A/N: This takes four or five months after the ending of the movie. The house is being rebuilt (just assume that the basement was okay and still in its original condition...). Jonah's spirit did not pass on. He stayed for some reason... but that's for another chapter. Please, please, review. :) I don't write very much in the third person so I want to know what you think.

October 1987

The elated voice came muffled through the phone speaker. "So it's all over now, Dr. Campbell?"

"Yes. My son's health is in excellent condition. Outstanding."

"And your house?"

"We're having it rebuilt, using the old plans. It'll be just the same as it was before, except…free." Peter parted the blinds in his study with his fingers and glanced fondly out the window at his two sons, Matt and Billy, roughly playing football. "Oh, and Dr. Blake? I have a suggestion for our research. See, we've only been using things that science and medicine provide. Machines and chemicals, and donated and artificial body parts. But what if we tried something more spiritual?"

"Like a ritual? That's insane, if not practically illegal."

"Science can't do everything. See, through this experience we've made a close friend of a reverend who specializes in spirits and death and what-not. I think he'd oblige to help us. Plus, we've got a…a specimen." Peter's tone and expression darkened as he glanced at the shoebox that sat dauntingly in the corner of the room, up on a shelf where the smaller kids couldn't see or reach it. "A set of remains and a spirit we can rejoin, if only we knew how."

There was a pause on the other line, some caught breaths as Dr. Blake struggled to find the right words. "You—you sure do have some idiotic ideas, Campbell. But...there must be a way. We need to try it. Perhaps spirituality can trump science in a field or two."

"Better not mention that in front of my wife," Peter advised. "She's…rather religious. She takes a half-hour every day to thank God, and that dead boy who practically killed our son for saving Matt's life. Over and over. Clutching that rosary."

Dr. Blake ignored that chilling statement. "You got it, Campbell. Contact the priest and we'll test your hypothesis as soon as possible."

Peter pressed the receiver with his thumb, keeping the phone on his shoulder. Right away he dialed Rev. Popescu's number off the business card he'd taped next to the phone in case he ever needed it. Like now.

The priest answered, "Hello. You've reached Reverend Nicholas Popescu. How may I help you?" in such a feeble attempt at a corporate tone that Peter had to stifle a chuckle. But he quickly sobered. He was about to ask a priest to perform a terrible ritual that may conflict his beliefs.

"Yeah, Reverend?...Well, I'll get straight into it…We—me and a few college science professors—are doing this highly controversial study on reincarnation. All of our medically scientific attempts have failed so far…We're wondering if there is any kind of ceremony, or ritual, or whatever, that you could try?...We have remains, and a spirit that match…Yes, they're his…No, I don't believe he did cross…Of course you won't be held responsible for any damage—Okay, thank-you, Reverend. For all your help…Bye."

----

Reverend Popescu shakily hung up his phone, and idly stared at the curly lock of the phone cord until he felt dizzy. He crept upstairs.

He stared into the bathroom mirror yet paid no attention to the elderly man reflected inside it. An image—a swollen, bloody burnt face was branded into his mind. The pale smooth skin, the crispy ashes, the thick black hair, the missing charred clumps. The only constant: the pools of icy-colored eyes that commanded sympathy either way.

But what a dangerous ritual it would be. There'd never been any recorded successes to that date, unless there had and the breakthrough had been concealed for secrecy. The reverend imagined that if this worked, it would be kept a government secret, too.

There'd be nightfall, and a smooth blue stone. There would be a chanted Ancient phrase. And a lot of pain for the boy. Then a coma. Then, if by some miracle he remained in a sense alive for more than a day, there'd be another chantry and a potion, either injected into his blood or poured down his throat. After that, it remained an indecipherable question on whether he would ever awaken from his coma or not. If not, he would eventually die again and—in this boy's case—he'd have at least an intact body to properly bury, not a pile of ashes and a piece of skull sitting in a shoebox.

Yes—the whole thing—it was Satanic arts in its purest form, at least in Reverend's opinion.

Iron cross in hand, he closed his eyes, held it to his lips, and muttered, "Forgive me, Lord, but it must help my friend…"

----

The next day, midnight, Peter put on his suit—somehow he felt this should be a formal and well-respected occasion—even though he was to put on his lab coat over top it.

"Peter," said the soft and tired voice of his wife Sara, "you really, really are going to do this?" Her expression was unreadable. Was she excited? Doubtful? Did she support him in this? Or not?

He reached up and slowly, carefully, took the shoebox down from the shelf. "Yes," he said. "Just a note…it'll have to take place on this property, probably in the basement as it seems that's where his spirit likes to retreat. Two of my colleagues, some doctors, and the reverend will be here any minute. Maybe try to keep the kids—especially Matt—away?"

"Okay." Sara kissed him, then walked off.

Peter carried the eerie little shoebox that held pieces of a once-human body, down to the basement, where the emergency doctors were there and already setting up.

"So…Dr. Campbell…" one of the doctors casually began, "There's a—so there's a ghost down here, huh?"

Peter set the box down on one of the old mortuary operating tables and cleared his throat. "Well, unless he's gone off upstairs, yes."

The doctor shuddered. "So—why does he hang around down here?"
"We suspect he's somehow bound here. He died here, this very room." Peter gestured to the furnace used for cremating bodies. "It's the priest's theory. Makes sense to me."

The doctor gaped at the furnace. "He—alive?!"

Peter solemnly nodded. "Ashes," he muttered, patting the shoebox.

"Dr. Campbell? Do you think he'll adjust well? I mean, if it all…works?"

"Hm?"

"Come on, Campbell, you fool. The kid died in…the 1920's, did you say? He's never seen a television, or a color photograph, or a tape player… He's gonna emerge expecting to see Model T's and Victrolas and those crazy flapper girls."

Peter, a bit uncomfortable of his own ethics now, shrugged. "It all depends on what he remembers and what he doesn't."

A shy, quiet male voice interrupted them. "Ahem—are you ready to get started, Dr. Campbell?" The reverend stood in the doorway to the embalming room, clutching a sort of brief-case like bag and a cross pendant around his neck. Peter's scientist colleagues stood behind him, clipboards and lab coats at the ready.

"Yes," Peter clapped his hands, slipping on his own lab coat. He opened the shoebox and turned it towards the reverend. "Let us begin. Is he here?"

----

"Indeed, he is." The reverend fixed his eyes upon the charred figure standing hunched over in the corner, near the furnace. The boy recognized him.

Suddenly there was a flash in front of Reverend's eyes, and he once again was looking in on a scene, of a boy and five sitters around a table. The medium began to twitch and whimper in pain, and then from his mouth burst the horrible substance—

Reverend was whiplashed out of the vision. "Yes," he whispered, "I do indeed remember you."

And, ignoring the spirit's confused and pleading eyes, he opened his briefcase and took out the stone. He recited the mysterious words. And again. And again. He chanted the phrase until the boy's spirit tipped its head back and slowly disappeared.

The room gave a violent jolt and it was like they were transported to another realm. The ashes were now back in the furnace! They started to smolder, and rise up, and then the furnace was consumed in fire again.

So that's how the ritual worked. It reversed the death. They were watching the boy's death in reverse motion. Soon a crouching human form was visible amongst the flames. It was unbearable and disturbing for the scientists to watch, but the reverend had seen it before, not a few months prior. The boy's hysteric broken shrieks filled the air.

The flames flicked off, and a terrified but unharmed and alive boy sprawled, frozen by time, in the furnace.

There was another aggressive jolt in the room and they were returned to the present. Reverend realized he'd been clamping his eyes closed, and he opened them just in time to see Jonah's physical and human body standing completely naked and with a dazed expression, right in front of him. Reverend wrapped a blanket around Jonah's quaking shoulders, just before he collapsed.

Reverend held him, supporting his head. Jonah sputtered and gasped in pain. It would only be moments before he lost consciousness…

Peter pushed the doctors out of the way. "Oh, my God…" he murmured. "It's him…" He knelt down and reached out to touch the boy. He'd never seen him before, only heard the stories and accounts of his wife and son. The infamous "Jonah" wasn't as he'd pictured, at all. He looked much more fragile, smooth, innocent.

"Best not get too acquainted…" Reverend advised him, just as Jonah's muscles relaxed and he stopped screaming. "He's comatose. Now, we wait."

Time to REVIEW. Because that little button down there is sooo enticing...