“Impressive. How does it work?”

“I don’t know. The technology is far beyond ours. It could have been fried in that thunderstorm for all I know.”

“Look, something is on over there.” She said.

“It looks like a computer.” I stated, walking towards it. “Look. There are many different sectors of memory. 1.Dungeon 2.Castle 3.Mall 4.Great Neck 5.Nanopolis 6.Beach 7.Hawaii 8.Boat.” I read aloud.

“Do you remember any of those?”

“Well, I remember the Dungeon, the Castle, the Mall, Great Neck, Nanopolis, and the Beach, but I don’t remember the last two.”

“Those are probably the future ones. Should we try to open those files?”

“Why not, which one do you want to try?”

“I think I’d like to go to Hawaii.”

“Hawaii, here we come.” I exclaimed, pressing the ‘7′ key. We observed a change in the scenery out the window. There was water and a big hotel in the middle.

“Look, is there anyone you know there?” She asked.

“No. Funny, I bet you the personnel access files are somewhere else.”

“How about over here.” She said, pointing to another console.

“This could be it, but it looks like its shot. Do you want to go to Hawaii anyway?”

“Nah, it’s not real. How about Great Neck, at least we can relive old memories.” I pressed the ‘4′ key and it changed once more.

“What do you want the weather to be like?”

“Let’s have some rain.” I programmed the rain.

“Are you ready to enter?”

“Where will we enter?”

“At church. There will be no one on the set, but the set will appear real.”

“Great, where do we get in?”

“Up top.” I said. We walked back over to the hole and climbed up the ladder that we could now see, to get out. Going over to the entrance way, I said, “You do realize that we will be quite wet.”

“Yeah, but that will make it appear more real.”

“Okay.” I said, lowering her in the hole. We appeared right outside the church building, which, to my bad luck, was locked.

“Great, he materializes us at the church without the key.”

“Well, I didn’t ask for rain.” I said back.

“Humph!” She said. “So now what do we do, Sherlock.”

“I’ll just think that we had rain coats on.”

“You’ll what?!!”

“Stay here.” I said, going around back, I thought about Tracy having a raincoat on. Returning to the front I saw that she did.

“Amazing.”

“I told you that this was a mind game. All I have to do is change scenery and think.”

“Let me try.”

“Only one thing. When whatever occurred in the game happens in real life, I will regain my memory. Right now, I keep having dreams about people and places I saw inside. I will keep remembering, little by little, until that event occurs.”

“Oh. I see. How much do you remember?”

“Well, this morning I dreamt about someone I was to meet today. Later on I realized that it was someone very close to me that I was to meet. After you came in, I dreamt about some volcano and a marriage ceremony. But, I can’t be sure if this is my memory returning, or just a dream.”

“If it is your memory returning, whoever you met yesterday, myself included, could be very close to you. Who else did you meet?”

“I met my cousin’s friend, Jacie.”

“She is the one replacing me, right?”

“Yeah.”

“So, it’s me or her?”

“If you believe that my dream is really my memory. Until I remember more, I will have to play it like I don’t know.”

“Good.”

“When I get back, I think I’ll write about what happened in my last adventure.”

“What will you call it?”

“Well, when I was in the game, the present part, my friend Andy called the missing palette, the Purloined Palette. I think I’ll call my book, The Mystery of the Purloined Palette. I think I’ll get Noah to help me reconstruct as much as I can remember.”

“If I can be of any help, let me know.”

“You already have.” I said, clutching her hand.

“One more question about this game, if you don’t mind.”

“Not at all.”

“Where was it?”

“Follow me. Its entrance is a walking distance from here.” I said. We stood up and I took her hand, leading the way. As we walked I noticed a bush tipped sideways, but it wasn’t dead. “That’s odd.”

“What’s that?”

“Look at that bush.” I went over. Moving the bush, a door opened.

“What’s that?”

“It must be the entrance to the control room.”

“The Control Room?”

“Yes, this could be the place where Matt and Noelle controlled our environment.”

“Wow.” She stammered. The door was on the ground. I jumped into the hole, and then called for Tracy to follow. She jumped, and I caught her in my arms. For a brief second, we paused, looking into each other’s eyes. I quickly set her down, and we looked around. We saw a working machine. A big window was directly in front, although without lights it was tough to see. “Where’s the light switch?”

“I don’t know. Ah, here it is.” I said, turning it on. Lights came on in the room and on the other side of the window. It was as big as a football field.

“Is that???”

“Yes, the game. Look at its size!”

“Hi, Dave. Could you saddle two horses? Tracy and I would like to go for a ride around the grounds.”

“Certainly, sir,” he said in response. He saddled two horses and left to continue some of his other chores. I stood waiting for a while. I looked at my watch and deduced that it had been ten minutes. I looked up from my watch to see Tracy standing there, dressed in a turquoise polo shirt, and blue jeans.

“You know. Those clothes look awfully familiar.”

“That’s because they are yours. The clothes that I ordered still haven’t come, and Karin said you wouldn’t mind if I borrowed them for this afternoon.”

“Did she now? I guess I’ll have to have a word or two with Karin!” I said, with a slight grin. “Shall we be off?” I helped her on to her horse, and mounted mine. We rode out toward the pond first, stopping at all the ‘picture perfect’ places. We arrived at the pond and dismounted.

“Isn’t it lovely?” Tracy asked, looking toward the pond.

“Yes, but you haven’t seen anything yet. You should see it at sundown!”

“Oh, could we come out here, please? I just love watching the sun set!”

“Oh, all right. Are you ready to go back?”

“Go back?! We just got here! Can’t we sit and watch the pond for a while?”

“Sure! Here’s my favorite spot.” I said, showing Tracy to a spot in front of the pond. She sat down, and I next to her. “Sometimes I just come out here, lie down, and listen to the animals all around.”

“Adam.”

“Hmm.”

“Karin was telling me an interesting story.”

“What was that?”

“Something about some dream.”

“Boy, that Karin. Let me explain. It was just a few months ago that Noah hooked me up with Tricia.”

“Tricia?”

“Yeah, he didn’t think I was going out enough. Anyway, she was present during the theft of the Da Vinci Palette.”

“Oh yeah, I remember reading about it in the paper. That’s why I decided to ask you to help me. It said that although it took you over a month to solve the case, you recovered the palette, but not without injury.”

“That’s only part of the story. As we were searching for clues, Michelle (a receptionist at a used car dealership) got kidnapped. We went on the rescue and eventually got inside a huge mind game.”

“Mind game?”

“Yeah. It probes your mind to get part of the game. We went through many levels, including past, present, and future.”

“Future!?”

“Yes, but after we got out of the game, by an act of God, I went to the real future.”

“Can you remember anything?”