It was only 2 days that had passed, but finally, at least to the other side, which was waiting for one of them, he came by. Before any of the ghosts could get to Sidney or even Candice to urge them to greet the young lad, he paused to have a look at the old place. “Hmmm, looks like someone finally bought the place, or they just finally found one of my siblings.”

For some reason a horrid thought of death swept over him and he felt like he should go tend to the Cow Plants. “Sid, what are you running off for?”

“The Cow Plants need feeding before someone gets eaten. I just got a weird feeling I should go check on them.” Spotting him there looking up at the house, he looked over, his friendly outgoing inquisitive nature overtook him, and forgetting all about what he came out here to do, went to greet him. “Hi there, I'm Sidney, I see you’re admiring our new home, it is nice. I mean it’s new to us, but I think it’s been here for ages.”

“Oh hi, nice to meet you, I’m Orlando,” he smiled greeting Sidney with a handshake. “Yeah, I guess someone finally bought the old place. So you’re living here with one of my siblings, helping pay the bills, and help looking after things. Mind if I go in and say hi to him or her?”

“Uhh…no, my wife and I, own the place…wait, your siblings, own, this place?”

“Uhh, no, not exactly, we do and we don’t. See we were all adopted years ago as little toddlers. We were children when a fire broke out and killed our dad, not by the fire, but the starvation that came after that. The adoption agency took us back but screwed us all over by giving us these injections to suspend our youths until we could be placed in new homes. You have to know the adoption agency can be evil, they take children as well as speed up the growths of some of the children they take in. What’s worse is they always erase their minds right before they are placed into a new home. It’s their little excuse, for what they are really doing, saying it’s for the children, so they aren’t saddened by the remembrance of the loss of their birth family. When the truth is, it’s so they don’t remember what was done to them, so they can’t later report them in. We were the first to be given this new youth suspension drug. It worked, a little too well, the only problem is, that it didn’t mix with the mind-erasing drug, so we all remember our adoptive father. Unfortunately, the combination of the 2 drugs also had a weird side effect, of making us, age, very, very, slowly, so slowly that we stayed children for years, even when old age set in on our adoptive mothers. Finally, we all eventually aged, and turned into teenagers, only a short time before all of our adoptive mothers died of natural causes. Now here we are rogue down townies stuck living on the streets, old enough to take care of ourselves being teenagers, that the adoption agency won’t take us back, but still young that we all still need parents to take care of us. Stuck as teens, I fear, perhaps forever, ” he finally rambled off the last bit with a deep sigh and taking in the scent of flowers in the air from the graves in the backyard.

“I hear you, I have an adopted brother Keith. My parents adopted him as a teen, but the funny thing is, he didn’t even remember being potty trained and all that, just that he somehow had a job, that was it.”

“He’s one of the lucky ones, not one of my siblings, but one of the lucky ones to at least find a home and a family to love him. He probably was, but he just doesn’t remember it, he probably was injected with the mind erasing drug before he was brought over to his new home.”

“Ah, well, my dad fixed that, he invented a special formula to de-age a teen back to a toddler. I heard him say my mom had experienced something like that, so that’s what prompted him to make that experimental formula. Problem is he…”

“Dommosskey, so you’re one of the Dommosskey children, right?!”

“Yes, I guess you heard of the formula. It’s still being tested, but I guess it somehow leaked out I suppose.”

“Yeah, it’s a back word on the streets how someone named James Dommosskey had invented a serum to de-age a teenager to a toddler. We were all hoping we could find him to take the injections or whatever voluntarily if just to be able to age normally or be experimented on to fix us. So does it work, do you know?”

“We think so, we’ll know for sure in a few days, Keith is just about ready to head off to College, and so we’ll know for sure then. It works as far as we can see and know, but is iffy since you have normal wants for the toddler skills, to learn to walk and talk and use the potty, but still retain some wants that you can’t do, like cleaning, cooking or learning mechanical skills, so it’s hard to adapt, that’s the only limitation, we hope. I think if you are warned of it ahead of time, it might be easier after the transformation from Teen to Toddler. It’s like a teen trapped in a toddler body, it’s like, you know, but you don’t know. See what I’m saying?”

“Totally, I totally get it, believe me, all too well.” Orlando snickered as he came up with a good one, as it burnt out. “Been thinking too hard,” pointing to the Thinking Cap on his head that just burnt out.

“Heh, heh, not really, I earned and learned my Lifetime Want when I was a teen, but I still have yet to figure out this ghostly mystery, I figured this might help me,” he smiled taking off the thinking cap and disposing of it conveniently in the trashcan right beside them. “That and I was working on some badges. So what were you saying about your siblings supposed to be living here?”

“Yeah, our father died here then eventually his wife, who was supposedly supposed to be our mother, and the rest of his family, in another tragic fire, I hear. Apparently, he wanted to keep the home in the family, but his will was never found in time. So a caretaker was appointed to fix up and look after the place, and to find us, but, I don’t know what happened to that. That’s why I thought one of my siblings was living here now, and why I asked if I could see them.”

“A caretaker, yeah, that explains the third grave that doesn’t seem to belong to anyone. I think she was scared to death, by the looks of her ghost color, so Rainelle must have been the caretaker since she doesn’t have all the other’s last names. Maybe she was either looking after the place and or Fricorith and I don’t know how to pronounce her name, almost all of them have strange or hard to say names. So you know them, the Trick-a-you-s?”

Orlando giggled over his mispronunciation of the last name, he wasn’t the first one to make that mistake in how it was pronounced. “Tricou, it’s pronounced, tree-coo, tree as in this house, The House of Fallen Trees, and coo as in the coo of a baby. And yes, our adopted father is Jonathan, well, Jon Smith Tricou.”

“Jon Smith Tricou, oh God, that’s it, the last piece of the puzzle! Come here, quick,” Sidney grabbed his arm, and ran him to the backyard and showed him the graves, Jon Smith’s especially. “Is this your father?”
Both grief, and shock, overtook him immediately, along with confusion, and anger, and he didn’t know what to express. But then just before anything could come out a feeling of happiness, overtook everything, when he realized why Sidney had did this, as he sighed and a smile creped out, right before he went downcast in the face. “Yes, yes, that’s his grave, but it was…”

Lifting him up and lovingly patting him on the arm, Sidney gave Orlando his smile, to cheer him back up. “It’s going to be okay, I promise. I know, but I did it for them, and I wouldn’t have done it if it didn’t feel right in here to do it. I moved them all from Gothier Green Lawns back here to be home with the rest of their family. I’m sure the children missed their parents, as I’m sure their parents missed their children, they’ve been less, uhh, angry, after they I’m sure realized why I did it, and they could now be with their kids. They all but virtually stopped spooking us, although now they sure do haunt a lot more now, even in the daytime, which is a bit unusual for a ghost. Ah, see, what I mean, there’s one now, that’s…” Before he could say it and the sun sets, he jumped out at him and scared Sidney, for what Sidney hoped was the last time. “Ahh, Fricorith, ohh, him and his sister…” he heard a hiss like howl coming from Fricorith, he realized his mistake. It should have been obvious. “Cousin, is she your cousin?” There was an immediate change in him he could swear he saw a smile and a little giggle come out of him. “Ohh, she’s your cousin, I’m sorry, I didn’t know for sure. I guess I should have realized that though. Oh, and well what do you know, here’s Jon Smith your adoptive father. I bet he knows you’re here. Hi, Jon Smith, Tricou, hey I finally know how to say your last name correctly, thanks to your kid here. I’ll bet you came out just to come say hi to your little one, but be nice and don’t spook Orlando unless he’s a Knowledge aspiration, like me, I know he would not appreciate that if he isn’t one. I read that ghosts can hear us talking, so they do know what we’re saying, so don’t think that this is weird, it’s very normal. They may be dead and ghosts, but they still do know quite a lot, and still do understand us when we speak to them.”

“Whoa, this is, trippy, spooky doesn’t begin to describe it. I’m not, try Pleasure, ohh, still, I would like to be that secondary, I just can’t take it in to do that.”

“So you do know him, personally, still, even with your mind wiped, you could still per se, bring him back, resurrect him, right?”

“Yes, yeah I could, but uh, no I can’t, I can’t do that.”

“But you just said you can.” Worried a moment he was just fooling around and he was lying about this, he wasn’t. It was the other thing, Sidney knew, was the only limitation to bring the Tricou’s back, but was easily gotten around, if Orlando would do it.

“I know, I could,” sighing deeply, “but I don’t live here, I have to be in this house as a member of the family, somehow, to be able to do that, and only provided I have access to a, whoa!” Sidney took him inside to the living room, where he had it by the piano, “Yeah to that, to a Grim Phone. I can’t do it until I become a member of either your house or someone else’s, and you bring that over to me, I could then do it there. I’m really sorry, I really wish I could, I would love to bring my dad back, but I can’t do it because of that one limitation, I don’t really have a home.” That hurt him the most not having a home to go to at night, no family to take care of him, when he got scared or hurt. Okay he has his siblings, truly, but no one he could call mom or dad, and care for him, his only father was dead. That hurt the most, as the tears of grief over took him as he walked outside in the dark, trying to hide his tears. “I’m a down townie orphan, living on the street, I don’t have a home.”

“Yes, you can, and you will have a home and a family, provided you’re willing to die to bring your family back.”

“What, you mean you’ll kill me to…”

“No, no, no, no, I’m not a murderer. I said if you’re willing to die to bring back your family. I can bring you back if you die, see what I’m getting at, and then you’ll be in our home then, and then you can bring your family back, starting with your dad, Jon Smith. I don’t know them personally so I can’t bring any of them, back, otherwise I would have done it a long time ago, but you do, and yes I do get it that you have to be in here as a member somehow of our family. That’s why I said you have to die, you have to die to do that.”

“Sigh, and how do you propose I die for my family.”

“Ohh, I donno, get a little peckish, have a look around some, and have some dessert, a nice piece of cake, ahem, maybe outside, ahem.”

“Huh?”

“Sid, I thought you said you were going to feed them. It’s too late now though, since it just ate someone I was talking with outside. I guess I get to drink him since it was my Cow Plant he fell victim to.”

“Oh, oh no, no, you want me to get eaten by a Cow Plant?! Are you crazy, I’ll die, and you’ll drink me!”

“Yes, but I will then bring you back, good as new, then you can bring back your father and then he can bring them all back. Don’t worry, I promise, I swear to you, by the Lord God Almighty, I will pay the full price for your resurrection. I know how to use this, I’ve done it before, there will be no screw-up’s, I promise you that.”

The thought of dying was bad enough yes, but how much suffering he would have to go through was much more daunting then the fear of the unknown. “Uhh, uh, will it, uhh, hurt,” Orlando asked timidly, unlike his bold personality would have led him to act. He wished now that he hadn’t wound up with the Pleasure aspiration but rather have Knowledge right now. Then dying would be something that he would have wanted to experience, an awesome adventure to experience, to be snatched back from death, a grand thing, rather than something to be feared.

“I don’t know. But I think it is one of the easier ways to die, by Cow Plant, say compared to downing or fire.”

“Sigh, can I at least think about it?”

“Of course, take your time. But if you choose not to do it, then at least tell your other siblings to come by and ring our doorbell, if they choose to do this, rather than you.”

Nodding he walked off, and had a look around the place and played a bit on the Dance Sphere until he was thrown off it, for the fifth time. Maybe it was a combination of the dizziness, or a chance to be a hero, and finally be reunited with his estranged father, that he managed to get up the courage, to just, do it. He hadn’t realized how long it had been, it was already almost morning, he had spent the whole night here, playing on the Dance Sphere, and yet, no one told him he had to leave. Was this what it was like, to have a family, or at least, someone who really cared for you? Any other place he had been to, he was usually told before, or if he was so lucky, after dinner, to go home, or worse yet that he wasn’t wanted here. With renewed courage, he knew what he had to do. “Sigh, okay, there it is, just grab the cake and it will all be over with, quickly,” Orlando sighs, “I hope. I hope you know I’m doing this for you, dad.” Bravely he walked towards the demise of his life and the promises of a family reunion. Praying silently to God, that it wouldn’t hurt too much, or at least be done quickly, so he wouldn’t have time to chicken out of it, “Oh, God, give me the strength I need to do this,” he moaned as he took the last few steps towards the Cow Plant. Encouraged by something his dad once told him from a book, he remembered from being a toddler. ‘A true friend is willing to lay down his life for his friends.’ “Well dad I know you can hear me, and I tell you this, you are my dad and my friend as well, as I am now willing to die, for you. Especially so I can then come back to bring you and all the others back! I love you so much, this is for you, daddy! Here, give me that darn cake you overgrown Venus Fly Trap, give me that darn cake, let me have it, give it to me,” he jumped up and grabbed for it, as the Cow Plant responded by sniffing him right down, first, and finding him to be smelling, quite, delicious, to, eat, teased him again with its tongue cake! “Ohh uhh, ewww, just give me that cake already,” Orlando yelled out, and as if to obey him, it let out an almost wolfish loud gurgling hungry growl as it instantaneously snapped down to captured him up its cup like fanged toothed mouth, as he was quickly wolfed down in a blink of an eye! It was quick, he was swallowed whole, and he felt his bones snapping, before his neck was quickly bitten, and broken, as the plant chewed him a few times before ingesting him to attain his essence, to churn out the elixir of life, from him, as it belched loudly, and, that was it.

“Oh, sigh, he did it, he really did it,” Sidney sighed as he was taking the old newspaper to the composter bin and just witnessed it, what Orlando had done. He shuddered as he spotted the second gravestone, by his Cow Plant, as it finished Orlando off. “Candice he did it! Orlando really did it, I’m so proud of him, he’s such a brave kid, to do that for his daddy.”

She came out and walked over towards him and the Cow Plants.
Nodding with a saddened sigh, “He is brave, he really is a real hero, God bless you Orlando, and God bless you again.”

“Amen to that amen to that, yes indeed, God bless you Orlando, and you are indeed blessed to do what you did. You will be richly rewarded for your brave act. So, I’ll drink him and you drink from your Cow Plant, and then I’ll get to resurrecting Orlando, so he can then resurrect the rest of the Tricou’s. You can deal with whoever that was some other time later, but for now, the Tricou’s.” He still couldn’t help but feel a bit of guilt for extending his life by drinking the teenager, but he knew he would feel much better and guilt-free once he resurrected Orlando, as he promised, and more importantly, to the Tricou’s, who were still all waiting for him, impatiently, possibly, or perhaps patiently, to keep his word.

With a brilliant flash, all he saw was radiance of brilliance, which Orlando could only describe as Heaven’s Light, which was God’s Glory, and then he soon saw Jon Smith, his father, standing there, in the glories of Heaven to greet him. “Hello, son, I’m very proud of you. You’ll be back very shortly, don’t worry, we all will be now, because of you, and to Sidney as well. You made me so proud, and God is especially proud of you, for what you just did. Come here, I missed you so much,” giving him a long very warm hug and a kiss on his head. “You’ve grown so much.”

“Oh I know, dad, I missed you so much.”

“I know, I have missed you as well, son. Goodbye.”

“Goodbye??”