Kyle finally got it. He did! Anyone claiming otherwise was a damn liar, and twice the fool. Implying a teacher was wrong, without instantly receiving a sputtering, indignant rebuttal, was reason enough to celebrate. On the contrary; Dr. Z adopted the eager innocence of a four-year-old on Christmas Eve, and Kyle was Santa, about to unload a fat sack of toys. Kyle didn't know of course, that to a thoroughly defeated old man, Kyle's theory—even if immeasurably naive and patently ridiculous—was a burgeoning spark in the dim.

To James Zibowitz, Kyle was all that remained between true life, and the dreary simulacrum that was his eternal prison.

"Well..." Kyle began, "I was wrong about this 'cause I thought it was all some trick, or maybe I was daydreaming in your class and just mindlessly writing." At this, Kyle blushed slightly, now realizing he just admitted to goofing around in class to a teacher.

To his surprise, James merely winked and flicked the back of his hand toward Kyle, manicured fingers relaxed and slightly curled. I was young once, it said, jus' gimme the goods and all is forgotten.

"But it's not, is it? None of the others came back. You sent others, and nobody got it; Nobody saw. I don't know if I've figured this out, but I know what comes next." Kyle relaxed bonelessly into a desk in the front row. He knew what came next, alright: legwork. Places to see, people to go, and dreams to shatter. "But you're wrong in thinking I'm something special. If not for my weird habit of keeping a journal, I'd be just like the rest." To join the ranks of the clueless, Kyle only had to destroy the evidence. Tempting.

"Kyle, you are a bright boy. Right on all counts, and critically wrong where it matters. Do you know what this is?" he asked, pointing to the prominent stack of loose paper he carelessly hurled at his desk upon starting class.

Naturally, Kyle had no inkling, though a few theories swam timidly through his mind: papers to grade, maybe a novel in progress? He shook his head, wishing things had gone differently; being in trouble would have been far easier.

"It's my journal, Kyle. Every last page, loose paper because I exhausted the book I normally use. It's not all the same day, of course, but there's no pattern either. Some days are just a day. Others go on for months. I counted every page just this morning, and unless I'm the world's oldest man, I should be long dead by now." Earth-shattering revelations all, and so many at once, Kyle lost touch with reality.

Lost touch, and floated free, untethered by the bonds of mundane life. This isn't real. I'm obviously asleep again. And then he closed his eyes and willed himself awake. But when he looked again on Dr. Z, unchanged and still frustratingly corporeal, he muttered a small whimper while fidgeting uncomfortably, wrestling to control a surge of panic.

James frowned and blew a long sigh. "I'm sorry for that, Kyle. But you see we are the same, you and I. What if I told you that nobody else in town kept a diary? Not a single person, man, woman, or child. Young or old, giddy teenage girl, to budding journalist. None.

"Every time I ask, I'm greeted with an incredulous stare, as if a colony of hissing cockroaches is spilling steadily from my nose. It's not just that people don't journal, Kyle—the very idea is an anathema to them. Somewhere, deep inside, the thought of recording the day's events is akin to preparing a fresh baby-pot-pie. There's a lot of reasons I would ask you to explore Old Town, and principle among them, is that you're not a local. Neither am I, for that matter." He stood up then, grimacing as his legs protested and body generally rebelled against hauling itself upright. Without a word, he paced to the back of the classroom and stared wistfully outside, admiring the winter wonderland and the thin crystalline sheen of ice coating each individual tree-branch and blade of grass.

"I know your journal says you've already been there. But you need to go again. There's another mystery in the missing diaries. I just wish I knew why I've somehow escaped the influence." He shook his head, his gaze dropping to floor and his sensible, professional shoes. "You're right that you're the first one to see it, Kyle. Because all the others are dead, or their family hastily moved away." He turned toward Kyle, a grim smile twisting the corners of his mouth into a mockery of all things simple. "Maybe I'm just not threatening, or young enough."

How could Kyle possibly respond to something like that? His teacher had just spun an unbelievable yarn straight out of the dusty fiction section of a library, where nerds and other rejects spent their time immersed somewhere else. But, as Kyle still failed to awaken, this was—every last syllable and scenario—unfortunately real. Oddly enough, none of these significant revelations changed his plan in the slightest. He still imagined some concrete road fading into the horizon, everything he had to accomplish in a few short days. And time is short, Kyle. Don't forget that. It's practically under the floorboards, picking mushrooms and singing love ballads to your dead grandma. Don't know where the path leads, but follow it, or end up like the rest. He stared silently at James, mulling the oats.

The old man laughed then, driving a wooden stake through the silence in the classroom, striking dead the lurking doubts both of them shared. "Look at us! So serious, we're practically jumping at shadows. If any of this is true, we've got the grandest adventure in all of history looming ahead! Who else can say they fought time?" That certainly was one way of looking at it; no demons or creeping horrors, just time gone awry, and two heroes destined to break the cycle.

"Let me ask you a question, Kyle. How much do you know about Hinduism?" Well that was a non sequitur. Why not ask how many thumbtacks Kyle could gargle while blinking the National Anthem in Morse code?

What was there to know? Everyone knew, to a degree. Reincarnation, karma, etc.. He shrugged with his arms up, feigning ignorance to encourage James to continue, as the man obviously needed for his own sanity.

"Well, you know what everyone else does. But I'm not going to introduce anything esoteric here. I just want you to know that nothing like this exists in even their interpretation of life. Souls may be reborn, and lives may be lived from multiple perspectives, and the universe itself may repeat in an endless cycle, but nothing like this. If we ever make it out of here, we'll be hailed as immortal men of science. Consider that while you're crawling through slush and abandoned detritus at that forsaken ruin."

Is this guy serious? "What... what if there's nothing? I mean, I have this series of people I need to talk to—everyone in my journal, for one. But this is insane! They'd lock us away and melt the key into a portrait of Thomas Jefferson if they heard us now. It's just a damn abandoned town, and we're both imagining things!" Kyle protested. Solid road or not, he could not escape the assumption he was still unconscious, possibly in a coma; maybe he fell off of Craig's Hill and knocked his brain into a mushy pudding.

"Kyle," James, teacher and mentor to at least two generations of students, started to say, before thinking better and silencing himself. "You're probably right. But an insanity shared is real enough. Even if you're delusional, and I'm outright crazy, the chances of our stories coinciding is astronomical. Either one of us is dreaming, or we're both right. Personally I'd rather be dreaming, or imagining you agree with me; but in the presence of affirmation, I go with my gut." He trudged back to his solid desk and accommodating chair and collapsed into its paradoxically hard and relaxing grip. "But we're trying too hard. This isn't about right or wrong, crazy or solidly rational. If this is a dream, maybe especially if this is a dream, I personally want to see how it ends."

It sounded fine to Kyle. More than fine—almost the meaning of life itself. See how it ends, even if you die in the attempt; the answer is obvious in any case. And still, his list of people to see, places to go (including Adriana's house), didn't change. His underlying sense was unshaken by their wild speculations; he had work to do. So he nodded at his favorite teacher in this new school, stood up, and strode toward the door, invigorated with purpose and direction.

"Kyle, before you go, remember to go alone. The people in this town, even if they don't realize it, are pawns here. I'm not sure why I'm not by now, after so many decades, but you'll want to do this alone, rain or shine, hell or high-water."

Kyle didn't really understand what Dr. Z meant, but that was easy enough. Walking alone was his birthright, night or day, even past midnight when his parents were asleep, he breathed the crisp night air while pumping his legs in inexhaustible rhythm, thinking about anything and everything. Wandering a couple miles to a town, even through waist-high snow, was nothing to Kyle. He'd just skip lunch and consider his objective. His friends could wait, since they'd always be there. This, Kyle understood, was important and vital to Tammond Dale, Detroit, and every place he'd left behind in the intervening years. Even if he didn't head a revolution, a revolt might erupt anyway, with him as a figurehead.

Reluctant, and ignorant of his true role, Kyle followed his guide to subjugate Tammond Dale and its residents, if only by proxy. He knew Rue would be there, somewhere, yet that final confrontation didn't matter—so far away it seemed. He nodded a confirmation back at Dr. Z, and added a wink for good measure. One way or another, he'd figure this out. If the universe unraveled in the meantime, then so be it; there were always more where that came from.

Dr. Z went back to his dauntingly thick journal, reluctant and invigorated with a new sense of hope. Was that hope misplaced, or would Kyle succeed? Only time would tell. James wished only that time was inexhaustible; maybe then his late wife would utter his name in the dark again. He watched Kyle leave, sadly borne through the encounter bolstered mostly by an undaunted lack of imagination of what could go wrong.

And there were thousands, millions even, of things that could and would thwart his pursuit of the truth. The most important, Rue, was already on the case, and God help the unfortunate soul in his way. But here in Tammond Dale, everyone was a possible disruption. Kyle was merely the worst, and he could be dealt with.

Oh yes, he could be dealt with.