Chapter Seventeen
Her eyes snapped open. She blinked a few times before giving them a rub and sitting up straight. Cassie had fallen asleep on the sofa, in the middle of the day, in the middle of watching a movie, and this was not the first time this had happened.
"Good morning, sleepy-head," said Cassie's mother as she came into the room.
Cassie smiled and stretched. "How long was I asleep?"
"About an hour."
Cassie stood up from the sofa and followed her mother through to the kitchen, where she leaned on the counter and watched as she made coffee.
"I had the weirdest dream," said Cassie. "I can't really remember it now."
"I paused the movie for you," she said with a small chuckle. "You fell asleep at the best moment. Lucy was just going through the wardrobe."
Something about her mother's words reminded her of her dream, but she couldn't put her finger on what. She picked the DVD case up from the counter, turning it over in her hands. Her arm tingled as she did, and she rubbed it gently.
"What's wrong?" her mother asked.
"Just a bruise," said Cassie. She stared at the cover, at the faces that seemed so familiar to her now. "It was so vivid."
"It was just a dream."
"You were on a business trip." Cassie put the DVD down and looked at her mother with a frown. She felt so confused, and frustrated at herself for not remembering.
Her mother shook her head. "Cassie, I haven't been on a business trip in years. Not since your father left us. I wouldn't leave you alone like that."
Cassie shut her eyes and turned away from her mother. Something was wrong. Very wrong. Inexplicably wrong. Her dream had been so vivid, so colourful and real. Her eyes opened, and fell on something on the fireplace opposite. It was curious because she had never before seen a fireplace so close to the kitchen. And upon it there had never been the small origami figure that lay there presently.
Cassie picked it up and turned it over in her hand. It was a donkey, she was sure of it, though it was hardly distinguishable.
"What have you got?" her mother asked. "What is it?"
Cassie turned around. "What is this?"
Her mother held her hand out, her other placed firmly on her hip. "Give it to me."
"No." Cassie shook her head. "It's mine. It was given to me."
"You've never seen it before in your life," her mother insisted. "Give it to me now!"
"No, it was given to me," Cassie repeated. She could see the memories, feel them lingering at the edge of her consciousness, but she could not remember. And all the while her mother was closing in, and there was something not quite right - with her mother, with the origami donkey, and with the whole situation in itself.
"Peter!" Cassie suddenly cried, her memories flooding back to her - the shock of which was reminiscent to a punch in the gut. She remembered the Pevensies, and Harry and Ron and Hermione and Voldemort, and Bella. How could she have forgotten them so easily? "It was given to me by Peter Pevensie! He made it for me."
Her mother scoffed, stomping forward. "This is your last chance, Cassie."
"This is a dream," said Cassie softly. "And any moment now, I'm going to wake up."
She closed her eyes, squeezed them tightly shut, and pinched her arm. She gasped in pain, but when she opened her eyes again, she was still in the dream. Except, instead of her mother, before her stood Bella Cullen.
Bella's hand was hidden behind her back. She licked her lips with a malicious smile. "If this was a dream," she said sweetly, "would this hurt?" She lunged forward and in her hand she held a knife.
Cassie sidestepped her, pushing her away before she started to run. She found that she was no longer in her house but in a never-ending, dimly-lit corridor. She could hear Bella's footsteps pounding along the floor behind her. It was a strange dream, in that she was running and actually getting somewhere.
She saw a door ahead and headed straight for it, slamming it behind her before Bella could reach it. She heard fists banging upon the door, and her heart pumped and her body shook and her lungs burned as she tried to breathe.
"Listen here, sweetheart," came a voice in front of Cassie. She opened her eyes, and nearly fainted. "You need to get your ass together and kick the snot out of that glittering fairy princess, do you understand me?"
Cassie stood frozen. She could not move, could not speak, could not even breathe.
"Bruce Willis?" she whispered finally. "What are you doing here?"
It was a stupid question. She was dreaming and she was in need, in desperate need of a hero. Why would it not be Bruce Willis?
He slung his gun around his back and reached forward to grab her and pull her away from the door. Bella stormed into the room, in all her wild, perfect glory, wielding her knife like the completely insane, ridiculously beautiful maniac she was.
Bruce Willis arched a brow at the vision of beauty before him, but (and this was most unusual an occurrence) was not impressed by it. "Now, you listen to me, you jumped-up little shit. You either take that fucking knife out of my fucking face or I'm gonna impale it up your fucking ass. Do I make myself clear or are you going to need a demonstration?"
Queen Bella's eyes widened (and almost blinded Cassie and Bruce as she did, for they shone like beacons of light). She was insane, that much was true, but she was not so insane as to mess with the legend that was Bruce Willis. She took a step back, and then another, and before they knew it she was running away.
Bruce Willis cocked his remarkably large gun, a devilish grin upon his face as he chased after her with a cry of "Yippee-ki-yay, motherfucker!"
Cassie heard gunfire, followed by a bang, and then another. She cringed by the doorway, peering around it cautiously as she tried to see what was going on. Bruce Willis was on the floor, Bella standing over him. She had in her possession a sword, though Cassie had no idea how she had gotten it, and she held it poised in her slender hand.
"Just think of this," said Bella sweetly (the adverb had been used before, not so long ago, but the author was at a loss as to a replacement), "as a good day to die hard."
And with that she plunged it into Bruce Willis's body.
Cassie tripped backwards. She turned and ran. The corridor had reappeared, replacing the room she has just been in, and she ran as fast as she possibly could. Her surroundings twisted and lurched as she ran, throwing her off balance every once in a while. She saw another door, this time to her right, and had to turn back to go through it.
This room was dark, and she heard no Bella on the other side. Cassie could not see a thing through the darkness. She reached out to feel her way forward and her hand touched something cold and metallic.
Then, all of a sudden, there was a boom and a surge of light into the previously black room. Cassie held a hand over her eyes to shield them, squinting through the bright light. Her eyes would not seem to focus, her head would not seem to stop spinning.
The suit was larger than she ever imagined it would be, shinier than she ever thought was possible. She stared in awe, her hands travelling along the smooth torso.
"Bruce Willis who?" she whispered softly, and, though she was dreaming, a tear formed in the corner of her eye, so overwhelmed was she in the presence of Iron Man's armour.
"I dream big."
A bang on the door sent Cassie back to her senses. Queen Bella was here and Queen Bella was angry. Bone-crushingly so. She sunk her nails into the wood of the door as she gave it one final push, knocking it off of its hinges.
Before she was blasted right off her feet.
The helmet rolled back off of Cassie's face as she hovered above the floor. She blew coolly at invisible smoke coming from her hands. If Bruce Willis' AK-47 couldn't do the trick, Iron Man's repulsor beams were bound to.
Cassie cried out in celebration. She was too ecstatic to realise that she was still trapped inside her dream, too proud of herself to notice the rumbling of the room that was gradually increasing in volume. No, Cassie did not hear the thunder at first, but the roar was more than enough to bring her to her senses. Had it not been, the Hulk-shaped hole suddenly present in the wall before her most certainly would have.
Cassie froze mid-air. The giant green monster stood still in front of her. Then she heard the words that frightened her more than anything she had ever heard before:
"Hulk, SMASH!"
There was no time to think, only time to run. The room had disappeared, replaced by another hallway, and Cassie flew through it as quickly as the suit would allow her to, but it was not quick enough. The Hulk was stomping behind her, so close she could feel his breath on her as he roared.
Then it stopped. She was no longer flying. The Hulk was behind her somewhere, but further than before and she could no longer see him. The suit was also somewhere - she could hear it. She looked up, to see it floating to her right, but someone else now wore it.
"You think you got what it takes to wear the suit?" asked Tony Stark. "Because I don't. You're doing a really good job of ruining my reputation though. Seriously, congratulations. I can hear you screaming a mile away."
Cassie responded with a series of incomprehensible squeals as Tony shook his head. "Excuse me. I have work to-"
He didn't finish. It was rather rude of him to cut off their conversation so abruptly, but the Hulk did not seem to bother about social politeness in the slightest. He smashed Iron Man into the ground like he was nothing more than a basketball, swiping Cassie out of the way with a mere flick of his abnormally large hand.
She felt as though she was flying. Perhaps, in a way, she was, but it was not to be a permanent trip, and she could feel herself coming back down again, falling further and further to the ground where she was sure she would meet her untimely death.
But it never came. Not her death. The fall did, as did the landing, but it was not as painful as she anticipated it would be. She put this down to the water that she landed in, which somewhat cushioned it all for her.
A rope wrapped around her waist - its origin and ability to tie itself a mystery - and dragged her up, out of the water, and onto the deck of a ship.
Cassie was done questioning what on earth was going on. She had now accepted that this was a dream. She was, however, slightly fearful of her sanity, but hopeful that there was some form of medication her doctor might prescribeto cure these insane dreams.
Yes, thought Cassie, this was indeed a dream (albeit a rather strange one), which was why she was not too surprised to see that it was Captain Jack Sparrow who had pulled her from the depths of the ocean and on to his Black Pearl.
He did not say a single word. His face contorted and he hunched forward. Cassie did nothing but watch as he started to retch. She could not think of how to help him and, in any case, it was just a dream.
Any worry that she once had was replaced by horror as Captain Jack Sparrow regurgitated a glass bottle, uncorked the lid and attempted to tip its contents into his mouth. It was empty, much to his disappointment.
"Why is the rum always gone?" he slurred.
Cassie looked anywhere but at the captain, which was when she saw that she was now sporting a complete pirate costume. The captain bowed lowly, his hand hovering a little too close to the hilt of his sword for her liking. She followed suit, bowing also.
Her hair obscured much of her vision, but her hearing remained intact. She heard the strangest of buzzing noises and lifted her head to find the source of it - which was when she noticed that Captain Sparrow had in his possession not a sword, but a lightsaber. And he happened to be wielding it quite enthusiastically in Cassie's direction.
A lightsaber of her own had appeared in Cassie's hands and she smiled triumphantly with a cry of "aha!" as she poked the weapon into the Captain's side.
He stumbled backwards, taking her lightsaber with him, his face expressionless as he said nothing. Not a single sound came from him. He simply looked down at the sword, which had gone right through to the other side of his body, and slowly pulled it out, turned it around, and plunged it into Cassie's arm.
She had not expected it to hurt, but it had. Not as much as would an actual lightsaber, but there was a definite pain in her arm. Not only that, but everything around her started to spin. She wanted to vomit or faint. She wondered if she might finally wake up. She could still see Jack Sparrow in front of her, but his face was fading.
She stumbled backwards and shook her head. It was as though she was falling again, but this time the dream appeared to be unravelling around her. She squeezed her eyes shut and let herself fall.
When she opened them again, she recognised her surroundings only vaguely, and was almost certain that she had not actually been here before but had only seen this room in pictures. From what she could see, she was stood in someone's flat, in the living room to be precise. There were two armchairs around a coffee table, on which there was a teapot with two teacups, a folded newspaper, and a pile of unopened letters. She dared not turn around and explore further, for fear of what was inevitably waiting behind her.
"You don't notice much do you?" came the voice behind her. This she recognised completely. "Perhaps the violin was too subtle? Perhaps - though I don't see how since I can read it quite clearly from here - you did not see the laptop, on which John is currently retyping our latest adventure - his words, not mine - to post on his blog? Though surely anyone would see the stack of letters upon that table, clearly addressed to here.
"No, it was only when you heard my voice that you realised exactly where you were."
Cassie swallowed. Her throat had become rather dry and her hands were shaking. She opened her mouth and whispered the words the man behind her was waiting to hear: "221B Baker Street."
She jumped as he clapped his hands in a most patronising manner, and turned to see him pass her to sit in one of the armchairs. He gestured for her to take the other, which she did.
"Tea?" asked Sherlock.
Cassie nodded. She felt very strange indeed, different to how she had felt at the start of her dream. She felt so sick.
"You'll have to excuse me," Sherlock said. "I'm afraid we've run out of proper tea and John refuses to go and buy more. I told him I can't be expected to live on this dribble, but he insists that teabags are just as good as tealeaves!"
Cassie smiled. "I'm sure they won't kill you," she said softly, and took the cup that she was offered, starting to add sugar and milk.
"You'll be surprised what can and can't kill you," said Sherlock.
Cassie sipped her tea. She sighed quietly. The tea could not seem to warm her up, and she felt so terribly cold.
"So serious..." said Sherlock. "Why so serious?"
"I remember everything now," she said as she put her cup back down on the table. "When I wake up, they'll change me into a vampire, and that will be the end."
"But you are not awake yet, so no need to be so serious. Besides, there's no need to be so stupid about it."
Cassie blinked. "Excuse me?"
"That's the problem, you see. Haven't you noticed? Everyone you have met so far in your dream has been stupid. Not themselves at all. Even myself, though it pains me deeply to admit it. I am not myself. I am, quite frankly, stupid. Because I am you, Cassie. We were all you. We were all brought here, to your dream, to help you. Yet you refuse to help yourself."
It made sense. Of course it did.
"I don't know what to do," said Cassie.
"Life's a bowl of cherries, my dear dear Cassie, and this is the pits," he said in a blatant case of plagiarism, "but sitting around here drinking tea is hardly going to help, is it?"
He stood up and dragged a protesting Cassie to her feet.
"What are you doing?" she cried, perhaps a little more dramatically than was necessary, but her dream had been lacking any real excitement since she had left the Black Pearl.
"I don't plan on doing anything," he told her. "Not solo anyway."
Cassie's eyes widened and she tried to wriggle out of Sherlock's hold, but he held on tight, already spinning them around.
"Sorry, my dear, that didn't quite come out how I wanted it to. What I meant is that we're going to dance."
"What? No! Stop it! Sherlock, no, put me down!"
The room span around her, too fast for her to be able to focus her eyes on anything. Voices and laughter and music flooded her ears as the room slowed and she saw that she was now in a ballroom. Sherlock Holmes had changed into his dinner suit and Cassie, looking down on herself, discovered that she was wearing the most beautiful red ball gown.
They were twirling in circles, along with several other couples in the room, as Sherlock complimented her taste in music (Waltz of the Flowers, Tchaikovsky) and Cassie realised that it was the music Carlisle often played in the basement as he 'worked'.
"You're waking up," Sherlock said, and Cassie's heart skipped a beat. "Which is why you can hear Carlisle's music.
"So serious... I brought you here for a reason, you know. Do you know where we are?"
"No. Where are we?"
"A ballroom," he explained, "in my mind palace. It's where I come to think."
"I never thought I could dance."
"Pay attention, won't you?" he said firmly. "Now, I want you to think of your surroundings."
"I'm in a ballroom in your mind palace," she said as they danced.
Sherlock sighed. "So stupid, young girl," he whispered. "And serious. Why is that?"
"I don't think I like you calling me stupid, Mr Holmes."
"Then why won't you think?"
"I am!"
"Think, you fool, think!" he insisted. "Not of here, but of there! You are not here, are you? You are out there. So think!"
She sighed heavily, though she finally understood his ramblings. "I'm in a room in the Cullen Castle," she said quietly. "It's big and empty and there's only me in here. Maybe a guard?"
"Outside of the room. By the doors and windows."
"Then there is no escape."
He simply looked at her, but she knew what he wanted to say. She was not thinking hard enough.
"If all the exits are guarded-" she began.
"Are they?" he interrupted.
"But you just said-"
"Said what?"
"That all the windows and doors-"
"Exactly!"
Cassie growled. "You're really not helping."
"There's a grate," he finally admitted. "It won't be guarded."
"Why not?"
"She would never think that you would go down there."
"And why not?"
"It leads to the lake. It's cold and dirty and it smells somewhat terrible. You might even drown."
"Oh, brilliant."
He simply smiled and let her go to swap partners. She was forced to dance with a rather short man, who could not properly reach her arms and instead hugged Cassie about the waste as they span. He seemed to be quite enjoying himself, though she was rather uncomfortable.
Her dizziness returned and the room around her seemed to fade. She was suddenly dancing with Sherlock again. The music grew louder and louder, the room darker, Sherlock's face nearer. He was speaking but she heard nothing. He was grinning but she did not understand the joke.
"Why so serious?"
He kept asking it over and over. She could hear it now, but his mouth had stopped moving. His grin was broadening, further and further, further than she thought was possible, until it looked painfully wide. She wanted to run but he held her tight.
His face was mutating and all she could see was his grin. She was filled with a sense of dread and horror. Her dream had turned into a nightmare. The music had stopped, instead replaced by screams. And the Joker's face grew nearer.
"Why so serious? Let's put a smile on that face!"
She clawed at his hands, tripping backwards as she fought her way out of his grip, until at last she was free.
She fell into the armchair. Sherlock was still sipping tea opposite, as if nothing had happened.
"Did you see that?" she whispered, her heart beating faster than ever. "Did you see what happened?"
"Of course. I am you, remember?"
"They have me sedated, don't they?"
"That's why your dreams are so vivid."
"And the pain in my arm..."
"Finally, you're thinking."
"I think I'm waking up now. It's strange. I feel... sleepy."
"Remember what I said." He set his empty cup on the table and picked up a biscuit. "Go to the lake."
"You only look like him, you know," she said sleepily. "Sherlock Holmes, I mean. He's much more..."
"Muchier?" he asked. Cassie nodded. "You stole that."
"This dream is full of stolen things," she said. "One more can't hurt." She let her voice trail off. She could hear the music again, playing faintly in the background.
"No, it can't," Sherlock agreed. "How about one more on top of that?"
"What do you mean?"
"It felt as though you were waking up."
"But I was still dreaming," she said. "I just switched scenes."
"To the Black Pearl, to here, from the ballroom..."
"Like a dream within a dream."
"Is all that we see or seem but a dream within a dream?" said Sherlock, in a rather pointless reference to Edgar Allen Poe.
"Like Inception."
"Exactly!" His sudden movement made her jump, so fast did he leap out of his chair and walk straight through the coffee table to her. "So what we need now, to truly wake us up, is a kick, is it not?"
She did not have time to register his words, for he was already tipping her chair backwards. She opened her mouth to scream, and realised that she was back there, in that room, strapped to that chair.
