by John Hulme
They burst into laughter and began scurrying about, collecting a series of instruments: a butterfly net, a ball of twine, a set of metal prongs.
“Seriously, you guys. This is a big mistake. I know you have a job to do, but I have to warn you, I’m trained in the art of Fixing, and nothing, I mean nothing, can compromise my Mission.”
From out of his Toolkit, Becker pulled out his Sticks & Stones™ and was about to kick some serious butt, when he felt something sharp bite him right in his own. Becker turned to see a fourth Bed Bug, this one short and pimply and bearing a hypodermic needle—which had just been emptied into the Fixer’s rump.
“Don’t worry. Our last Taster totally recovered.”
They all laughed again but the bad medicine had already found its way into Becker’s bloodstream. The walls became woozy and the crooked shelves even more warped, and the Bed Bugs themselves began to change shape, morphing into horrifically tall insectosoid beasts.
“Well, he almost did . . .”
Following the sound of the explosion, Simly had radioed Central Command, but he wasn’t getting the answer he was hoping for.
“With all due respect, Mr. Dispatcher, sir, the Manual is quite clear on this matter.” The force of the bubble’s detonation had knocked a stack of pillow tiles off the ceiling, but Simly had cleared a space beneath the Transport Tube. “Appendix B, Paragraph 6, Line 4: ‘In a crisis situation, or if the assigned Fixer is rendered incapable, a Briefer may be granted a temporary elevation in clearance.’ ”
“I repeat,” said the Dispatcher, as humorless as ever, “clearance denied.”
“But sir, it’s an emergency! I’ve been out of radio contact for—”
“Are you requesting backup, Briefer Frye?”
Simly was about to say, “Of course I want some backup, you stupid jarhead,” but he bit his tongue. To call in an emergency team on Becker’s first Mission would be a huge embarrassment to the Fixer, and regardless of the circumstances, it would forever plant a subconscious blemish on his record.
“Negative, sir.”
“Then carry on. Central Command out.”
Simly slammed down his Receiver, then looked back up at the tube above. He was paralyzed between his respect for the Rules and his responsibility to his Fixer.
“Where the heck are you, Becker?”
The light in the walk-in freezer automatically turned on when the door opened, and in came the leader of the Bed Bugs.
“Where is it? Where is it?” Frost filled the air, and there were racks of canisters on the metal-grated shelves. But these containers had much more modern packaging than those in the other room. “Marty! Where’s Today’s Horrors?”
“Check on the back shelf,” came the voice of the pimply one.
On the shelf in the back, shrink-wrapped and labeled in Seemsian Modern font (22 point), was a rack called:
TODAY’S HORRORS: A NEW SERIES OF NIGHTMARES FROM THE DEPARTMENT OF SLEEP
The vials had names like EXISTENTIAL ANGST, DIRTY BOMB, and YOU GO TO THE DOCTOR FOR A ROUTINE CHECKUP AND HE FINDS THIS STRANGE “GROWTH” ON YOUR BODY AND IT’S REALLY ITCHY AND RED AND GETS BIGGER AND BIGGER AND BIGGER UNTIL . . . But separate from the others was one with a skull and crossbones tag.
“Ahhh . . . there you are, my pretty.”
It was labeled:
YOUR WORST NIGHTMARE (BETA)
Becker was still dazed and confused from the sedative but he was aware enough to tell that his situation wasn’t good. He was strapped into an old metal chair, his arms affixed by leather cords, and the Bed Bugs were placing a conductive leather helmet on his skull.
“What are you doing to me?”
“The only way to measure the fear factor of our Nightmares is to test them on the Scaredy Cat.”
Becker blanched, for he’d thought this primitive method of gauging abject horror had been banned long ago. Ever since the concept of Dreaming had been introduced, the notion of Nightmares had been fiercely debated. The decision had been made to grant the Bed Bugs autonomy to conduct a limited amount of “necessary evil.” After all, a little helping of Fear is sometimes just what the doctor ordered.
“Is he all strapped in?” The lead Bed Bug returned, holding the canister with his metal tongs. Inside was a fluorescent yellow liquid, and a noxious mist floated from the top.
“Seymour, no! That one’s still in development!”
“But how often do we get a specimen from the other side, right here in our own lab?”
Marty, the pimply Bed Bug, looked deeply concerned.
“But what if he doesn’t come back? What if he’s . . . scared to death?”
“Then we’ll know it works!”
All of their reservations evaporated as they suddenly grasped the genius of Seymour’s plan. The Bed Bugs burst into a new round of cackling and back-patting, as if on the verge of a great discovery.
“You’re gonna be sorry for this,” threatened Becker, finally starting to come around.
“That makes two of us!”
The Fixer struggled mightily, trying to free himself from the confines of the chair, but the leather straps dug into his skin. Behind him, the needle on the Scaredy Cat moved up the meter from “Mildly Disturbed” to “Anxiety Attack” to “I’m Totally Freaking Out, Man!” And there were many more settings still to go.
“Hold him down!”
While two Bed Bugs restrained his head, Marty jammed a funnel into Becker’s mouth, and Seymour slowly poured “Your Worst Nightmare” straight down his throat.
“Sweet dreams, kid.”
22. Fixer Fresno Bob Herlihy was mortally wounded when he tried to Fix a Glitch by himself, inadvertently triggering a devastating earthquake in Sector 81 (San Francisco, USA) in 1906.
23. Alannis Niboot and Al Penske (aka “the Toolmaster”), who was the inventor of most of the Tools in the current editions of the Catalog.
8
Ripple Effect
When Becker awoke, it was four hours later and the Bed Bugs were nowhere to be found. He was still strapped into the Scaredy Cat and the needle had reached “White Knuckles,” which was only one setting down from the highest possible level of fear. Luckily, Becker didn’t remember much from his Nightmare— he rarely recalled his Dreams—but the evidence that something bad had happened was indisputable. His wrists were marked with deep strap burns, his shirt soaked with sweat, and his body sore from exhaustion, like he’d just climbed a mountain the day before.
“Hello? Is anybody there?”
From somewhere deep in the recesses of the lab, it sounded like a party was going on. There was music, laughter, the clinking of champagne glasses, but Becker’s invitation must have been lost in the mail.
“You got what you wanted! Now I have to get back to my Mission!”
The Bed Bugs must have been celebrating the success of their experiment, but in their jubilation they had neglected to double-check Becker’s restraints. The leather on his right wrist had come a little bit loose—just loose enough for him to reach under his shirtsleeve and pull out his Finger Nail™.
It was a silly Tool and many Fixers mocked it as something MacGyver might use, but Becker liked MacGyver because he always got out of a jam. As he frantically cut himself loose, his mind raced with worst-case scenarios. Four hours was an eternity to be out of action, and Dawn must’ve already come and gone. By the time Becker sawed his way through the final strap, the pit in his stomach had turned into a chasm.
“Becker to Simly! Simly, come in.”
Still nothing but static.
“Fixer #37 to Central Command, come in. Over!”
Nothing.
Nothing at all.
Back in the Dreamatorium, Becker began to see that things were even worse than he had feared. There were no more bubbles floating through the air, just the evidence of soapy liquid on the floor where they had popped. He knew this was the result of the Dream he had unintentionally exploded, and to make matters worse, the machi
ne that produced them had gone into shutdown.
“Prepare for Dreamatorium departure,” announced the voice of the computer as Becker stood above the Transport Tube. He needed to reconnect with his Briefer. He needed to talk to his superiors. And more than anything else, he needed to get the Mission back online. “Dreamatorium departure in 3 . . . 2 . . .”
When Becker’s feet hit the ground, he grabbed for his Receiver, but he was rudely interrupted by the screeching of his Blinker.
194 MISSED CALLS
Uh-oh. Someone had been trying to reach him for quite some time—a lot of someones—and judging by the red flag next to each communication, he wasn’t sure he wanted to hear what they had to say. He was about to suck it up and listen to the first one when he heard the sound of someone sobbing amid a pile of fallen pillowstones.
“Simly? Is that you?”
His Briefer didn’t look up, his head tucked between his knees.
“Simly! What’s wrong?”
“I’m sorry, sir. I didn’t know what to do.” Simly’s voice was cracking and his eyes were red from crying. “They wouldn’t give me clearance to go in.”
“Just calm down and tell me what happened.”
Simly stood up and tried to dust himself off, but Becker could tell he was barely holding it together.
“When we lost contact, I tried to get a priority override, but they wouldn’t give it to me. So after an hour, I had to call in for a backup team. I’m sorry, Becker, I didn’t want to do that to you.”
“Don’t worry, Sim. You did the right thing.”
“It didn’t matter, though.” The Briefer was tearing at his hair. “No backup teams were available!”
“What do you mean no backup teams were—?”
“By that time, the Glitch had left Sleep and infiltrated three other departments! It was moving so fast, nobody could even figure out where to start! You don’t know what’s happening over there, man. You just don’t know . . .”
The enormity of the disaster came crashing down upon the Briefer’s shoulders and he fell back to the ground in tears.
“What happened up there, Becker?” He wept. “Where were you?”
Night Watchmen’s Station, Department of Sleep, The Seems
RIPPLE EFFECT! RIPPLE EFFECT!
When Becker returned to the Night Watchmen’s station, he expected to see a bundle of activity, but all he found was the cavernous room, illuminated by red emergency lights and only a Skeleton Crew on duty. On each of their screens, the same awful message flashed again and again and again:
RIPPLE EFFECT! RIPPLE EFFECT!
RIPPLE EFFECT!
Most of the Night Watchmen were staring numbly at their Windows, while over by the craft service table, NW #42 was weeping onto the shoulder of his supervisor.
“Can someone please tell me where I can find Night Watchman #1?” Becker asked.
A group of exhausted employees heard him, but instead of the instant respect he was granted upon first entrance, something else was in their eyes: a mixture of rage, contempt, and shock at what was taking place in The World they loved. And from the way they simply turned away, it was pretty obvious who they held responsible.
Becker swallowed hard and scanned about for the Watchman who had helped him earlier, and found him still at his post—glued to the screen with his headset dangling uselessly around his neck.
“You’re too late.” The way he looked straight ahead, Becker felt like an invisible man.
“Wasn’t anyone able to Fix it?”
“Po and Philadelphia neutralized the Glitch, but the Chains of Events had already slipped too far! Nature went offline first, then Weather, and from there it was like a snowball. The Plan was in shambles and before you knew it, Reality itself started to lose integrity . . .”
“But surely the Powers That Be—”
“There’s nothing they can do! Don’t you understand?” His voice dropped to a whisper of terrible defeat. “There’s nothing . . .”
Night Watchman #1 rose from the chair, handed Becker his headset, and slowly walked away.
“Take a look for yourself.”
Becker attached the headphones and stared at the monitor, and when he saw what was taking place in sector after sector, he couldn’t believe his eyes.
In Bangladesh, the monsoon rains were made of nails instead of water.
In Reykjavik, the temperature had reached 243 degrees.
And in Mexico City, Gravity had lost its hold, and everything that wasn’t tied down was sailing off into the sky. People were screaming and trying to hold on for dear life, and the wild fear in their eyes betrayed the unfathomable experience of being trapped inside a World gone mad.
The same numbness that affected the others began to settle over Becker. How could he have let this happen? His fingers mechanically found their way to the keyboard and punched in the numbers for Sector 33, Grid 514.
“Oh, no.”
Highland Park, New Jersey, USA
As soon as Becker stepped back through the Door, he dropped his Toolkit and ripped off his Badge and pedaled frantically back to 12 Grant Avenue. He was no longer a Fixer (for there was nothing left to Fix), but simply the son of Dr. and Dr. F. B. Drane, and the older brother to a little boy named Benjamin. And he was more scared than he’d ever been in his life.
While Becker pumped his feet as fast as they would go, cars and people were headed in the opposite direction, desperately trying to get out of town. But little did they know, there was no safe haven left. Bark was literally melting off the trees, while high above in the sky, the moon had cracked itself in two.
“Becker—you’re going the wrong way!” Dr. Kole was running by in his bathrobe, clutching a sack spilling over with his beloved books. “We have to get to higher ground!”
Becker wanted to stop and tell him that somehow this would all be okay, but he knew in his heart that it wouldn’t, so he sped on past without saying a word.
“Mom, Dad!”
Much like he’d done the day before, Becker dropped his bike on the lawn and flew inside the house. On the couch in the living room, his father was clutching Benjamin, who was crying like a baby, while his mother stared at him in disbelief.
“Becker, but—I don’t understand.”
“Mom, I tried. I swear, I tried the best I could. But the Bed Bugs, they knocked me out, and the Glitch—” As he stammered out an explanation, Becker had the distinct recollection of the time when he’d broken his mom’s favorite sunglasses, which he’d borrowed without asking. But unlike then, when she had reassured him “it’s no big deal, sweetheart,” no such relief was coming.
“How is this possible?” she said. “Who are you?”
“What are you talking about? I’m me!”
His parents looked at each other, utterly confused, just as Becker’s spitting image came scrambling from the kitchen. In the Me-2’s hands were a ration of canned goods, and it looked just as surprised to see Becker as Becker was to see it.
“What the heck are you doing here?” said the Me-2. “Why aren’t you Fixing the Glitch?”
“Because the Glitch can’t be Fixed!”
The Me-2 was about to ask why, when—
“Will somebody please tell me what on earth is going on around here!” shouted Professor Drane, as Benjamin’s wails increased to an ear-splitting shriek.
“I’ll explain everything later, but right now we have to—”
Both Becker and the Me-2 stopped talking, because they were saying the exact same thing at the exact same time (in the exact same voice).
“Shut up, Me! I’ll handle this!”
“Like you handled the Glitch? No thank you!”
Becker started to respond with anger, but he realized the Me-2 was right. He’d blown the Mission and cost The World dearly.
“I—I—”
Enraged, the Me-2 lunged at Becker and grabbed him around the throat. While they wrestled on the floor, his mom began to scream, matched only b
y the cries of horror that filtered in through the window.
“You’ve doomed us all, you incompetent fool!”
Becker was still struggling to take a breath when his hand finally found the dial on the back of the Me-2’s neck. He flicked it to “Off,” and instantly the doppelganger began to deflate—but not without a parting shot.
“This . . . is . . . all . . . your . . . faul—”
The Me-2’s voice eked to a halt.
Becker rose to his feet, but any solace he may have felt from the end of the fight was quickly wiped away by the sight of his mom fainting to the floor.
“Becker, please, what’s happening?”
“There’s no time to explain, Dad! We’ve got to get out of here!”
Becker figured if he could just get his family back to the Door, he might be able to take them to the safety of The Seems before it was too late. But suddenly, from outside his house, there was a terrible ripping sound, followed soon after by a blinding blue light—and Becker didn’t even need to look to know what it meant. He did anyway, though, and there it was: the Fabric of Reality, tearing like a piece of cloth through the middle of his neighborhood, to expose the In-Between behind it.
And as the ground beneath his feet began to rupture and shake, it hit Becker Drane like a ton of bricks. He knew exactly who was to blame for the end of The World. He was.
“Marty, you nincompoop!”
Laboratory of the Bed Bugs, Department of Sleep, The Seems
Seymour the Bed Bug was fuming.
“What’s it gonna take for you to mix a real Nightmare?”
Marty was crushed. Though the beta test for YOUR WORST NIGHTMARE had gone swimmingly ( judging by the gesticulations of the unconscious Taster in the chair), the Scaredy Cat said otherwise.
“But it made it to ‘White Knuckles’ . . .”
“White Knuckles! If I wanted White Knuckles, I’d take MONSTER IN THE CLOSET for the thirty-fourth time!”
Marty and the other Bed Bugs in the room dropped their heads in shame.
“You heard what the VP said—‘If you don’t deliver me a Nightmare that makes it to “Curled Up in the Fetal Position and Crying for Mommy,” you’re out and I’m bringing in Hubie’s team.’ ”