Timothy opened the door to the daycare. It was quiet inside, the children are not playing or napping, they are sitting quietly at tables with their hands folded. He scanned the room but does not see Giselle. The younglings do not make eye contact with him, except one, an antsy one in the corner. He laughed; “Hi, I’m here for my cousin,” he said to the person behind the desk. Lucille came in behind Timothy, “Hey, I’m clocking in,” she announced.
Timothy turned back to the worker, “Giselle please.”
“Giselle, Giselle,” the worker said flipping through the sign in log; “Giselle, right.”
“Yes.”
“It says she has been picked up already.”
“Picked up already? By who?”
“Her parents.”
“Her parents?” The student registered the lie, “Really her parents came in, they didn’t tell me they were picking her up.”
“Well, she left, with her parents.”
Timothy turned around and snapped back to the worker, “Mister or Miss, picked her up?”
“Both of them.”
“Uh huh,” Timothy walked out the daycare.
Outside the daycare, the temperature rose a lot. “Man, it got hot out of nowhere,” he commented to himself. A breeze blew by and stopped when it touched his body, for the first time in his life he felt wind as a solid. The wind jabbed him in his gut, and he swatted it away. It clunked as it hit the ground and then another clunk hit the ground. Heat materialized as two rows of flames beside the boy. He ran towards the daycare, the fire intersected and cut him off. “Foolish mortal, you can’t run from my authority,” a woman’s voice said behind him.
“Who are you?” he asked turning around to see a woman in a flowing gown, face covered by the fanning inferno.
“I’m the Princess of the Specter Zone, head of the summoning committee.”
“The Specter Zone?”
“Yes, the Specter Zone, where you summoned the girl from?”
“Oh, that place…”
“I need to see your license.”
“License, what license?”
“Your license that allows you to do summons.”
“Is this about the book?”
“Yes, Mortal!”
“Oh, if that’s the case I have a library card and that allows me to get books.”
“A library card!” She scoffed and cut her eyes at him, “Do you think you’re funny?”
“I have my moments.”
“Well, do you like dark humor?”
“…at times.”
“Well let me humor you if you don’t return the girl back in three days, I’m burning your neighborhood down.”
“Where’s the humor in that?” Timothy’s demeanor changed.
“In your face,” the Princess laughed.
Her laughter picked up his mood. “Oh, it’s humor!”
“No idiot, it’s a promise. I will have this place set ablaze if Giselle is not back in three days.”
“Wait, how can you set the whole town on fire.”
She snapped her fingers and in a poof of smoke comes out a Black, bald individual with orange eyes. “Ashton here will do it for me.”
“Hey fireman, how about I get a week to find the girl.”
“No, you get three days.” She checked her watch, “You have until four P.M. on Thursday, before this place is smoked out.”
“Big man, you let this woman dictate to you,” Timothy instigated.
“What are you doing?”
“Asking the man, a question.”
“Cut your foolishness out, three days or this place is gone.”
“Wait, wait, wait!” Timothy panicked recalling his recent conversation in the daycare. I was told she was picked up by her parents.”
“That’s a good cover up.”
“No, I’m serious, if you go back into the daycare and ask for her they will say her parents picked her up.” Timothy looked past the Princess to see the daycare was not behind her or behind him. “I think it is next to one of these walls of fire.”
Both paranormal individuals looked at each other. “I don’t think he knows,” Ashton says to the Princess.
“He doesn’t know, but knows how to do summons. That doesn't seem believable.”
“What am I supposed to know?” Timothy asked.
“Hm, he could be acting dumb,” the Princess commented.
“Acting dumb to what, this fire thing is new to me.”
“Just tell him,” Ashton told her.
“You are in a pocket of space between both realms. That way your world is not affected by things in the Specter Zone.”
“If that’s the case, why am I being penalized for losing the girl.”
“Because she’s not in the pocket of space but roaming around in your world.”
“What happens if a person from the Specter Zone stays to long in my world.”
“I see he hasn’t been following along,” Ashton commented.
“We set your home on fire!” the Princess exclaimed.
“I meant without intervention.”
“Horrible things but remember bring the girl home.”
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The walls of fire collide with each other. In a moment of intense heat, Timothy cooled down and is back outside the daycare.
After his episode with the paranormal authorities, he called Gloria, “You won’t believe what just happened.”
“What happened?”
“Giselle went missing.”
“What! How?”
“Apparently her parents picked up.”
“Parents? She doesn’t have parents, she’s a spirit…do spirits have parents?”
“Supposedly. But now we have to find Giselle, or the town will be set on fire.”
“Set on fire! Set on fire by who?”
“By another spirit that some Princess of the summoning commission is sicking on us.”
“A summoning committee, this all sounds fake, stop playing.”
“I’m not it was the strangest thing. I left the daycare and all of a sudden, I was surrounded by fire and this woman was threatening me with destruction if I didn’t send Giselle back.”
“Did you tell her about the parents?”
“Yeah, and they were not going for it.”
“Well, you’re going to have to fix that.”
“Yeah, we are going to have to fix it.”
“We, we nothing, I didn’t summon any spirits to do my project.”
“But if you don’t help me, you and everyone you love will be dead.”
“Dammit Timmy!”
“And you and the girl bonded, I know she would love to see your face when she gets saved.”
“How do we know she’s even in the area, she might be out the country for all we know or worse.”
“Don’t say that, then we all will be worse. Have some faith.”
“I would but you give me nothing to have faith in.” Gloria hung up.
“Gloria, Gloria! Aw damn, she’s mad at me…”
“Lucille you’re back!” a woman in the backroom said.
“Yeah, I really wanted to help out since we have a big event coming up.”
“Ah, yes the big event…” the woman paused, then resumed, “Your dedication to our group has been fantastic, I think you should get a scholarship after our trip.”
“Really!”
“Yes, of course I don’t make the calls, but I’ll put in a word for you.” The lady said watching the children rove around on the floor. “Oh, and Duke has recommitted himself back to the Loving Hands Friendship House.
“Oh wow, really, that’s great!”
“Speaking of the man himself.”
“Good afternoon,” he greeted the females.
“Hi, are you coming back to the Loving Hands Friendship House!” blurted out Lucille.
“…Yeah” he answered.
“Sorry, if you wanted to tell her yourself. It was such big news, I had to tell her,”The woman apologized.
“It’s fine, is Mother here?”
“Ah yes, she is. I know she wanted to talk to you. She should be in her office.”
“Thank you.” Duke walked away from the females.
Lucille watched him walk away, “Do you know what Mother wants to talk to him about?” Lucille asks.
“I don’t but I don’t think he’s in trouble.”
Duke got to Mother’s office and knocked on the door. “Come in,” her voice says from the other side.
He opened the door, “Good afternoon, Mother.”
“Welcome back Duke, I heard that you had interesting weekend.” She is shrouded in the darkness of her clothing. Mother’s presence had a dominating effect on those around her. Her eyes are piercing yet allowed those to open to her.
“Yes, I did.”
“I heard those effects in the production were amazing, how did you do it?”
“Uh… well it’s a crazy story.” He did not know how to put the information across, “Well, I had a helper, who miraculously was able to make things happen.”
“Make things happen, how?”
“It might be magic… I know it sounds crazy.”
“No, it doesn’t, we believe in a power above our understanding, this could be apart of this power.” Duke did not say anything. “Welcome back Duke, I’ll see you at the event this weekend?”
“Yes… erm, what is the event?”
“We are going to visit the next plane, with our guide.”
“We found a guide?”
“Yes, a sign from the powers outside our understanding.”
“I see.”
“Please, stay and help us prepare a bit, get yourself reacclimated,” her eyes transferred her darkness to him.
“Yes, Mother.”
Duke left and Mother followed behind him.
It was late night around midnight and Timothy was flipping through channels on the television. He quickly skipped over Barry doing psychic work on an informercial, he flipped back to the channel. “Call 1-800 PSYCHIC for a reading,” Barry announced. “We have a caller. To give you some speaking time, what’s your name?”
“Ms. Kwon”
“Hello, Ms. Kwon. What’s your question?”
“When will I get my book back?”
“The person you are talking about, the person who has it will come seek you out real soon.”
“Okay.”
The phone call ended. Another call comes in, “Hello caller.”
“Hey, Mr. See It All, I got a message for…”
“I will tell him! Don’t worry…” Barry cut off. “Commercial!” he ended the call.
During the commercial break Timothy got the idea to call Barry for help with Giselle. He dialed the number in and got put on hold. The program came back on, and Barry was with a caller. Timothy held the line. From the television, Barry could be heard giving a prediction, “Things ain’t looking so great, delete those pictures off your phone and deactivate your social media accounts, we’ll leave it at that.” He abruptly yelled, “Don’t connect line 5!”. But it was too late, the caller was in. “Because I’m too young to gamble,” he cut the customer off. The operator disconnected the call. Timothy finally got through, “I’m sure you already know my name, do you know where I can find a girl named Giselle?”
“Ah yeah… ain’t she a bit young?” Seeming like a predator, Barry’s boss instructed him to keep the call going. “So, tell me a bit, is she important in your life. I feel like you owe her something.”
“… I just need to find the kid.”
“I see, Ms. Ancer’s psychic hotline does not assist in crimes.”
“I’m not a pedophile. I need to find my cousin, she went missing.
Timothy’s call got switched over to the boss, “His name is Timothy!” Barry shouted over.
The boss now has the call in her hands, “Hello Timothy, this is head psychic Ms. Ancer, we would like to assist you in your search for your cousin. However, we would like to use your story to help promote the brand; we would change the names of course.”
“Sure, I just need to find the kid A.S.A.P.”
“Of course, call again tomorrow for more help.”
“Wait, wait, wait, wait, this current caller.”
Barry took the current caller, “Hello caller.”
“What do you see in my future?”
“A phone call. Callers usually come with a defined narrow question.”
“Do you double as a medium?”
“Usually, the questions are about yourself.”
“Is there fire?”
“Yes…”
“A lot?”
“More than a normal person would see.”
“Good to hear, about that Giselle girl is she safe?”
“Yes, she is safe.”
“Do you know where she is at?”
He got a signal from the boss to milk the call. “Dang this girl is popular.”
“3 days or everyone will be on fire.”
“Goodbye, we are going to commercial,” Barry cut the call. “Man, the psychos and predators are out tonight,” he told his boss.
“Hold on, I got the predator on the phone,” She gave her attention back to Timothy “Do you know that last caller?”
“He wants the girl, and he kills.”
“Are you a cop?”
“No, I’m the girls cousin.”
“Maybe you should call the authorities.”
“I called because I know Barry is a real psychic.”
“Wait, how do you know his name?”
“I just do, can you help or not?”
“If you honor the deal, sure.”
“Yeah, whatever just help me.”
Ms. Ancer recruited Barry to Timothy’s search, “I got a job for you. This Timothy boy will call often just advise him on finding the girl.”
“I can tell you that…” he saw a vision of his boss’s future seeing she will short him of his pay. He came back into it, “I will take the job.” The vision turned into a grand fire at his job, he focused hard to figure the date, it is 2 days from the current date, “I just want off on the 6th.”
“That’s too short notice!”
“That’s it I quit.”
“You wouldn’t.”
Barry placed his hand on the crystal ball and rolled it over to the edge of the table.
“Fine you can be off on the 6th!” she caved. “She continued to tell Timothy to call tomorrow night.”
“But I need…” the call ends.
In between switching channels, Timothy heard rumbling outside, he peeked out his window to see Roscoe struggling to get into his house. He retreated into his blinds when he saw Roscoe’s head turn towards his house. He kept watching television when a knock comes at his door, “Crap,” he mumbled to himself. He answered the door, “Hey Tim, can I get a knife, I need to open my lock,” Roscoe requested.
“Sure…” Timothy closed the door.
Timothy returned to the door with the knife, before he gave him the knife, he posed a question to Roscoe, “I have a question for you?”
“Its to get in my house.”
“No, I figured that, but you know about somethings going on.”
“It depends on what are these things?”
“I have a friend who lost their daughter, she got kidnapped out the daycare in town.”
“The mother’s place?”
“Yeah, that one, what do you know about it?”
“It’s a recruiting ground for the Loving Hands Friendship House.”
“Oh boy. How?”
“Apparently they warp the minds of the kids who go and then they bother their parents to go to a meeting and then the whole family gets involved and once they are committed the whole family is trapped in that cult.”
“But why would they kidnap a child?”
“I don’t know, but she was that girl who stopped the production at the fair the other day, right?”
“You were there?”
“Yeah, I saw the final moments.”
“Maybe the family of the girl is apart of the cult.”
“She’s not.”
“Are you sure? You never know.”
“I know she’s not apart of the cult, can you help me with some info on her disappearance?”
“I’ll look around for you, same time tomorrow?”
Timothy looked back to check the time, “Yeah,” he hands him the knife.
Barry texted Timothy with a plan to get views on the situation and for Timothy to not pay standard rates. He sent him the number to the hotline, with the extension number and let him know going through this route will skip the processing fees. Timothy was to call at midnight.