The art gallery that the gang entered was a large octagonal room with 8 towering walls on all sides covered in bubblegum striped colored wallpaper rising up to meet a plaster relief ceiling recessed in its center. 4 portraits of the Gracey Family members hung on each corner; a beautiful woman in a summer dress holding a parasol, a handsome man smiling, his arms folded. An old gentleman in a business suit placing a will document into his pocket, an old woman smiling, holding a red rose. Just below the paintings are 16 gargoyle statues holding candles in their claw-hands perched on a ledge and leering down at the mutants with evil grinning faces. Just then the door behind them slid closed.

MICHAELANGELO: Uh-oh, another door shut in our faces again.
RASH: Nuts! < Looks mad > Just what we needed, getting trapped yet again.
NINJARA: Don, we shouldn't have come in here, I'm scared.
DONATELLO: < Surprised > Hey, I don't see a way out. < Looks around > There are no doors, not even a window.
PIMPLE: So, how do we escape if there are no EXITS anywhere?
LEONARDO: Hold on a second, < Thinks quickly > There must be a hidden panel somewhere in this room, I've read about mansions having tunnels or passageways built in the old days behind false panels used to get around easily without having to use ordinary doors.

The others stare at the blue-masked turtle in stunned amazement! Hidden tunnels behind false panels???

Meanwhile the Ghost Host begins talking, his voice traveling around the gallery as though he was standing in the room with his visitors about to start his guided tour through his home./bq

GHOST HOST: HERE IN THE GALLERY...YOU SEE THERE PAINTINGS OF SOME OF OUR RESIDENTS AS THEY APPEARED IN THEIR CORUPTABLE MORTAL STATE...EVEN IN THIS FLICKERING GLOOM, YOUR CADAVOROUS PALLOR BETRAYS AN AURA OF FOREBODING...ALMOST AS THOUGH YOU SENSE A DISQUIETING METAMORPHYSIS...YOUR TRUSTING MORTAL EYES TELL YOU THAT THESE WALLS ARE STRECHING...

Suddenly before the startled eyes of the mutants the paintings began to strech, expand themselves and getting bigger! Or was it the walls actually moving themselves with the ceiling going up? Leo, Ninjara, Don, Mike, Ralph, Zitz, Rash and Pimple froze in shock-terror.

NINJARA: What's happening? Why is the room getting taller?
RAPHAEL: Yegads, the ceiling's moving away from us.
MICHAELANGELO: Whoa, dudes! Look at the paintings, they're streching too!
PIMPLE: Oh, no! < Scared look > They are getting bigger, man.
RASH: Good grief, the woman with parasol is standing on a tightrope above a hungry crocodile waiting to eat her!
DONATELLO: The man with arms folded is sitting on the shoulders of another man who's sitting on the shoulders of another man and they're sinking in quicksand!
ZITZ: The old man is not wearing pants but boxer shorts & socks and standing on a barrel of TNT with the fuse lighted!
LEONARDO: The old woman is sitting on a gravestone of her dead husband with a statue bust that has an axe embedded in its head!

The turtles, vixen and toads cannot comprehend what is happening to them at the moment all the while, paralyzed by the frightening sights before them as the Ghost Host continues his narrative.

GHOST HOST: BUT LOGIC SAYS, NO...IT'S MERE HALLUCINATION, YOUR MIND PLAYING TRICKS ON YOUR EYES SO TO SPEAK...THEN LOOK ABOVE YOU, EXAMINE EVERYTHING CAREFULLY...YOUR LOGIC CANNOT DENY THAT THIS CHAMBER HAS NO WINDOWS AND NO DOORS...WHICH OFFERS A RATHER LOGICAL CHALLENGE, TO FIND A WAY OUT...< Breaks out into more giggling fits of laughter > HMHMMHMMMAHAHAAHAHAHAAH...OF COURSE, THERE'S ALWAYS MY WAY...

Lightning flashed from above the room, illuminating the attic area, there seemed to be no roof. From the rafters a corpse swayed, probably the dead body of the Ghost Host dangling from a taut rope. Leo, Don, Mike, Ralph, Ninjara, Zitz, Pimple and Rash gasped with eyes wide and mouth open before the entire room was plunged into blackness as all the candles went out by an unfelt wind.

No sooner had this occured when a loud scream shatters the stillness as though some unseen person was falling to his death.

GHOST SCREAM: AAAAaaaaaaahhhhhh...< Swallowed up by booming crash of thunder >

Again the mutants froze in paralisys shock, unable to move. Then came a flapping noise like the beating of wings and a crow from out of nowhere flew into the room through one of the broken dormer windows overhead to perch on one of the gargoyle statues. Peering down at the mortals it suddenly spoke to them in a ghostly voice that was not its own!

CROW: < Possessed by spirit > Caw-caw! The courage way out, he chose the courage way out. Caw-caw-caw!

Then it spread its wings and flew off, disappearing into the blackness like a phantom. Ninjara clutched Raphael & Rash's hands in horror, pressed tightly against them while Mike, Don, Leo, Zitz and Pimple were shaking-trembling themselves during what seemed to be an endless darkness. In a few seconds the candles relit by magic.

NINJARA: What-the? < Looks around > The room, it-it's normal again.
RASH: Yeah, even the ceiling's back to normal again, no sign of that dead guy.
RAPHAEL: Thank goodness for that. By the way, who was that dude hanging up there?
LEONARDO: Who knows? < Shrugs > maybe it was the Ghost Host's former body.
PIMPLE & MIKEY: M-WHA?!! THAT WAS HIS DEAD BODY UP THERE?
ZITZ: Could have been, but we cannot know for sure. < Suddenly he hears a noise > What was that?
DONATELLO: Look! < He points > Over there.

All heads spun to see a false panel slide up or sideways revealing a dimly lit hallway outside.

RAPHAEL: That must be the secret passage Leo told us.
LEONARDO: See, I told ya so.
NINJARA: Where does it lead to this time, I wonder. < More curious than fear >
LEONARDO: There's one way to find out, come on.
MICHAELANGELO: Okay, you lead and we follow.

One by one the gang ran out of the art gallery and into the corridor with no knowledge of what lay beyond or what awaited them next on this bizarre tour through this cursed mansion.

TO BE CONTINUED...