool...out...took the girl...you watched...you stopped completely...fact...so that will leave to now..."
The third hive, much as he wanted to ignore it, also had a strange mess of blended words:
"Being with watching, listening...spaceships where aliens know everything done...that killed...then slashed...didn't them...you of course helped...you paranoia desirable...where is now she heard...the Martians right then...are what talk...and for you...girl adopting their crazy...find you...the real you...like you...stalking you...are in...are insane...actually, speaking, right?"
Raphael drifted to the right of the garden and ventured through another bush tunnel. Strange as they were, those bees were certainly food for thought. He pondered what they meant about aliens, space ships, some girl not liking his ghost and...murder. The man killed himself, it was a suicide! What did they mean by aliens and space ships? Was the man obsessed with UFO's? That would explain why the girl doesn't like him. It was him that was the psycho!
"Those bees were all a bunch of liars!" The ghost continued to gripe as they left that portion of the garden.
"Didn't I tell you to chill?" Raph groaned. "I just said they can't harm you because you're already dead. As if you'd listen to me, anyway...moron..."
A creepy-looking spider lurked within the branches of this next tunnel, but Raphael knew it couldn't do harm to either of them. The bright sunshine told him he was entering a new area full of more weeds as well as more unanswered questions. The next section looked rather inviting with a green and white checkered floor and a beautiful yet inactive water fountain. Two steel figures of a man and woman danced in the center of the fountain, looking quite content with each other. The front end was cut out in orange square tiles to make the appearance of the sunlight beaming down on the couple. It was a very happy scene, perhaps too cheery for him.
"Let me guess. This fountain is supposed to represent you and that girl you like, right?" Raph waited, getting no reply. "Oh, who the hell knows? I never cared for stupid lawn furniture, anyway. Hmm?" Raph blinked and peered behind the fountain. "What have we here..." Built on the other side of the orange square tile was a small wooden shed, possibly a room where there could be some better clues to this strange world. Raph found the door and stepped inside, gazing around at all of the garden tools and accessories.
"Oh, yeah. I'm a gardener." The man spoke up quietly. "This is my shed."
"Could have fooled me, Einstein." Raph muttered. "Well, I've seen enough. Let's--" He went to leave, but the door slammed shut in his face, indicating his ghost wanted to further investigate. "Ohhhkay, let's look around."
The shed was not only uncomfortably tight in space, it was also dark and musty, the perfect atmosphere for a gardener to keep his most precious things. Raphael's eyes looked everywhere, having them meet back with the dirty walls that were mere inches from his face. With the enclosure so cramped and the air so thick, he was starting to become a slight claustrophobic, something he never considered himself after living underground his entire life.
"Let's see we've got a shovel, some fertilizer, a tissue box..." The ghost jokingly sneezed at the mention of the tissues, "...very funny...moron...and...heeey, what's this, Porky?" Raph asked the ghost when his eyes scanned the ground, coming in contact with two peepholes in the wall. Stooping down, his face met with a circular light as he peered out one hole, suddenly feeling like he was peeking into a girl's shower room in the movie Porky's. The peepholes had a piece of wood that could slide from left to right, giving him two different views outside. A planted pine tree appeared back at him with a mirror attached to the pot. Strange. Why would this guy have a peephole looking out to a potted plant?
Raphael forced himself out of the shed and walked over to some identical planted trees, all having mirrors attached to their pots. The mirrors must reflect off of some view beyond the gardens, but he couldn't figure out exactly where. The man had made sure whatever he liked to look at, he would assemble the mirrors accordingly. Raphael turned one of the plants to face it in another direction, then turned another, still unsure of what he was doing.
"This should bounce off the others onto something. All right, Porky, let's see what we've got here now...hello?"
The ghost stared at the hedges with a groan. "I hate these weeds."
"Deal with it!" Raph shouted back. Returning to the shed, he dropped down again and stared through one of the peepholes. The sight made his eyes light up. A neighbor's window came into view in the mirror's reflection and something was written on various panes of glass:
Leave me
alone freak!
"Who the hell lives there?" Raph asked, feeling guilty for the price of his curiosity. The neighbor must have known about this man's prying eyes and they were definitely giving a message of pure anger. "Wait, don't tell me, that girl lives there. The one you like, right?"
The ghost peered in to see. "Looks kind of like her window...I think she's trying to tell me something!"
"And I thought I had problems..." Raph circled back around at the fountain's edge, giving it another size up. He was satisfied to know he was getting one step ahead of what was going on here. Within the man's shed, he not only stored tools, he used it to spy on some girl he liked. He wished he got a more clear response from the bees. Then again, the idea of obtaining information from some honey-producing insects would be too weird to explain to the others when he got back!
With this area having nothing more for him to offer, he slipped back through the hole, past the beehives, and on to a new section of the garden. He had hoped he was reaching the end soon. The grass and flower pollen were becoming too much for his hay fever. Along the newfound trail, he paused at a nice quiet bench big enough for two. Resting on top of the bench was a small, red heart carved out of wood. Three nails, two on either side and one in the center, were punctured within as if holding the little craft together. Raphael smirked to the center nail. It looked like the heart was struck by a love arrow. How romantic...how revolting, he thought to himself.
"What's this, Cupid?" Raph loomed over the heart with a feeling of nausea.
"I believe I made that." The ghost said thoughtfully. Raphael read a white triangular paper attached to the heart: Key To The Stars. The ghost recognized it even more and sounded thrilled. "I did! I made it for her. We're going away together."
"The only place you're going is six feet under. Moron. What are these nails for? Incase she says no and you pierce her own heart?" Raph reached out and touched the center nail. The nail pulled in half-way and stopped while the left nail pushed outward. He pulled the center nail again, getting the right nail to pull out next. Finally, he pulled the left nail until they all snapped out and fell to the ground. "Simple little contraption." Peering closer, he stared at the contents inside and made a face to it. Numbers were written on a piece of paper the size of a fortune from a fortune cookie. "It's just some numbers. Do you feel lucky yet?"
Raphael memorized the numbers and continued forward through yet another tunnel. The path carried him upward, this time through some wood steps and out to a very familiar clearing. Pausing at the end of the tunnel, he could feel his mouth unhinge just a little bit. He was at the gazebo again, however this one looked under construction with some of the circular side walls missing. A sudden thought of seeing his family rushed through his head, then quickly went away. This was where he last saw them, before he was taken away to this new dimension. If the gazebo was his entrance here, it must also be his exit...back home!
The time it took him to reach the top of the stairs was mere seconds. His heart began to pound, his senses almost on fire, and then, total silence. A full three-sixty turn, a quick glance up to the ceiling, and nothing happened. Raphael started to get agitated. This was the way back, he just knew it! But, how? Finally, he dropped his head and spied a wooden door in the floor boards. Eyes widened, he collapsed on the door and tried to pry it open.
"Come on! Open up! Please, open! Moron, what the hell do I do now?" Again, the ghost said nothing. Raph was starting to grow tired of not getting answers when he needed them. This was the way home, the way back to his family, and the door was locked! "There's gotta be a switch somewhere..." Raph trampled down the stairs and circled the gazebo, looking all over for some sort of lever, a switch, or...a red button. Raph paused at the button and heaved a big sigh. This should do the trick of going up, going in, and finally going down the gazebo.
"What's this thing do?" The ghost asked bewildered.
"Probably opens the wood floor in the gazebo. Moron." Raph pushed the button and heard the door open upstairs. "Yes! Homeward bound!" Skipping a few steps, his smile grew wide to the open floorboards, then quickly faded. Underneath the wood was a caged door made of steel, also closed and locked. The final piece to the puzzle was below within the gazebo itself. He just knew it. Raph's heart began to pound against his chest as he threw himself upon the door and again tried to pry it open. He struggled till his invisible fingers began to ache. "God, not another friggin' door!"
"Damn it!" The ghost hissed.
"Shut up, you! I'm trying to..." Raph paused and stared at something. "...concentrate." Squinting to the door, he found a combination lock right in front of his face. Panting with a laugh, he knew exactly what to do now. The ghost, however, was still slow as ever.
"This looks familiar, but I can't remember the combination."
"I said, shut up! Let me handled this." Raph had a hunch what the combination was and started to spin the dials around. The sound of a click echoed in his ears. "Got it! Jeez, man, what the hell would you do without me? No, wait, I know. Just hang around!" Raph chuckled to himself as he began the descend into the gazebo. The chuckling almost stopped instantly when he paused half way down the ladder. Straight ahead of him were a series of white and red lit candles, a letter, and a picture of a smiling girl with dark hair. Oh, dear lord. It was a shrine. He had a shrine for this girl. Now, it was becoming more than just being friends. This guy was obsessed with her!
"What the hell is all this crap?" Raph asked in disgust. "And that girl...is it--"
"That's my Mandy." The ghost beamed with pride. "She's coming with me!" Raphael snatched up the letter and began to read it, shaking his head in utter disbelief. Before he could ask, the ghost was way ahead of him. "She wrote this to me..."
"Yeah, right, I figured that." There was still that hint of happiness in the ghost's tone that he couldn't stand. Raph rolled his eyes and continued to read:
"Brice,
I don't even want to write this, but you won't listen to me. Please believe me, I don't
like you and I want you to leave me alone! I don't want your
gifts. You can keep that stupid heart or whatever it is. I don't believe in
flying saucers and I want you to stop talking to me about them!
Never,
Mandy
P.S. My Dad said that if you don't stop bothering me, he's going to fire you!"
"Oh, crap." Raph whispered. "This is insane. And you probably didn't listen to one damn word of this, did you?"
"She has the prettiest handwriting..." Brice said dreamily.
"Jesus, man! Get it through your empty skull! The girl doesn't like you! Why are you torturing yourself with this? Damn, this has gone too far; I don't even want to think what's below me." Raph growled and looked down the ladder. It was the only direction he could go. He had to find out why Brice died or else stay in this god-forsaken world forever. Reaching the bottom, he knew he had stepped into a place known as the Twilight Zone. The first thing he spotted at the base of the ladder were three pieces of brown luggage, the name marked 'Brice Walker' and address 'Planet Earth' on a tag.
"No. This can't be happening. This can't be for real..." Raph's voice drifted weakly. The pressure was beginning to way down on him as he took in a breath to calm himself. All the feelings of anger and calling Brice a moron had suddenly left his thoughts. Now, there was only one thing that currently played in his mind, and it was a thing he dreaded most. He knew this thing quite well and he hated it deeply. It was known as fear.
"We'd better get ready. They'll be here soon..." Brice said, now with a hint of anxiety growing in his voice.
"This has to be dream. Just like Shadow said. I'll close my eyes and when I open them, I'll be back home." Raph bowed his head and closed his eyes briefly, then opened them again. Just as he he thought, the underground gazebo room and its contents were still there. "Damn!" Raph lifted his head with a sigh. It was best to start looking around for clues that would help get him back home. The answer to Brice's death had to be in here somewhere.
The room, like the gazebo, was circular and contained a series of what a typical fan boy of UFO's would keep or create. Next to the ladder was a light bulb turned into a little spacey contraption. Brice tied a metal ring around the chain with wooden round pieces representing the moon, the sun, and planets hanging from thin wires. To the far left side of the ladder appeared to be the living room section in this burrow of a hole. There was a pole of three cone-shaped reading lamps, a wooden table with scraps of flying saucer paper crafts, and a god-awful rainbow checkered chair that not even Casey's grandmother would dare own in her house. Raphael's eyes went straight to the chair's seat cushion where he found a local newspaper, giving him the exact date of when this all took place.
"Local News, Summeria Sentinel, Thursday, September 21..." he swallowed a bit. "1959." The majority of the headlines were all about flying saucers and witnesses discovering UFO's in the area. Raph looked over the top article first. "Unexplained Objects Seen In Night Sky. Speculation runs high as numerous eye-witnesses come forward." His brow dropped next as he read on:
Fern Valley - Reports have been made to local authorities of a series of five lights of varying intensity flying in the sky above our city. Local military officials have been investigating over 200 reports of these "UFO's", and currently have no explanation for their presence. In the past two weeks alone, at least 100 residents of the Fern Valley District have witnessed strange lights flying in an erratic pattern which includes spins, dives and temporary hovering. In virtually all reported cases, the lights fly close to the ground after hovering for a few minutes, then seem to disappear from view instantly. However, while the witnesses were observing the objects, the lights often appeared to strobe and flicker, which reduced visibility of the crafts themselves. There are no reported cases of the objects landings, nor are there any clues as to who might be piloting the objects. A local radio station, WSTW, is offering a reward to any witness who can produce an authentic photo of the "pilot" involved.
Another article below had a similar case, this one involving one of the local yokels. "Pilot Reports UFO." Raph frowned to the photo of the pilot before reading on. "He should also report to a decent barber. What's with the stupid crew-cut? Oh, yeah, this is the fifties, when crew-cuts were the IN look. Thank God I wasn't born in this era, let alone born with hair! So, what's your story..."
West Highland - Bill Peace, a thirty-two year old resident of West Highland, reports the following incident, which occurred while Bill was flying his single-engine plane at 4,300 feet. As Bill reports it, a bright flash suddenly appeared over the left wing. Shortly thereafter, Mr. Peace witnesses a formation of dazzling objects flying across the sky at amazing speed.
"Well, that's enough of that. And what does this other moron have to say?" Raph skimmed over to the right at another photo of a man named Larry Harrison, looking rather spooked. "Local Citizen Hears Aliens...looks more like he saw them rather than heard them."
Fern Valley - One witness to this week's bizarre events is Larry Harrison of Fern Valley District. Larry claims to have received a message from one of the lights. "They're aliens all right," said the disturbed resident. "When those lights went overhead, my ham radio started acting up, then I heard some strange voices talking. We better get ready, because they are coming to take some of us back with them into space!"
Raph paused and looked all around. "Yo, Brice, are you reading this? Looks like you're not the only loony loser in this town after all." He had read enough and dropped the paper back down on the cushion, gazing back up to the wall in front of him. "Hmmm..."
Above the chair were numerous things all pertaining to the skies above. A beautiful star chart hung to the right with four photos of the galaxy, two on either side of the chart. To the left were some black and white photographs of the surrounding woods outside, all of them capturing disc-shaped objects floating in the sky. Raphael was half-convinced these were real sightings caught on film, but just to make sure, Brice wrote, "PROOF!" in big letters above these photos. It seemed as though everything in this room appeared science fiction, or at least, had a futuristic taste to it. Even a clock with blue planets for numbers looked fitting for the astronomically-obsessed type. Yes, this man needed a normal social life, one that didn't require his head trapped in limbo beyond the clouds.
Raphael turned again and almost tripped his spirit over some protruding boxes. Next to the wood table was a much larger one made of blue marble. On top laid some discarded tools and a wooden plank with a carved-out body of a bird. He remembered when he first arrived at the gazebo, he noticed a portion of the side wall missing. This could very well have been the last piece of craft Brice worked on before he hung himself in the solarium. Unless someone else hung him?
Above the tool table were three notebook papers tacked to the wall, all of which featured draft sketches of the gazebo in progress. It was so sad to see all this work put into such a thing when it all-knowingly laid to waste in the future. Brice painstakingly measured the size of it, the depth of it, and even carved the images of birds for a girl and one girl only. Raphael read the title of the left-most paper out loud.
"Mandy's Gazebo. He did this all for her." Peering closer to a sketch of the roof, he could see Brice took a red pencil and colored in a flag waving on a pole at the top. "The signal flag. A signal for what? For...them?" One more turn and he met face to face with a large, steel door, almost like a door used to seal in people during an air raid. "Damn, that's a huge door."
"Whatever is in there must be a pretty big secret." Brice said supiciously.
Raphael sized up the door from every angle. This was obviously a last minute addition for sure; the whole look of it clashed with all the other furniture in the room. Tiny bulbs of light covered the entire frame of the door to give it an appearance of walking into a room full of mystery. With nowhere else left to go, he knew it was a room full of the remaining clues to get out of this place. This was it. This was the door that should have been marked in big letters: EXIT.
"Big secret or not, it's my ticket out of here." Raph approached the door and noticed a white flag hanging on a hook. A lanyard stood right next to it, vacant of anything except the rope itself. "Let's see what'll happen if I put this on here." Raph moved the flag onto the lanyard and pulled it downward, turning its color from white to red. "What the...?" Raph backed away to look down, seeing a pool of red substance seeping out from the door. "Please, tell me that's just paint." He groaned as the the flag continued to pull upward through a hole and onto the gazebo's roof outside. A circular image of a red flag appeared on the door.
"That oughta get there attention." Brice sounded pleased. "I hear they like red."
Below the red flag image was a small, wooden lid, perhaps the button to open the steel door. Raph pulled it open and looked inside. Yep, it was a button, six red ones to be exact. Just like the steel door to the gazebo's ladder, the lock also required a combination of some sort. This one, however, was far different than the wooden heart craft combination. Raphael stared long and hard, wondering which buttons to press. Brice felt the same way.
"This reminds me of something else, but I can't quite place it."
"Wait. Think back to everything we've been through. Everything we've seen. And don't forget...this is Mandy's gazebo...yet she wants to be left alone. No. It was..." Raph sighed and, with remembering a sentence, pushed some of the buttons, hearing a click sound. "Whoa! I got it! Jeez, that was just a guess!" The door calmly squeaked open to reveal just an average storage closet. The pool of the red substance came from a red paint can turned over on a shelf full of a few other cans. No, wait. That wasn't just red paint. Raph gasped and nearly fell backwards at what he saw lying on the floor in a crumpled heap.
"Oh, my God...you...you murderous son-of-a-bitch...you killed her!"
"Mandy?" Brice whimpered. "Mandy...why'd you have to stop screaming? I thought they were coming and-- and you were fighting me...but, then they never came after all..."
Raph stared in outrage. "You're lucky to be dead, you bastard, because if you weren't, I would have beaten you till--"
"Wait! Shhh!"
The two paused simultaneously to hear an unusual sound coming from outside. It almost sounded like a twirping motor coming from...no, it can't be. From...a space ship? Brice reached over and punched all the light bulbs out, leaving them in the dark for a few seconds. Then, above their heads, the motor grew louder and a red light appeared in the center of the hole.
"It's them..." Brice spun around with Raphael to look at the ladder, watching the three-piece luggage magically levitate up through the hole. The motor sound increased and the red light began to flicker with a strobing effect. "They're here..."
It was happening. It was actually happening. Raphael was so scared, he had reached the point of either losing self control or passing out in a dead faint. The force that once brought him here had returned to claim yet another soul. Having no sympathy for their emotions, it dragged them both under the red light, spun them side-ways, and bumped them against the steel door. The steel door opened and slammed repeatedly with a squeak as if unsure how to react to this unknown presence. Beyond the steel door, the roof of the gazebo had blown off, the sky became a swirling blood red, lightning flashed all over, the spaceship twirping grew louder, and for once, Raphael couldn't utter a single word. Brice, meanwhile, went from being totally excited to totally frightened out of his wits.
"Wait! Something's not right!" The steel door flew off its hinges and was hurled into the center of the swirling red skies. A bright, reddish orb flew out right behind the door as if being sucked into the center like a powerful vacuum cleaner. "NOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!"
Brice's spirit shot out of Raphael's body like a rocket and hurled itself upward into the sky, his screams fading as it went. Before he could take a quick breather, the wooden floorboards slammed shut in his face, sealing off all the horror scenes beyond. Next, his body was heavily thrown backwards through what now seemed like a dark tunnel, all the way down until he felt his shell smack against something hard.
Blinking, his vision was filled with multicolor images again, just like when he first saw the side view of Brice's head. No, it wasn't a head this time. It was a view of the gazebo's ceiling. Finally, his vision returned to a normal state and he saw the ceiling turn a darker shade of brown. Night time. It was dark outside. Crickets could be heard chirping in the distance along with voices approaching from the wooden log path. They were familiar voices calling out to him, calling out his name. A piece of metal clung to his head and it felt as cold as ice. Raphael reached up to touch it, smiling weakly as he did.
"It's that...thing. That...headset...I...oh, God...I'm back."
**********
A.N.: Whew! Thanks for being so paitent with me, and an even bigger thanks for voting this fic for "Best Supernatural"! I really appreciated it! Chapter 10 is finished and I hope to get 11 up soon! Bye for now!