*The names of friends have been changed in order to protect them from any further harm.

I’ve been running for too long. It’s finally time to stop and give myself up.
But not before I tell my story. Somebody has to know that I existed and what I
did in the hopes that they can carry on my work even if the government does
erase all references to my life and me.
My name is Patricia Marie Donnelly. For the record it is 2038. I am 55 five
years old. My friend *Nicholas Hunter Orion LaDuke is now dead. Or that’s at
least the official story. I have my doubts but we’ll get to that later. The
trouble all started when I was about 13. That was the year I met Nick. We both
auditioned for a play called "You Could Hear the Loons Sing Every Night". During rehearsals we would start talking. Neither of us was very popular so we talked to each other. We found that we were both interested in paranormal phenomenon especially the idea of reincarnation. So I purchased a book on the subject. It gave instructions on how to do a past life regression so we decided to try it. I lead him through it.
"Take three deep breaths. Let the white light surround and protect you. The
light is bringing you to a beautiful garden with trees and flowers and chirping
birds. There is a waterfall with the clearest water you’ve ever seen. It looks
like the spring over by Horseshoe Lake." And then that was it. He took to it so
easily. Maybe too easily. The first thing we did was find his higher self. It actually ended up being and angel like being that looked like me and went by the name Tamara. He had a long talk with her about god knows what. I just sat there on the other end of the phone listening to silence.
After about three weeks he started becoming curious about the garden that he
passed through before he explored his past lives. By now he could talk while
under and whenever he went in he voiced his wish to stay in the garden and
explore it. So I agreed. The next day I guided him in and stopped at the garden. I asked him to describe what he saw.

" I see tree’s, flowers, a water fall, a river, a hill. Wait a second. There’s a path."
So I lead him up the path. It branched out into a cave just behind the
waterfall. Then he continued on down the right path, balancing carefully as it
narrowed to a thin ledge. The caves slick wall blocked one side of him, while
the other was a sheer drop down. Becoming bold he took a rope that had just
appeared around his waist, tied it to a rock and started down the cliff.
"Now probably isn’t a good time to ask," he said, sounding slightly nervous,
"but what would happen if you died while in your subtonics?"
"What happens when you die in your dreams. I don’t know. If you think you’re in danger though just let me know and I’ll bring you out."
Then he reached the bottom. It was a narrow hallway with doors extending down each direction. He went to the door in front of him first. I heard a quick
intake of breath as he viewed its contents. He had gone into the door of his
past. The other doors extending to the right contained the present and future
doors. The future door wasn’t very reliable though because it kept changing with every decision you made. At the end of the right corridor was a room full of mirrors. Each mirror represented a person in his life. The colours and size told how he thought of each person. One was a big pink one. That was the mirror that represented his current girlfriend and so forth. But there was one door that he didn’t recognize. One week later he was diagnosed with DPD, dual personality disorder. That mirror was his other personality who we named Hunter for his middle name. Hunter was darker than Nick was. He was more violent and slicker. That is he had the personality of a mob leader. For months I had to deal with my best friend switching from person to person, not knowing whom I was talking to when I called. So I came up with a plan. We would break Hunter’s mirror and kill him with it. So the next day when I called Nick, first I made sure it was Nick, and brought him in. As we had seen on previous meditations, Hunter moved around in the shadows and watched us. When Nick got to the mirror room I told him my plan. I told him to take his foot, which was encased in a heavy boot I made him put on before he entered the garden, and I had him kick the mirror. I told him to kick it with the strength of him and myself put together because I was right there with him. As he did, Hunter ran into the cave. He tackled Nick and they crashed into the mirror. They rolled around for another few minutes, until Nick managed to grab a wedge of glass. He then rolled over so that he was on top and shoved the piece into the monster that stared up at him with hate. Hunter writhed for a few moments and spat in Nick’s face just before his eyes closed and he died. For about a year things stayed quit.

By now I was going in also. We discovered a multitude of things in ‘the garden’ during that year. Such as if you dived into the river and swam down a ways there were underwater caves, whose contents included the ability to heal yourself and one with a giant ball of chaos. I still have not figured out the purpose or use of the chaos ball but, oh well. We did discover one very interesting thing that I have made much use of. The ability to travel to others subconscious through a special portal in the mind. I stumbled on it kind of by accident. It has come in handy though. Nick and I were on dusk ‘til dawn phone conversation. It was about 3am and we were barley hanging on. We had even resorted to exchanging lame redneck jokes to stay awake. But he didn’t make it. He was asleep with the phone still off the hook. It it stayed that way I knew that I wouldn’t be able to call him before school the next morning. So I went into the garden and went to his mind. He was sitting there on a rock beside the river, so I snuck up behind him and shoved him into the river. We spent a couple of hours just fooling around in there; we even had a pick-nick with some delicious food. Then when I left I told him that he had to wake up and hang up the phone. The next morning when I called he said he had the coolest dream about us until he woke up to hang up the phone. I don’t think I’ve laughed as hard in my life as I did then. But then things got ugly again.
Nick’s best friend in Saranac Lake at the time was Tom Stuart. Tom was an okay person, but he was kind of naive and excitable. Somehow he started catching onto Nick’s powers. Almost like they were feeding him. And he started doing the garden with no guidance at all. Maybe if he’d had guidance things wouldn’t have turned out the way that they did. Without an idea of the kind of power he was getting himself into he started traveling between minds. Nick found out one day when he went in and was greeted by his friend. But power can be a powerful drug for those who have tasted nothing stronger than water. And Tom definitely became an addict. Within a few weeks strange occurrences began to happen. A shadowy figure started haunting us. At the time we didn’t link the figure to Tom because we didn’t think him possible of it. But he was the one. When confronted he only said ‘I am your worst nightmare’ and then vanished abruptly. After a week the figure started to become bolder. He would challenge our authority over our own garden. Then, after a few days of that he finally stated his purpose. He wanted a bride. Yes, the nightmare wanted a bride of innocence and purity. And the one he had chosen was me. When I rejected him the after effects were horrible. He
transformed into a hideous demon, spitting fire and acid at us. I got a severe
burn on my leg in there and it somehow transferred itself to my body.
After that incident I decided to stay out of the garden for quite a while. I
still led Nick in, found new things and so forth, but I didn’t actually try to
get in again until I was twenty-four years old. That’s when I received the shock
of my life. I found that I couldn’t get in. Someone had built a wall around it.
I could go in and get to a perimeter but I couldn’t get in. It was a giant wall,
tan in colour with the word ‘timoria’ written all over it. It wasn’t a new thing
either. Parts of it were crumbling, bricks had fallen out, and even the writing
had faded a bit. But it was still impenetrable. I quickly got out and called
Nick. By now he had finished college. He was a behavioral annalist for the FBI.
I still can’t figure out how that happened but I guess I’m not even sure why I
chose forensic pathology. I’ve always had an interest in the human body, but I
didn’t think it would go this far. Oh well. Now that I’ve finished with the
medical part of my training in the military I’m in Quantico, a FBI academy. Nick told me about how they needed more forensic pathologists there and it would allow us to work together.
Anyway, I’m off the subject. Forgive me. So I snapped out and gave Nick a call. He answered his phone on the third ring in a bored voice. As soon as he heard my voice though he came to life. I told him what had happened, about going in and finding the wall and the writing. He proposed a plausible solution, though it was slightly risky. He wanted to blow it up. The effect could be, if the explosives were placed exactly right, that the wall would be gone. If not, then I could lose my ability to go in, or perhaps, even part of my mind. That took me by shock. I had never considered the possibility of never going in again. I had always just put it off knowing that it would be there tomorrow. Now there was a chance that it wouldn’t be. I paused for a long moment and silence hung over the phone. Nick prompted me and I told him to go ahead. After all, it wasn’t like I could go in now. I told him just to be very careful, that I didn’t want to wake up tomorrow and not know who I was or something. So we parted, promising a call tomorrow to find out how things had gone. The next day I went in again. The wall was gone, but then again so was everything else. The whole place was in chaos. Things were flying all over the place. A Japanese anime girl kept following me around saying she wanted to be my friend and then morphed into a giant monster. The trees were spinning around me at an alarming pace. Tinkerbell kept appearing and saying that she was here to help and then she took a chunk out of my arm with her razor teeth. Even the white rabbit from Alice in Wonderland made a cameo appearance in there. Finally I freaked and ran out into Nick’s head. There it was safe and quiet. He wasn’t in at the time, but I think that helped. I just needed to be alone, in a peaceful environment. When I was ready to go I just brought myself out from there. I didn’t even bother to go back to my garden. I came out of that trip so existed that I just fell asleep. When I woke up later that night I immediately called Nick. I told him what happened and started sobbing right there on the phone. That was the first time I had cried in 14 years. And the last time I was awarded the luxury.
It was about six years before anything else happened. Things kind of got quiet
for awhile. I didn’t really talk about the garden much and if Nick even went in
during that time he made no mention of it. I turned my attention to my career,
which took off from the moment that I graduated from the academy in Quanitco. I became the head pathologist in the Salt Lake City division within four years of work. Then Hunter came back out. Josh was stationed over in Washington D.C. at the time. We communicated daily by e-mail. His career as a special agent was also thriving. Then, one day in December, I got his mail.
"I know this may be a shock to you," the voice said clearly as I watched the
clear blue eyes of my friend stare out of the computer screen, "but I am not
Nick. I am Hunter. Nick has retreated into the garden to work on a plan to
defeat the government. Yes, we believe that they are responsible for my being
brought back. Them along with the fact that he gave you his power crystal which was also helping to keep me under. Yes, I know you have not yet gotten it. It should arrive through the underground by Friday. Nick said that he knows it’s illegal to send packages because of the string of package bombs that went on last year, but he told me to tell you that he had to. It’s for your protection.
He senses something bad coming. So anyway, with the rate of underground
transport it should be there by Friday. He also asked me to tell you that he is
fine. That he went into the garden of his own free will and will be back as soon
as possible. Meanwhile you need to cooperate with me." He finished the message with a twisted smile and signed off. I felt kind of odd working with a man whom I had thought of as the enemy for so many years, but there was no choice. He had me look up information on The Boys and Girls Club of America for him on the Internet, and I also feed him information about the garden. Everything I knew about it and everything that I thought Nick knew. I was really uncomfortable about it. I didn’t know if I was doing the right thing. So I had a talk with Jessi. She was my best friend in Salt Lake. We agreed on a time and place to meet at the food court in VR. She expressed her concern about the situation and said that she didn’t feel I should trust him. Then she brought up another topic. Me. She felt that since I had started talking to Hunter I had become darker, a little more morbid if that was possible. We talked for hours while roaming the virtual mall together online. We both picked up some clothes and some slickers that would be hand delivered to our doors by their staff. We got the new kind that allowed us to go outside in an acid rain storm and not be burned. Then we said good-bye and signed off. I thought about what she had said. Mostly abut how I had changed. And I realized that she was right. I had changed. But it wasn’t since I had started talking to Hunter; it was since I had started wearing the crystal. So I went to the biohazard room where I stored all the required chemicals. I took down the jar of acid and set it on my table. Very carefully I took off the cover and taking a pair of tongs I lowered the crystal into the jar. A resounding fizz filled the room and the foam actually turned black. Odd, I thought. I’d never seen that type of a reaction before.
Later that evening my I received another e-mail. It was from Hunter again. He
said that he had found out some new and disturbing news. That he wasn’t real.
There was a computer chip implanted in Nick and that was what he came from. He continued on and said that now that he knew the truth he had two options. One, he could remove the chip and he would be gone forever, or two, he could stay and we could try and find out more about the garden. So far all we had found out was that the government played a fairly big role in it. He gave me the final decision. I chose for Hunter to leave. I know it was the cowardly choice, but I wanted my real friend back. I wanted someone I could trust. One week later I found out I had made the wrong choice.
They came in the middle of the night. Dressed all in black they took me from my apartment, blindfolded me, and put me in a car. "You had to be so clever. You had to mess with the plan. Why did you have to mess with the plan? You’d been doing so well ‘til now, ever since you were a child doing the things we discreetly suggested. But now you messed it up and we’ll have to continue from a more sheltered area. Don’t worry though. You’ll have company." The man in the shadow lectured me as he injected me with some
syrup that caused me to start becoming drowsy. The last thing I remember seeing was a big sign with the number 51 written on it.
When I awoke later that night I was in a small dark room. Across from me was a door with a small window of bars. Then I noticed that I wasn’t alone in the
room. Nick was propped against the wall to my left, softly tilting to one side,
asleep. I started to try and wake him when the shadow man came into the room.
The light from the hall was blinding.
"Shh." He said quietly, "We should let him rest. Why don’t you come with us." He signaled for a pair of tall figures to get me. I started yelling; trying
desperately to wake my slumbering friend but it was in vain. My actions were met promptly with a slap to my face that was hard enough to temporarily knock me unconscious again.
When I awoke for the second time that night I was strapped into a chair. There
was a man sitting across from me, watching me. His dark brown eyes penetrated mine as he realized I had awakened. It was then that he told me of the plan.
The man who was my real father had been a government agent. He was involved in a project for mind reading and control. The garden, the man explained to me, was the result of that research. After he had found out about me he had started tracking me. Through crude means he had planted the idea about reincarnation and past life regression into my mind. From there he had placed the 99-cent book in my path. After that they had carefully guided me through, nudged me towards the places where I was to go, and even built the wall to keep me out when I became too powerful for them to control. I had been a pawn in their game and now the pawn had reached the end of the board and had turned to a queen. He explained that after Nick had so foolishly blown up my garden they had had staff on call 24 hours a day to fix it. So now it was in better shape then it had been in the first place. Then he told me why they had taken me. He told me that I would be used in as a weapon in warfare. I would suggest to them, through my mind, that they should surrender. It would make the US invincible. That was why they had had me be part of the military for a time, to instill a sense of patriotism within me. So for about eight years I went along with their scheme. Not always willingly, but I usually broke down after about a month of solitary confinement and horrid music. Over and over again, I told people what to believe and that they should surrender to us. For four years I was nothing but a tool, no longer a person. I don’t think I even would have survived if it hadn’t been for Nick. Then we figured out a way to get out. We were in the garden together, just fooling around on one those rare occasions when neither of us were ‘working’. By now I was 38 years old. I could never have a normal life with a husband and perhaps children. I had dreamed of that once upon a time when I had still been working at the FBI. But I’m getting off track. We had decided to break out. Using a tiny laser pen we I had snuck out of the lab one day when they were doing they’re bimonthly physicals we burned a small door out of one of the walls. They had used regular metal instead of the new trilithium carbonate that was heat resistant. We waited until they had made they’re hourly round so that we could have even a slight head start. We melted the hole, crept out silently and ran for the nearby wood. And basically that brings me to now.

Over the years we have been running from town to town, staying only a few weeks in each place and then heading through the woods to the next town. We had fake ID’s that we used to get a job for the short time that we were there. We would stock up on food and then leave again.
Eventually we bought a car and that made life a lot easier. And wherever we went we always taught at least one person there about the garden. Just the basics.
They could figure the rest out on their own. But I’m not 38 anymore. Twelve
years is a long time to be running. And now without Nick, it’s not really worth
running anymore. So, whomever this may find, remember me. Copy this and pass it along. And also remember it only takes a little while to learn the tools I
posses. Just take three deep breaths and let the white light surround you and
carry you to the garden. Where you go from there is up to you.