It was 9:21 and Ness was sound asleep in his very own bed for the first time in months. Hey, you would understand too if you had just vanquished the Embodiment of Evil a few hours earlier. Suddenly, Ness jolted awake and got up on his knees. (He’s a light sleeper) Somebody was knocking on the door at an obnoxious pitch. He groaned, shook his head several times, and hopped out of bed. Making his way across his room, he realized that about five months ago he was rudely awaken the same way, and that was the start of the adventure.

No, he thought, I’m just gonna get on with life now. I’ve got so much ahead of me.

The knocking didn’t cease when Ness had fumbled down the steps. His mom and sister were still up, but they were glued to the TV watching something-or-another. His lazy old dog, King, was lying down by the couch trying to sleep.

"My land! Who could be knocking at the door at this time of the night? Please answer it, Ness. I’m in no condition to open the door!" his mom said over the TV.

"Mom," Ness replied sleepily, "I just got out of bed, my hair’s messed up, I’m in my pajamas, and my ears are ringing. YOU’RE watching television, you’re wearing what you wore hours ago, and you look wide awake."

"… I guess you’ve got a point."

With that, his mom got up and ran over to answer the door. She was just about there, when it flew open. Standing in the porchlight was none other than Picky, Pokey’s little brother!

"Good evening, Mrs. Lee," he said in his stuffy and slightly lisped voice, "My brother, Pokey dropped by and said I should give this letter to Ness."

Ness gasped. He ran over to the door and snatched the letter out of Picky’s hand. It was slightly blotched, and written in Pokey’s handwriting. Ness could make out:

Pokey Minch

It was another mild summer night when Ricky and Krause, two brothers, were playing BS to pass the time. Ricky looked at his deck, thought for a moment, then put down two cards.

"Two queens… OR IS IT?" he said with a grin.

"How long have we been playing this?" Krause sighed. It looked like he was about to tear his thick blond hair right out of his head.

Ricky checked his watch.

"Only two hours and seven minutes. C’mon bro, it’s only 11:43!"

"Well play BS by yourself! I’m gonna go to bed. See you in the morning," Krause said impatiently as he turned and waked off towards his bunk at the end of the room. Being the clumsy type, he tripped over their sleeping beagle, Boney, who responded with a yelp. He plopped down and put his face into the pillow.

Darn! He never makes it past midnight! Ricky thought. He might as well go to bed too. However, as he walked over to his bunk, the whole room lit up with white light for an instant. Then a sudden rumble shook the whole house. The fire in the fireplace went up in a roar and both Ricky and Boney were jolted off the ground. Krause let out a very audible YOWCH! as his head banged against the top bunk.

"What the hey…?" Ricky said as he picked himself up and rushed to the window. Through the old and now cracked glass, he could see a strange, slowly flashing light emitting from the nearby wood. His neighbor’s lights were now on, and he could see people’s figures milling about inside. The light stopped and it was dark, except for his neighbor’s lights.

"Lemme see! Lemme see!" Krause said as he tried jumping over his taller brother’s shoulders, "I was born a minute before you were, you know!"

Ricky didn’t really care.

"It looks like somebody was just playing with illegal fireworks. Go back to bed."

Krause sneered and crossed his arms. Their door swung open. They turned around to see their dad, Flint. He was wearing his cowboy hat and leather trenchcoat. In his hand was the old baseball bat that hung over their mantle. He had a very solemn look on his face, even more so than normal. In his low, grim voice, he warned them:

"Boys, listen here. I’m going out there now. I don’t want you even leaving your rooms now. Stay put. I’ll be back in the morning."

As Flint turned to leave, Boney scrambled to his feet and followed happily at his heels. Their door slammed shut behind them and there was the sound of a latch shutting. They were silent for about a minute, then Krause spoke out.

"That’s crap! I wanna see what he’s up to!"

"Me too, but if we step outside, there’ll be Hell to pay…" Ricky muttered.

"Has that ever stopped us before?" Krause asked, getting closer to Ricky’s face. Ricky paused, thought it over for about a second, then said:

"I’m not going."

"Fine then!" Krause snapped, "You can stay here and play solitaire while I go check out what might be the coolest thing to ever happen in the history of this boring hick town!"

Krause grabbed his slingshot from the table and stormed over to the door, where he picked the lock with two paperclips and stormed right through. Ricky made a weird face. It got too darn boring without Krause. He climbed up to his bunk, pulled out his paintball gun, and ran out the door.

Ricky ran through his front yard and out onto the dirt road, when he caught up to Krause.

"I knew you’d tag along," Krause said, smiling.

There weren’t many people out yet. They walked on down the lane, getting a rather unsettling feeling about the incident, but they were yet determined to see what it was. The ancient road was dotted with oil-burning lamps about every 30 feet, so it was rather dim. The twins knew they were getting close to the woods that they played in. As they crossed through a cornfield, Ricky swore that he saw something creeping through the stalks. It seemed to be small and rather fat, and moved in a stooped gait. He was about to point it out, but when he turned away, it was gone. The air was now strong with the odor of smoke and something else that neither of the twins recognized. Suddenly, they head the sound of sprinting paws. Before either of them could turn to look at what was coming, something zipped right in between the two, followed by the sound of yipping and a great breeze.

"Is that-?" Krause began.

"Boney…" Ricky said. They were beginning to get unnerved. When Boney ran like that, something was certainly not right.

"Are we…still going?" Ricky asked, trying to hide his obvious tension.

"Of course…of course. Boney probably saw a snake…"

"I hate snakes."

"So do I."

"I wonder if Dad is okay…"

"Of course he’s okay. He can handle it himself."

Ricky and Krause walked on nervously. In no time at all, they were at the edge of the woods. Krause flipped on his powerful flashlight. Some of the smaller trees had fallen due to whatever incident occurred, and about every ten feet, there was what appeared to be a small ripple in the ground, each time growing bigger. If you’ve been out after an earthquake, you know what it’s like. The smoke was starting to weave through the trees like grayish snakes. The kids used their t-shirts as a filter, which worked rather well. The visibility dropped dramatically until finally they could only see about five feet in front of them. Finally, they stumbled over a rather large ripple and it cleared out altogether. The boys climbed to their feet, brushed themselves off, and looked up in awe. About ten feet in front of them, there was a very odd mechanism. It looked like a spider on it’s back, with eight crooked legs sticking up into the air in various positions. Smoke poured out from the bottom of it, and it strangely followed the ground until about ten feet. Slowly blinking pale lights on the machine lit this in an eerie, disturbing manner. There were a few small fires burning around it. Krause noticed that there was also shards of broken glass that they were lucky not to step on. Ricky, wide-eyed, tried stepping closer, but the heat kept him back.

"I knew you would leave the house…" a deep voice boomed from beside them. The twins jumped with a start. Standing very tall and still right beside them was the father, Flint. He looked down at them, raising his cowboy hat.

"No matter how much I imply something, you’ve just gotta go and disobey me directly."

"We’re…" Ricky began, but Flint cut in sharply.

"I know. You’re sorry. You best be. You’ve put us all in danger…"

"Danger?" Krause inquired, though there was a huge lump in his throat.

"You’re probably not ready for what I’m about to tell you, but if I don’t tell you, you’ll find out sooner or later. Plainly put… I’m not your father."

Ricky: …

Krause: How…?

"There’s a reason you’re with me. I’m actually your uncle. You see, your parents were two people of great importance. That’s all that I’ll tell you. It seems that … someone knows too much. We need to get to somewhere else as quickly as possible. You two get home, pack as much as you can carry, grab Boney, then get into the truck and keep quiet. If I’m not there in ten minutes, just hotwire the ignition like you did to my old Jeep!"

The twins stood still, shocked and wide-eyed. It was too much information to process at once. They did not quite know why, but they knew that their whole life would be changed. Flint turned around, swinging his trenchcoat and revealing his metal bat.

"NOW."

The twins scrambled off into the smoke. Flint turned back around, slowly drawing his old aluminum baseball bat. He was ready all right…