Chapter Seventy-Eight: Integration
I was standing in front of an old plantation house.
Between myself and the house was a large, open front lawn of unkempt golden grass. Dandelions and wishers protruded from the grass, alongside violets and tulips.
A luminous willow tree grew in the middle of the front lawn. The trunk glowed a rich malachite hue, the leaves a soft silver light. A gentle breeze disturbed the stillness of the willow tree, causing its silver leaves to dance ethereally around the puffs of wind, light and silent as snowflakes.
Strangely enough, everything was bathed in sunlight. I call this strange because the sky was currently midnight black. Stars winked at us from above. Millions of stars, shining all colors of the rainbow. When I looked at them for a long enough time, I began to track their subtle crawl across the sky.
More of my surroundings eased into view.
The plantation house's grounds were surrounded on all sides by a dense forest of glowing willow trees, identical in species to the one growing on the front lawn. The strange sunlight, unsurprisingly, was not actually sunlight - it was the collective light generated by the bioluminescence of all those willow trees.
I walked forward towards the house. A white light radiated behind the entrance door.
With light and fleeting footsteps, I stole across the lawn. I felt almost weightless, drifting through the air. I stepped up onto the front porch of the plantation house. The front steps wobbled as I climbed them, causing me to bounce up and down. Oddly enough, they felt spongy.
I had a sudden urge to know what time it was, so I took out my phone and checked the clock. The numbers were wavering, almost as if they were underwater. I had to squint to get a good look at them. Before I could make out the time, the numbers peeled away from my phone and floated up into the sky.
The front door swung open at the lightest touch.
I stepped inside. There was a black-and-gray cat lounging on a table to my left. The cat licked its fur, giving itself a much-needed cleaning. It looked up from its grooming for a moment, appraising me. Then it seemed to shrug, returning to its grooming, paying me no further attention.
The white light I'd seen outside appeared to be emanating from the crystal chandelier hanging in the front hall. The chandelier was enormous – at least six feet in diameter. It occupied most of the upper space of the hall. For some reason, its light was flickering.
I flipped the chandelier's light switch. Nothing happened. None of the light switches worked.
The chandelier suddenly went dark. I was left in the shadows for a moment, wondering what had happened to the light. Then there was a deafening crash, an avalanche of shattering glass. Hidden fluorescent tube lights flickered on, illuminating the front hall once more. The chandelier rested in about a million pieces on the floor of the front hall.
"Causing a mess, Adam?" The voice was deep and clear, layered with a faint Eastern European lilt. I recognized the voice, somehow, despite having never met its owner.
Violin music drifted down from the top of the stairs.
Someone had appeared.
The violinist was a young man in his late twenties - close to my sister's age. He had unruly black hair and pale green eyes. As he played his violin – a slow, mournful tune – he wore an expression of bliss. This expression, more than anything else, tipped me off to the violinist's identity.
"Are you Tami's brother?" I asked.
The young violinist smiled. "Call me Tash."
"What are you doing here, Tash?"
Tash shrugged, continuing to play his violin. "Your dream, Adam. You tell me."
"Dream?" I blinked once. For a moment I was surprised, but the moment quickly passed.
Of course this was a dream.
"Okay, then, I'm dreaming." I began to levitate, hovering about an inch off the floor. "Been a while since I've had a lucid dream. Are you really Tash?"
Tash shrugged a second time. "Maybe? Then again, maybe I'm a thoughtform generated by your unconscious mind as part of this dream. Either way, you're still dreaming and I'm still talking to you. We both exist."
"Dreaming…" I murmured. Doubt gripped my chest as I tried to remember how I got here. I must've fallen asleep, at some point, but when? "I'm not dead, am I?" I asked my third question.
Tash shook his head. "No, you're not dead. Just in a coma."
"Coma?" My eyes narrowed. Flashes of memory tugged at my mind. There was a vision of a sky filled with laser bolts. Gradually, I remembered. "Tyrene. Right. That happened. Fuck. Um… Any idea how long it'll last?"
"It'll last until you wake yourself up."
I groaned quietly, massaging my temples. A mild ache was dancing about my head. Perhaps there is a good reason why we don't usually remember our waking lives when we dream. It can be dizzying to keep track of two worlds at once.
Tash changed his tune to a playful melody that, surprisingly enough, I recognized as the opening music to Fiddler on the Roof. I listened to the violin, smiling. I had performed in this musical, once upon a time, and the soundtrack was very familiar. I levitated up to Tash's level, floating over the broken glass and onto the railing of the stairs, joining Tami's brother on the upper floor.
"Mind if we go someplace else?" I asked, stepping down onto solid ground.
"Not at all," Tash replied. "Go ahead and visualize a door."
"Two steps ahead of you." I gestured to the wall behind Tash, which now sported a small, ornate oaken door.
Tash gave a grunt of surprise in reaction to the door's sudden appearance. "Didn't even see you put that there." He lowered his violin and gave a low whistle, running his fingers over the intricate carving on the door's panels. "Nice attention to detail. You're a natural."
"I've dreamed a lot." I took hold of the doorknob, twisting it and pushing the door open. I stepped through the portal onto fine white sand.
There was a gentle breeze which carried the smell of salt. Waves lapped against the edges of the beach. The water was remarkably clear – I could spot the fringes of a vast coral reef further on out. There were a few large fluffy clouds drifting lazily across the sky, but they did not obscure the sun. I started sweating, prompting me to seek shade.
I took shelter underneath a palm tree.
At the top of the palm tree, nestled within the juncture of the palm fronds and the tree trunk, was a cluster of coconuts. My stomach growled. I started climbing the tree, reaching the top within seconds. I plucked out one of the coconuts. I used the Force Aspect to drill a hole into the coconut's shell.
I raised the coconut to my lips and tilted my head back, allowing the milk to pour straight into my mouth. It was one of the sweetest things I ever tasted.
"Watcha doin' up there?" Tash called up to me from below.
Tash. Crap, I'd nearly forgotten about him. Memory was wonky here.
"Got distracted," I replied, sliding down the tree.
"You started losing consciousness," Tash observed. "You'll want to be careful of that."
"Why?"
"Because there's a window of opportunity approaching. When it arrives, you'll be able to wake yourself up. You won't do this if you lose consciousness."
"Will I die if I miss the window?"
A third shrug from Tash. "Probably. You were in pretty bad shape when you came into this coma. It'll take some work on your part to bring yourself out of it. By the way, what's that noise?"
"Huh?" I was caught off guard by the sudden change of topic.
"What's that noise?" Tash repeated himself, his head cocked slightly to one side. "Listen."
I blinked as my lucidity expanded ever so slightly.
It was a faint sound, carried by the breeze alongside the scent of the ocean. It was the sound of screaming. I decided to start walking in that direction. Tash fell into step beside me. As we neared the source of all the noise, I could tell that we were hearing hundreds, perhaps even thousands of voices.
The forest of coconut trees slid right on by.
I gazed deeper into the woods while we walked. As I watched, several of the trees shuddered and uprooted themselves, floating up into the sky. Droplets of red light trailed from the dangling roots of the floating trees. As more droplets fell, they gathered into pools. Slowly from each pool of red light rose a budding lotus flower glowing with an aura of violet.
The stems of the lotus flowers shimmered with a mesmerizing rainbow haze, but the buds remained a powerful violet. As they began to open, a blinding white light burst from the myriad petals of the lotus flowers. The pools of red light began to shrink as they were absorbed by the flowering lotuses, and I noticed the smell of burning sage.
I took a step towards the strange lotus flowers, followed closely by another. There was no third step, however, because upon taking the second step I realized that they were the first steps I'd taken in a little while.
I no longer tasted any coconut. How long have I been standing here?
"Difficult to say," Tash replied to my thought. He was now sitting cross-legged on the ground, resting against one of the trees. In his lap was a giant carton of flavor-blasted goldfish. He was happily nomming. "Time exists in a dream, but it works differently. Think cyclical as opposed to linear. Much more flexible."
"I got distracted, again."
"Dreams tend to do that." Tash nodded in agreement. "Whoever said staying lucid was easy? This won't be the last time you're distracted. What matters is how good you are at bringing yourself back."
"Bringing myself back…" I murmured. "Dunno if I'm good at that, or not, but I know I'm experienced."
"Usually that means you're good at it."
The forest of coconut trees continued to slide on by.
When we emerged from the woods, I was startled by what lay beyond.
Looming over the coconut tree forest was a mountain. The smell of the sea was smothered by the pungent, metallic stench of spilled blood. Smoke curled into the sky from the ruins of the fort built into the mountainside. Corpses littered the slopes approaching the fort. Dead snakes. Cobras, to be precise. My consorts. Northerners, by the looks of them.
Something deeper within my mind sparked.
Mount Lonesome.
"What?" Tash arched an eyebrow.
"Mount Lonesome," I said. "That's the name of this mountain. I fought a battle here."
There was an army of Northerners charging up the mountainside towards the Dersite fort. They were getting torn apart by the Dersite defenders' superior weapons. Consorts were falling left and right, riddled with laser burns. The screaming continued.
Tash started munching on another handful of goldfish. "Messy," he remarked, watching the consorts die on the mountainside.
"Very messy," I agreed. "Do I have to join in?"
Tash shrugged. "Your choice. Goldfish?" He held out the carton.
I reached into the carton and grabbed a small handful. "Gimme a sec," I said to Tash. I levitated myself into the air, flying towards Mount Lonesome. I looked down as I neared my beleaguered consorts. I remembered this battle in vivid detail – the frenzied, desperate push up the mountainside, and the exhaustion from maintaining the protective force field.
I had no desire to repeat history, here. Rather than join the Northerners, I flew right past them, straight up to the Dersite fort. I'd finished all my goldfish by the time I made it up the mountainside. I brushed the cheese dust from my fingers and landed on the fort's walls.
"Go home, guys!" I said to the Dersite soldiers on the walls. They stopped shooting at the consorts, regarding me with expressions of confusion. I persisted. "Go home! Battle's over! Shoo!"
The Dersite soldiers traded glances with one another. Then they all gave a collective shrug and dropped their weapons, casually strolling away from their posts. The entire fort fell silent. The consorts, no longer under fire, stopped their charge. They milled about the mountainside in confusion for a few seconds before they, too, turned around and left the battlefield.
After a few seconds of quiescence, birdsong slowly started to fill the silence. I spotted birds with vibrant red feathers flitting about the ruins of the fort. Cardinals.
Tash was patiently waiting for me at the bottom of the mountain. "Nice," he remarked. "I don't suppose that's how the battle actually went?"
"Not exactly," I replied.
"How about that battle over there?" Tash pointed behind us.
I turned around, my gaze following the direction of Tash's index finger. The forest of coconut trees had vanished. It was replaced by plains of bristling yellow-green grass. The earth underneath the grass was colored a familiar chessboard pattern of black and white squares. Each individual color patch was multiple square miles in size.
Vast walls of white stone rose in the near distance, looming over the surrounding plains. The walls had turrets at regular intervals. There were a few towers within that were tall enough to peek over the walls, though they were dwarfed in size when compared to the compound's central citadel – a gigantic marble fortress with four turrets sprouting from each side.
The White Keep.
Yes. The White Keep. I was looking at the White Keep – that's why it looked so familiar.
The White Keep was on fire. Several of the turrets on the outer walls had crumbled. Banners of gold and white hung limp from the battlements, many of them charred and in tatters. The outer walls were burned, ravaged, and filled with pockmarks, but they appeared to have held against the severe beating they had taken. Or so I initially thought.
The outer gate, as it turned out, had not fared so well. I arrived at this conclusion upon observing the jagged, gaping rend in the outer walls where the outer gate had once stood. The entire gatehouse was gone, and there were not many large chunks of debris lying around. Just small fragments and chunks of masonry. The gatehouse had not simply collapsed with the destruction of the gate – somehow, it had been blown to pieces.
The sight sent a shudder up my spine.
I did not want to meet whatever was strong enough to deal damage on that scale.
I could not see any corpses, nor was there any fighting going on. In fact, the White Keep was eerily silent. I think the silence unnerved me more than the screaming from Mount Lonesome.
"I don't know," I answered Tash. "I don't remember this one."
"No?"
"No. What do you think took down the gates?" I asked.
"Nothing I want to meet." Tash accentuated that thought with a loud crunch, popping another handful of goldfish into his mouth. "Probably the Black King. The monarchs are supposed to pack quite a punch when they're prototyped."
"Wanna check it out?"
Tash merely shrugged again. "Your choice."
I made the choice. "C'mon, let's go check it out." I floated into the air and flew across the plains, arriving at the ruined outer walls of the White Keep in no time at all. Tash followed behind, moving at his own pace.
The smell on the wind grew acrid as I drew near to all the smoke. Bits of ash were falling gently from the sky like black snow. Much to my surprise, there was someone sitting cross-legged in the midst of the wreckage of the outer gate. He held his head in his hands and appeared as if he were weeping, though he made no sound.
It was Gino.
The moment I recognized Gino, he perked up and looked over at us. His eyes were completely white. "Hey Tash," he murmured, his voice quiet and subdued. Unusual for him. "Hey Adam."
"Hey Gino," I said. "What are you doing here?"
"I don't know," Gino replied, blinking slowly. "I guess I died. Am I in hell? Is this hell?"
It sure looked like it.
"No, this isn't hell," I told him. What was I supposed to say to that? Yes, Dead Sir, you are indeed in hell! Gino would've had a meltdown.
"Adam." Gino's hand shot forward abruptly, catching my wrist in a grip of steel. He fixed me with his blank gaze of white, his face devoid of any expression. Also unusual for him. "The Outer Gods. They're coming. You're all gonna die." Gino's body then proceeded to disintegrate into ash, quickly snatched away by the breeze. Within seconds, he was gone and I was left staring at the ground.
"Well." I clicked my tongue a few times, not quite sure what to make of this. "That was fucked up. That was incredibly fucked up. Tash? Your thoughts on how incredibly fucked up that was?"
Tash gave another shrug. "He's having a bad day. He'll have help soon, though. You don't need to worry."
"If you say so…" I muttered.
Not wanting to linger around the breach in the outer walls, I wandered into the small city beyond, making my way towards the White Keep's citadel. Few of the dwellings were intact. The entire place had been razed in the fighting. I think it was a miracle the citadel was still standing.
The citadel gates, much like the outer gates, no longer existed. Something had caved them in. The entrance hall beyond was lit by torches that, somehow, still burned from their fixtures on the walls. The firelight filled the space with dancing shadows. I stepped inside, walking slowly down the middle of the hall.
I reached the double doors that opened up into the White King's library, taking hold of the handles. Before I could pull them open, however, I was interrupted from behind by a familiar voice.
"Careful, Knight," said the familiar voice. "You might not like what you'll find on the other side. Some doors, once opened, cannot be closed."
I turned around and nearly puked all over my shoes. The White King himself had appeared. He was the one who was speaking. But he was… He… His head was… The White King's neck ended in a ragged, bloody stump. He was holding his own head, and it was his head that was speaking to me.
"Jesus H. Fucknuggets, what the hell happened to you?" I asked the King.
"It was my choice," the White King's head replied. Then he, too, crumbled into ash. Gone.
I looked over at Tash, who raised an eyebrow at me. "What are you looking at me for?" he queried.
"Should I open the door?"
"Your choice."
"Dude. Repeating the same phrase over and over again is not helping."
Tash gave me the latest addition to an extensive series of shrugs. "Truth is truth. I won't make a choice for you – when something painful happens, you'd be more likely to blame me rather than start choosing for yourself. And you're playing Sburb, which means something painful happens at least once every fifteen minutes."
"Will going through this door help me wake up?"
Rather than give another of his damned shrugs, Tash actually smiled at me. "Yes, it might."
That was all I needed. I pushed open the double doors, which were much lighter in my dream than they were in real life. Waiting for me on the other side of the doors was not the White King's throne room-turned-library. Instead, I was looking at a huge mirror, one that filled the entire space.
My body was all wrong. I was made out of red light. I had wings and feathers. My fingers had become talons. My lower body tapered off into wisp. My legs were gone. Wrong, wrong, wrong.
I was repulsive.
I summoned the Force Aspect and shattered the mirror. Unfortunately, my dreamscape shattered along with it. Cracks spiderwebbed across the walls, floor, and ceiling. My surroundings fizzled away in little trails of light, leaving behind only inky black space.
I drifted through this void for a little while. There was no sound or light, nothing beyond my own breathing and heartbeat. For what felt like the first time in a very long while, I was completely alone. But then there was a glimmer in the darkness. And then another glimmer. And another.
Stars gradually came into view, giving me some measure of company in the darkness. As more of them appeared, I felt a warmth emanating from behind me. I spun myself around. Earth came into view. Yes, as in Planet Earth. I was floating in outer space looking at the Earth. There were storms ravaging its surface, visible even from my current vantage point.
Points of white light started rising from the storms. At first they rose in clumps of a dozen or so, but as the storms intensified the points of light began leaving the Earth in droves. Hundreds of thousands, millions, perhaps even billions of white lights - all streaming away from Earth. It was like watching bioluminescent algae flow down a gentle river.
After a few minutes, the streams of light ceased. The storms stopped soon after.
One of the streams of light flowed past me, not too far away. I willed myself forward in that direction. As I neared the moving points of light, the stars blurred and the blackness of space started to lighten. By the time I reached the stream, everything had gone completely white. I was no longer even moving. I was standing on white light, surrounded by white light.
The warmth felt like I was sitting in front of a fireplace.
Actually, I was sitting in front of a fireplace. The moment the thought passed through my mind, a brick fireplace popped into existence. Logs, fire, and all. I sat down cross-legged and held my hands out to the fire's warmth. I was relieved to see that my hands were human once more. I had fingers, not talons.
Fingers. Not talons.
"Marshmallow?" Tash offered me a stick with a marshmallow impaled on the tip.
Wait a hot second. When the hell did Tash get here?
Tash started to shrug, then stopped himself and said, "I don't know. I had to catch up with you after you broke the mirror. Marshmallow?"
"Sure." I accepted the stick and held the marshmallow end out to the fireplace. I kept it low, beneath most of the flames and towards the glowing red embers. The embers were the best place to toast marshmallows – that was where most of the fire's heat was concentrated. I managed to get the marshmallow a rich golden-brown in a single revolution.
The trick to getting golden-brown marshmallows was to find that Goldilocks zone that was neither too close nor too far from the embers. Then turn the marshmallow slowly. The fewer turns you take, the better. Unless you're one of those heathens who like to burn their marshmallows. If that's the case, I'm sorry to inform you that you're madder than I am.
I plucked the marshmallow from the end of the stick and popped it into my mouth, closing my eyes to help me savor the taste. I hadn't toasted marshmallows since my time among the Alabaster Rifles, following the destruction of the King's Airfield. It's been a while.
"Is my window here yet?" I spoke up after I chewed and swallowed. "Much as I'm enjoying our time, Tash, I think it's time for me to wake up."
"I agree," said Tash. "Your window is close, but not quite here. You haven't fully integrated yourself, yet."
I made a face. "Say what?"
"You haven't fully integrated yourself," Tash patiently repeated. "There is a huge part of yourself that you're in denial over. The psychological fragmentation is keeping you asleep. You need unity."
"What part of myself?" I asked.
"You already know."
"No I don't."
"Why did you break the mirror, Adam?"
"Because it had my body all wrong."
"Did it?" Tash's question was not accusatory in the slightest, yet still it pierced through to the center of my mind, leaving a faint ringing in my ears. The dreamscape started flickering. The fireplace winked in and out of existence several times, and the warm feeling in the air started to quiver and pulsate.
Then the fireplace completely vanished and omnipresent white light subsided.
I was now standing on the summit of a mountain. The sky was the purest unbroken blue. Not a cloud to be seen. The gentle breeze, which had accompanied me since the beginning, strengthened to a constant gust. I spread my arms out wide, allowing the wind to pass unhindered around every surface of my body. This gave me a sort of 'clean' feeling.
"Your window is here," Tash announced, pointing up to the sky.
Sure enough, floating high up in the air, dozens of feet up from the summit of this mountain, was what I recognized as a fenestrated window. A giant fenestrated window. I started to levitate, climbing higher and higher into the sky, reaching out for the window. Much to my surprise, the window itself was not solid – my hand went right through the glassy surface.
When my hand passed through, however… My stomach twisted and heaved. My fingers were morphing back into talons, feathers were beginning to sprout from my wrist and forearm…
I yanked my hand out of the window and backed down. I sank down, down, all the way back down to the summit of the mountain. When I made landfall, Tash was gone. I looked around for him, but he was nowhere to be seen. I was alone once again. The mountain gradually started to flicker. My breathing increased almost to the rate of hyperventilation as panic set in.
The fenestrated window wobbled in the air a little bit. Then it started to rise, moving further and further away. My window of opportunity was passing me by. I tried to float up after it, only to discover that I could no longer fly. No matter how hard I tried to levitate, I could not get myself up off the ground.
My panic worsened. Was I ever going to wake up?
I steadied myself on a nearby boulder, focusing on my breathing. I took deeper, longer breaths, establishing a stable rhythm of inhale and exhale. I looked down from the sky, allowing my vision to relax while I concentrated on breathing. The wind felt good on my face.
As I calmed down, I took a moment to look around, take in more of the current dreamscape.
There were many other mountains surrounding this one. I was in the middle of a vast, snowy mountain range. They were jagged peaks. Harsh and unforgiving. Dark green forests grew along the foothills far below, extending up the lower slopes of all the mountains until they hit the treeline. There was nothing up here but rock, snow, and little white flowers.
I grunted in surprise. I hadn't noticed the little white flowers until now. I crouched down and picked one, holding it up to my nose. The scent reminded me of fresh laundry. A familiar tune swam its way into my awareness and I started to sing quietly. "Edelweiss… Edelweiss… Every morning you greet me..."
Before I could continue any further, I was interrupted by a piercing avian screech. A shadow blanketed the summit of my mountain. This was my only warning, my only chance to dive for cover before a giant eagle swooped out of the sky, its claws swiping through the air where I'd just a moment ago been standing.
I ducked behind the boulder. Shit. That eagle was fucking massive. Probably big enough for me to ride.
The eagle overshot the boulder, flying out into the open sky beyond the mountain summit. As it wheeled around for another pass I tensed to dive out of the way a second time.
But then something gave me pause.
I looked straight up. The fenestrated window was still visible, but barely. It was a shrinking dot, at this point, growing smaller and smaller as it moved farther away. Soon it would be gone completely.
That's what did it. Looking up, seeing my window fading away…it awakened a fiery sense of resolve that hummed within my upper abdomen. My center of gravity. I stepped out from behind the boulder and planted my feet wide, standing up straight. The eagle screeched again and thundered towards me, but I stood my ground. Defiant.
I am dreaming. This is a dream. The eagle cannot hurt me.
The eagle cannot hurt me.
The eagle flew right up to me and screeched directly into my face, actually managing to blow my hair back. But it had stopped. It did not use its claws, nor did it attack with its beak. It merely hovered there, staring into my eyes.
Eagles are not sentient creatures. All the same… As I looked into the eagle's eyes, I could see the intelligence. And the fear. The poor thing was terrified.
I took a chance and slowly raised my hand, reached out towards the eagle. I touched its face. The eagle flinched, but did not screech, nor did it flee. It continued to hover there. I caressed the eagle's neck feathers, careful not to ruffle any of them. The eagle settled down, landing on its feet, folding its wings. Its eyes slid shut. I continued to stroke its feathers.
A low hum came from deep within the eagle's chest. A cooing. Then the moment passed and the eagle's eyes shot back open. It turned away from me and sat down. I stood still, unsure of what to do next. But in a moment, it all became clear. The eagle turned its head back to face me and flared its wings, as if it were gesturing for me to hop on.
I glanced up at the nearly-vanished window, then back at the eagle. I must be going crazy. But sometimes that's okay. "Okay, then...here goes nothing." I climbed onto the eagle's back, barely having enough time to wrap my arms around its neck before it took off, launching itself into the sky. Several powerful wingbeats later, the eagle and I were shooting straight up after the retreating window.
The window was moving away fast, but the eagle was faster.
I buried my head in the eagle's neck feathers and closed my eyes before we hit the glass.