The Dream Thief

by Leann M Rettell

  The longer style suited him. His face, as with all dream thieves, could be considered either feminine or masculine, but he had always chosen to appear male. Some of the others changed sexes depending on the era or after regeneration, but not him. He had no interest in looking like a woman. He’d get too much attention from the human males.

  Removing a tiny travel pack of wet wipes from one of the various pockets of his black leather jacket, he cleaned the blood from his face and facial hair. From another pocket, he extracted a vial of simple syrup, sucked it down, and shuddered at the sweetness. He needed the calories. After running a comb through his wavy chocolate brown hair, he stood and wiped off the black running pants, black t-shirt, and black leather jacket. He hadn’t expected a target tonight, but his outfit suited the job. Since most of his targets took him to various bedrooms in the middle of the night, black worked well, most of the time, but when he had to escape from the target’s rooms, back into the real world, usually not so much. All black made him look like a crazed stalker, especially if he didn’t get all the blood off his face.

  He longed to remove the jacket as sweat tickled along his back. Being in the Deep South in mid-March, the day was already warmer than Chicago’s temperature. The grass blossomed a vibrant green and new leaves formed on the trees. Birds chirped nearby. His shirt clung to him as he peeked around the corner, finding the streets empty. He dashed from behind the wall and waited at the corner for the cab. It didn’t take long for it to arrive. He climbed inside.

  “Where to?” The cabby, an older bald man with a thick Cajun accent, asked.

  “Starbucks. Then Louis Armstrong Airport.”

  “Yessir,” he said, the words stringing together like one syllable.

  Malcolm closed his eyes as the car pulled forward, intent on catching a nap during the ride through the city. The radio played softly giving local traffic updates. The thick smell of fishy river lingered in the air. The cabby cleared his throat. Malcolm opened his eyes, seeing the familiar Starbucks logo. “Can you go through the drive-thru?”

  “Sure thing.”

  He handed a wad of bills to the driver. “Triple espresso with four shots of syrup. Get yourself something."

  “Thank you, sir. Mighty fine of you.”

  They pulled away, and Malcolm downed his scalding hot coffee. It burned his mouth, but it didn’t matter. He needed the caffeine and the calories. His mouth would heal before he really had time to develop blisters.

  Being immortal with fast healing was convenient sometimes and a right pain in the ass at other times, just like living forever and not being able to tell a soul or being neither male nor female. Talk about a downer. Whatever god or gods had created dream thieves had a fucked-up sense of humor. The dream thieves had a desire for love and companionship, and, quite frankly, the lust as well, but none of the parts capable of executing those desires. Don’t forget to add in the sense of taste and smell but inability to consume anything besides basics like tea, sugar, alcohol, and some syrups. More recently, coffee and soda had been added to the list, but no proteins.

  It didn’t help that food smelled and tasted so damn good. If they dared to eat it, they’d end up vomiting it right back out along with a good deal of blood.

  Malcolm pulled out his cell, wishing he had ordered two espressos, and checked his email. Four junk messages, one from his accountant, and one from Debbie reminding him of her prize or millions a year bonus, his choice. He answered quickly, using text messaging to freak her out, and then pulled up the new, shiny, and very secret website. Putting in his five different passwords and thumbprint ID, he reached the unnamed site. His long-time friend, like from the dawn of time, and fellow dream thief and current Librarian, Aelia, had set up the site. For the last ten years or so she had gone by Stephanie. He finished logging in by his true name, Gabriel.

  There had always been a Librarian, the leader of the dream thieves and the one in charge of keeping track of all the records at the Cave of Scrolls, or Cos. The job passed from one dream thief to another at random. One of them would get an alarm and be transported to Cos, and the power would shift to them. Each time was different. For some, they were only the Librarian for a handful of years, others lasted decades. For the last thirty years, it had fallen to Aelia.

  After some indeterminate amount of time, someone else will get the signal, and she’d stay on for a while teaching them, but then she’d be called back to regular dream thief duty (aka internal alarm). She’d pop out of existence to somewhere else on the planet and suck out someone’s dream. Good times.

  A video chat popped up on his phone. Stephanie’s face appeared like magic in the top right-hand corner of his screen. She smiled and did a little wave. He waved back, nodded toward the cabby, indicating he wasn’t alone, and she disappeared, replaced by text. Despite being stuck at Cos, she’d embrace today’s tech with enthusiasm.

  “Here to log in a target?”

  “Yeah. Just got done. It was a late call. I almost didn’t make it.” He typed into the small screen.

  “There have been a lot of those. I’ll make a note. All agents are more active these days. Be prepared at all times. Something strange is going on.”

  He nodded, assuming she could see him through his phone. He couldn’t say anything in front of the cabby. The instant message vanished, and he pushed the button that read log new target.

  He sometimes wondered why they started calling themselves agents and the ones who they had to take the dreams from targets, as if they were some sort of military organization. But they had to call themselves something, and agent wouldn’t get nearly as many looks if they’d been overheard than if they said dream thief. He supposed that in some ways they did bear some striking similarities to a military organization, but whom or what they worked for, none of them knew. They’d all often wondered why they kept doing it.

  A few times, someone ignored the call and afterward the dream thieves felt the dream take hold of reality. The singularity inside them rang out like a gong and images of the horrors of what would come would play in their mind’s eye as they were helpless to stop it. The first two instances of this, and the most noteworthy, were the rise of the Goths and the survival of Attila the Hun from a childhood illness.

  After that, the dream thieves never ignored a call and understood why they had to keep going, even if they didn’t like being the gatekeepers of ideas, the protectors of Earth and humanity.

  What people don’t realize is that most great ideas start in a dream.

  When the dream thief removes the memory of a dream, they remove the idea. Like last night, Natalie would never remember her horse demon. That fear would never come to fruition and instead of going to that college and fraternity party, she would go on to become a professional horse jumper. One of the young men who would’ve died in the fire would go on to become an Ob/Gyn. One night while on call, he would stay in the delivery room of a laboring patient longer than necessary for the chance to flirt with a new nurse. If he hadn’t been there, he wouldn’t have seen the infant’s heart rate plummet or have been able to rush the mother into a C-section. If he had been seconds later, the baby girl would’ve died. The same little girl will grow up to be the woman who develops a subatomic engine that allows humanity to travel beyond our local star system. The infinitesimal possibilities and repercussions of the smallest of human actions can affect the fate of the entire world in ways never predicted.

  Typing fast, Malcolm recorded the dream and sequence of events halted along with those that will now be allowed to come to pass. He pressed the save button and logged off as the cab reached the Louis Armstrong International Airport. He passed the cabby some more bills to cover the trip and a hefty tip. Another triple espresso from the airport’s coffee shop sustained him until he boarded the plane and promptly fell asleep. His flight took about four hours following a layover in Dallas.

  The plane landed around lunchtime. He could sleep more, but he had an assistant to appease. Following a t
arget, he did his best to dive back into his regular routine and restore some semblance of normalcy. He hailed his second cab of the day on the sidewalk of the O’Hare Airport terminal. He instructed the dark-skinned Indian man to drive along the Kennedy Expressway heading southeast toward Ortega Towing.

  His friend’s garage bustled with activity as usual. Juan owned the place as his father had before him. Juan mainly ran the phones but still took the occasional call. His brothers and brothers-in-law ran the trucks. One or two of his sisters hung around, bringing along his nieces and nephews to see their dads. Two-story, red brick, and with a faint smell of oil and brake fluid, the place radiated feelings of home and belonging.

  Malcolm had befriended Juan when he’d left yet another car to transport to a different target. Once he showed up here, watching the interaction of the very large extended family, he immediately offered Juan a generous retainer to keep him on call for when he required his services.

  Juan didn’t hesitate, saying he’d have done it for free for the chance to drive Malcolm’s beauties like the Cayman. The two became fast friends and made sure to go out for a beer, or ten, once every few weeks. He paid the new cabby, who drove off amazed at the size of the tip.

  Juan walked out of the shop, a Red Socks cap on his head, and cracked a grin. The suspicious look on Juan’s face made Malcolm laugh.

  “Man, you ever going to tell me how you can afford these hotties? Cause you can’t tell me you roll in this kind of money owning a little bookstore. Come on, fess up, you like a bank robber, right?”

  Malcolm slicked back his hair, put a little swag in his step, then put his two hands together, hands pointed upwards like a gun. Humming the theme to James Bond, he strolled around the car.

  “You wish.” Juan slapped him on the back.

  Malcolm smiled, feeling relaxed for the first time since driving the Cayman the night before. “How’s the family?”

  Juan nodded, doing a half turn looking back at the place. “Good. Good. Kiddos are rotten. Oldest wants the latest Xbox or Nintendo. One of those gaming mumbo jumbos. The girl won’t shut up about ponies and riding lessons. I swear our family is bleeding money, but they’re healthy, so we’re blessed.” He stared at the Cayman, shaking a soiled work glove. “Ha-ha. I’ve got it. It’s because you don’t have kids. No wife. That’s why you can afford stuff like this.”

  Malcolm nodded, making a mental note to find a riding camp with reasonable rates and to give the family his gaming console along with the games since it hadn’t been the diversion he’d hoped it would be. “Yup, and the spy business.”

  “Obviously. So when are we going out again? It’s been like forever.” His friend looked well, with faint smile lines around his dark eyes. Juan wore his usual blue overalls and work boots.

  “Soon. You’re right, it has been too long. I’ll give you a call.”

  “All right. Sounds good.” Juan shoved the glove into a back pocket. “You taking off?”

  “Yeah, got to get back to the store.”

  Juan smirked, giving him a knowing glance. “Tell Debbie I said hello.”

  “It’s not like that.”

  Juan turned, giving him his back, and waved over his head. “Uh huh. You keep telling yourself that. See ya buddy.”

  “Catch ya later.” He pulled the keys out of his jacket, happy that in the moments before transporting, he remembered to keep them. Otherwise, he would’ve been locked out. He unlocked the Cayman, inhaled the new car scent, turned on his favorite Elvis best hits collection, and headed toward his store.

  3

  The parking garage where Malcolm stored his prized possessions, namely fast cars, was hidden underneath his home and business. Being able to see future events and living forever allowed one the freedom of buying properties when they were cheap and putting in hidden features that never showed up on city maps. Also, knowing which stocks would hit big didn’t hurt, either. Occasionally the knowledge of what actually is going to happen versus what he prevented from happening got blurred. He’d been burned a few times in the stock market, but overall, he had been more successful than not. And with centuries of having little in the way of possessions as he transported from one side of the world to the other and no way home, he relished in having things and places that belonged to him.

  In 1861, he’d stolen a dream from a childhood friend of Vincent van Gogh. Van Gogh’s friend would get the idea to go fishing, and during the trip, van Gogh would have gotten caught in an undertow and pulled down river. If the fishing dream had remained and become reality, the doomed painter would’ve survived, but broken his hand and would’ve had extensive nerve damage. Malcolm noticed the change in van Gogh’s life after removing the dream from his friend. He had kept track of the young painter and bought some of his early work when it was cheap. Malcolm had sold most of the artwork before the Roaring Twenties hit, but he still kept the third work from van Gogh’s sunflower series for sentimental value. It was unknown to everyone in the world except Malcolm. Having the ability to see the future made it easy to get rich, and since every twenty years or so he had to move, change lives, get a new identity, well, things got expensive in a hurry, especially in this modern age.

  Malcolm parked his car, admiring his other beauties: a 1937 Bugatti, a 1961 Ferrari 250 GT California Spyder, a 1934 “Star of India” Rolls-Royce Phantom II Continental, and a 1912 Renault type CB Town car. His favorite was the 007 Aston Martin DB5—because 007. His fingertips touched each of them, running his hand down their sleek frames. He secured the garage and pressed the elevator to take him to the first floor, emerging in the hallway of his building. The top floors held his living quarters, taking up the entire second and third floors. The first floor let out onto the street and housed several businesses. Malcolm had owned the property, under one alias or another, since the creation of the building and rented out spaces for the businesses. He’d kept the best space for himself and his beloved antique bookstore, Eye of the Beholder. Instead of going to his store, he turned right, into the coffee shop and bakery, The Chai Life.

  The thick rich smell of coffee filled the air along with sweet pastries. Greta greeted him when he walked in. “Hi, Mr. Jones. We missed you this morning.”

  She addressed him over the long line of customers in for the lunchtime rush. He raised his hands palm up and shrugged, not wanting to shout above the crowd. She waved him closer. Malcolm made his way around the crowd to the side of the main counter. Greta finished the order at the front. Walking near him to get out a cupcake from inside the display case, she leaned over and asked, “What can I get for you, honey?” She gave him her best smile.

  Since Greta's divorced daughter, Margaret, had moved back in last year, Greta had secret hopes of them getting together.

  Dating wasn't something he did. What was the point?

  Greta waited while he eyed the display case, full of saucer-sized cookies, scones, cupcakes, macaroons, and éclairs. He ordered Debbie her favorite chocolate fritter and a large mocha frappe with extra whipped cream and, for himself, an iced sweet tea. Proper sweet tea was hard to come by in the North, but when he’d lived in Atlanta, he’d developed a taste for it. He’d charmed the owners Greta and Margaret into making it special. They’d liked it so much they’d added it to the menu, labeling it Southern Tea, and it had become one of their biggest sellers. Malcolm also bought a bagel with cream cheese to pretend to eat.

  As Greta waved goodbye, telling him she'd put his order on his tab, the other customers glared at him. Not that he blamed them but being a regular and the landlord did have its perks.

  While balancing the two cups and the bag of goodies, he held the door of the coffee shop open for a very pregnant woman. Despite being obviously taken or at the very least not in the market for a new man, she still eyed him up and down, giving him a sultry smile.

  Both men and women found dream thieves attractive. Malcolm guessed this was their creator’s way of giving them an advantage. Popping out of nowhere while the
target slept wasn’t always the private affair it had been last night. People dozed at all hours of the day or night and sometimes in the weirdest of places. He'd once appeared in the trunk of a car. Try not waking the target up when that happens. Most people didn’t sleep alone either. Perhaps being attractive gave them a non-threatening appearance, and if their angelic vibe failed, they always had the super speed and strength with fast healing to fall back on.

  The little bell rang as the door opened to Eye of the Beholder. The sweet smell of old parchment and leather wrapped around him like the arms of a mother. The scent of safety and home. Not that any of the dream thieves had mothers. Outside, the cars passed by in a steady onslaught, but the store remained quiet, save for Debbie's iPhone playing her convoluted playlist consisting of Madonna, Janet Jackson, Bon Jovi, the Beatles, Bee Gees, Trans-Siberian Orchestra, Beethoven, Chopin, Linkin Park, Justin Timberlake, and who knew what else.

  "Welcome. Welcome. Let me know if I can help you find anything. Oh it’s you," Debbie said all this very fast, walking from the aged wooden counter in the back. Her long brown hair curled around the edges of her face, having escaped from a tie-dyed headband. Large amethyst stones hung from her ears. Twirls of gold linked together other various pearls and stones in the necklaces she wore. A wide flowing skirt of teal and purple swirled around her ankles, matching the teal tunic. The look was part hippie, part gypsy, and part renaissance. If ever a twenty-five-year-old woman had no clue what era she fit in, it was Debbie. Lips always half turned up in a smile rose farther as she closed the distance between them. She snatched her frappe and the bag, and then she walked back to the counter with all the confidence of a woman twice her age. Peeking inside, her shoulders slumped overly dramatic. Looking back at him over her shoulder with her bottom lip popped out. "I could’ve sworn this bag had a million bucks in it, but this'll have to do."