A/N: This chapter may or may not be slightly rushed because it's past my bedtime and tonight is the only night I have a chance to write in forever! I feel good about the amount of interesting this chapter has as compared to the previous ones! They're not just walking from cave to cave here! haha

The blood-soaked shirts had dried.

They were sort of brittle, and they had been crumpled up on the floor. Boober was annoyed because now they didn't look scary, but gross. Really gross.

Disgusted by the amount of germs which inevitably covered every inch of his cave at this point, Boober refused to touch the nasty things, and his friends were obliged to examine them for themselves.

They mostly reacted in a way you would expect them to: Mokey's eyes widened and her small hand shot to her mouth, Red's jaw dropped and she stared intensely, shaking slightly, and poor little Wembley clasped his hands and looked away, rolling his eyes and mumbling indistinctively.

But Gobo's reaction was slower. He didn't want any of this to be real, and if it weren't for the overwhelming stench he would have been denying it aloud.

Instead, as he unwillingly stared at the mess, he began to gag. As experienced and brave he was, that cloying smell was determined to overtake him. He turned, starting for the door and covering his mouth, with his friends following suit.

The soothing, damp and earthy air of the tunnels quickly calmed him, although he was left with a slight nausea.

"That...was definitely blood."

The others nodded and Boober sighed, but no other words were spoken for a few moments.

They were all busy thinking.

When's the last time I saw Lou...

What was Marlon saying about his cult yesterday?

...she doesn't have any white shirts, does she?

Could it really be a fraggle's blood?

Those have obviously been in there for a while...

Gobo looked up sharply at Boober.

"How long have those been there!"

Boober jumped at the sudden exclamation and his heart skipped a beat at the angry implication.

"I...I..."

I'm crazy. I don't know how long they've been there.

Now everyone was looking at Boober, waiting for an explanation.

"I mean, didn't I tell you they came in with all the other dirty clothes?"

Gobo scratched his head.

"Oh yeah...well, how come we're only just now doing something about it?"

"I...don't remember anything happening before Wembley came in...I mean, it only seemed like a few moments had passed."

I'm crazy.

"Hey, if Boober says Wembley came in right after he found them...well, that's how it must have happened." Mokey turned to Boober, placing her hand on his shoulder. "I believe it."

Wembley nodded vigorously. "Me too! Definitely!"

Gobo acquiesced, nodding slowly with his hand on his chin, saying nothing.

Red...Red?

Mokey looked around. "Red?"

She had vanished.

Hours later, Boober was alone in his cave.

Red was still nowhere to be found, and Gobo was in the process of rounding up a few fraggles to search for her because everything seemed so much more ominous after Boober had found those shirts. Boober, of course, did not expect to be asked along. Besides, he had a job to do: the laundry.

But the laundry didn't have the same hold on Boober that it usually did; in fact it even seemed to depress him further, and after finishing about five or six shirts, he was obliged to take a break. He settled down on his bed with a cup of warm tea, which usually soothed him and prepared him for a nice, relaxing nap. As the tea slowly drained from his cup, Boober's eyelids slowly became heavier and heavier until he could no longer hold them open, and, his small hand grasping the warm mug with an ugly lump of tea leaves at the bottom, he fell asleep.

Boober had a recurring dream involving a fun-loving, Boober-resembling fraggle named Sidebottom, whose mission in life was to cheer Boober up. A visit from him on a day like this should have been extremely predictable for Boober, who would have avoided sleep at all costs had he thought of Sidebottom (who now stood beside him in a very plain dream-world).

Sidebottom was usually as annoying as fragglishly possible, and Boober had almost begun to whine and protest his antics when he noticed that Sidebottom was actually comparatively calm.

He stared at Sidebottom, who grinned uneasily. "Hey...I can still be your fun side while showing a little respect!" His grin widened as he poked Boober in the arm.

"What brings you to the land of dreams today, Boober? I mean, I love the gesture but I don't think you'll make any progress with the shirt mystery here!"

Boober sighed. "I don't know...I didn't stop to think that I might run into you, although your respect is rather refreshing," he noted.

Sidebottom's face twitched a little.

"No problem."

"Er..." Boober had noticed the strange facial tic.

"Oh, it's just extremely hard for me to keep so still. There's nothing wrong with us!"

Sidebottom tried to grin it off, but something seemed wrong to Boober, who was very ready to wake up at this point. This was the first time he actually wanted Sidebottom to be...well, more like Sidebottom.

"Well, Sidebottom...h-I think I need to be...um-"

Suddenly Sidebottom grabbed Boober by his scarf and jerked him forward, face-to-face with himself, their noses almost touching.

"Listen. Carefully.", he articulated very darkly. Boober was too startled to let out the scream that had formed in his chest, and gave no resistance to the seemingly stronger Sidebottom.

"There are things that I, as a piece of your sub-conscious, know and remember that you do not.

If you are going to survive what is going to happen in the next few days, you must

LISTEN. TO. ME."

Boober gulped and nodded, and Sidebottom let go of his scarf.

"This morning...when you got the laundry..."

Boober thought back to that moment, but now he could see a third fraggle in the room.

He heard screaming.

Real screaming, a noise he had never heard anyone make.

Sobbing.

Laughing.

It terrified him and he tried to stop remembering, but it was as if it were real, and he had no control over his thoughts.

Someone grabbed him and shook him, yelling at him, poking him...

And he sat up in his bed. Screamed.

Gobo, standing next to him, was stunned.

"Sorry, Boober! I've been trying to wake you for a few minutes now...you okay?"

Boober apologized and nodded, looking deathly pale.

"Well...you don't seem very well. And you didn't even do much laundry...well, never mind. I was going to ask you about coming to search for Red but I think you might be better off staying back."

"You were going to ask me?" Boober never got asked to do things like that. For a good reason, too: he hated doing things like that.

"Boober, no one will come with me." Gobo looked to be on the verge of tears.

"But I have to go. Alone, if I have to. Well and Wembley, of course."

Boober looked up. He stared at Gobo.

He remembered what Sidebottom had begun to show him.

"Don't go."

Gobo shook his head.

"I've got to go."

Boober wanted to explain.

He didn't know how.

"At least wait a little while...maybe someone will change their mind. Maybe Red will show up."

"I'm not wasting any time."

"She's only been gone for a few hours."

Gobo looked at Boober incredulously.

"Boober. She disappeared yesterday evening. How long have you been asleep?"