The Big O and all of its settings and characters are owned by Cartoon Network, Sunrise, and Bandai Visual. Additional plot, settings and characters are © by Chaosium. Additional material by Howard Phillips Lovecraft.

THE BIG O:

ACT 31

DREAMS DARK AND DEADLY

Chapter Eleven: The Walking Dead

At that moment the door slid open and a short slender black clad girl burst into the room. R Dorothy Wayneright ran straight for the clear circular chamber where Roger was restrained. Shielding her face with her arms, she leaped up into the air and broke through the transparent plexiglass barrier. Once inside, her nimble hands worked quickly at the straps binding his arms to the gurney.

"Dorothy!" Roger cried as she freed his arms and waist. "You're alive!"

"No!" Gilbert Manes shouted as the door to the heart of the Dreamweb slid open. "Stop her! Destroy that android!" he cried as he jumped on Dorothy's back as she freed Roger's legs. Dorothy staggered forward under the unexpected weight but managed to undo the strap. Roger's long leg kicked out and struck Manes in the head, knocking him off the little redhead and sending him backwards into the wall.

Roger sat up and pulled the suction cups off his face. They came off with a popping noise. He was panting as if he had just run a mile. "Dorothy!" he smiled as he got off the gurney. "You're—" He stopped, frowning as the injured Gilbert Manes staggered to his feet and lurched forward. "Murderous rat!" Roger growled as he grabbed the shorter man's head and slammed his face against the metal gurney. "I hope you spend the rest of your life behind bars!" To his credit, Manes remained standing and turned to face Roger Smith but Roger struck him in the chin, knocking him out and laying him at an awkward angle on the gurney. "Let's get out of here." Roger said as they left the circular room to enter the control and monitoring chamber. "Are you all right?"

"I'm fine," Dorothy assured him. Her bedraggled state was completely at odds with her normally prim and proper appearance. A thin layer of dirt and leaves clung to her skin, hair and clothing. Her clothes were torn, wet and muddy in places, especially at her legs. The hem of her skirt was torn and her leggings had so many rips and runs in them that he could see her slender white legs peeking through. She was missing her shoes and her toes poked out of her torn stockings. "I'm not going to catch cold, if that's what you mean."

"Dorothy I'm sorry," he said as he put his large hands on her slender shoulders. It was obvious that she had been through an ordeal that would give a human girl nightmares. He thought that if he could keep her nearby he could protect her but like an idiot he had left her out in the woods alone…

"Look out," Dorothy said as she pushed him away and seized Marina Ivanovna's arm. Doctor Ivanovna had snuck up behind Roger with a hypodermic needle in her hand. Neither Roger nor Dorothy knew what was in it, but it couldn't be good.

"I forgot, everybody here is under Mane's control," Roger said as he wheeled around trying to face everybody in the room. The whole chamber circled the Dreamweb. Burton Fielding and Johnny Booger were to the right of them. Marina Ivanovna and Ellen Cody were to the left. "They shouldn't be too tough in a fight but remember that they're in a trance," he told her while trying to keep his voice calm. Their glazed expressions and sluggish movements were unsettling. "No matter what they do we've got to remember that they are the victims here!"

It was four against two, but fortunately, Roger and Dorothy had the advantage. None of their attackers knew how to fight and their attacks were clumsy and uncoordinated. Roger countered with blocks and throws while Dorothy preferred dodges and holds. The real challenge was stopping them without hurting them.

While they were struggling with the mesmerized victims the door opened and the elderly but dashing Lawrence Winthrop entered followed by the young and freckled Harry Jones. "In here, Harry," Winthrop ordered. "We've got to save Mister Smith!"

"Ellen!" Jones cried as he pointed a .45 caliber revolver at Dorothy. "Wayneright! What are you doing?"

"I'm trying to restrain her," Dorothy said calmly as she pulled Ellen Cody's arm behind the blonde maid's back and pulled Marina Ivanovna off her feet. "I'm trying to keep her from harming herself and others."

"Put that thing away Harry, I don't see Manes anywhere!" Winthrop ordered. He came up behind Johnny Booger and wrapped an arm around the patient's neck while pushing two fingers against the drug addict's chest. The former guitarist slid out of the old man's arms and onto the ground.

"That's not bad!" Roger smiled as he put Fielding in a choke hold. "Where'd you learn moves like that? You've got to teach me that someday!"

"I have no idea," the old man rubbed the back of his neck and stretched. "I must have been quite the warrior before the Amnesia."

Roger could relate. To be honest he didn't know where his skill in acrobatics, hand to hand fighting, and piloting the Big O came from either. At least Winthrop was around when the Big Amnesia hit and had an excuse.

"Could somebody help me with these two?" Dorothy asked as she held the struggling Marina Ivanovna and Ellen Cody. "I don't want to hurt them."

"Ellen! Wake up! It's me, Harry!" Harry Jones implored her. "I don't know what's happened to you but you've got to snap out of…" his voice trailed off as a strange chiming filled the air. He shut his eyes and his chin rested against his collarbone for a few moments. It was as if he had fallen asleep standing up.

As a matter of fact Roger Smith felt pretty tired himself right now. It would be so easy to close his eyes and let his mind wander, but he snapped back to attention when he saw Harry's revolver rise slowly to point at Dorothy's head. "Dorothy!" Roger cried as he karate chopped Harry's wrist. The gun clattered to the floor as Harry took a swing at Roger.

"That sound is coming from the intercom system!" Winthrop exclaimed as he slapped himself in order to stay alert. "We've got to get everybody out of here!"

Dorothy pushed the two resisting women out the door as Roger struggled with Harry. Although Harry's punch had struck Roger by surprise the negotiator managed to stun the young handyman with a blow to the chin. Winthrop seized Harry from behind and pressed two fingers against the young man's neck.

"Pressure points," the old dandy explained as Harry slumped to the floor. "By applying pressure to certain nerve clusters you can incapacitate an opponent. Useful if you're getting too old for a serious fight…"

"You're pretty quick on your feet old man," Roger grinned. "You spry enough to carry a guy out of here?"

"Put Mister Fielding over my shoulder," Winthrop decided. "He looks light and I should manage if I don't have to bend over too much."

The old dandy seemed to have the strength and agility of a professional athlete but Roger was content to let Winthrop do the 'don't mind the harmless old man' routine if it meant getting the old codger's help. Soon the two men were hauling Fielding and Jones outside by draping them over their shoulders in a fireman's carry.

As the door slid shut behind them, Johnny Booger blinked awake as the hypersonic chime increased in intensity. He shambled into the heart of the Dreamweb and straightened Manes' body so the squat chef wouldn't fall off the gurney before placing suction cups on the murderer's face while singing a disjointed tune:

"The time has come; the gate appears, ending the fascist realm of years; a trembling mountain of green gelatin, steps into the sun at man's age end…"

With stiff, jerky movements Johnny Booger walked back out to the control room. The chime changed, and he flicked a switch.


Outside Roger and Winthrop set Fielding and Harry down before applying the old man's 'pressure point nerve pinches' to Marina Ivanovna and Ellen Cody. They stopped to catch their breath as Dorothy watched the entrance to the building.

"Any stretchers around?" Roger asked the old man.

"I believe they're in the infirmary," the old man nodded at the doors to the lab building. Neither one of them wanted to go back in there.

"Do I look like that?" Dorothy asked.

"Like what?" Roger turned to look at the little android.

"When a human is mind controlled," the girl clarified. "Do I look like that? Vacant eyed and staring and moving like an automation?"

"Uh… no…" Roger looked away and scratched the back of his head. "Of course not. Where have you been all this time anyway? I was worried sick about you!"

"Manes ambushed me in the woods," Dorothy explained. "Even though he was wearing a mask, I recognized him. When he discovered I was an android, he summoned some kind of creature. It appeared out of nothing. To escape it, I jumped in the lake and remained submerged until I could be sure it was safe."

"You were gone for hours," Roger scolded. "I was worried sick."

"It looks like I should have been worried about you," she replied. "I managed to sneak back to the lodge and saw Manes and the others moving you and Mister Winthrop to the lab building. They didn't notice me following them so I listened in while trying to come up with a rescue plan."

"Then Harry Jones rescued me," Winthrop added. "After spending hours in the woods looking for Miss Wayneright he spotted her sneaking into the lab building and got curious. He found me tied up in the infirmary and I told him about Manes." He stopped and stared sadly at the doors to the lab building. "What a blind old fool I've been. All that going on right under my nose. And I was technically bankrolling it all too. Poor Torrance, Rita, Carl, and all those other poor devils Manes murdered. How could I have been so blind?"

"Don't blame yourself," Roger told him. "Dorothy and I came here looking for something incriminating and if Dorothy hadn't stumbled upon that dead body by accident I would have let myself become one of those Dreamweb zombies too. Manes actually covered his tracks pretty well."

"That's all very well and good Mister Smith but it happened on my watch so to speak," Winthrop muttered. "This place is called the 'Winthrop Institute for Dream Research' is it not?"

"I know how you feel," Roger looked at Dorothy and imagined one of Beck's scorpion robots flying away with her. "Well Dorothy, you better clean yourself up while Winthrop and I collect Gilbert Manes and…" Abruptly he turned to Winthrop. "Is Johnny Booger a real name?"

"I believe a better course of action would be for me to go in and retrieve them," Dorothy said. "I seem to be immune to the vibrations Manes used to take over everyone's minds and I'm stronger and can carry them out on my own."

"No way Dorothy," Roger shook his head. "Jones brought a revolver in there. If I didn't hit Manes hard enough that maniac has got a gun and I'm not about to let you risk your life."

"If I may interject, I have a set of earplugs that Mister Smith may find handy," Winthrop said as he offered Roger a tiny plastic box. "I take catnaps during the day. I don't know how effective they will be in filtering out those 'mind controlling subsonic echoes' but they should help."

Roger and Dorothy looked at each other. Roger had a stubborn look on his face while Dorothy stubbornly avoided having any expression on her face at all. "Well, it's stupid to go in alone anyway," the young man conceded while placing the plugs in his ears.


They entered the building and made their way to the infirmary, where Dorothy and Winthrop found a stretcher. Roger carefully made his way back to the Dreamweb. He flinched as the vacuum nozzles in the tiny 'airlock' between the hall and the monitoring room roared to life but no one sprung from hiding as he entered. The room seemed to be empty. Roger removed one of the earplugs. The mind controlling chime had stopped. No sign of the bedraggled musician called 'Johnny Booger. He crept closer to the Dreamweb proper to see if Gilbert Manes was still there, making an effort to avoid stepping on the tiny shards of broken glass that Dorothy left behind when she rescued him earlier.

He walked towards the shattered barrier and gasped when he saw Johnny Booger lying on the gurney, all the sensors of the Dreamweb wired up to him. He yelped and spun around as the doors behind him opened to allow Dorothy and Winthrop into the room. He put his finger to his lips, motioning them to be silent. Dorothy pointed to an object lying on the floor. It was Harry Jones' revolver. Okay, so Manes didn't have a gun, at least not that one. So far so good. But where was he? And what was he going to do next?

Roger got closer to see if Manes was hiding in the center of the Dreamweb. He spotted the lethal chef's corpulent form lying on the floor at the feet of the gurney at an awkward angle. He entered the small circular chamber and crouched to examine the potbellied lunatic. "He's not breathing," he announced as he took off a glove and checked for a pulse.

"How is Johnny Booger?" Winthrop asked.

"He's not breathing either," Roger told him.

"Let me have a look," the old man said while pulling a stethoscope out of a medical bag. "I may not be a doctor but I can find a heartbeat given the right equipment." The old man undid their shirts and listened to the chest of first one man, then the other. "Dead," Winthrop muttered while handing the stethoscope to Roger. "Both of them. And not a mark on either of them. Neither one of us are medical men, but it looks like the Dreamweb really could suck the life-force from a human after all. In that respect, Gilbert Manes wasn't lying."

"But why?" Roger asked. "If the Dreamweb was used to kill them, Johnny Booger was the last one to die. Manes died first. Who killed Johnny Booger? Who's left?"

"Neither one of us saw Torrance or Carl die," Winthrop offered. "Does that mean that one of them…?"

Roger and Winthrop jumped back when Johnny Booger rose from the gurney. Gilbert Manes pulled himself off the floor at the same time. Dorothy had been keeping a lookout at the door and turned to see the duo shamble towards her, their movements clumsy and jerky like marionettes. That's when the building shook and the lights went out.


Outside the lab building Marina Ivanovna was being shaken awake. "Wake up! Hey! Wake up!" Burton Fielding shouted.

"Get your hands off me!" Marina slapped him away. "What's going on? Where am I? What am I doing outside?"

"Mister Winthrop said that Gilbert Manes took over your minds," Harry Jones said as he helped Ellen Cody to her feet. "You were fighting with Roger Smith and his little assistant in there. Don't you remember anything?"

"No, nothing," Marina winced as she got to her feet. "Ow, I'm bumped and bruised all over… Holy mother of God! What is that?"

A gigantic image appeared in the middle of the lake, distorted at first and shot through with snow like a bad television reception. At that moment the carillon tower exploded, becoming a hissing cloud of white hot plasma. Ignoring the panicked quartet cowering at the doors to the lab building, the plasma cloud drifted over the lake before descending and turning the lake into a frothing cauldron of steam. From the seething churning chaos the colossal image appeared, now only slightly transparent and outlined by flickering points of bright green lights like sullen lightning. As the quartet watched in horror, the ooze and slime from the bottom of the lake crept up the inside of the titanic image, transforming it into living flesh!

The solidifying image was a monster of vaguely anthropoid outline, but with an octopus like head whose face was a mass of feelers, a scaly rubbery-looking body, prodigious claws on hind and fore feet and long narrow bat like wings behind. This thing, which seemed to radiate a fearsome and unnatural malignancy, was of a somewhat bloated corpulence, and squatted evilly in the water as it waited for its body to solidify into a fleshy shape, yet a significant portion of its head remained semitransparent.

Without a word, Torrance Dandridge, Carl Weemes, Johnny Booger and Gilbert Manes exited the lab building, two at a time to brush past the startled foursome and walk towards the lake. Burton Fielding called out to them but stopped as the walkers reached the shoreline. Marina Ivanovna fainted as they dissolved, and Harry Jones insisted that he passed out when their flesh drained into formless plasm and oozed into the lake, despite the fact that he remained standing.

So sickened and awestruck were the two pairs of men and women that they didn't notice other figures emerging from the forest, but these wretched souls were much worse for wear than the silent foursome that left the lab building to dissolve and pour into the lake. They were foul corpses, rotten with corruption, but thankfully the sun was setting and it was hard to make out their details as they shambled out of the forest to dissolve into a fetid ooze at the shoreline.

Ellen Cody looked up from where she had been retching to see that the corrupted flesh had left the discarded skeletons to form amoeboid mass that melded together to fill the empty space in the octopus creature's cranium. It was as if the hundred corpses that dissolved in the lake had become the physical components of bizarre organ which the creature would use for a brain. She screamed as the image became real and her mind was bombarded by thoughts that were alien to her and every other human being.


On a desk filled with hourglasses a phone rings. Roger's hand picks up the receiver and a sinister voice says:

Next: The Terror from the Lake