Chapter Eleven

All I Got To Do Is Dream

Lubdan had listened to Talos and he had been running for what seemed like days. Shortly after flying off from the dreamscape Beowulf in the shuttle everything had gone pitch black where he couldn't see his hand in front of his face and when light returned he was in front of his high school robotics club. He had only been six years old at the time but he had made the best robotic dog his teacher had ever seen. He named it Jason after his best friend from grade school, Jason O'neal. Thinking about Jason O'neal made him sad because he'd had to say goodbye too soon because he advanced to high school so young. Lubdan's childhood had been marked by loneliness and an absence of friends.

The memory of his presentation of Jason the dog was normally a nice memory in spite of that but this time was different. When his dream changed from the shuttle to that day in the robotics club things did not go as they originally had.

For starters, Jason was not painted red and green striped. Secondly, Jason did not have rows of sharp teeth made out of razors. Third, Jason had originally been controlled by Lubdan's vocal commands but as soon as the presentation began Jason had lunged on Mr. Greene and ripped his throat out before turning to attack the other members of the robotics club. Lubdan took his first chance to run and Jason had followed. Several times he thought Jason was going to catch him but Lubdan luckily was able to always barely get away. He'd turned a corner and ran right into another dreamscape and found himself reliving a memory from almost a year before when he had completed his work on Talos-16.

The day Talos was finished was one of Lubdan's favorite memories. Talos quickly became Lubdan's best friend and more. Yes, he knew it was strange and not the norm and that people would talk but he didn't care. He was a part of Talos, had helped Talos find his place in the world where Talos quickly became a very important crew member on the Beowulf. More than that, Talos and Lubdan grew an inseparable bond as Talos' evolving AI grew. Lubdan found he had feelings for his creation and was astonished when Talos returned those feelings and their connection grew into something beyond friendship.

But, this was Freddy's dreamscape and again when the dream changed from being chased by Jason to standing next to the table where he activated Talos for the first time things did not go as the attached memory had. Talos' eyes immediately turned bright red and he reached out and began choking Lubdan, Talos then lifted him in the air. Lubdan began feeling light headed and out of sheer luck he noticed a sonic tool laying on the side of the lab table. He reached for it and barely got it in his hands. He pressed a small button and touched it to Talos-16's wrist sending a surge through the android that gave him just enough time to break free from the chokehold and run.

Lubdan had checked the countdown device the real Talos had given him as he flew away from the dreamscape Beowulf and the timer had read fifty two hours. He checked it again as he ran down a paved road through what appeared to be an old Earth neighborhood of small houses in the dead of night. The device read fourteen hours twenty three minutes and sixteen seconds. He only needed to survive a little more than half a day longer and the nightmare would be over.

That was easier said than done though. He glanced over his shoulder and despaired as he saw both dreamscape Talos-16 and dreamscape Jason the robot dog hot on his heels. They went on and on like the machines they were. He was tiring, they were not.

Lubdan wished more than anything to have the real Talos here to help him. Or at the very least for a chance to say goodbye. Lubdan chanced a look over his shoulder, Jason and Talos were gaining ground, they would be on him soon. His luck was running out. He was never an athlete, always the academic but he was running with everything he had.

"Play time is over, nerd!" Freddy's voice came from somewhere close by. "I've been a little busy with some of your crew mates but I've cleared up some room in my calendar to give my puppy here a well deserved playdate."

Freddy's voice sent a shiver of ice down Lubdan's back and suddenly he felt like he had stepped into mud. He looked down and realized in horror that the pavement he was running on had melted. Both his feet were now completely submerged in the liquid asphalt. He tried to keep running but each step took so much effort. He tried to lift his leg to pull his foot free for another step but it was too hard. His chest felt like it was going to explode. He sagged, finally at his limit. He fell to his hands and knees in the gunky asphalt and turned to face his attackers and to accept his fate.

As he turned in the gunky asphalt to let things go the way they were going to go, he saw dreamscape Jason the robot dog sitting and saw the evil dreamscape Talos-16 changing form. Lubdan watched as the evil android morphed into Freddy Krueger. The dream demon looked down and began petting the psychotic robotic dog who sat near his feet.

"Good dog, would ya look at that, a Jason that actually knows his place!" Freddy said more to himself than Lubdan. Freddy then looked back at Lubdan sitting in the melted asphalt a few feet away. "Sorry to have kept you waiting asshole. Your tin man has been trying like hell to come back and visit Freddyland but his season pass has been revoked. But at least he'll get to see you bleed to death back in your box! I promised him that much!" Freddy said in a low menacing voice. "SIC HIM BOY!"

Jason dove into the air baring his razor teeth and he came down...down...and went right through Lubdan. Lubdan looked down at his asphalt covered hands and realized he was beginning to become see through. Jason tried to bite at him but again he went right through Lubdan. Freddy in a fit of anger marched forward and was standing over Lubdan. Lubdan looked up at Freddy, Freddy looked down at Lubdan. He swung his bladed glove and again the attack went right through the young ginger.

"What the fuck are you doing, Poindexter!?" he growled.

Lubdan was becoming so transparent that he was almost invisible. He wasn't sure what was happening but he was pretty sure Freddy couldn't touch him. Lubdan raised his middle finger and smiled as he disappeared completely. He wasn't sure what would happen next but at least for now he didn't have to die being mauled to death by his high school project or at the hands of the child killing undead maniac Freddy Krueger.

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Varissa was sitting on the boiler room floor where she'd been since Freddy had ran away. How long had it been? She wasn't sure but she sat and meditated. She could feel the power Alice had bestowed upon her inside of her body. She could feel it changing her, but Freddy had made sure she didn't get the instruction booklet from Alice and now Varissa had these powers but wasn't completely sure how to use them. When Freddy had destroyed Alice's soul and the power was cast into her from her burning ancestor something was set off in that moment and the power sort of did the work for Varissa. However now that she was alone and there was no threat she couldn't find a command or thought that made anything happen like before.

Frustration exploded inside Varissa. She needed to figure out how to access the powers so she could do what Alice said and take the fight to Freddy. She needed to help her crew. She tried again to pull a crew mate into her dream. Varissa closed her eyes for at least the hundredth time and cleared her mind. She sat that way for several minutes and nothing happened. She began to let defeat finally take hold of her and she began to cry.

She thought of Alice, all these centuries being stuck in Freddy's dreamscape as a watcher, all that sacrifice only to go out in such a horrible way and pass on her powers to someone who was apparently too dumb to do anything with them. Then Varissa began thinking about what Alice had said, that two of her crewmate's had been claimed by Freddy. She wished she knew who the two were and as she put all of her thoughts on her crew a strange feeling came over her and suddenly she felt the white energy began to sizzle around her body like it had after receiving it from Alice.

Varissa thought harder on the crew and suddenly she was seeing through someone else's eyes. First, she saw Candilynn, her star student. A young woman who was only on the Beowulf because she was a student of Varissa's. She saw Candilynn beating on a door looking through a small window into the eyes Varissa was currently seeing through. Varissa then saw through those same eyes as the head they sat in turned and looked at a scanner on a wall and Varissa shivered as she saw the gloved hand of Freddy activate the air lock on the Beowulf in this dream world. Varissa saw Candilynn hanging on for dear life until she couldn't anymore and then saw her get sucked out into open space and die horrifically.

Tears streamed out of Varissa's closed eyes. Candi was dead and if not for Varissa bringing her along she would still be alive and enjoying her life. Before she could feel any worse about Candilynne, Varissa's view changed and she saw Christina's back at the bottom of a stair well. It was in the house on old earth. Christina was trying to pull her foot out of a sludge that had replaced the bottom step of the stairs. She saw Christina finally break free and lunge for the open front door only for it to slam on her face. Then she saw through those eyes, Freddy's eyes, as Freddy pinned the poor girl against the door and drove his bladed glove through her back. Anger and sadness surged through Varissa's body. She began trembling as she then saw Butch sitting on a sofa in what appeared to be a club of some kind.

Strobing lights and loud music pounded around him and Butch sat looking up at Freddy as he slowly approached him. Freddy's eyes caught a glimpse of himself in a mirror on the wall behind the couch and Varissa saw it wasn't Freddy, but a noc'tralian female scantily dressed, almost nude. But within moments she realized it was Freddy, he was disguising himself and Varissa finally saw that gloved hand slash over and over until Butch was dead. Varissa wanted it to stop but her eyes were shut tight. She no longer had control over opening them.

She then saw through Freddy's eyes as he looked down at Nyquilio on what appeared to be an operating table. Freddy was cutting him open and then cut out his middle eye. Nyquilio was screaming as Freddy began removing his organs and finally mercy befell the blue alien as he died as well. Varissa couldn't take anymore, was the entire crew dead? Alice had only said two. Had Freddy claimed everyone else in the time Varissa had been trying to access her new powers? How long had she been here, damnit? She thought if I only had figured out these powers I could have saved them all.

Then Varissa saw through Freddy's eyes again. This time she was looking down at Donella from high above her. The eyes glimpsed Freddy's body but it was not Freddy's body but that of a large creature of some kind. The creature that Varissa was seeing through thrust it's head forward and she saw fire engulf her boss, the owner of Hawkins Salvage and Recovery Donella Hawkins. Donella was dead in seconds. Then she did not see through Freddy's eyes anymore, saw only blackness. She felt she had control over her own eyes again but she did not open them. She concentrated, maybe this meant that Lubdan, Warlock and Nero were still alive. All was not lost. She began concentrating on the three with every fiber of her being and felt herself begin to levitate off the floor. Her body reached out into the dreamscape and took hold of something. She strained, felt herself pulling it towards her. A moment later a voice snapped her out of her meditation.

"Dr. DeGenarro?" the voice of Lubdan Gallagher asked.

Varissa opened her eyes and saw an out of breath Lubdan sitting on the ground a few feet away, his hands, feet, and clothes were covered in a dark substance. She stood and ran to him.

"Lubdan! Is it really you?"

"I sure hope so!" he replied.

Varissa reached down and helped Lubdan to his feet and embraced him in a tight hug.

"Oh my god I'm so glad to see you," she said. She then saw the injury on his upper arm that he had bandaged with part of his shirt. "Are you okay?"

"It's just a wee scratch, m'dear. I'll be fine," he answered. "Where are we, how did I get here?"

Varissa told him everything she had gotten the chance to learn from Alice. She filled Lubdan in on who all had been killed by Freddy and told him of the powers she now possessed, about how she was able to pull others into her dream and the powers inside all dreamers to become a dream warrior of their own. Lubdan listened with wide eyed fascination and when Varissa finished he spoke up.

"Before cryo-sleep I never would have believed a word of any of this, but we brought something evil onto that ship and set it free. Look, Talos got into my dream a couple days ago and gave me this," Lubdan said, showing Varissa the countdown bracelet. It now showed them that they had ten hours and forty five minutes left until cryo-sleep ended. "Before ya brought me here it said we had fourteen hours. Sometimes the timer goes down fast, sometimes it goes down slow."

"Alice told me that time is different here. I also am starting to believe Freddy doesn't have limitless power. I believe he wears down and needs time to let his power build again after extreme exertion. It's the only thing that makes sense, otherwise he would have killed us all in the first day. I fought him, I hit him with pure dream energy from the powers given to me by Alice and I could see it weakening him to the point he ran from me and has not returned yet. Once he left me, I think that was when he went after and killed Butch, Nyquilio, and Donella in quick succession, I think he let his irritation and frustration at our fight fuel him into a swift revenge killing spree. I also felt very exhausted and it took time to feel rested again after I attacked him so I believe his powers like mine may weaken him when over used and that he has to rest up himself. We can use that against him. We need to take the fight to him, Lubdan. We brought him back and if we don't stop him he could spread throughout the galaxies. I know you have been using that timer as a means to know how long you need to survive to wake up but now we need to use it to know how much time we have to stop him. Waking up wont change anything. We will need to sleep again eventually and he will be waiting for us. We researched him on the Beowulf. Everything we do on the ship is part of a record when the ship returns. Others will find out about Freddy and now that he is unleashed that is all it will take!" Varissa explained.

"Oh, heaven help us, you're right. But can he even be destroyed?" Lubdan asked.

"Alice said he has been defeated multiple times before and always found a way to come back but she also said her powers wouldn't reach their full potential until she passed them to a blood heir. I don't know if I'm capable of destroying him for good but we have to try! You can reach into yourself Lubdan and be anything you want in the dreamscape. You can be a dream warrior and together we might have a chance at ending him for good!" Varissa said.

"Okay then! But we are going to need more help. We need to get to Warlock and Nero before Freddy gets to them," Lubdan said a bit hesitant.

"I'm on it," Varissa replied.

Varissa closed her eyes and began to concentrate on the pilot and the head of security, hoping she wasn't too late.

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