Samantha "Sam" White is almost invisible. She isn't alive at present. If you could travel back in time 50 years ago, you could see her, interact with her. Kasey Smith can't travel through time. But Sam can, and she frequently visits the year 2012. And Kasey thinks she is the only one who knows Sam can do that; that only she knows Sam exists.
"Wow, I feel so bad for you!" Sam says, after Kasey has just finished explaining how she was stuck working on a project with the despicable, immature Willy McFilly.
"I know, right? Willy doesn't contribute anything. He just sits there and sucks his thumb! How does he deserve any credit for all my hard work?" responds Kasey.
None of them had any idea that they were being watched. Not just by anyone, but by a spy, working for the Home for Mentally Disturbed Children.
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"Yes, master, the girl was talking to a time-traveler. Samantha White, from 50 years ago.," says the skinny teenage boy in black. His name is August Harper, and he's talking to none other than Nimbus Clarke, founder of the Home for Mentally Disturbed Children. The girl in question goes by the name Kasey Smith.
Clarke's eyes widen. "A time-traveler? Samantha White? Something is seriously wrong here, August. Thank you. I shall board her right away. Have you the girl's contact information?"
August nods, handing his master a slip of paper. A few weeks ago, he recalls, he found two other girls, called Shannon Caldwell and Marisel Burns, who he had recruited. Both had been caught with Sam, who had lived at the Home for half a year. Before she escaped.
Samantha White was the only child to ever escape alive.
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"Kasey, honey, I'm really sorry, okay?" says Mrs. Smith to her daughter. "You're going to this Home for Mentally Disturbed Children place. You'll be back in a year or so. I don't know why they think this, but I can't say no. They just won't let me. Kasey, I know you aren't mentally disturbed."
Kasey Smith bursts into a fountain of tears. Her life is ruined. Now she'd never see Sam, her other friends, or even her family again. She'd be locked up in a prison-like place for a whole year, with kids who were really psycho. Unlike her. Kasey knew she was normal.
***********************************
The gigantic coal-colored bus pulls up to 1029 Fairweather Street. Inside the warm and inviting house, Kasey Smith is getting ready to leave her life behind. Her friends, her family, all gone. Kasey trudges down the stairs, her suitcase packed, and out the front door to board the bus to the Home for Mentally Disturbed Children.
Kasey shoves her suitcase in the back and sits down. Next to her, she sees a short girl with freckles and brown hair. The girl is frowning, her head bowed. A green book bag is below her seat.
"Hi. My name is Shannon. Do I look mentally disturbed? You don't," says the girl. Kasey replies, "No, you look perfectly normal. Why are we being sent here anyways?"
Shannon shrugs her shoulders, then pulls out a comic book from her book bag and starts reading it. Kasey, who loves comics, looks over Shannon's shoulder. As she reads, she wonders why normal girls like them were sent to this place. It shouldn't be that bad. What if everyone else there is normal? Even if they aren't, you still have Shannon to talk to, she thinks.
After what seems like a million billion years, the bus stops at a towering brick building. A sign on the building says "Welcome to the Home for Mentally Disturbed Children". Kasey, Shannon, and everyone else file out of the bus.
*******************************
"Hello, all you mentally disturbed children," a voice booms. The voice belongs to Nimbus Clarke, the founder of the Home. Clarke treats the children to a very long and wordy lecture, involving details about room arrangements and those things. After the lecture, the children are free to go to their assigned rooms. To her delight, Kasey finds she's with Shannon, and another girl named Marisel, who is really tall, has short blonde hair, and seems to be at least two years older than her.
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As the girls get to know each other,, Kasey learns that Marisel isn't mentally troubled, and has lived here for about a year already. She eagerly shows Kasey and Shannon the way around the Home.
"I know a lot about this dungeon of a place, but not how to escape. I’ll figure it out, mark my words!," Marisel says, her eyes glinting with determination.
"Psst! Kasey!! Are you listening or what? Oh, and hi, Marisel and Shannon!" says a light and feathery voice that can only belong to Sam White. Kasey is overwhelmed with joy. How did Sam, of all people, get here? And how did Sam know Marisel and Shannon?
"Yeah, it's Sam. You know, Marisel and Shannon can see me too. You three are the only ones that can. And I was there when all of you were spied on and referred to the Home. You were all referred by the same person, August Harper," Sam explains.
Kasey can't believe her luck. This place was supposed to be for mentally disturbed people, and her roommates were probably the only normal kids in the entire Home, not including herself. And they were pretty nice too!
*****************************
It's a few weeks after Kasey and Shannon arrived. They've set up a pillow and blanket for Sam, and sneak her some cafeteria food every day when she "visits". Marisel doesn't hesitate to help Kasey and Shannon with basically everything, from playing her trumpet for them to showing them around the building.
"You guys, I need to tell you something. Like, right now!" Sam whispers. She glances around to make sure no one is looking (even though they probably won't be able to see her) and continues.
"Back when I actually existed, about fifty-something years ago, I was locked up in this exact same place. Yes, the Home existed back then, and so did Nimbus Clarke, its founder. "So anyways, the reason I was locked up was quite simple. My parents had died in a car crash, and I had severe brain damage. I lived alone for a few years, when I discovered the secrets of time travel and used them to escape my life.
"But after these happy few years were over, I was discovered by a teenage boy, who also sent you guys here. His name is August and he's a time traveler too. He was the one who dispensed the secrets to me, but after a few years, he forgot who I was.
"I was locked up there for a whole year, or so the staff thought. It was torture because most of the kids there had... serious... disciplinary problems. But when the 6-month mark had passed, I started having strange dreams. Dreams involving me, a skinny, brown-haired girl resembling Kasey, a shorter kid who looked like Shannon, and a tall redheaded girl who seemed to be Marisel. These dreams involved a pterosaur-like creature showing up from time to time. It would sometimes attack us, sometimes be a friend. It would swoop into my room and carry me out sometimes. But one day, the dreams became a reality. Well, the pterodactyl part, at least."
"Whoa! You're telling me you saw a real pterodactyl? Really? Weren't they extinct, like, fifty-six million years ago?" Marisel asks, her eyes wide with surprise. "Maybe it was just a robot or something."
A mysterious smile inches across Sam's ghostly face. "Maybe it was," she says, then dives into the rest of the tale.
"So the huge pterodactyl-thingie came up to my room. I was in an unfortunate situation, because my roommate was a mean and ruthless girl who tried to kill me each day. When the pterodactyl flew through the window, my roommate wanted to use it to kill me. However, the creature scratched her rather badly instead.
"And then I heard a strange voice inside my head. 'Samantha, Samantha, climb up on me. I will take you to safety,' it said. A little instinct inside my brain told me that it was the pterodactyl, speaking to me! So I hopped up on the huge creature and it flew away, down the hallway. And Marisel, yes, the ceiling was that high, so don't ask!!
"The creature flew directly into the office of Nimbus Clarke himself. Now, seeing what a frightful man the founder can be, I wasn't convinced this was the best idea. I started hearing that melodious pterodactyl voice in my head again, telling me that everything was going to be fine. And then, from under his desk, Clarke appeared. I think he'd been hiding there."
"Was he scared of you?" asks Shannon. "If he was, then I understand. I'd be pretty surprised if a girl riding on a dinosaur flew right into my office.
"Well, after the incident, in an interview, he said that he was just picking something up from under his desk. But I don't believe him," Sam replies.
"Clarke produced a gadget that looked like a ray gun, the kind you see in sci-fi movies. And by 'produced,' I mean that he somehow got it to appear out of thin air, right into his hand. He shot the pterodactyl with it. A hole burned in the great creature's wings and it fell to the floor. Suddenly, I felt a surge of energy come over me. When I looked down on myself, I saw a golden sphere of light around me. I was in one of those on-top-of-the-world moments, when you feel like you can do anything. And then it all collapsed. My rising energy fell, plummeting like a rock in a swimming pool. Half a second before, I felt like I climbed Mount Everest, but now I could have died on the descent. And soon I was so drained that I couldn't stand upright.
"I lost consciousness for about ten straight minutes, during which Clarke managed to drag me halfway down the hall to my room. When I woke up at last, I had no memories of who I was or what had happened. Clarke produced a huge metal rod, like he produced the ray gun, and attempted to kill me with it. But every one of his blows just went through my body! I looked at my hands and couldn't see them. Even my feet were gone. Somehow, I'd managed to disintegrate.”
Just then, someone is knocking on the door. When Kasey opens it, she finds one of the kitchen staff of the Home. "GIRLS! Come downstairs for your dinner or there will be SERIOUS CONSEQUENCES!" yells the cook, enraged. Kasey, Shannon, Marisel, and Sam trudge downstairs, hoping that they can still hear Sam's story.
Sam attempts to continue her story, but she's out of luck. The cook literally drags the girls downstairs to the dirty, horribly maintained kitchen. The girls can see obese chefs preparing dishes of horse poop and mashed potatoes. “What kind of a place is this?” asked Kasey, surprised. “A demented, rundown, and totally psycho place!” said Marisel, a teasing twinkle in her eye. “Hey Kasey, Shannon, Sam, you know something screwy about this place? It’s for mental people, right? Well, the people here aren’t mental, except for the staff! There’s something to this that’s more than a normal asylum...”
***********************
Kasey pauses and thinks about Marisel’s comment. “Well, a while ago, I read about how most so-called cases of mental illness are really normal people. Doctors make mistakes all the time.”
“No,” Sam replies. “It’s something more. So basically, when I somehow became a time-traveler, Clarke wanted to track me down. So he’s locking up all the kids who’ve ever interacted with me or other time travelers. Dumb idea, I know, but he hopes that he’ll be able to track my whereabouts and tap into my abilities. Which is why we must get out of here without becoming time travelers like me”
**************************
Kasey, Shannon, Marisel, and Sam are in their room, having endured dinner. They’re reading books, making crafts, and hanging out. It feels like a perfectly normal day... until a blood-curdling scream nearly makes all the girls go deaf. The dorm room’s only window turns to sharp slivers of glass, and a beast of colossal proportions is now standing in the room.
“The pterodactyl!” Sam exclaims. “We can escape now! But first we need to take care of that beastly Nimbus Clarke. Quick, grab anything you can use as a weapon!”
Kasey picks up a pair of scissors, which she’d been using only a few seconds ago to make paper snowflakes. Shannon takes her book bag, while Marisel tucks her small flashlight into her sweater pocket.
The four girls climb aboard the pterodactyl and try to hold on as it takes off flying. After many death-defying dives and almost too much turbulence, they land in the office of the one and only Nimbus Clarke.
The headmaster is surprised when he saw the girls and the dinosaur. The sight reminds him of the escape of Samantha White fifty years ago. He would have tried to kill the pterodactyl again, except before he can make a move, Shannon clouts him over the head with her book bag. Clarke falls unconscious, hitting the light switch and turning it off.
Marisel winks. “Good thing I brought this!” she says, whipping out her pocket flashlight and illuminating the office... just as Clarke regains consciousness. “I’ll... get you... you.... horrible people!” he manages to speak. Kasey impulsively dashes towards Clarke and attempts to stab him with her scissors, but she’s stopped by Sam, who says “Kasey! No! It’s not right to kill people, not even Nimbus Clarke!” Kasey restrains herself, agreeing entirely with Sam’s words.
As she mounts the pterodactyl, Kasey thinks about what just happened. Nimbus Clarke had abused her and her friends, but it wasn’t right to kill him for that.
Her thoughts are interrupted by Marisel’s voice. “Hey, I was thinking, this is what just might set us apart from the kind of people who are supposed to be locked up here. They can’t feel enough empathy to spare the life of the guy who tortured them. But we can. So we’ve gotta get out of here!”
*******************
The pterodactyl has just left the Home for Mentally Disturbed Children. Kasey and her friends are doing all they can to hang on. The girls find themselves dropped off in front of the school Kasey used to attend. All their parents are waiting there, and so is August Harper, the one who referred the girls to the Home. There’s a blatantly guilty look on his face.
“I’m sorry. It was my fault. I shouldn’t have listened to stupid old Clarke, who’s only doing this whole Home for Mentally Disturbed Children thing for the pleasure of locking people up. You see, Clarke’s the mentally disturbed psychopath. Watching people suffer makes him happy, so he shut you up just because he felt like it. As for the time-travel thing... well, there’s something about the flying dinosaur thingie that causes people to turn into invisible time travelers like Sam here.” August explains.
Hooked by his story so far, the girls tell August to continue, while their parents exchange puzzled looks. And so he does.
“Somehow, the pterodactyl that saved you had managed to survive when that asteroid killed all the dinosaurs 65 million years ago. But that asteroid was no ordinary space rock. It had a powerful magic spell on it, which rubbed off on the pterodactyl, causing it to travel through time. When Clarke nearly killed it, the time-traveling powers passed on to Sam. So now there’s a pterodactyl trapped in 2012. And it can turn invisible at will.” Perfectly on cue, the beast flies off, slowly fading away as it does.
“I sure hope he visits us sometime soon...” Shannon says, a faraway look in her eyes.
Marisel laughs. “What makes you think it’s a he?” she asks, a hint of mischief in her voice.
“How does it matter?” Sam replies quietly. “He or she or it saved our lives, and that’s what really matters...”
“So you’re not going back in time to where you were supposed to be?!” says Shannon. “Because if you did, I can bet we’d all be so mad.”
Sam winks. “I have three super-awesome and totally-not-mental friends, and that’s all I care about right now. Thanks for an awesome adventure, even if it was a little too scary at times....”
