Murder on Parade
Page 9
As the diesel struggled to reach parity with our steam engine, I glanced forward a final time and saw with satisfaction that new tracks were still laying themselves down in front of our speeding engine. Thomas was handling things fine on his own. I looked back to the black diesel and then let fly with my next manifestation which was a three foot thick steel wall that appeared immediately ahead of the chasing diesel. They had no time to apply the brakes.
“Holy shit!” Thomas yelled.
The crash produced by the collision of these two dream forces was nothing short of spectacular. I felt the backlash rattle my teeth. The sound of grinding metal was horrendous, and parts flew in all directions, some of them continuing to keep pace with our own locomotive. Thomas jumped up and down and clapped his hands in response to the crash, but I knew better than to think we were safe. The DP weren’t giving up this time. I began to wonder if they had been bribed.
My suspicion that the DP couldn’t be hurt was proved correct. No sooner had the diesel disintegrated than a massive starship flew out of the fire ball that was the locomotive and positioned itself in the skies overhead. As I had suspected, killing the NarcoNazis wasn’t an option. There would always be more.
Seeing the tip of the massive laser mounted on the side of the craft begin to glow with pent up dream energy, I grabbed Thomas’ hand and prepared for the next phase of our journey. Fortunately the next dream membrane was right ahead and our train was turning on a new course that would come within a few feet of it. My first impulse had been to run the train right into the wall, but I wasn’t desperate enough to risk freaking out whoever was dreaming on the other side.
“Get ready to jump,” I warned.
Seeing the shimmering barrier ahead of us and recognizing it for what it was, Thomas’ resisted, pulling back against my grip. “No, it’s too far, we’ll never make it. Let’s fight them here. I always wanted to fly a space ship.”
“Thomas, remember, in this world we can fly ourselves. Didn’t you have flying dreams when you were a kid?” I asked with a forced smile. This reminder of this universally pleasant dream cheered him up immensely, and together we faced the rapidly approaching barrier. “Please just trust me. If you don’t fight it, it won’t hurt.”
“Okay.”
We jumped not a moment too soon since our transportation was blown to pieces by a death ray fired from the spacecraft the moment our feet left its floorboards.
Flying through the air, or more like swimming in Thomas’s case, it required only a few flaps of our arms to travel the full distance to the dream barrier. As usual, I penetrated the membrane without difficulty and was then pulled up short by Thomas who was sill hanging onto my hand. Yanking on his arm, I tugged him through. We both summersault over the powdery ground.
Thomas coughed and tried to wipe the dust away.
“Where are we?”
The new dreamscape was comparatively quiet but I knew instinctively that we were not safe. Something strange was happening. I could feel power massing and everything was moving way too slowly. The world seemed hazy and out of focus. Regardless of the disorienting atmosphere, I couldn’t remember the last time I had felt so good.
No, wait a second, I could remember.
“Oh no.” I finally recognized the signature of an adolescent wet-dream. Letting go of Thomas’ hand, I knew that we had no reasonable choice but to ride it out and hope the NarcoNazi’s didn’t arrive until our host was done.
Sitting down on the bed that formed behind me, I ignored the couple that was writhing in ecstasy beneath the sheets. I tipped my head back trying not to be too vocal as I enjoy the inevitable ride. Fortunately, the kid had a short fuse because I doubt that I could have handled any more arousal and my inner-clock said we really didn’t have the time for this.
With a final thrust, in which I was not involved but of which I was still intimately aware, the situation came to a climax. And this climax was long and hard like only a male, adolescent orgasm can be. We climaxed together and I arched so hard I damn near broke my back. As is always the case when I’m involved in such dreams, I wondered what my body was doing on the wakeside. Was it currently arching itself as it moaned in ecstasy? That would be embarrassing and would give the nurses on the third floor something to talk about. I just hoped to hell they didn’t think I was having a seizure and try to revive me. If I got pulled back wakeside, Thomas would be left alone.
Rising to my feet, I grabbed Thomas and pulled him forward on wobbly legs. I made a point of not staring at the large wet spot on the front of his jeans. Opening the bedroom door, we ran out of the room into a barren desert under a blood red sky. There was some kind of small spacecraft hovering in the driveway. The hood of the flying car said: Fuckmobile.
Finding it strange that the boy’s bedroom was in the middle of a Martian landscape, I glanced back at the bed to take a look at what the boy had been having relations with. She looked like a green Barbarella in thigh-high silver boots.
There was just no accounting for taste, I thought as I dragged Thomas to the next barrier only a few yards ahead.
Looking out into the desert beside us, I saw that the mighty DP spacecraft had crashed. It gave me quite a chuckle to think of the members of her crew trying to pilot the craft while having a massive group orgasm. Unfortunately for us, the after-affects of sex were short lived, and black-clad storm troopers were already pouring out of the craft to fire pulse rifles in our direction.
Plunging through the next dream barrier was far easier. I guess Thomas was getting the hang of dream-hopping. I just hoped I wasn’t turning him into a dream-visitation junky. It could and did happen to dreamers who lacked imagination and developed a taste for more exciting dream scenarios. I told myself that I would worry about this later.
Pop.
“Get down!” I screamed. It appeared that we had just stepped into the middle of a full out military battle circa World War II.
Hitting the sand and pulling Thomas down beside me, I peeked over the top of a dune only to have a spray of machinegun fire force me to bury my head back in the relative safety of the sandbank. Apparently we were hitting a beach with the marines, and based on the authenticity of this dream, I assumed that the owner had done this in the real world. He was having some kind of flashback.
“Keep your head down and try not to get hit,” I warned Thomas. “It hurts a lot if you get shot.”
Propping himself up to ask a question, Thomas immediately took a bullet in the shoulder. “Oh, shit,” he screamed, pressing a hand against the wound to staunch the flow of blood. “That really hurts!”
“I warned you,” I chided, and then I focused my attention on getting us to the next barrier. Why, oh why had I had the misfortune of entering the Narcoscape so many canvases away from my destination? I wondered as I surveyed the beachhead for possible safe trails. I knew that there was an exit from this dream somewhere, but I couldn’t see it. Why hadn’t Thomas been where he was supposed to be? I would have to ask him about that later when he stopped whimpering. “Just stop the bleeding,” I said. “You know how.”
“I’m trying. It still hurts.”
“There it is—the next barrier. See it?” I pointed. The next wall was just behind enemy lines over the top of a large hill. Machinegun fire sprayed from that knoll and several Panzer tanks pulled up in reinforcement. The Dream Police had arrived. The NarcoNazis and joined the regular Nazis and swelled their ranks.
“This is all wrong,” Thomas complained. “What did we ever do to them?”
Looking along the line of troops hiding behind our hillock, I quickly identified the dream owner as the lieutenant three positions down who lay shaking with his head buried in the sand.
“Keep your head down and follow me.” Crawling down the line, I forced myself in beside lieutenant and tried to get his attention. Wearing my father’s body and what I hoped was a proper uniform, I nudged him in the ribs as I shouted: “Lieutenant, the enemy has brought in a battalion of Panze
r tanks in support. What should we do?”
There was a long silence.
“Panzers? There are no Panzers in this battle. Where the bloody hell did they come from?” he replied in a terror-stricken voice.
“Sir, I’m afraid the enemy is not fighting fair. We need you— you’re our only hope against a bunch of damned Nazi cheaters. Those bastards just won’t fight fair.”
At the mention of cheating, the lieutenant seemed to perk up. After considering my words for a moment, his face became downright livid.
“Cheaters, are they?” he said in indignation. “Well, I’ll show them.”
Popping his head over the top of the dune, the lieutenant shouldered his Thompson machinegun and started to spray bullets at the enemy. The amazing thing is that every bullet seemed to hit its intended target. In the wake of his seemingly random fire, enemy soldiers keeled over and the gas tanks on Panzers exploded in a way that would never have happened in real life. By the time the lieutenant had to replace the clip on his machinegun, the enemy forces were decimated and what few remained unharmed were running for cover. Since the dream owner had shot them, they were obliged to play dead.
The NarcoNazis weren’t willing to shoot the dream owner. How lucky for us.
“Come on, Lieutenant, we need to get to the top of that hill before the enemy regroups,” I shouted encouragingly, sending him some of my power. I could be wrong, but I thought that defeating these bastards would be good therapy for this guy.
“Come on, boys, follow me,” the suddenly brave lieutenant bellowed as he raced over the top of the dune leading us toward the next dream barrier. Again, his machinegun fired with incredible precision, cutting a swath through the Dream Police soldiers who tried to stand in our way. I laughed breathlessly as I stormed through ineffectual return fire. Thomas did little but whine about the pain in his shoulder as he followed, but at least he kept up.
Arriving at the top of the hill, we found a line of almost one hundred enemy troops standing between us and the barrier. No worries though. With a single spray of no more than twenty bullets, the lieutenant managed to send all of the enemy to the ground, convulsing in overly theatrical death throes. I didn’t stay to give thanks to our rescuer. Plunging through the center of the enemy line, Thomas and I hit the barrier running and never looked back.
I was pleased to find that this time I didn’t need to pull Thomas through the wall. With a bit of a struggle, he managed to make it by himself. Once past the obstruction, his shoulder stopped hurting and he seemed much relieved, though again we didn’t have a lot of time to prepare mentally before finding ourselves in the middle of another intense dream sequence.
“Damn. Doesn’t anyone have simple house-keeping dreams any more?” I muttered as grass sprouted under my suddenly cleated feet.
“Hut one, hut two, hike,” the owner of the dream shouted. Receiving an oblong ball through the legs of the man crouched before him, the dream-owner immediately turned and handed the ball to Thomas who, though startled, gamely pushed me out in front of him as we started to run for the end of the field.
“Run for the end zone, I can see the barrier there,” Thomas yelled as he tried to guide me in the direction he wanted to go. I had no idea what the end zone looked like, but I recognized the barrier just beyond a line of giant men wearing black football uniforms. Having a basic familiarity of the game, I started throwing my shoulders into the opposing players sending them flying to either side of the field as I forced a hole for Thomas to run through. Unfortunately, the more players I knocked aside the more players who showed up to replace them. Soon there seemed to be hundreds of opponents packed close together between us and the end zone. This was blatant cheating. Still I hammered on and watched as the gridlines disappeared under my feet. The dream owner really wanted that touchdown and was helping Thomas and I get there.
I saw the exit sign glowing green at the end of the tunnel behind the end-zone. Hallelujah! We had a way out. Ten yards, nine, eight, seven— I continued to push on. Six, five, four— now I was beginning to slow and was thankful when I felt Thomas shove at my back to add momentum. Once past the goal line, the dreamer had abandoned us, but we couldn’t let the drop in energy slow us down. Usually I don’t tire dreamside but today had been unusually taxing. Three, two, one, I had almost stopped now, feeling that I was too exhausted to move on, then suddenly we were there, running down the tunnel toward the glowing exit sign next to the locker-room.
I shoved the door open and snapped awake instantly. I was slumped in a very uncomfortable hospital chair just outside Thomas’ room. Springing to my feet, I threw open the door to room 316 and found a ring of concerned looking individuals surrounding Thomas’ bed. They watched in amazement as he regained consciousness and slurred what I recognized as: “Touchdown!”
One woman in particular looked more amazed then the rest. She stood beside the bed holding an unplugged cable in her hand. Although I had never met her, from the cast on her right arm, I recognized her as Thomas’ supposedly loving wife, Nora.
“Nora, what are you doing with that plug in your hand,” were the first clear, waking words that left Thomas’ mouth.
That was a telling question. I can’t tell you how many times I had seen it. Loved ones who take the expression “pull the plug” literally then end up unplugging the lights over the patient’s headboard or the heart monitoring machine in their eagerness to get it all over with.
“Nora?” he asked again.
It looked like someone had some explaining to do. Thankfully it wasn’t me.
I backed out of the room before anyone noticed me. I felt no inclination to participate in the subsequent heated discussion. Having completed my contractual obligation and seen Thomas safely wakeside, I decided that the rest of the details such as billing and words of thanks could be taken care of via the mail.
If Thomas ever asked why I left without talking to him, I’d tell him that I hate long, mushy goodbyes. Really, I just hate long family arguments.
He probably wouldn’t ask though. Most rescued dreamers never quite believed that I was real.
About the Author
Melanie Jackson is the author of 23 novels. If you enjoyed this story, please visit Melanie’s author web site at www.melaniejackson.com
Be sure to check out all the books in the Chloe Boston Mystery Series:
Moving Violation
The Pumpkin Thief
Death in a Turkey Town
Murder on Parade
And don’t miss Melanie’s exciting new series co-written with her husband, The Book of Dreams:
The First Book of Dreams: Metropolis
The Second Book of Dreams: Meridian
The Third Book of Dreams: Destiny
Table of Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
The First Book of Dreams: Metropolis
Chapter 1