Into the Gray

by Geanna Culbertson

  “It’s okay,” I said softly.

  Which it wasn’t.

  “I’ll go back for him,” I said more sternly. “If I brought Lucky to life from statue form once, I can do it again. For the time being, the only way I could think to protect him was by turning him to stone.”

  “You did the right thing,” Girtha said. Then she looked around. “Speaking of time being, what’s with all the clocks?”

  “It’s an entrance and exit thing,” boomed a deep voice. Across from us, a shadowy figure appeared out of nowhere. He wore a floor-length midnight blue cloak that concealed his face in a deep hood, and he held a shoulder-height staff that seemed to be wrapped in stars.

  “You are standing on either the exact time you were born or the exact time you are going to die,” the figure said. “Welcome to the Dreamland dimension. I am Daralek: Guardian of Dreamland. The Clockwork Intersection you stand in is where all black hole entrances to Dreamland lead. This is the only part of the dimension that maintains its structure. Once you go through a door, you will enter some part of Enigma—Dreamland’s most powerful realm—and from there all environments you pass through will be unpredictable.”

  Blue raised a hand. “Great introduction, but quick side question. Have you seen a few other people come through tonight? A blonde girl and a boy with a scar on his face?”

  “The people you speak of entered this dimension, as you did, through here. They have now proceeded on with their other followers.”

  Jason looked at me. “We were right about the antagonists taking the wormhole near Alderon. Since it opened hours ahead of ours, we’ll have to move fast to catch up.”

  Daralek chuckled in an unsettling way. We turned to look at him. “What?” I asked.

  The mysterious guardian shook his hooded head. “Fast and slow are foolish concepts here. Time does not work the same way in Dreamland as it does in other dimensions. That is why I greet all travelers who enter in their physical forms: to provide the rules and one warning. The latter is this. Once you leave the Clockwork Intersection, time and space mean nothing.”

  He raised a hand, and I stifled a gasp. His skin looked charred and splintered like a petrified tree branch with curled roots for fingers. A magic cerulean aura glowed around him, then four carriage-sized balls of clay, each a different color, appeared above us amid the doors and clocks.

  “You’re used to thinking of worlds and their time zones as succinct entities,” Daralek said. He gestured to the four clay balls individually. “Each one having its own unique parameters and being separate from the rest. But that view is not applicable to this dimension. Dreamland and its four realms do not have parameters or boundaries in the traditional sense.”

  Daralek raised his staff. The clay balls glowed blue. Then they joined together to form one mega colorful ball that continuously expanded and shrank, causing the four colors that represented Dreamland’s realms to re-squish together in different allotments and locations.

  “Time, space, and connection points between realms in Dreamland are mixed together and ever-morphing,” Daralek continued. “Because you are here in your physical forms—unlike the minds of sleeping souls—you must follow the natural flow of the dimensions and go from Enigma to Sweet Dreams to the Wanderers’ Void to Nightmare. However, the terrains you encounter will be constantly in flux. If you have the right magical equipment to guide you, eventually you will be able to make it from one realm to the next in the aforementioned sequence. The when and where and how you find your way to each new realm though is unpredictable. Hold that truth in mind and respect it as you proceed.”

  “In terms of rules for conduct . . . I detect four of you hold magic from other dimensions. It will not work here. No non-Dreamland magic will work, including non-Dreamland specific magic tech. Furthermore, since you entered here in your physical bodies, you can be hurt and killed by what lies within these realms.”

  My eyes widened. The danger to our physical forms I knew about, but no magic at all? I had never embarked on a quest without my powers; even before I knew about them they were there, protecting me like a reflex. In recent months I’d come to rely on them more and more. Now I was stripped of that great power, including my resurrection abilities. I was completely vulnerable. I couldn’t even morph my wand. While all my friends still had use of their trusty weapons, the only thing I had left now was me.

  Which meant . . . I could actually die here.

  “Lastly,” Daralek went on, “the exit rule. Dreamland only forms exit portals during full moons. The moon of the world you entered from is always visible from any Dreamland realm, except if you’re in a realm’s heart. When a full moon in the world you came from occurs, summon an exit portal by holding up one of these moonstones and concentrating on that place.” With another wave of his staff, a moonstone appeared in each of our hands. The stones were purple-ish, smooth, and shiny.

  “Keep in mind though, the moonstones will not work in Nightmare. That realm is magically sealed during full moons to prevent Shadows from escaping into other worlds. You will have to get to another Dreamland realm to exit the dimension. That is all. Good luck and pleasant dreams.”

  With that, the mysterious being thumped his staff on the clock he stood upon. He and the ball of clay vanished in a flash of blinding blue.

  A beat of silence passed as we absorbed the details, and I slipped my moonstone into my pocket.

  “So which door should we take out of here?” Chance asked.

  I looked around and shrugged. “Every door in here is just a guess. Who wants to pick?”

  “As a first time member to the Crisa and Co. Quest Team, I’d like to put my hat in the ring,” Girtha said. “How about that one?” She pointed to a nearby white door with daisies all over it. “Seems harmless.”

  “Watch us open it and get swallowed by a shark,” Blue responded. “Are the Dream Compasses saying anything?”

  We checked. Daniel shook his head. “Mine’s not moving.”

  “Neither is mine,” I said.

  “Maybe we have to pick a door first,” Jason suggested. “Girtha’s is fine. Let’s just go.”

  We gradually stepped from one clock to the next, using them like floating steps. It wasn’t particularly dangerous as the clocks were close together, but I did not want to know what happened if you fell and dropped through this seemingly infinite void.

  Blue reached the daisy door first and opened it. I took in my first view of Enigma and was at a loss for words.

  All of the fantastical, magical worlds we’d been to, even the most crazy and ridiculous ones, were rooted in rules, restrictions, and explanations. That made them easy to accept. What we saw on the other side of this door had none of that. Enigma was a huge hodgepodge of random with no connecting points.

  As I waited my turn to go through the door and enter the realm, the first thing I glimpsed was a raccoon floating inside a giant pink bubble. The creature was lime green and had glowing fingernails. He gave me a perplexed look as he floated by. I’m sure I mirrored the expression.

  When I stepped through the door, something crunched.

  Hm. Bizarre.

  The ground was composed of a million broken items—peanut brittle, plastic whistles, orthodontic retainers, potato chips, shattered plates. Suddenly a school desk scurried past us—like literally it ran with its legs. Another desk followed, chasing the first desk. An enormous tuba, bigger than DZ’s ice cream parlor, lay on its side, weeds spilling from its bell. A half dozen ten-foot-tall grasshoppers with swords for legs and watermelons for eyes strolled ahead, only to dissolve into snow a moment later.

  Farther out, the landscape was sparsely dotted with trees, some of which moved as if alive. Vaguely female forms made of bark glided through the wide spaces between the trees in a ghostly manner. Roots flowed from their trunk bodies like ball gown trains and silver flame lanterns sparkled in their hands.

  Jason examined his Dream Compass and directed us forward. We wandered through
the world, passing more confusing, marvelous things. Bushes with yellow flowers that turned out to be tiny foxes curled up in balls. Big butterflies made of tortilla chips with avocado seed bodies. A brown swamp that smelled like beef stew and had giant carrots and rulers sunk into it. Typewriters with frog legs that leapt around and perched in tree branches.

  Suddenly, the terrain ahead of us contorted. Previously we’d been heading toward purple-shaded woods. In an instant those trees shriveled and shrank until they were gone. In their place, directly ahead was a cliff edge rimmed with enormous books. These texts were each the size of a classroom wall and lay flat on their backs with the pages open. Every time I tried to read one, it shifted, making my head hurt.

  “We’re supposed to go down,” Jason said, standing on one of the books and pointing over the edge. We climbed up next to him and discovered a steep, rocky descent. At the base of the cliff lay a gray sand beach and an ocean that looked like the night sky. Every wave brought down a crashing slew of liquid darkness and sparkly cosmos.

  One by one, we lowered ourselves over the edge of the book and onto the rocky path. A few minutes later, we’d reached the sand. I checked my own Dream Compass. It was glowing and the half dozen small arrows on the device never stopped moving, but the glimmering word forward appeared over the face with a bigger arrow pointing straight ahead. According to that, we needed to cross the water.

  “Look, a boat,” Kai said. She gestured to a long gondola on its side in the sand. We worked to get it into the ocean and then climbed aboard. Chance and Daniel rowed one long paddle; Girtha and I operated the other. Enormous cotton balls and billiards balls floated like buoys in the distance.

  As we started to churn up the water with our strokes, my eyes widened. Every time the paddle disturbed the sea of night, the area where it broke the surface shifted, forming small fractured visions that rippled out behind us.

  “They’re memories,” Blue marveled, looking over the edge of the boat. “I just saw my driving test and my first day of school in there.”

  “They’re all our memories blended together,” Chance said. “Every time I paddle, I see quick flashes of each of us.”

  “Guys, paddle toward that shore,” Jason interrupted, focused on his Dream Compass. I glanced ahead. Another beach was coming into view.

  A couple minutes later we ran the gondola onto shore. When we did, we notably heard a crack and peered over the edge of the boat. The shore was entirely composed of stained-glass windows. Several small fractures had appeared in the glass as a result of our sudden impact.

  We disembarked carefully. Although you couldn’t see anything beneath the glass floor, the creaking sound of our footsteps as we moved alluded to a drop underneath. We couldn’t see anything else for miles—just more of this fragile beach and fascinating ocean.

  “That’s strange,” Jason said. “My Dream Compass just changed. It wants us to go down again. But I don’t see how we could—”

  “Donut!” Blue yelled, pointing up.

  Holy—

  There was no time to get out of the drop zone. We huddled together as a house-sized donut came down from the sky. Luckily, the hole in the center had the combined circumference of six hot tubs and we weren’t flattened. Though the donut’s landing did create several giant cracks in the stained glass floor.

  I touched the baked good and made a disgusted face. It was hairy. It was also heaving up and down like it was breathing. A split had formed in one area of the donut next to Girtha and red liquid spilled out. I thought it was jam at first, but the consistency and smell were off.

  “Is that blood?” Kai asked.

  No one answered. We had more pressing problems. The glass floor’s fissures were spreading, widening.

  “It still says to go down,” Daniel said, looking at his Dream Compass. Then, realizing that we were surrounded on all sides by the donut, Daniel drew his sword and glanced at me. “Crazy ideas aren’t just your thing, right?”

  “Right.”

  “Good. Everyone, brace yourselves.” He plunged his cursed sword into the floor. The blade pierced the ground and the spidery cracks that had already formed continued to open until—

  The floor shattered and fell out from under us. We screamed as we dropped past an assortment of strange environments. One second we were tumbling through orange and gold leaves, the next we were underwater and being sucked down a giant drain. Then we were going through some kind of blinding wind tunnel like an air duct. For a moment, everything was just stripes. Finally we collided with a giant spiderweb made of chewing gum and yarn.

  Ugh. My head hurt.

  Below us, thankfully, looked like normal beach. We climbed out of the web and onto the sand. The beach was empty and quiet. You couldn’t even hear the waves. It was as if they were muted. When the last of us had landed in the sand, the scenery ominously began to change. Everything faded in color like someone was turning us into a black-and-white photograph. Soon, all color and noise had drained from the world.

  Seriously.

  When Jason checked his Dream Compass anew, he said something but we couldn’t hear him. His voice was gone. The rest of us tried to talk and it was the same. No sound at all.

  Jason gestured to the right and we kept moving. Farther up the beach unidentifiable objects stuck up from the sand. When we got closer, we realized they were shovels—thousands upon thousands of them all stabbed in the sand upright like grave markers in a war cemetery. Our Dream Compasses started flashing like crazy when we arrived at the shovel graveyard; the arrows had vanished, and the mechanisms just pulsed with light. Maybe we weren’t supposed to go any farther? Maybe these shovels were a part of our path? That’s when Chance waved to get our attention and gestured to a sign planted in the sand:

  “You are on the threshold of MEMORY, the heart of Enigma. Please dig up the past to proceed.”

  I put my hand close to a shovel and my Dream Compass flashed even brighter. We literally had to dig. I motioned to my friends, who got the message. We each stationed ourselves by a shovel, exchanged a glance, then nodded.

  Now.

  I grabbed the shovel with both hands and yanked. Then, abruptly, I was somewhere else. Everything stayed mostly black and white, but a hint of maroon bled in. My friends were gone, as was the shovel I’d been holding, but I quickly figured out why. I’d been transported to one of my memories. When my friends grabbed their shovels they were probably sent off to their own. I worried about being separated from them, but what could I do about it now? Perhaps we had to let individual recollections play out and follow where they led? Hopefully it was a way out of Enigma that would reconnect us and take us to the next realm in the Dreamland sequence—Sweet Dreams.

  I looked around and a frown sunk into my face. I didn’t much care for this memory. Dream versions of Alex and me were nearby—aged about ten and seven. They were armored up and practicing sword fighting in one of our castle’s combat arenas. Sound had returned, even though the color hadn’t. I heard the clinks, the laughs, and the clatters as I watched young Crisa get bested by her older brother. Her sword fell to the floor.

  “Come on, Crisa. You have to fight with no mercy,” Alex said.

  “I’m seven.”

  “Doesn’t matter. I’m not going to take it easy on you. If you want to be a hero, you have to go all in. Make a move or someone will make it for you.”

  Young Crisa sighed and picked up the sword. It was heavy for her; her movements were more sluggish than Alex’s as a result. The pair play-fought for a while longer before young Crisa huffed indignantly and lowered her weapon. She took off her helmet and threw it to the floor. “I give up. All the grown-ups are right. I’ll never be taken seriously because I’m just a teeny tiny princess.” She threw down her sword too and started taking off her gloves. Alex lifted the visor of his helmet and walked over, sword in hand.

  “Crisa,” he said. She dropped her first glove, not looking at him. “I don’t see you that way, honest. I know
you can be anything you—”

  All of a sudden, young Crisa grabbed the blade of Alex’s sword with her bare hand and yanked it away while her other hand caught him by the visor and pulled down. She jerked the helmet with such force that he fell to the floor. Alex’s armor made a loud clattering noise and young Crisa pivoted, coming to hold the handle of his sword properly, and pointing it at his face.

  “You do see me that way, Alex, just like everyone else. I need to accept that and use it to my advantage. People can’t stop what they don’t bother to pay attention to.”

  Alex got up slowly. Concern marred his face. “Crisa, your hand is bleeding. Look what you did to yourself to beat me. Was that really worth it?”

  Young Crisa did not flinch. “Yes. You said show no mercy, but that can work both ways, don’t you think? No mercy on my enemy, and no mercy on myself either. Aren’t you the one who told me yesterday that being a hero is all about sacrifice?”

  A flash of light shone off the sword in young Crisa’s hands and consumed the whole memory, taking me to a different one. Dream versions of Arthur and me stood in the Boar’s Mouth Temple beneath his castle. We’d gone there before my friends and I had left following the Vicennalia Aurora.

  The room’s twisting pillars stretched up into curved arches. Rows of braziers led to the mighty boar’s head statue at the back of the room. The floor and ceiling were paneled with glowing tiles that contained the souls of heroes who’d failed to complete the oaths they’d sworn. This place didn’t need to be trapped in Enigma’s black-and-white color scheme to be creepy; it achieved that on its own.

  “What do you mean our quests were different?” dream me asked. “Alex and I both wanted to get blessed by the statue to claim Excalibur and it deemed us both worthy.”

  “The statue deemed you worthy of the challenge itself,” Arthur replied. “That’s why it blessed your mission. But it saw different things in your character, so it gave you different parameters and asked distinctive things of you. In your case, it wanted you to return our land’s lost king to the throne. You did that when you brought Peter home, so the piece of your soul that the Boar’s Mouth took was returned. It could have asked anything of Alex.”