Red had never been one to question his own convictions. Far from it. However, the events of the past day or so had caused him to question something else entirely: his sanity.



You'd think that having hundreds of Voices in his head and taking orders from a talking rock would have done so before, but then again, you're not Red.



So when did the facade finally crack?



---



Was it when the doctor returned?



It had been dark in Rock Tunnel, so dark that Red couldn't even tell if it had really been Dr. Abby Camden or just some trick of the light. But he could have sworn it was that damned Mankey, even though the Voices had distinctly told him that she was dead, and the Voices wouldn't lie to him, would they? Even though the voice was Dr. Camden's and she kept insisting that he needed to turn around and go back, that he wasn't well, that he needed to rest...



He'd captured the phantom and, as soon as he could, deposited her into a PC box. Better not to mess with the undead.



If Lord Helix had had tentacles in His fossil form, He would have facepalmed.



---



Was it the sign?



Not a metaphysical sign. Well, perhaps it was, but it was also a literal sign, reading "Come to8 ERROR." At least, at first it read that way. But then as he stared at it, it read "Come to9 ERROR," and then "Come to10 ERROR," and then it said, "No, wait, come toA ERROR, I screwed it up, sorry."



Red raised an eyebrow. "A talking sign?" he whispered.



"Yes, you found me," the sign admitted. "This is the one thing different about the 151 HACK. The encounter tables didn't change. The evolution tables didn't change. This sign's text is broken. I was originally supposed to say something like... Come to Evolution House buy stones, find? Route 12 is blocked off by a huge SNORLAX use tunnel to visit VIRIDIAN!! But the ROMHACKER screwed up and now I just say something about an 8 ERROR."



Red stared in something vaguely resembling utter disbelief, or perhaps utter apathy. It was impossible to tell.



"Yup, that's all this hack is. 151 on the title screen, 151 in the SGB Border, and this sign. That's all, folks!"



Red shrugged and started away.



---



Was it the ghosts?



Red had tried and failed to lure one particularly nasty specimen of Lavender Tower away with a Poke Doll. It hadn't worked, and the Voices had not been happy. So he'd had to blunder his way through the Team Rocket base and its stupid sliding puzzles, with very little margin for error, only to find and defeat Giovanni so he could get the damn Silph Scope and identify the ghosts so his Pokemon wouldn't be cringing at the very sight of them and would know which parts of them to hit.



But the Silph Scope had revealed a bit more than Red had really been ready for:



Team Rocket hired the undead.



Red had stumbled his way up the stairs to the highest point in the tower and confronted a Team Rocket grunt, only to discover -- surprise! This grunt was a ghoulish grinning Gastly in disguise as an ordinary human. It had popped straight out of its uniform to scare the crap out of him. Watching what appeared to be a normal person suddenly dissolve into mist and try to lick him would have absolutely terrified any ordinary person.



Red had barely even blinked.



---



Or was it Red himself?



He hadn't felt any remorse over abandoning his Pokemon, even when the Voices believed them dead and gone. He hadn't cared when one of them had suddenly turned up alive. He'd shown little emotion at the talking sign, or at the dissolving Rocket grunt, and he'd actually had the nerve of trying to escape past a particularly terrifying ghost by distracting it with a plush toy.



Had Red been broken to begin with?



Helix didn't know. And, for the first time, He was starting to realize that He should never have chosen this child as His acolyte to begin with.



But they'd come too far to give up now.



---



It was the talking sign that bemused Lord Helix the most. Was it a message from whatever had caused the time rewind? Was it merely an aberration? Or was it some sort of practical joke from a psychic with too much time on their hands?



He would have to consider that carefully. Perhaps speak to Dome about it. Or Amber, if They could find Him.



How deep did this Sentret hole go, and how far could They delve into it before They passed the point of no return?



And as time went by and more oddities occurred, as Effigy taunted Red throughout the Safari Zone, as Burglar Simon once again cornered the Host within the Pokemon Mansion, Lord Helix continued watching.



Watching... and waiting.