At first, Rose believed that the room she entered was empty. The only things visible within it were a canopy bed with grey bedsheets covering it, a brown chest, and a rocking chair. There was no light source apart from the open window, and an odd smell seemed to fill the place, like a combination of dust and the odor of a blossoming flower.

"What could we possibly find here?" Rose asked.

"I think it's what we're not seeing that we should be keeping an eye out for," Susan said.

A few seconds later, Rose spotted her mother sprawled out on the bed, wearing a white nightgown and looking unusually well after all she'd been going through.

"Rose? Is that you, love," she called out in a sweet voice.

"Yes, Mummy. It's me, Victoria, and Susan," Rose said, not sure if seeing her mother so well was something that ought to concern her.

"Why, it feels as if I've been waiting over a lifetime for you, sweetheart. Now be a good girl and walk over to Mummy," Jackie answered, stretching her arms out to welcome her daughter over.

Victoria looked suspiciously over at Jackie, then turned to Rose and whispered, "You shouldn't do everything she says, Rose. It seems to me that your mother isn't herself right now."

"I think you're right. Mummy doesn't act this sweet even when she's happy," Rose said.

"Excuse me? The way I see things, I'm supposed to be that girl's mother, not you!" Jackie yelled. "I'm the only one Rose should be taking orders from. There's no telling what a bunch of freaks like you two girls would do to her if I were to leave her alone with you once again. Now Rose, ignore the bad ladies and come over to me."

Rose glared at her. "Victoria and Susan have been doing a lot to help me, Mummy. You always tell me to be polite to anyone who's nice to me, so now I want you to do the same."

"Nonsense! I know trouble when I see it, young lady. So if you don't leave these freaks right now, I'll have to make you leave by force." She then steadily set foot out of bed and marched over to where her three guests were standing.

"Enough!" Susan demanded. "We intend no harm upon your daughter. What must we do to convince you of this?"

"How about getting the hell out of this hotel before you cause any more trouble?" Jackie answered. She then yanked Rose's arm and said, "Come along with me, sweetheart. I'm going to take you somewhere where you'll remain safe forever."

Rose struggled to break free from her mother's grasp. "Let go of me!" she yelled.

"No, darling. I can't let you go even if I wanted to!" Jackie said, laughing hysterically.

Then, right before Rose's eyes, her long blonde hair turned into a dark bob, while her nightgown became a gorgeous evening gown. She was no longer Jackie Tyler, but Peggy, the unruly American woman from the New Year's Eve party who became one of the hotel's first victims.

Rose started shaking with fear. "What are you doing here?" she asked. "And if I wasn't seeing my mummy, then where is she? Do you have her hidden away somewhere?"

"Oh, little girls. No matter what era they're in, they always have wild imaginations," Peggy said. "The littlest thing that goes wrong can have them crying over monsters or other ridiculous fantasies they come up with in their heads."

"But the imagination can also prepare girls to consider all possibilities when facing a problem," Victoria said. "While others may just notice whatever's before their eyes, imaginative children can see beyond what's in front of them and become aware of something the more logical amongst us tend to overlook."

Peggy laughed wickedly. "And how many times have such tendencies benefitted children in any way? Can you or your friend ever think of a time when your imagination won over more logical conclusions?"

At the mention of this, Victoria smiled and winked at Rose. Then, facing Peggy with her best schoolteacher expression, she said, "Well, when I was in my teens, I had the misfortune of having lost my father to a species of aliens known as the Deleks. The man who managed to rescue me claimed to have traveled across time and space using a machine that was bigger on the inside than the outside. At first, this notion seemed ridiculous to me, and I laughed at everything he suggested to me. But then, I thought back on some of the stories I'd read over the years where characters faced situations that were certainly out of the ordinary, like in Gulliver's Travels, Frankenstein, and Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. I used to go over what happened in those stories in my mind and imagine what it would be like for myself I had been the character, and if I would have done anything differently than they did. So when this man made these wild claims, I told myself to remember all those stories and consider the possibility that I might be stepping into my own adventure for once, taking on the role of those characters I grew to love and care about so much. And by reminding myself of this, I kept my mind open and prepared myself for all those frightening situations I was soon to face."

Peggy shook her head, obviously not impressed with Victoria's story. "And here I was thinking that being murdered by a phantom in a haunted hotel was some crazy notion I'd gotten into my mind. It's nonsense you must have taken out of a Verne or Wells story for all I'm concerned. If there really are time travelers in this world, then how come I never met one when I was young?"

"Well, you're looking at a Time Lady right now, miss," Susan said with a proud smile. "And let me just say that when I was little, human beings seemed as much a fantasy to me as time travelers seem to you."

"Oh, please don't make things sound even more crazy than they already are," Peggy said, rolling her eyes.

"Maybe you can start making things less crazy by just telling me where my mummy is," Rose said.

"I don't think I need to answer that for you, dear. Just look around you and you might figure out where you can find her," Peggy answered.

Rose took careful notice of the room once again, and became aware from looking out the window that instead of seeing the sky all sunny and clear as before, it was now dark purple and showing traces of stars. And from outside of the room, she could hear the exact same jazz music she'd heard in the party from 1924, instead of the old rock songs that were sometimes heard through the loud speakers.

"So, she's back in the party from 1924?" she asked.

"Of course, you stupid girl. It should have been obvious to you the moment you saw this room," Peggy said.

"But it looks exactly like…"

"Those bothersome twins gave me some insight into how the rooms are looking during your time, and trust me, they're nowhere as beautiful and refreshing to the senses as they were in my day, which happens to be right now, of course," Peggy said. "I mean, just stop for a while and smell the place, feel how fresh and soft the blankets and curtains are, taste those biscuits that…"

"She sounds as if she's lost her mind," Victoria whispered to Susan.

"She's probably had it lost ever since her awful death," Susan said. "But how about we take advantage of this rambling of hers and have Rose make a run for the ballroom?"

"Sounds like a good idea," Victoria said. Then, nudging Rose's shoulder, she said, "Rose, how about we try getting out of this scary room and go over to the ballroom to find your mother."

"But what if the room is locked up?" Rose asked.

"From what I can see, the door seems to have been left ajar," Susan said, gesturing over to the half open door with a smile. "Peggy clearly wasn't thinking over how we could leave her sight in her eagerness to possibly haunt us."

Rose chuckled, and started sprinting towards the exit while Peggy continued on with her overly dramatic monologue over how wonderful the hotel was now in comparison to its' lifeless state in the future. Victoria followed her, with Susan agreeing to keep an eye on Peggy so that she wouldn't come up with more mischief.

As they walked through the lobby, Victoria said, "She's right about one thing, Rose; Northern Horizons really does look much more beautiful now."

"I guess so," Rose said, not willing to admit that it truly was different. The dark red paint which took up much of the walls looked fresh and lovely, vastly different from the cracked or else sickly white walls that could be seen in 1992. There were also several paintings and adornments hanging in there, including various of flowers and landscapes, several of dancers which Rose recalled seeing at a museum over a year ago, and the picture of a woman that was in place at the present.

Looking at Victoria, Rose could sense that she was trying not to let how nervous she was become obvious to her. However, she couldn't stop thinking about how all the times she'd thought of traveling back in time, she'd never imagined it would be under such haunting circumstances, and that she was experiencing the 1920s in this manner made it seem more like a nightmare than the fulfillment of a dream.

Strangely enough, Victoria now noticed what Rose was doing, and said, "Can't help noticing how I'm feeling when I'm finally time traveling again, can't you, dear?"

Rose blushed. "I'm sorry. Am I making you nervous?"

"No. I don't have a problem with it at all, actually. It seems to me that your mind-reading abilities tend to be at work when you least expect them. Do you have any control over when you want to use them?"

"I don't think so," Rose admitted. "I may have been able to do it a few times, but not always when I really want to."

"I see," Victoria said with a nod. Noticing the sound of the jazz music getting louder and closer to their direction, she then said, "I suppose we're getting closer to the ballroom now."

"We are," Rose said, immediately noticing the yells of delight in addition to the music.

For a moment, Victoria was excited despite the situation, wondering if the parties of the 1920s were as extravagant as those in F. Scott Fitzgerald's novels, which had increased much of her curiosity about the decade back when she was at university for the first time. Even as she noticed the fear in Rose's face, she figured that at least this wouldn't be as frightening as seeing Peggy duplicating herself as Jackie Tyler had been.

But the moment she was through the door, her excitement almost instantly faded away. Yes, everyone in there looked as gleeful as could be, and the music sounded just as good as the small record collection of twenties jazz which she owned. However, that was all you could see in the ballroom, happiness and music. Some guests were drinking themselves away, erupting in wild laughter at the most insignificant comments their friends would make, while others mingled with every person within sight, trying too hard to appear sophisticated and polite, but seeming rather insecure and pitiful to Victoria. You could tell these people would be forgotten by the other guests the moment the party was over, if it ever did end, of course.

"Victoria?" she heard Rose asking as she desperately nudged her shoulder.

"What is it?" Victoria asked.

"Mummy's over there, and so is Peggy."

And she was right. Jackie was almost unrecognizable, wearing a white ballgown and with her hair in a bun, but she was there all the same, swinging around the ballroom with a handsome red-haired man. She was laughing and chatting away as much as the other party guests, but you still got the air that there was something even more unnatural about the way she was feeling than anyone else in there. Not only could she not remain quite for an instant, but she seemed to trust the man she was with way too much, as if she'd been her boyfriend for many years as opposed to someone she'd just met.

Most shocking of all, Peggy was there as well, standing along with a group of friends and downing a glass of wine within seconds. She actually turned to look at Victoria and Rose when they entered the ballroom, but she didn't show any sign of recognition or menace upon seeing them, instead turning back to her friends, shrugging, and saying, "Isn't it odd how this party seems to keep getting fuller in such a short period of time? Just five minutes ago, I think there were only twenty people here, and now it's as if word spread about our party and everyone's feeling free to come in whenever they please."

"Hasn't the manager heard anything about regulations?" one of her companions asked.

"I think he might actually be the one permitting this, from what I've heard about him," another companion said.

Victoria shook her head in confusion upon noticing this. "If Peggy's here right now, then does that mean…?"

"Actually, I think she might still be in the room with Susan right now. It could be that her good side remains in the party like always, while her bad side's the one that goes around haunting people," Rose said.

"Just where do you get these ideas from?" Victoria asked, amazed at the ideas she could come up with.

"From movies and stories. Like you said before, kids' imaginations really do help them figure things out sometimes," Rose replied.

"Good to know that I've been proven right," Victoria said. "Now, what are you thinking of doing now?"

"We have to make Mummy what's really happening. Because if we don't, she might become a part of this party for good," Rose said, preparing to run over to her mother's side.

"But Rose, don't try taking action too quickly," Victoria said, grabbing Rose's arm. "You don't know if you might run into twice as much…"

But it was too late to stop her. Rose immediately sprinted over to her mother's side, yelling, "Mummy, it's me, Rose! Stop trying to have too much fun here! None of this is supposed to be real!"

While the duplication of Jackie from upstairs had tried too hard to make it seem like she knew Rose, this version of Jackie was dumbstruck upon seeing her. "Excuse me? What is it that you want, little girl?" she asked.

"Don't you recognize me, Mummy? I'm Rose!" Rose yelled, looking deeply panicked.

"Oh, dear. Is this another case like that of the twins?" Jackie responded, not once suspecting that this was her daughter.

"What's going on here, Jackie?" the man she'd been dancing with asked.

"This is very unusual. This girl is claiming to be my daughter, just as these strange twins kept telling me they'd died in this hotel," Jackie said.

"But didn't you just tell me that you had a daughter?" the man asked.

"I do, but she's at home right now, with no idea that I'm here," Jackie said, sounding much more confusing as she was speaking.

"But we live here right now, Mummy! Please don't tell me that you've forgotten everything about yourself!" Rose said.

"I've forgotten nothing about myself, child. I'm a young woman born in the late 1890s who had the misfortune of being widowed in 1919, several months after my daughter Rose was born. This insistence from you and your friends that I'm from the future must stop. Absolutely no one finds these types of jokes funny," Jackie said, speaking so naturally that Rose immediately understood what'd just happened:

Her mother had made herself believe that she was a part of this world.