by Peter Ness
Suddenly, I found myself in a large, white, domed room. The whiteness flooded out all other light. A group of three tall elongate insect stick figures stood above me. They peered down at the pendant, hissing, clicking, and arguing about something. One tentatively touched the pendant, which flashed a bright green hue. The pendant spluttered, emitting a sharp flickering wave of green and red light, which spat out at the alien. The light pulse picked the alien up and flung it across to the other side of the large, white, domed room. Wham! Smash!
Jo lay in her pink pajamas on an adjacent white glass legless table, which hovered suspended above the floor. The insect figures seemed to leave her alone. Perhaps the pendant protected her as well? Dad and Mom lay suspended on other beds. Small glowing blue and yellow lumps, beads of light, pulsated on the back of their necks. Brian and his father Ashton sat in a trance on a white bench near some circular side widows. Glowing blue beads on the nape of each of their necks bounced around happily. After that, I watched as Dad, Mom, Amanda’s brother and sister (Ken and Patsy) and her father Bill Thomas all floated on their backs off out of an elongate rectangular window. Ken laughed. Patsy giggled. They seemed to be having great fun. Somehow, I could see out through the spacecraft wall. Way down below us I could just make out our farm house. A thin puff of smoke billowed up from the chimney in white rotating spurts.
Amanda floated in and landed on the table next to me. She wore a blue frilly flowery negligee. Our eyes met. She smiled and held out her hand, so I took it. It was, after all, my dream. That lovely hair pin with pink flowers shone in her sandy-blond hair. Reaching out, I grasped her warm hand. Just then, a small glowing bead in the back of her neck burst open with a sharp, splat! An object fell onto the floor. A second object hit the floor with a clatter. The bipedal alien creatures walked back over. They peered down at me through their large black bulging shizochroal insect eyes and began a heated argument, poking each other in the chest.
One of the creatures drew his pointed, sinister face closer down from above. My eyes widened as his face and body flashed and transformed, or morphed, into the rather short, scrawny NSA agent — the one we’d seen at the service station earlier. Insect skin transformed into a dark black suit and the man’s head now sported a bar-code haircut. Let’s call him Goto. Smiling down at me, in sympathy, Goto traded glances with the other creatures. One of them held up a thin piece of metal which had a tiny, and tightly, coiled diode-like object attached. It had fallen out of Amanda’s head.
‘Ama Gedden, this is not our tracking device,’ an insect-like face said to the one that looked like Goto. ‘Someone else is tagging the humans as well. Not that it matters much. They’re just tracers.’
My eyes opened widely now. I trembled in fear and tried frantically to escape but my body just wouldn’t respond. This second creature’s body flickered metallic blue, then silver and reddish translucent hues, transforming into the dark wrinkled face of service station attendant Lance Abbott. He smiled, rotating a frayed blue cap, displaying a gap in his front teeth. Another alien abruptly morphed into our neighbor Cliff Horris. He gloated down at me, like a pedophile might.
‘Yes, and it seems that the Prima[20] is protecting anyone who comes into contact with the boy,’ Goto said in excellent American English. Bending now he stared at me closely. ‘I wonder why?’ Sitting up, I eyed him with some trepidation.
‘Who are you? Get away from me!’ I screamed. But the sound never came out of my mouth. Sensing my fear the pendant began flashing green, red and yellow ribbons of light towards them like a fierce light house beacon.
‘Go back to sleep Heni. It’s all just a dream,’ Cliff Horris said, wiping his open hand in front on my face like a magician. ‘There’s no reason to fear us. We’re your friends. Just give us the pendant, and then you can leave.’
‘Pigs might fly.’ They read my thoughts. ‘You are not my friends. And you can’t have it. Its mine!’
‘You have nothing to fear from us,’ Lance, the service station attendant, added. He smiled as he lifted his hand to pat me on the head and then thinking better of it, quickly retracted it. Goto turned now, focusing on Amanda.
‘Lucy-Far, leave her alone,’ he instructed, flashing a quick look back at me. ‘The boy’s pendant is protecting her.’ Noting that I understood them, the stick figures moved further away for a powwow.
I sat up properly now, cocking my head, my eyes scanning the room. Aunt Rosa lay on another bed. The stick figures lifted a white sheet and were placing something into her body now, up between her legs. She tried to push and kick them off, terrified, but to no avail. A piercing scream echoed from her lips. The tall stick figures were all around us now. I touched a red, itchy, lump on the back of my neck. I tried to rub it but couldn’t move. All of a sudden, something oozed out of my neck and fell onto the floor with a loud splat!
The pain ceased. A stick figure stood over me now, pushing me onto my back using some object, gently. It grimaced, then peered into my face, smiled and told me I had nothing to worry about. They only hurt people who try to hurt them. They’d protect us if we followed the rules.
‘What rules?’ I asked, trying to sit up again. ‘Who are you people anyway?’
‘Relax, you’ll be fine. Lay back down. Sleep now,’ it told me, with a sickly robotic smile, ‘and then, you can give us the pendant.’ Turning it moved away, and I watched it lead Brian and Ashton across to two spare levitating beds.
I relaxed. My body began to hover above the table. Amanda began to float as well, grasping at my hand again tightly. Our eyes met and she giggled. My heart bounced young and free, like Peter Pan, so I rolled over off the table onto my stomach, took her hand again, and then we flew out through the elongate spacecraft window and down towards the barn laughing. This was my dream, after all.
A clown face hovered above me now, gazing down from above; except, it was a large oval shaped alien face with hideous pitch black shizochroal eyes and a small slit mouth. Another stroked Amanda gently on the head with an object — like one pats a pet kitten — but other than that they never touched either of us. A clown face gurgled, salivating down at me. Two alien insect-like faces appeared, then three. I was hallucinating in my dream.
‘Shoot the clowns! Shoot the beggars!’
‘Zap! Zap!’ They floated away as my water pistol sprayed them and the clown faces vaporized in front of my face.
I heard Brian scream erratically in a panicked voice.
‘Crikey, we are going to — fall—,’ as he fell off the boat into a waterfall of curtains raining from a cloud. Blackie, our dog, jumped in after him. Amanda and I followed. Crash! I landed with a loud bang onto the sofa placed next to the bunk bed for exactly that reason. The crash woke me up with a start. Blood rushed to my head. Amanda lay on the floor next to me. Her eyes bulged open. And then she smiled and touched my hand gently.
‘Huh? Amanda what’re you doing here?’ I asked, retracting my hand sharply. A sharp flash of light made me blink. And, then her body faded from view and she was gone as if teleported away. I must have been dreaming, so I rolled over, staring at the clock on the corner cupboard. ‘It’s 3:00 a.m..’ I glanced across at the mirror on the opposite wall catching the reflection of Jo’s bed in the half-light. Then, I turned to check.
‘That’s funny, Jo’s not in bed. She must have had nightmares and wandered in to Dad and Mom’s room,’ I surmised. I yawned, sleepily, then clambered back onto the top bunk bed, rolled over facing the wall and was soon fast asleep snoring loudly.
The uncomfortable sounds of the animals outside — the cows mooing, pigs squealing, the chickens squawking and the dog barking and yapping in frightened monotone — kept waking me intermittently. In the background, Uncle Ashton’s dogs barked ferociously, and Aunt Rosa’s goats bleated with sinking hearts of hopelessness. The Thomas’s horses were neighing, panicking, stampeding in the distance. The animals were becoming rattled. They scurried around in a frenzied panic in my dreams. I saved them from rampagi
ng vampire clowns and insect aliens, which drawled blood and guts from the mouth and stuck metallic devices with strips of thin slivers of wire and beady blue eyes through everyone’s necks. The slithers of wire writhed like small insects. They rotated into the base of the brain stem like a flaying worm, emitting a pale green or orange light and then they pulsated, a bright blue, yellow or reddish hue.
Each time this happened, the person infected by the alien worm bounced around involuntarily. They rolled their eyes, screaming, convulsing and shaking uncontrollably like Teresa did before she died when she had an epileptic seizure. Then, their bodies abruptly relaxed and they dropped down limp. I began to cry now, uncontrollably, as I recollected Teresa dying in my arms and Pops dragging me kicking and screaming off her little body.
Then those afflicted by the alien implant bugs stood up in my dream, turned glaring in a detached manner at me with those cold evil red lizard-like eyes with glowing yellow vertical slits, pointing their fingers.
‘We will get you Heni Hani. You can run but you can’t hide. You have to sleep sometime and when you do — when you do. You are ours!’ their shrill, piercing voice screamed ripping, tearing the fabric of my spine. ‘And so too is the pendant.’ The voices reverberated around me.
‘You killed Teresa, didn’t you? I know you did!’ I screamed back at them. ‘Take that. Zap! Zap! Zap! Zap!’ I shot them all dead.
A thin trickle of blood dribbled down an insect alien’s neck dropping with a plop into a crystal clear pond below, creating murky-red blood ripples which interacted then died out. The next drop of blood landed — splat — into a pool of water below and more ripples formed, interacted and died out as well.
Several times during the night I woke to the sounds of Father opening and shutting doors and the echoed crunching of his boots on the gravel outside. At one stage, at around 4:30 a.m., I sat up, staring at the bedroom window. In the distance, I saw what appeared to be three small blue, orange and red fuzzy Min Min lights, bouncing above the tree line behind the barn. Plus, I swear I heard footsteps grinding the gravel outside, and loud gurgling sounds of the insect-like alien creatures.
At one stage I climbed down out of bed, walked over, and peered out of the window into the darkness. Suddenly, an alien face appeared on the outside of the window. My heart hammered against my brain. The alien slid its head through the solid wall and scrutinized the room intensely, but never saw me. The pendant may have rendered me invisible, perhaps? I recoiled back away from it — then, in a flash, I found myself back in the top bunk sitting up in bed. The alien was gone. Trembling, I didn’t feel safe. Plus, I wasn’t sure what was real and what was dream anymore. A pale white ghostly light hovered enclosed in a bubble by the doorway. The ghostly figure seemed to take on the shape of my sister Teresa. She held out her arm towards me.
‘Things are going to be alright Hani the Heni. Now go back to sleep,’ she said.
Then, in a puff of smoke she was gone. Feeling safe knowing she was there to protect me I rolled over, covering my head with the pillow to keep out the bright blue lights. Soon I was snoring. But, by this stage my listless dreams were mixed and confused.
‘It must be the Henton brothers spotlighting again. Hey! You! What’re you doing here? Get off our land! No! You cannot spotlight for rabbits. They’re mine, all mine. And, I’m not going to share them. I want them back alive. Give them back. Now! All of them.’ The toy rabbit was torn into two pieces in my dream. Rolling over in bed, I bit a chunk out of the pillow. And then I shot at the clowns again with my imaginary laser gun.
‘Take that. Zap! Zap! Zap!’ I groaned listlessly in my sleep.
Chapter 20: Same dream for all
The next morning: Saturday, September 22, 1973
‘Wakey, wakey, hands off snakey!’ Mom dragged the blanket off of me and the cool air sliced across my sweaty skin, so I shivered. ‘It’s time to get up Hen. Stop zapping aliens in your sleep and wake up.’
‘Sorry Mom. I had another dream about aliens and clowns.’ I yawned, rubbed my eyes and rolled out of bed feet first, dropping down onto the couch below drenched in sweat.
‘Yes. I heard,’ she replied, readjusting an old painting of French boats at sea in a storm signed by J.M.W. Turner which hung on the wall. I was dated 1803. I watched her eyes dancing over the painting as she touched the frame tenderly. The way she acted you’d think that it was worth a fortune. Huh! It was just another of those old worthless paintings that you can pick up at a garage sale for a few bucks, I guessed.
‘Jo! You too! Up, and at-em!’ Mother turned now, walking into the kitchen to prepare breakfast. Jo sat up in bed now rubbing her eyes.
‘I wanna sleep longer,’ Jo said, kicking at the top bunk bed. Rolling over, Jo shut her eyes. I yawned staring at her from the couch, still tired. Father’s anxious voice echoed through the cement wall.
‘Someone’s killing and gutting our cows,’ I’m phoning Ashton and then Denny straight away. ‘From the way they cut them up, it appears that some religious cult did it.’
I yawned and rolled over onto my stomach, scratching my crotch.
‘Religious cult; like the Mothers of the Blue Light?’ I spoke in my sleep, ‘Yep. That’s where Mom got the crappy painting. Maybe god signed it? Nope. Can’t be. Charlie Henton of the Moron cult must’ve done it, for sure. Brian, where the heck are you when you’re needed? Go beat a confession outa him,’ I taunted in my dream.
The alarm went off in my ear and I jerked awake.
‘Hey, get up sleepy head.’ Jo put the alarm back down on the floor. Her wet saggy Golliwog doll hung dangling from her hand, and then slapped into my face. Wiping my face, I smelt my hand.
‘What in the blazers?’ Reaching across I tugged the Golliwog out of Jo’s small hand apprehensively, smelt it, and then abruptly tossed it back at her. ‘Yuk! Pyuk! That stinks — like pee!’ I sat up sharply, yelling ‘Mom! Jo wet the bed again!’
‘I don’t think so! I did not! I did not!’ Jo responded angrily, with a bright red face.
‘You did too! Look at your pink pajama pants. They’re soaking wet. And they smell of ammonia. See the yellow stain? See? Mom! Jo wet her bed again!’ I sat up and pulled her bed covers back. ‘Look, can’t you smell your own pee?’ I pointed, almost dry reaching. Jo looked down, tears dribbling down her face from embarrassment and slowly nodding in short, sharp, sobs. Mom came in.
‘Oh! I’m sorry! Sorry Mom. Mom, I didn’t mean to wet the bed,’ Jo sobbed.
‘I know Pudding. Don’t fret. It’s not a big deal,’ Mom patted Jo on the back and ruffled her dark hair.
‘Mom, I had a bad dream about clowns. We were all in a big white round room lying on flying white glass tables. These stick men with evil looking insect faces and large black beady eyes stood over us. It was horrid, but they were quite nice to start with. They gave me a drink of sweet lemonade coconut juice — then one tried to jab a metal object in my neck so I bit him until he bled blue. Then I ran away hiding — really scared — petro flied — I wet the bed. Then Brian and Blackie came and saved me.’
‘You too—?’ I looked at Jo flabbergasted, as if she were an alien. ‘But—, you weren’t in my dream Jo. At least, I don’t recollect seeing you in it?’
‘I was too Heni,’ she snapped. ‘Yes. I saw you holding hands with Amanda Thomas and flying around everywhere like you owned the place!’
‘No! That’s just too creepy. You stole my dream — that’s what happened. Mom, Jo stole my dream and the scary clowns made her wet the bed!’
‘No worries, Pudding. You’ll grow out of it,’ Mother explained, consoling Jo. ‘You’re only ten. Let’s not make a big fuss about it. Your cousin Brian still wet the bed when he was twelve and your brother Heni—.’
‘That’s enough, Mom,’ I cut in.
‘And—, your brother, well he only stopped—,’ she continued.
‘That’s enough, Mom,’ I said, desperately trying to save the last scraps of my now thoroughly soiled reputation
.
‘Okay, Pudding. Let’s wash these sheets,’ Mother dragged them and the plastic sheet below them off of the bed. ‘Go take a shower Pudding. I’ll fix your bed. Put your clothes in the laundry on the way.’
I flicked the soggy, pee-ridden, squishy black Golliwog doll off the couch and onto the floor and tried not to vomit from the pee smell which saturated the room. After a while, I turned and sat up on the couch yawning, and decided to get dressed. My left hand still clasped something tightly. I stared down at the object in my hand. My eyes goggled widely in astonishment at the sight of one of Amanda’s hairpins, the lovely one with the pink flowers on it. Embarrassed now, I hurriedly placed Amanda’s hair pin on the couch and looked down at it transfixed, rubbing the bronze pendant in my hand. Then, I picked up the hair clip, rolled it over in my fingers and stroked it gently.
‘So the dream was real,’ I said to myself in surprise.
‘I could’ve told you that,’ Jo replied, still half asleep. ‘I was there. I saw Amanda give you the hair clip. We all did.’
‘No you weren’t. And you didn’t,’ I convinced myself. ‘It was my dream. Mine.’
‘Then how come I know all the details?’ Jo stood in a dreamy daze now. ‘‘
Mother wandered back now.
‘Pudding, are you still here?’ she asked. Jo stood groggily where Mother had left her. Bending down Jo picked up the Golliwog, clutching it in one hand. ‘Jo. Go and take a shower before breakfast. Sorry? What did you say your dream was about?’ Jo seemed to be in a day dream. ‘Jo! Wake up!’
Jo’s pale little face peered up at Mother.
‘Clowns—. We were all in a big white dome-shaped room, with these stick figure-like insects. They spoke with me — and then stuck a pin in my neck, so I bit them and ran away.’ Jo giggled loudly and ran to the shower room, laying a trail of clothes over the floor on her way.
Mother looked rather perplexed.
‘Pick up your—. Oh never mind, I’ll do it. Now, that is rather strange. It sounds just like my dream,’ she said to herself. Shrugging her shoulders, she followed the bread-crumbs of clothing that Jo had left behind and began to pick them up one item at a time. ‘Only, I never bit them—. I don’t think I did, anyway.’ She walked into the laundry, thrusting the clothes into the laundry tub. There she paused, mulling over her dream.