She lay stock-still. What was she doing in her own bed?
Roxie looked around her room. Everything was as it should be, minus how cold it was. Her bookshelves lined one entire wall, brimming with books. Her desk and computer, and all the clutter she could never seem to keep organized was scattered about her desk the way she’d left it. Her dresser and mirror looked normal. Her triangular hammock full of stuffed animals was as she remembered it, but it felt like every last toy was staring at her, watching. Everything looked less colorful than it should be, like there was a grey film over her vision. What was she doing here? How did she even get here? Had she world-hopped on accident or something?
Had she... had she dreamed Aerigo and the rest of it all up?
Thinking of Aerigo made her chest ache with a hollow pain. That felt quite real. Maybe she was dreaming now. That would explain the grey film over everything, and the creepiness of her own room. Yeah, that had to be it. She pushed off her blankets and sat up.
There was a dagger and a shield on her carpeted floor. And she was wearing gold and silver-plated greaves decorated in a curving pattern with stray feathers woven in. She had matching gauntlets with arm guards, a cuirass, a white knee-length skirt, and... wings. Angelic wings. Okay, so this part of her waking world had carried into her latest dream. There were blood stains where Aerigo’s blood had smeared her hand, forearm and thigh, but the blood looked more a part of her outfit.
Now what?
Roxie slipped off her bed and pulled the blankets back up to her pillow. She didn’t try to make it look remotely perfect; just less noticeable that she’d been in bed. Why was she dreaming of home? She missed it, yes, along with her family, but her thoughts had been consumed by Aerigo and what they needed to do to stop Nexus. She never stopped to think about home. And now that she was home, or at least dreaming about it, she very much didn’t want to be here.
She picked up Aerigo’s dagger, which transformed into a glowing longsword. The steel blade looked so simple and beautiful, and its glow made it look potent. Too bad she didn’t know how to sword fight, but at least she felt safer having it. A scabbard was hanging from one hip. She slipped the sword inside with a metallic hiss, and the hilt settled against the scabbard with a satisfying click. She attached her shield to her arm guard and headed upstairs. At least Grandma would be happy to see her again. Her stay would be short, though. She needed to get out of this house. There was something so unsettling about it.
Maybe she’d somehow world-hopped here.
No, that couldn’t be it. They’d always ended up in random places somewhat close to where they wanted to end up; never exactly on top of their destination, and certainly never inside a house. Yeah, definitely dreaming.
It was dead quiet and still upstairs. She couldn’t find Grandma or their cat Tucker anywhere. She searched with her mind vision for both of them, feeling the slightest twinge of fear, but her mind vision didn’t get sucked towards anyone. She was the only living thing in the house. That couldn’t be right. Even if Grandma was out and about, Tucker was an indoor cat. She headed out onto the back porch. The door didn’t screech like it always did. That struck her as peculiar. Had she gone deaf in her dream? She swung the door back and forth a few times, yet failed to coax any sound out of it. No, she couldn’t have. She’d heard the cold breeze in the trees when she’d been laying down.
“Hello?” Her voice rang out over the dead silence and the chill breeze hissed through the nearby maple forest, also tinted grey over the usual bold green. Roxie rubbed a sleeve-clad upper arm more to comfort than warm herself. “Grandma?”
She descended the three wood steps to their backyard and stopped. Train tracks materialized down the middle, complete with a raised gravel path. This is really strange. She cautiously approached the tracks and tapped them with a boot. The tracks were solid iron, running parallel to hers and all the neighboring houses.
Since Grandma wasn’t home, and she really wanted to know why the tracks where there, along with where they led to, Roxie decided to follow them to the heart of dreamed-up Buffalo. As much as she wanted to see Grandma again, she really needed to figure out how to wake herself back up. Then she needed to find someone--if there was anyone--who could help her world-hop back to Nexus’ realm. Where the heck would she wake up anyway? If she was still on Nexus’ realm she’d most certainly be dead.
Roxie stopped in the middle of the tracks and took in the dawn sky. It had the lushness of a sky clearing after a heavy rain. Low puffy clouds scooted towards the sun’s blushing light. The rest of the sky was painted soft blues, yellow, and silver. She ran towards the sun and, with a swift downward beat of her wings, launched into the air, and the tracks fell away beneath her.
Having wings was strange--well, not too strange. They were just a manifestation of her power, like her new outfit and armor, and no less complicated to operate than her arms.
The view of the world below splayed out in a mix of dull and breathtaking. The ground was tinted grey over its normal colors, but the expansive sky was beautiful. Roxie no longer had reason to envy birds. The sky was hers. How neat it would be to fly around Earth after she woke up, stopped Nexus and his war, and made it back home. She’d fly around the entire globe, visit every country, and pretend she was showing it all to Aerigo, just like he’d shown--
Roxie’s eyes and nose stung, and her vision blurred. The sight of Aerigo toppling backwards, the blood soaking through his shirt, his lifeless blue eyes, leaving him behind--all of it sapped the energy from her. She glided to the tracks and landed at a run, then slowed to a walk. She wanted to curl up in fetal position and cry, but she felt more hollow than tearful. She must still be in shock. She followed the tracks with leaden steps.
* * *
Roxie followed the tracks for a good hour when she realized she still hadn’t reached Buffalo. Her house was nowhere in sight, but the suburbs kept stretching between her and the city. On top of that, the sun hadn’t moved. It was stuck slightly to the left of the tracks and two hand widths above the horizon. This was the strangest and most vivid dream she’d ever had.
Stranger still, a train station lay ahead. It hadn’t been there five seconds ago.
Roxie took flight and glided the rest of the way to the station, touching down on the edge of a broad cement platform. To her left stood a brick building with several green metal benches seated up against it. Several people populated the benches, and more stood waiting in line that led to a booth window. To her right lay the tracks and an unending maple forest.
The people weren’t tinted grey. They looked properly colored, but unmoving. They also wore clothing from all eras, dating all the way back to, she guessed, the 1600’s. Those in dated clothing stood or sat near those who were definitely from Roxie’s time, but all of them indifferent to the clash of eras. Surprisingly, they were indifferent to her as well. No one gawked at her armor and wings. In fact, no one even looked at her.
Their statuesque indifference made her feel like she was standing among zombies; they were luring her into complacency before they attempted to make a feast of her flesh. No one looked decayed or dead, though. That would’ve been some comfort if at least one of them would move.
A man wearing a trench coat and dress pants and shoes shifted his weight. His form wavered and became ethereal, then re-solidified once he stilled. The sight sent chills up and down Roxie’s spine. Not only was this dream strange, it was creepy.
Cautiously, Roxie approached the man who’d moved. He looked friendly, but he didn’t react to her presence when she stood in his line of vision. He stared blankly at the back of the person ahead of him.
“Hello,” Roxie said in a small voice.
He shifted again, wavering and solidifying again, but didn’t answer.
She took a step closer. “Can you see me, or even hear me?”
The man’s grey eyes lost their vacant stare. He shook his head as if he’d been jolted out of a daydream. “Yes, I can see and hear you,”
he said impatiently. “What do you want?”
Roxie backed out of the man’s personal space. She should’ve snapped at him for being unnecessarily rude, but instead she felt cowed by his anger and ghostliness. “Sorry to bother you. I just wanted to know if this train leads into Buffalo.”
The man shoved his hands in his pockets. He scrutinized her folded wings. “Is this a joke?”
Roxie flinched and furrowed her brows. “No.”
“Go pester some souls that are actually lost, Guide. I am making my peace.” The man turned towards the sunrise and started walking off, his form becoming transparent.
Souls? Guide? Nothing he said made sense. She pursued him. “I’m an Aigis, not a Guide. Why can’t you just answer my question? Is it really that much to ask?”
“When you can answer your own question, yes. Leave me alone.” He vanished before he walked off the edge of the platform.
Roxie stopped and stared at the empty space, then looked around the station. All the others stood still and acted as if they hadn’t been listening.
The off-key wail of a train horn cut into the still silence, making Roxie jump. A tiny light winked to life in Buffalo’s direction and it rapidly drew closer. At least this made the man’s lack of cooperation irrelevant. She crossed to the edge of the platform and waited.
The collection of statuesque people snapped out of their inert trances and joined her at the edge of the platform and the few people in line collected their boarding passes. She should probably go get a boarding pass but, since she was dreaming, why bother?
One moment the train was still hundreds of yards away. The next moment, it was stopped at the platform. No sound, no gush of air, no nothing; now there was a train to board. The stop had to be fast enough to break every last passenger’s neck and make a mess of all loose items. Maybe boarding this train wasn’t such a good idea. But what other choice did she have, besides wandering along train tracks for hours on end without getting anywhere? She was getting places only because things felt like appearing out of thin air now and then.
The train was made of brass and amber-colored metal. It looked solid and fast, and its endless row of windows were tinted, leaving the interior a mystery. Roxie guessed, gauging by the wideness of the wheels’ arcs, they were taller than her.
A door near the front of the train slid open with a low rumble and people began filing aboard on silent feet. The train let out intermittent hisses as puffs of steam shot into the chill air from the train’s belly.
The lack of sound and energy from the people waiting to board unnerved her. She wanted to shout to fill in the void. A train station should be full of voices, movement, and energy. This place might as well have been full of ghosts.
When it was finally her turn to board, the steward held out a white-gloved hand for her nonexistent boarding pass. Movement on the floor caught Roxie’s attention. Strange markings on the first step swirled, then morphed into a script she could read. Golden letters in all capitals read, MIND THE GAP.
“Oh, hello, Guide,” the steward said in a polite, soft voice. He clasped his gloved hands together. “What’s your destination?”
Roxie fumbled for words. She almost corrected him calling her a Guide but she thought better of it. Maybe she’d get more help if she pretended to be what two people so far had assumed she was. Fake it ‘till you make it. Not exactly what the phrase was implying in her case, but close enough. “Anywhere but here is fine. I need to get away from this place and think.” She put one foot on the first step.
The steward held an arm out, blocking her path. “I’m sorry. I thought you were a Guide. You’re not allowed on this train.”
What? “Why?”
“You have to be either a Guide or be dead. I’m sorry. I can’t let you on.”
“Since when does being dead matter?”
He shifted his whole body in front of her, his dark eyes full of pity. “Please leave.”
“But I just want to get out of here!” She pushed his arms out of the way.
The steward held out both hands like he was gesturing at traffic to stop. “You’re not allowed on this train.”
Roxie bumped into an invisible wall, then staggered to her back foot on the platform. The steward had to be using extended reality. She shifted her weight and leaned into the invisible wall, hoping she could just muscle through it, but she might as well have been pushing against a mountain. “Please! Just let me on. I want to leave this place.” She reached for the steward and her hands went right through him, sending a throbbing chill up her arms like she’d just stuck them in a bucket of ice. She recoiled at the sight of her arms disappearing up to her elbow, then shook out the chill and stuck her hands under her underarms. The steward frowned at her pityingly, like he wholly regretted barring her from boarding.
She opened her mouth to ask about Buffalo, but the invisible wall slammed into her. She pinwheeled off the train and onto the platform, then caught her balance. The train door rumbled shut with a metallic thud, an explosive note sounded from the nose of the train, and the wheels started chugging. “Wait!” She took no more than three steps before she stopped and gaped at the empty tracks. The train was gone. Not vanished; gone. It had sped off like a bullet. There was no way her superhuman speed could catch up with it, much less keep up.
She heard amiable laughter behind her. She spun around and held up her fists. Once her knuckles were near her chin, she remembered her sword, but she didn’t draw it. It’d only make her look ridiculous if she dropped her guard to draw a weapon she didn’t know how to fight with.
A boyish-looking girl leaned against the brick building with her hands in her coat pockets, the sleeves bunched up by her scrawny elbows. The girl smiled, her silvery eyes looking at her through a mop of untidy hair held down by a Borsalino cap. She wore skinny jeans and Chuck Taylor sneakers, and she had wings as well. Membranous ones. The girl pushed off the wall with one shoulder and the sun gleamed off them, creating a rainbow in each section of membrane. Fairy?
“How did you get here?” the girl said as she drew closer.
Roxie lowered into a fighting stance and the girl stopped approaching. “I fell asleep. This is the strangest and creepiest dream I’ve ever had.”
The girl snorted a laugh, baring pointed canine teeth. “You’re not dreaming. You’re very much awake. How did you get here?”
“Why do you care?”
“Because in order to be here, you have to either be a Numina, or be dead. You are neither.” The fairy girl tilted her head. “How did you get here?”
Roxie had never heard of a Numina. “I...” She thought a moment, cycling through her memory of releasing Frava, then chasing after Nexus. “I... fell. Into darkness. I don’t know how I got here. Where are we?”
“The Realm of the Dead.”
Finish the trilogy with Determination!
Courage Page 41