“Good
luck.” The secretary handed Fred the keys to Red Ghost’s cell, then leaned
conspiratorially forward. “Don’t mention the extra food on his plate to Justin,
OK? He’d have a conniption. I just hate to see the poor guy suffer so much.”
Fred nodded his agreement and the secretary waved him through.

Truth
be told, Fred hated to see him suffer too. He had grown up with Red Ghost
stories, and it was his cousin that the now-insane hermit saved when he first
showed up. Stories had floated around the farming community for a while, but
his cousin had been the first credible account. The rat was called ‘Red Ghost’
because the first people to see him thought he was a ghost, and he was all red.
Not just red fur color, but actual red dye and red clothing; he looked like a
cherry.

Nobody
knew what to make of him at first, but Justin wouldn’t send out the Guards to
investigate; he wanted (and he got) the lone rat as Thorn Valley’s very first
folk hero. From killing a small stray cat to just helping someone split firewood,
Red Ghost came and went, doing large and small. That is, he did so until a few
days ago, when he tried to kill Justin.

It had been incredibly
abrupt; Justin was taking a walk, and Red Ghost had jumped out of the brush and
charged him with a strange white knife. Justin managed to fight him off, and
the illustrious Red Ghost had been sent to the valley’s haphazard jail as its
first inhabitant. He had been transferred to the psychiatric ward the next day,
and it was Fred’s job to try and make sense of him. All they knew so far was
what the Guards had observed: Red Ghost slept with his eyes open, and he wanted
to know if he had ‘got him’.

Expecting the worst, Fred
rounded the corner and slid the panel away from the tiny window in the cell’s
door. Interestingly, the ward had actual cells, whereas the jail was a
converted storage room. After the tragedy when the rats departed the Rosebush,
the Council called the mental health of the rats into question. The library was
ransacked for texts, and the ward was built. Seeing Red Ghost sitting in the
other corner, rocking back and forth, Fred almost wished that the Council had
ignored the issue. After nerving himself a bit, he decided it was safe to open
the door and enter. It was very strange to be in the same room with such a
larger-than-life figure, and to be treating him... Fred wasn’t sure he was up to
the task. But we have to know why he did it...

“Is
it safe? Did we get him?” Red Ghost was still staring into the corner, so Fred
had to resign himself to talking to his back. Fred noted what Red Ghost had
said before asking his first question.

“Who
do you mean?” Red Ghost slowly turned his head around.

“He
knows it if you say his name... And he doesn’t like it. I saw lots of Guards
coming to help me before he got me! Did they get him? Did they do it? Is it
safe now? It wasn’t safe... Never was safe... Not for me... Never would’ve been...”
Fred decided to play along. Red Ghost was staring at the wall now, his head
seeming to track some far away point of interest.

“Don’t
worry, we got him.” Red Ghost visibly relaxed. “They wanted me to ask you some
questions... you obviously know more about him than we do. For instance, why the
red?”

Red
Ghost hugged his knees up to his chest, and leaned up against the wall. “He can’t
see red... He’ll get you if he can see you, but he can’t get what he can’t see!”
He started to laugh. “He can’t get you then!”

‘Hmm’ing
like he understood, Fred wrote down the answer. “When did you first meet him?”

“That
was a long time ago... He almost had got me. He’s like a drug. You keep him next
to you, and you think you’re gaining from him, but all the while it’s the other
way ‘round. I realized it just in time, and I got away! I’m the only one he’s
never got!” Fred patiently waited for the laughing to die down again. “It took
me a long time to figure a way to get him, and even then it didn’t work. But
you guys did it!”

Fred
was about to ask another question when Red Ghost continued. “Poor Nicodemus...
never saw it coming. You see, Nicodemus thought to use him. Nicodemus wouldn’t
get got in the end. Nicodemus had it in hand. Nicodemus was safe.” Red Ghost
shook his head sadly. “An eye for an eye, that’s how the world works. No such
thing as a free lunch.”

Fred
asked a few more questions, but Red Ghost didn’t answer. It was quite possible
he couldn’t even hear him. Before long, the psychiatrist left, and as an
afterthought arranged to have some cleaning supplies put in the cell so Red
Ghost could clean himself up.

^>

Insulated
as they were, the cells weren’t soundproof. Consequently, Fred was woken up in
the middle of the night when an aide rushed into his room. Red Ghost was
screaming his lungs out, and a few of the nearby rats couldn’t sleep. Fred
hurried down to the ward. When the aide opened the door, the dim screaming
became loud enough to hear clearly; it sent a chill up Fred’s spine. It was a
death-scream; the kind given out only by an animal staring the reaper straight
in the eyes. The worst part was that it never stopped. On and on and on...
without pause. Red Ghost never stopped to breathe.

Jogging
the distance down to the cell, Fred didn’t even check the panel before opening
the door. He saw the rat holding his eyes and running back and forth, slamming
into the padded walls. He was still screaming. Instinctively, Fred pulled Red
Ghost’s hands away from his eyes and tried to slap him out of it, to no effect.
On a burst of inspiration, Fred stopped the screaming by prying Red Ghost’s
eyes open. The tortured rat immediately collapsed into the fetal position and
began crying. Between sobs and coughing up blood, he managed to talk a little;
on the plus side, at least he was normal color again. Fred stuck his head out
the door and yelled for Mr. Ages.

“You
said... you said that it was safe. You said we got him... but we didn’t! We
didn’t get him at all! Not safe... Never safe... Not me... Never again...” He rocked
back and forth for a while; Fred was disinclined to stop him.

“Well,
who were you trying to get?” Red Ghost stopped rocking, and pulled his head out
from his legs to look at Fred.

“You
don’t know? Don’t tell me you got Justin? It’s not Justin’s fault...” He
laughed bleakly. “I thought it was too, at first. Justin moved to protect him,
after all. I thought it was Justin just like I thought it was Nicodemus when
Nicodemus was using him. But then I remembered. He’s like a drug. Justin’s
addicted. He follows Justin wherever Justin goes... always there. He was with
Justin when I tried to get him, but Justin stopped me. You know, I even tried
to get Justin once? I was convinced Justin was the problem. Justin isn’t,
though. Nope. He is. He was all along. Allllll alllloonnnngggg...” Fred
had stopped writing. He was too busy staring at Red Ghost’s face.

No
rat had gone missing since the move to the valley, and none had died who wasn’t
buried. Therefore, the assumption had been that Red Ghost had been in Thorn
Valley to begin with. This was true; he was there before the rest of the
Rats of NIMH arrived. Fred was staring into the face of someone he had grown up
hating. His picture was in textbooks, and his visage populated nightmares.
Whatever his exploits since taking on that moniker, Red Ghost had once been the
Councilman Jenner. Fred turned to leave, intending to warn Mr. Ages, but Jenner
stopped him.

“Don’t
tell Justin!” He hissed, his viselike grip preventing Fred’s escape. “He knows
anything Justin knows! Whatever you do, don’t tell Justin! If you do, it’ll be
the death of us both!” Both fear and madness fought in Jenner’s eyes. Though
his original intent had been to tell his leader as soon as possible, something
in Jenner’s voice made him hesitate. Then he remembered the screaming.

“I
won’t.” He glanced around conspiratorially, if only to reassure Jenner. “How
long do we have?”

Jenner
cackled grimly. “That depends. How long does the leukemia patient have? Maybe
he’ll go into remission. Maybe he’ll get forgotten by the ‘body’ of Thorn
Valley. One thing’s for sure, though. Remission or no remission, if he’s
tainted you, you’re never safe. All it takes is one touch... one bit of aid... and
he’s got you. Nicodemus kept him by substituting others for Nicodemus’ own
self, but Nicodemus was got in the end. Only I got away, but I’m not safe.”
Fred recognized Jenner’s descent into himself, and turned again to leave. He
wasn’t stopped this time. “Not safe yet... Never safe... Not any of us... Never
again...”

On
his way out, Fred placed his papers in his desk. His memory was sufficient and
he no longer needed them, but he couldn’t discount the chance that someone else
might need what he’d found.

\/>

Mr.
Ages had originally stayed behind when the Rats of NIMH moved to Thorn Valley,
but loneliness and his declining health gradually forced him into
translocating. As the mouse was the only living person other than Justin to
have been Nicodemus’ confidant, Fred was very grateful for Mr. Ages’ choice. It
also meant that a top-notch doctor was never far away. After Mr. Ages got done
giving the now-unresponsive Jenner something for the pain, Fred walked him
home. He wanted a chance to talk. Thankfully, Mr. Ages had never seen Jenner up
close, and so he hadn’t recognized the rat.

It
was a good thing Mr. Ages had such a gruff personality; Fred didn’t have to
beat around the bush at all. Once they were alone in a hallway, he simply asked
Mr. Ages what he wanted to know. “I have to ask you some questions about
Nicodemus. It’s for Red Ghost’s benefit, not mine.” Ages nodded, and opened the
door wide enough to allow Fred entrance. “What can you tell me about
Nicodemus?”

“He’s
dead. Now, have you figured out what’s wrong with the boy?”

“I’ve
got an idea, but I need your help. Did Nicodemus ever mention an unnamed ‘him’,
or talk about getting ‘advice’ or ‘help’? Or about having to ‘substitute others
for himself’?”

“Well,
not specifically those things, exactly... but I think I know what you’re asking
about. He wasn’t born with those powers... he got them later. From the Stone, and
no, I don’t know where he got it. Nobody understood how it worked... How
much math do you know?”

“Excuse
me?”

“I’ll
explain... to take the square root of a number means to find another number
which, when multiplied with itself, will equal the target number. For more
complicated calculations, it is sometimes necessary to manipulate the square
root of negative one. The problem is that no number in existence will fit the
bill.”

“Not
to be rude, but what does this have to do with the topic? I don’t have much
time.”

“The
point is that mathematicians use i to represent the square root of negative
one, and it helps them to achieve understandable results. They use i because
they need to achieve their goals, but even after working with it for a long
time, they are no closer to understanding it. Can you imagine having i of
something? I know I can’t. The Stone is the same way. Use without
understanding; application without perception.”

“What,
do you think, would a mind be like that could perceive such a state?”

“Alien.
Unnatural. Completely foreign to our way of thought. I think it’s impossible
for a normal mind to wrap itself around such a concept. As for Nicodemus...
everything he did that seemed to defy basic physics, he did with the Stone,
however indirectly. I don’t know about ‘him’, ‘advice’, or ‘help’, but the
last... He couldn’t get something for nothing.” Mr. Ages trailed off.

“Go
on.”

“The
laws of physics. It doesn’t seem like he obeyed them, but he did. Not in any
way I can understand, but they still seem to hold true for things like i.
Instead of energy for work, he exchanged potential for energy. Do you remember
when the Fitzgibbons’ first cat just disappeared? He used it instead of
himself, because his body was almost gone.”

“That
only takes care of the help and substitute parts. Did he receive advice from
anyone?” Fred was surprised at himself; he managed to keep his cool as Ages
poured more and more on him.

“Well...
maybe... the Stone itself. It’s alive, to some extent... it can see, and think, and
it has a sense of self-preservation... Nicodemus told me that the Stone told him
to give it to Mrs. Brisby, because it ‘wasn’t safe otherwise’. Then he got
crushed under cement.” Mr. Ages paused a moment, but then continued abruptly.
“Don’t get the wrong idea. Nicodemus would have been dead countless times
earlier without the Stone.”

“Did
you ever use it?”

“No...
never have. Jenner and Nicodemus did; look where it got them.”

“Do
you know where that first cat went? I think I’d like to take a look.”

Mr.
Ages sighed before responding. “Believe me, you don’t. I went to look before I
came up here to the valley... thing is, you have to see it to believe it. If I
described it now, you’d only think I was more senile than you already, no
doubt, do.”

“Thank you for your time,
Mr. Ages.” The two of them had arrived at Mr. Ages’ home during the
conversation.

“I
just hope it’ll help Red Ghost, though I don’t see how it can.” Fred nodded,
and left for Jenner’s cell. He made a detour to the jail, where he asked for
and received the knife Jenner tried to use. Since most of the valley had been
disarmed after the incident at the cinder block, this was the only place he
could think to find a weapon. After what he had learned in the last few days,
he felt he needed one.

<\/

And
so it was that Fred found himself at the Fitzgibbons’ farm after all. Following
the directions of Mr. Ages, he made his way deep into the barn to his
destination, picking his way through things so rusted they may has well have
been debris. In a far corner of a forgotten stable, there was a small pile of
rotted hay. That hay concealed a small nook, which supposedly contained the cat
Nicodemus claimed to have ‘harvested’.

Pushing
aside the last of the hay, Fred entered the nook. He hadn’t seriously believed
Mr. Ages before, but he did then. It was dimly illuminated by beams of
moonlight streaking in through cracks in the wood, and Fred was grateful for
the absence of clarity.

There
was a cat in there, all right. Perfectly preserved skin and fur hung loosely
over bones, with no muscle in between. Empty eye sockets provided a good view
to the back of a cavernous skull, showing slightly dusty white bone. A small
empty sack as crumpled in the base of the cavity, undoubtedly the protective
layer that normally housed the brain. The whole beast was still in a pounce
position, impossibly balanced on one paw. It was the most disturbing thing he
had ever seen in his life.

Morbidly
curious, Fred couldn’t turn away. Muscle was gone, skin remained, and nothing
showed the smallest sign of decay. Strong-stomached as he was, he couldn’t
bring himself to actually touch it for closer examination. It was like the
impulse to avoid touching fire, except this was impossible to override. He
watched a stray fly come in through the hole he’d made, buzz the ceiling, land...
lose its balance... fall... land on the cat... and freeze. Though he couldn’t know
it, the Stone that lay around Justin’s neck glowed slightly brighter.

The
shadows abruptly seemed more ominous, and the cat somehow more unsettling.
There was something fundamentally wrong about the place. Instinct quite
loudly told him to leave, before he joined the cat. Fred clambered back out of
the nook, replaced the hay, and never looked back.

<^

The
secretary waved him through, and Jenner perked up immediately when he saw Fred.
“There it is! I was looking for it.” Jenner reached over to Fred’s cloak with a
madman’s speed, and pulled out the white knife. Fred’s feeble attempt to stop
him was just too slow. The worst part was, the debacle somehow didn’t surprise
him. Somehow. Heh... that’s a joke. It didn’t surprise me because I have no
surprise left. Thankfully, he was a psychiatrist. He was coping the best
his training would allow, which was far better than a normal rat would have. After
all, Jenner was trained as a guard at one time. Perhaps my clever hiding place
is the most likely place for a dagger to be, and he noticed it by the bulge in
my clothing. “I was worried I was going to have to make another one... No
such thing as something for nothing. Nothing for freeeeee......” Far from getting
better since being in here, Red Ghost had gotten worse.

“How
did you make that in the first place?” The pieces Fred had, plentiful as they
were, still didn’t quite gel with the puzzle.

“After
I first met him... I started to hear things. Nobody else could see them, except
for me and Nicodemus and Justin and anyone else he’s touched... Things nobody
else could see talking to me... Some of them never held up their end of the
bargain. I’d go out and do what they asked, but no response. Then, eventually,
one held up its end, and I got the knife.”

“What
did they want you to do?”

“Little
things... things they couldn’t. Eat a certain plant so they could taste it. Climb
a tree. Circle the mountain twice... Never made any sense. I always figured they
were making it up, because what he needed made sense. Made too much
sense... Just like gravity. Tip, fall. Ask, receive, pay. I didn’t pay... he tried
to make me, but I got away! I got away before he got meeee! .... Away... but not away.
He could still reach me... But not you!” Jenner suddenly leaned forward, on alert.

“You
can get to him without him hearing you coming! You’ve never used him! He’ll
know when you’re right next to him, but he doesn’t know now!” Jenner pressed
his knife into Fred’s hand. “Justin still has hope! Justin doesn’t have to end
up...” Jenner looked at his clothes, and the normal keening quality his voice
possessed faded, returning it some of the qualities it used to possess. “He
doesn’t have to end up like me. Go!”

Fred
left, but he still wasn’t sure he was going to ‘get him’. He was going to
Justin’s office, for sure. While he walked toward the leader’s chamber, he was
thinking. That last part has all the signs of a paranoid hallucination... His
madness finding excuses for why his efforts never produced results. He could
easily have made the knife out of bone. Having remembered the dagger, Fred
worked to better conceal it.

He
was shown into the office, but Justin was busy on something important, so he
had time to sit and think. Jenner had always envied the Stone. Mr. Ages’
story and the cat are certainly valid, but Jenner’s are suspect... Eliminating
all of his speech as the work of a madman, I have no valid reason left to
attempt destruction of the Stone.

 

It might have been his
overactive imagination, but Fred could feel the weapon he had concealed jerk
around. A mere bone knife would have no chance to destroy a gemstone like
that...so no loss in trying. The Stone would only break if the dagger were
something special, and in such case, it’d be worth it. I’d probably be tossed
in jail, then undergo psychiatric treatment for attacking the Leader. I’d be
able to recover quickly enough from that... and what if Jenner was right? What if
it is doing to Justin what it did to him? The risk of my freedom is
acceptable next to that.

 

Justin
suddenly stood up, a red light with an obvious source piercing his tunic. Ages
said it had self-determination... but only Jenner said it would know what I’d do
before I did it. Time to put my trust in madness. Fred sprung out of the
chair, vaulting over the desk while drawing the dagger. It seemed that, for now
at least, he had experience and dexterity beyond his norm. Justin flung his
hand up at a pulse of the Stone, but the only effect was the dagger turning
from white to black. Fred’s knife plunged unerringly into the red gem. Time
seemed to stand still... Jenner’s knife and Nicodemus’ Stone, fighting the climax
of a battle that’d been going for years. Justin and Fred, vassals for the
combatants, were on the sidelines.

“What
are you doing?” Justin demanded. Demand might have been too strong a word...
Justin sounded as enthusiastic as a geriatric on sleeping pills. Worst of all,
his speech was slurred severely. Somehow, Fred still understood him.

“Curing
your addiction.”

“The
Stone isn’t a drug! Without it, we wouldn’t be where we are today!”

“It
had its time, but we don’t need it any more. It killed Nicodemus. What makes
you think it’ll let you live?”

“It
isn’t evil. It’s just an exchange mechanism... You give it potential, it gives
you energy! It’s just a tool! Nicodemus died because death lets no one escape.
His time had been up for a long while; he was overdue.”

“It’s
not just a tool. It’s alive.” Fred was doing his best to keep a clam ‘voice’.
“It wants be used, even if there’s no need to use it. Even if using it means
killing you. Justin, you must have known who Red Ghost was, and what he was
trying to do. Look at him! He only used it once. Imagine how much worse off you
are now.”

“So
we should just break it now? What if we need it again? It’s not that bad. I’m
willing to accept dependence if it’ll save us.”

“Justin...”

“It’s
my decision to make!”

“Justin,
you’re the Leader. It can’t be your decision.”

Whatever
he used to perceive Justin’s voice could also detect mental defeat. The Stone
glowing bright red was the last thing Fred remembered.

<^\/>>^\/<

 

Fred
had been right about one thing, at least. He was put into jail immediately
after Guards drawn to the explosion discovered their unconscious bodies. Justin
spent the next few days in a hospital bed, first comatose, then experiencing
obvious symptoms of withdrawal. Mr. Ages stepped forward to link his condition
to the Stone, and Fred was released the next day. Initially as a precaution,
then as a necessity, the Stone’s ultimate nature and Red Ghost’s identity were
never made known to the rest of the rats. Red Ghost recovered partially, but it
seemed that only his newfound feeling of safety was responsible for his
recovery, and not some mental curse being lifted. The only hard evidence that
the Stone had been stood in a forgotten corner of the Fitzgibbons’ shed. Muscle
and mind, along with anything else capable of action, were missing. In their
place, where the beast’s heart used to be, sat a tiny red stone no larger than
a grain of sand.