Thanks to Joanna Capello for the title "MindWalkers" and Dawnatello for the title "MindFrame."
Warning! This story contains cursing and may not be suitable for young readers. It is rated PG for parental guidance.
The next morning, Raph lay awake in the small, neat guest room, staring at the ceiling. Mike would be making pancakes in the den now. With syrup. Raph’s stomach growled. Or had they been out looking for him all night? One thing was sure, they weren’t going to find him in any of the places they’d think to look...He wondered where Leo was, and what he was having for breakfast.
His stomach grumbled at him again, and he threw the covers aside. Thinking about breakfast was making him hungry.
Once Raph had mastered the trick of walking through the odd, opaque doorways without freaking out, he sought out the kitchen. Kaladra was sitting at the kitchen table, sipping something hot from a mug and reading a newspaper. Kazim had his own miniature table and stool set up on one end of Kaladra’s table. Raph tried not to stare at the mouse.
Kaladra looked up with a grin. "Hi," he said. "Hungry?"
"Yeah." That fruit had been his only food yesterday, and Raph was starving. His stomach growled again, loud enough for Kazim and Kaladra to hear. "Heh."
Kazim shook his head. Kaladra poured Raph a mug of the brownish stuff. He swished it around and experimentally took a sip. It was syrupy and sweet, not half bad. Raph watched Kaladra find him another round fruit and bowl of something hot that looked sort of like oatmeal but tasted completely unlike it. Raph gave up trying to figure out what the taste reminded him of and just ate it.
His mind wandered back to Donatello again....He was worried about his little brother. Don had gotten them mixed up in all that bombing stuff, and then decided to announce that he thought he might have ESP. Raph knew now, beyond a doubt, that Don was not insane; he really had some kind of power. But it was freaking Raph out, and he wasn’t sure quite how to deal with having his perception of the universe screwed up like that. Stuff like ESP wasn’t supposed to be possible, and regular people weren’t supposed to be tormented with horrible prophetic dreams. But then-when were they ever regular? They mutant turtles, and trained warriors at 16. ESP was just another bit of weirdness to add to the stack. Poor Don.....
Kaladra watched him over the paper as he gazed into the distance and pondered. "So," he said.
Raph looked at him, snapping out of reverie. "So?"
Kazim put in, "I think what my verbally challenged friend means is, ‘What exactly are we going to do next?’"
Kaladra rolled his eyes. "Something like that. Got any ideas, Kazim?"
"A few. It seems to me that a long-range particle beam could have transported Raphael here from his own planet. The question would then be whether the beam being focused on that particular spot on his planet, just in time for him to walk into it, was an accident-a misfire-or whether it was in fact a deliberate attempt to transport Raphael here, to Inra."
Raphael paused and said slowly, "But why would anyone want to bring me here? I’d never even heard of Rri’tar before I showed up here!"
Kazim shrugged. "I don’t have the answers to all your questions. I am a scientist and a theorist, not a psi-high."
"A what?" Raph scratched his head.
"Psi-high," Kazim said slowly, and slightly condescendingly. "Persons with abilities of a psychic nature. Telepathy, telekinesis, clairvoyance, precognition, etc., etc." He went back to his own newspaper.
"Don’t you have any of them on Earth?" Kaladra asked, a shocked look on his face.
"Uh, I guess...We’ve got people who claim to be telepathic. Psychic hotlines, people like Uri Geller who can bend spoons. An’ I read somewhere how sometimes people claiming to be psychic can help track down lost people or murderers." Raph paused. "I guess I just figured it was a crock. I mean, how is that stuff possible? It just seems so fake." Raph thought of Don again-fake...I wish- but said nothing.
Kazim laughed, harshly. "A lot of things are called impossible; however, many of them are actually quite real."
Kaladra cast a sly glance at Raph. "Like yourself for example."
Raph grinned. "Touché."
"The problem still remains," Kaladra replied. "How do we get you home?"
"Kazim," Raph said. "This particle beam thing-if that’s how I got here, don’t you think I could get home the same way?"
"Let’s not get over-excited," Kazim said. "Particle beams are in the early development stages; long range ones are technological impossibilities at this point. And even if I DID have such a device, how can I aim the beam if I don’t know the coordinates of your planet?"
"Oh, man..." Raph sagged in his chair and moaned, "This is not good..."
"I agree whole-heartedly," Kaladra said, frowning. "Tell me, Kazim, how exactly would Raph get here on a long-range particle beam if they don’t exist?"
"I was just offering a theory." Kazim shrugged. "I suppose a private and dedicated scientist with enough funding could put one together. Most great inventions come from the private sector. Private citizens make the breakthroughs while government-funded fools are still staggering around in the dark."
"So it’s just a matter of finding out who has the particle beam," Raph said, brightening.
"And our suspect list consists of everyone on the planet," Kaladra said grimly.
Raph slumped in his chair again. Kazim sighed and twitched his whiskers, and they all sat in thoughtful silence for a moment.
"Okay, how ‘bout this," Kaladra said. "We can check the planetary records and see who is registered as a professional scientist, who is receiving grants for research, etc. That might give us some clues as to where to look."
"Excellent thought," Kazim said appreciatively. "And we can search the coordinates charts for a planet Earth. I haven’t heard of it, but who knows? The astronomers may have logged it somewhere."
"Is there some way we could make an announcement?" asked Raph. "I mean, if you’re accidentally beaming people around the universe, you’d wanna know, right? Even if you only care to know that your invention is busted."
"A classified ad!" exclaimed Kaladra, gesturing wildly. "Young, green alien seeks crazed inventor-"
"For an evening of passionate beaming," Raph couldn’t resist adding. Kazim stared at them as if they were maniacs. He sighed and stood up.
"Well," Kazim said, "I’m going to get moving, and I suggest you do as well. I’ve got quite a few other projects to work on." The two watched him descend from the table via ladder and stalk from the room.
Raph’s brow creased. "Will he really help me? He seems so...uncaring."
"Don’t worry," assured Kaladra. "Kazim can be a bore, but once he gets on a project, you can’t stop him." Raph nodded slowly.
"How did you two get together anyway? Sort of an odd pair...."
Kaladra chuckled. "Boring story, I’m afraid. We met on a cruise to a vacation planet called Kissar. We became pretty good friends on the trip-just connected, for some reason. And a few months later, he turned up on Rri’tar to study our technology, hoping to learn something he could take back to his own planet. I offered him a place to stay as long as he needed."
They both sat in silence for a bit, sipping the black syrup. "So what should I do?" Raph asked quietly.
"I don’t think there’s anything you can do," Kaladra said. "Kazim and I will make our inquiries; and of course you’re welcome to stay as long as you like. The police have likely forgotten all about you by now, so you might want to go out for a while. Stealing fruit is hardly a felony." He grinned.
Two hours later, Raph was alone and bored out of his skull. He decided that perhaps an outing was just what he needed. He was about to write a note for Kaladra, in case he got home from work early, but then he remembered that the written alphabet on Rri’tar was different than the one on Earth. “Shit,” he said. "Ah, screw it. I’ll be back first anyway.