Hey everyone. Raine here. I sorta messed up the numbers on my chapter. THIS is the real 29. My apologies!

I drove home.

We were less than 24 hours away from the Gateway opening, and I still had no idea what was going on.

The facts were these: Somehow I’d been caught up in by a big dark tentacular Something that wanted to come through into this reality.

Or…did it want to come through into my original reality?

I thought about the face, staring at me through the multi-dimensional times-space I’d been falling through. It was the only constant, those shimmering yellow eyes as the rest of space and time fell around me.

Desdemonia’s personality and memories were in my mind. As were Brother Langtree's. April had been caught by Desdemonia in this reality where she took her body as hers. Mitzy Butterfly had been caught and turned into a feral butterfly. Dad and Mom were alive, healthy, human and here. If only I knew where here was?

If I saved this reality, would it save all realities? Did I somehow have to battle that thing in each reality? Or if I lost once would it all be over? Not to mention how I was supposed to battle a multi-dimensional being that could pull me into dimensions like someone pulls open a can of beer.
I was the Key.

It made sense. It didn’t seem like anyone else was going through these reality shifts. If they were would I even know? Could someone or many someones be traveling through them as I am?

I thought of the crystal in my home reality. Desdemonia had taken over my mind and had enacted a plan to usher in the new Being like he was a celebrity at a trade show. She had hypnotized the entire town and bent them to her will. And I had willingly gone through with it, I hadn’t fought back, hadn’t even thought to fight back while she was doing it.

So what happened?

I scratched my head, feeling the grit of sand.

Somehow, I had come to the fore. So not only was I battling this extra-dimensional being, I had to battle Desdemonia for the right to my own mind? Was there any winning this thing?

I thought of everyone I loved. Mitzy, stuck here as a butterfly, April, Stuck in the last dimension as a wolf. Dad, ditto for that. April stuck here as her own mother. Desdemonia had left that morning to go into town for some dark reason. Could she be plotting the same thing here, just in April’s body instead of mine?

I had to stop them. Had to stop myself from being used to their ends. Had to find a way to close whatever gate had opened that was causing me to fall through time, space, and dimensions so I could put things right. I couldn’t make any headway when I was being yanked on a chain like this.

April had said she saw a tentacle…I closed my eyes, opening my Third eye.

I glanced in the mirror and immediately realized why you should never do that while opening your third eye.

Opening the window, I puked out the side of the truck, heaving whatever this body had last ate into the parking lot.

Ugh, not good.

Taking a few breaths, and sucking some water from a nearby water bottle, I tried it again.

This time, rather than looking in the mirror, I looked town.

I could see my aura, bright orange, but it was now mixed with blue and black, just like I’d seen on Desdemonia. She was still in me, somewhere, maybe knocked unconscious?

As I looked at my arms, my legs, and then my middle, I spotted it. A tentacle tied directly into my nether regions down there. It was the same kind of binding as April and I had days earlier.

Gritting my teeth, I pulled on the tentacle.

Pain suffused my testicles, like I was yanking a live wire directly in my brain. I coughed then fell over on the front seat of my truck, bringing my knees up to my chest.

Well, that wouldn’t work.

I needed more info. How could one fight an extradimensional being capable of shuffling realities like a cardmaster shuffles a deck of cards? If I battle it in one dimension, do I have to continue to jump to other dimensions and battle it again and again? If I lose in one did I lose in all? If a won in one, would I win in all?

None of it felt right. I decided to visit the one person I knew who might be able to help.

Starting my truck up again, I sped off. I’m pretty sure I knew where he lived; I’d been to his house a few times selling raffle tickets and chocolate bars for Little League.

###

Mr. Stewart, my High School Math teacher lived in the middle of a cul-de-sac at the top of a slight hill. His lights were on, and his car was in the driveway. I went to the door and knocked.

“Yes?” Said an older hispanic woman who opened the door.

“Uh, I’m looking for Mr. Stewart? Does he live here?”

“Who’s at—Oh! Hello, Seth! What brings you here?” Mr. Stewart worked his way around the woman, smiling at me.

“Um, I’m having a problem I hope you can help me with.”

“Sure, come on in!” He held the door open. “Anita, this is Seth, Seth, Anita, my wife.”

“Hello Ma’am,” I said, smiling and holding my hand out.

“Hello, Seth.” She shook my hand. “Awfully late to be out, isn’t it?”

“Um, yes, but this is an emergency. I’m so sorry to intrude.”

She smiled. “No trouble, Seth. Would you like something to drink?”

“Water if you have it,” I said. I was still really thirsty.

“You look like you just came from the baseball diamond,” Mr. Stewart said. He was a small man with salt and pepper thinning hair and a small mustache.

“Yeah,” I said. “Game against Fuller Academy.”

“Victorious?” he asked, as we sat down at his kitchen table.

“Yes.” I took the glass Mrs. Stewart offered and drank it dry. “Thank you.”

“So, how can I help you at this late hour? I haven’t seen you in school, so I’ve been wondering what’s happened.”

I nodded and sighed. Well…you see there was this girl—“ and I proceeded to tell him about April and getting snared in the trap of the Who.

He frowned and took out a piece of paper and a pencil. He made a quick sketch. “This the creature you saw?”

I looked down at it and shivered. “Yep, that’s it.”

“And you say it’s wanting to come through the Gate tomorrow night?”

I nodded.

He tapped the drawing with his pencil, idly. “And now, it’s pulling you through different dimensions of reality?”

“Yes.” I crossed my arms. “In the last one, Desdemonia Landcaster sort of took over my consciousness and had created a hypno virus that infected the town. She wanted to open the Gate to the Who, and she was going to offer everyone in town as a sacrifice to hopefully keep her in power.”

Mr. Stewart rubbed the back of his neck. “Yeah, I can see why she’d do that.”

“Wow,” I said. “Not the answer I expected.”

“Well, it’s the old bear trick, right? Roll yourself up into a ball and play dead and hope the bear doesn’t tear you to ribbons.”
“I’ve heard that rarely woks.”

He grinned. “It must work enough times for it to become a survival technique. And hence, why Desdemonia thought rolling the town up into a ball might just reduce the amount of casualties this being might inflict.”

I thought about the creature in the green dimension. “I don’t think it cares, it’s just going to eat everything in its path.”

“Exactly. It and it’s ilk are precisely why we have dimensional gates in the first place. They tried to seal every dimension away, but that just made things worse. No, I don’t think rolling the town into a ball will save anything.”

“What am I going to do?” I said, feeling a sense of panic. “This thing is going to take me somehow tomorrow, and use me to come into the realities.”

“I have an idea…” he went and dug around in a closet and came back with a couple of items.

“So, let’s say fabric represents our dimension.” He held out a piece of gray microfiber cloth in front of him.

“This represents the being we’re talking about.” He took a ball bearing and set it onto the fabric.

“Now, imagine, if you will, a multitude of pieces of fabric laid on top of each other, but also at every possible angle.

“Okay.”

“He isn’t restricted by time, space, or dimension. That means he has some ability to perceive the dimensions as we do light. We have eyes, so the light reflects off a plane and strikes our eyes that is translated into electrical impulses, and then to our brain which interprets, analyzes and synthesizes the information it’s receiving. It does this very quickly.”

“Right, I follow.”

“The Who, must have some type of organ that allows it to perceive dimensions in the same manner. For us, we can’t understand it because it’s like seeing with your kneecaps.”

“Okay.”

“So, if you were able to somehow take out that organ, incapacitate, or ‘blind’ it for want of a better word, it wouldn’t be able to move between dimensions.”

I nodded. “I think I see where you’re going with this.”

“After ‘blinding’ it, and this would take mathematics beyond my own comprehension, but if you could create a ‘pocket dimension’ that would seal the being off from any other dimensions…”

“Ahh, a dimensional prison! Yes.”

“Correct. So it’s a two step process…well, three if you include terminating it. But I don’t know I’d recommend trying to terminate it, this being probably pre-dates time/space as we know it. I don’t think a knife to the heart is going to do it.”

“A baseball bat,” Mrs. Stewart said. “You could use a baseball bat to it’s brains.”

He chuckled. “I doubt a baseball bat would work either, dear.”

I nodded. “How do I do all that though?”

Mr. Stewart smiled, as he stood up from the table. “That, I can’t help you with, my boy.”

I got up from the table and sighed.

“There is, one other option,” Mrs. Stewart said.

“Oh?” we both paused.

“You say you fight this t’ing.”

“Well, not really fight. More like ran and hid and tried to avoid being squished like a bug.”

“One way to fight a dimensional being…be another dimensional being.”

“If you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em!” Mr. Stewart said.

“Hah.” I nodded. “True.”

As I left his house, I had more of an idea of how to stop it.

If you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em! Echoed through my brain as I got into my truck and started it up.