When We Got Lost in Dreamland

by Ross Welford

  He makes a move towards the bathroom door. ‘Wait!’ I say, and he turns back. ‘We are going to succeed, aren’t we? I mean, in rescuing Seb?’

  He moves his glasses down his nose to look at me over the top. ‘That, Malcolm, is entirely down to you.’

  He opens the bathroom door and beckons me through, and I’m back in Kobi’s cave. ‘Now,’ he says, ‘follow me and get ready to meet that crocodile again.’

  I feel sick. ‘Cuthbert? Why?’

  ‘Because I’ve a feeling that until you kill him, you’ll never be rid of him.’

  Outside, the mouth of the cave is exactly as before, with the airship drifting in a clear sky and a chilly wind scooping up whitecaps on the waves in the bay. I turn to Kenneth, who seems far younger than when he was …

  … this is going to sound strange, but I’ll say it anyway …

  He seems far younger than when he was alive.

  He’s standing at the cave mouth, hands on hips, his face lifted to the sharp autumn sunshine, the breeze flicking his kilt round his knees.

  ‘What do we do, Kenneth?’ I say.

  He keeps his face turned to the sky. ‘Why do you keep asking me, laddie? It’s your dream.’

  ‘I know, it’s just … you know, I don’t know what to do and I thought you might.’

  He looks at me and says, ‘No. You’re in charge, or at least your subconscious mind is, and right now that’s all there is of you. That’s just how it goes.’

  I’m beginning to panic, and I can hear my panic-voice getting louder and higher. ‘But you made the Dreaminator: you must know!’

  ‘Och, I long ago gave up havin’ any proper control over my dreams. I used to meet wee Uri and that was about it. I’d just allow my dreaming mind to do whatever it wanted and you know – as you youngsters say – go with the flow.’

  ‘And that worked? That was okay?’

  ‘Aye, it was,’ he says, smiling slowly. ‘And I got to meet my son again.’

  ‘Oh,’ I say. ‘Of course.’

  Kenneth gives me a long stare. ‘This is a lot of talking when you’ve got a job to do, if you don’t mind me saying.’

  ‘Can you run?’ I ask.

  Kenneth answers by bobbing up and down on the spot a couple of times, and then starting to jog up the beach like a much younger man, his knobbly knees working hard and his shiny black lace-ups kicking up sand. I catch him up, limping badly, then for the second time in an hour I find myself running up the rocky incline to where the clock tower will be in 10,000 years’ time, through the low, dusty bushes of the Turk’s Head pub, crossing the space where the seafront road will be and on to the wide plain that leads to Custard Canyon and eventually the Gravy Lake that one day will be Marden Quarry.

  I keep wanting to test my dream-control. ‘Fly!’ I shout, and stretch out my arms, but I remain stubbornly earthbound. I try not to think about how I will rescue Seb if I have to do it, you know, normally. That is, without the power of dream-control.

  We run faster and faster. The agony in my foot hasn’t lessened, my chest is hurting, my legs are tired, and we’re still only halfway.

  As he runs alongside me, Kenneth seems hardly breathless at all, which must, I figure, be a big advantage of being dead. He lifts up his arm to look at his wrist.

  ‘I don’t mean to alarm you, wee man, but outside your bedroom it’s getting light and you’ll be awakening naturally in about half an hour. Maybe less, actually.’

  In reply, I grit my teeth, pump my arms harder and lengthen my stride until I can see a small speck in the distance, standing on the lip of the canyon. A moment later, I recognise the tiny, round shape, more or less exactly where I had left her before.

  By the time I draw up next to Mola, I have a painful stitch in my side, and I am so light-headed with exhaustion that it stops me noticing how much my foot is hurting. Five seconds later, old Kenneth McKinley, ninety years of age, saunters up in his kilt – breathing no more heavily than if he had just walked up the steps to his front door.

  Mola and Kenneth face each other warily for what seems like ages. Mola speaks first.

  ‘So it is you then? You what got them into all this kerfuffling, huh? Your fault, eh?’

  ‘Madam, you could not be more wrong. Malcolm and Sebastian got themselves into all this, ahh … kerfuffling with no more help from me than the development of the infernal Dreaminator, which Malcolm here stole.’ He looks at me with a wry smile. ‘Sorry, laddie.’

  ‘How did … you know?’ I wheeze.

  ‘I didn’t, actually. Well, not until you admitted it just now. But Dreamworld or not, the truth will out, as your Wullie Shakespeare said.’

  I’m still too breathless to speak properly, but I’d be unable to say anything, anyway, I am so stunned.

  Mola does not look as though Kenneth’s explanation has satisfied her. She shakes her head, angrily, and says, ‘For centuries, people have contemplated the inner workings of the mind, our whole existence. Through meditation, through prayer, and then you come along with your toy and look what happens!’

  Kenneth seems a bit embarrassed. ‘Madam, you may be right. But you are mistaking me for someone who is alive and has the power to change things. That power, alas, is no longer mine owing to my essential, well … deadness, I suppose. By the way, I’ve not been in this dream before, but I don’t like the lean an’ hungry look of yon fella coming up behind you.’

  Mola and I turn and with a lurch in my stomach I see Cuthbert crawling over the lip of the canyon and he’s looking straight at me with his huge yellow eyes.

  I groan out loud.

  Cuthbert heaves himself over the lip of the canyon and takes a couple of scuttling steps towards me before stopping to lick his lips.

  ‘What do I do?’ I ask.

  ‘Ye’ll ken when ye ken is all I ken,’ says Kenneth and I have no idea what he means, but I don’t have time to work it out. All I can think of is running away.

  ‘Follow me!’ I say, and I scramble back down the canyon, leaving Cuthbert at the top, struggling to turn round so that he can pursue us. Kenneth comes after me, digging his shoes into the smooth, steep canyon wall, which is about the height of a house and even has windows … and a familiar front door with cracked black paint …

  As he descends, he grunts something at me, and I hear it in snatches.

  ‘If he’s been with you a while, then you don’t want to run away, Malcolm … your greatest fear will always chase you until you confront it.’

  Mola slides down, her long sarong riding up past her knees, and seconds later we’re at the bottom together, while Cuthbert looks down at us angrily from the canyon’s edge, snapping his jaws. We haven’t got long, I know it: he’ll be after us soon enough.

  When she gets alongside me, Mola grips my arm and points to where, midstream, three more crocodiles are gliding towards us through the pale green custard.

  ‘It’s getting worse. Can’t you stop them?’ she says.

  I shake my head. ‘It doesn’t work like that, Mola. Not any more. Look.’ I point at the crocs and say, ‘Stop. Turn around!’

  Nothing happens and they get closer to us, about thirty metres upstream.

  I glance up to check on Cuthbert’s progress at the exact moment the beast launches himself down the steep, muddy slope towards us, rolling and sliding and flapping his tail. I stare helplessly, my head swivelling between Mola, Kenneth, Cuthbert and the three crocs.

  We are trapped. I look across the custard river to the bank opposite: it’s our only escape, if we can outrun, or outswim, the crocs.

  ‘What should we do?’ I wail, while Mola and Kenneth shake their heads, sympathetically.

  ‘It’s your dream, Dream-boy. No one else is in charge. Just like life. But seeing as you ask …’ She’s looking at the river. ‘Your brother is on the other side, right?’

  I’m ahead of her. ‘Come on! Into the erm … custard!’ I’m knee-deep already, and Mola is too, but Kenneth is lagging behind. ‘Come
on, Kenneth – we have to be faster than those crocs!’

  Mola and I are midstream. The three crocodiles are getting closer. Kenneth calls out to us: ‘You don’t have to be faster than them. You just have to be faster than me! I’ll take care of these wee scunners, but you, Malcolm – good Scottish name that, by the way, did I ever tell you? – you have to deal with yon big lad.’ He points to Cuthbert. ‘Here – you might need this! Catch.’

  He unhooks his dirk from the sheath at the side of his kilt and tosses it to me. I watch it twirl and spin in the air, glinting in the sun as it arcs towards me, and I know – don’t ask me how, I just know – that if I raise my arm I will catch it perfectly, and I do. It lands with a thwack in my palm, much bigger and heavier than I had expected.

  At the same time, the liquid around me stops being thick green custard and becomes a regular river, flowing with cold water.

  Everything is becoming more real.

  And it’s at that moment – the exact moment that I curl my fingers round the carved handle of the dirk – that I begin to surrender. I give myself up to whatever will happen and start to trust in my lack of control.

  Let it be, let it be, let it be, let it be …

  Kenneth is wading through the water towards the three smaller crocodiles. His musical, gentle Scots accent has been replaced with a guttural city growl. ‘Right, come oan, ye hockit wee jobbies. Ah’ll gie ye whit fer! Leave me pal alone!’

  Behind me, Cuthbert has entered the water with a splash and is gliding quickly towards us. I turn to Mola, who is out of the deepest part now, and nearing the other side. I push through the waist-deep water, my feet slipping on the rocks on the bottom.

  ‘Mola! Help! Kenneth!’ I cry – pointlessly. There is nothing anyone can do. I look upstream to where Kenneth entered with the crocs.

  Nothing.

  Kenneth has gone. Cuthbert has gone too. I swivel round in terror, alone in the middle of the river.

  ‘Kenneth!’ I shout. ‘Kenneth!’ A scrap of blue-green tartan floats past me on the fast-moving water.

  Mola shouts back. ‘Forget him, Malky. He was dead already.’

  That’s when I see it: the huge creamy-white belly of Cuthbert just below the surface of the water, barrelling towards me as he turns and grabs my leg in his jaws, pulling me under the surface as I suck in a mouthful of river.

  This can’t be happening! Wake up! Wake up!

  I can’t shout because I’m underwater, but, if my thoughts could yell, they’d be deafening. I have forgotten Seb, I have forgotten everything in my desperate bid to fight off this beast that is churning up the water and twisting my leg, as if trying to wrench it off.

  Around me I can see the water turning a misty red from my blood, and at some point I struggle to the surface, taking a gurgling, desperate breath as my head breaks free of the water. Cuthbert has let go and I manage to half swim, half stagger a couple more strides to the far bank, where I can see Mola screaming, ‘Malky! Malky! Behind you!’

  I turn to see Cuthbert less than a metre away, swivelling once more to expose his belly as he opens his jaws for a final attack, the attack that will surely finish the fight. My right hand is still gripping Kenneth’s dirk and in a last, desperate effort I add my left hand to steady the blade and plunge it downwards – carelessly, furiously, knowing it is my only chance.

  Half of the crocodile’s belly is above the surface, and the razor-sharp steel shaft slips silently into the skin, all the way to the knife’s hilt, opening up a massive gash but without stopping the beast. His tail thrashes round me, and I lose my grip, sliding below the water again, which is now a swirling mass of blood – Cuthbert’s and mine. Through the mist, I see his mouth open, ready for a last attack, his glassy yellow eyes fix on me and I screw my eyes shut, ready for the end, for there isn’t anything more that I can do, and then …

  Nothing.

  I’m standing now, near the shore, and I can hear Mola shouting, ‘Malky, Malky!’

  Swallowing hard, gasping for breath, I look to my side where the body of Cuthbert lies upside down, nudging the dry bank, his purple guts spilling into the water, the cross-shaped handle of the dirk jutting out of the flesh. I stagger away until I’m lying, choking, at Mola’s feet.

  Then I see something move inside the gaping corpse. In the space where the crocodile’s guts once were is a shape that rises up out of the split belly.

  The slimy mound straightens out and I see that it is the back of a person who has been crouched down inside the beast. The human creature – stinking crocodile innards clinging to his clothes – stands up, removes his spectacles, and wipes a sloppy clot of blood from his eyes and beard before stepping out of the crocodile’s body with a squelch.

  ‘Dad?’ I croak, and he nods, puffing out his cheeks.

  ‘Aye.’

  ‘What are you doing here?’

  He looks around, bewildered. ‘I wish I knew, Malky.’

  I look behind me to where Mola was standing a moment ago. She has gone, and I turn back to Dad.

  ‘Is that it?’ I say. ‘Aren’t you supposed to say something, you know, inspirational at this point? Something properly … Daddish?’

  Dad spits a bit of crocodile innards on to the ground and says, ‘Well. According to your mam, Malky, I gave up the right to say how I’d bring you up three years ago, and so …’

  ‘That doesn’t mean you can’t tell me stuff! Like now, for example. Can’t you just tell me what to do? Isn’t that what dads are for?’

  He shakes his head, sorrowfully. ‘I’m sorry, son. I guess I’m not that sort of dad and never have been.’

  ‘But why, Dad? Why?’

  He takes a step towards me, but I shrink back: he stinks of crocodile guts. He sinks to his knees and looks at me, his face streaked with blood, and shakes his head.

  ‘You want the whole lot now, Malky? The drugs, the depression, the divorce? It’s going to take more time than you have, son.’

  He’s right, of course, and I feel my shoulders drooping in despair.

  Then he takes a deep breath and says, ‘How about I tell you that I love you instead? And your brother. That I always have and always will.’

  I turn to face him. ‘That would be good. I guess.’

  He gives a sad little nod. ‘Aye. Well, it’s true. I love you, then and now and always.’

  I smile. I didn’t know how much I needed to hear this.

  ‘Listen, Malky,’ he says, ‘I’ll be better in future, I promise. But you’ve got a job to do, and I’m not the one to help you.’

  From behind me comes an urgent voice. ‘How much longer you gon’ be, Dream-boy?’

  I turn, and there is only Mola. My dad has gone.

  Mola holds out her hand to help me up and we stand, soaking wet, looking back where we came. My foot and leg are in a terrible state, but the agony I should be feeling is less than I expected. Perhaps it will come later. There are no crocodiles to be seen.

  ‘I … I think we just did something pretty amazing,’ I say to Mola, panting. She sniffs and shrugs.

  ‘Not over yet. And we are running out of time.’

  She’s right, of course. I have known it since the start of this dream. No way am I going to get through this on my own. I have been trying to dream up help – Kenneth, even my dad – but I am not in control.

  What did Kenneth say? The sun is coming up in the real, awake world? That would make it way past six a.m., and I’m normally awake by six thirty, even without an alarm. If you account for the time that has passed since Kenneth said that …

  ‘I should say we have about fifteen minutes,’ says Susan.

  What? Where did she come from?

  ‘You look surprised to see me. Do not be. Instead, let’s get going. Hi, Mola. Sorry I am late. I was so nervous I could not sleep. But it worked. You were right.’

  My head swivels between them. ‘It worked? What worked? What are you doing here?’

  ‘I came to help. I hope that is okay.�
�

  ‘Well, yes, but … am I dreaming you?’

  ‘Actually, I think we are all in this together. But, right now, there may be more important considerations, Malky.’

  I turn my head away from the wind in order to listen better. From afar, I hear Seb.

  ‘Malky! Help!’

  Without saying anything, the three of us start to run towards his voice.

  When we reach the big rock, I hold up my hand to Mola and Susan. We stop and crouch down behind it.

  I hear Seb again: ‘Malky! Help me!’

  Inching my head past the rock, I see the group of Stone Age people, led by the biggest one with the square moustache. Two dogs sniff the ground. Craning a little further, I can see Seb, lashed to a large stake driven into the earth, with his hands tied behind his back. Next to him, similarly tethered, are three more people: our friends Kobi, Erin and Farook. Only, like the custard river becoming water, they have totally lost their cartoonish quality. They are no longer drawings come to life, but real people.

  I was last here, what? Two nights ago? It feels a lot, lot longer.

  Poor Seb is terrified and wriggling, trying to loosen the rough ropes that are binding his wrists, and drawing blood with the effort. He’s in the middle of a flat, dusty area, about the size of a tennis court, that has been cleared of bushes, with larger rocks and big logs positioned round it.

  More seconds are ticking by and I weigh up the options.

  We could run at them, armed with nothing? In a fight between two eleven-year-olds and a short, round old lady, and a group of Stone Age adults armed with long wooden spears, I know who is going to win. My dream-controlling abilities are close to zero now. If I am captured, the same might happen to me as to Seb and I will be trapped forever in a dream of my own making. And what if I am killed? Will I die in real life, or will I just wake up?