Chapter 19 – Fall into Your Dream
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By ten thirty, Valeria and I are floating over East Austin, waiting for the sign, and keeping each other warm.

Midnight would have been a much more suitable time, but the beam of light erupts from a downtown intersection at two minutes before eleven. I text the others on Valeria’s phone as she flies us toward the battle.

Things are just starting to emerge from the pillar of light when we arrive. The first out are seven giant armored crabs, like the one that had almost killed me. Luckily, they don’t immediately go on the rampage. They form a circle (heptagon?) around the beam, facing outwards. Like they’re guarding it.

That’s a little ominous, but I’m willing to take it. There’s not a lot of traffic, given the time of night, but there are a few people around. I get to work on crowd control. I dial up my voice to full boom and order everyone out of the area.

It works pretty well. Most of the people who have been staring stupidly at the monsters turn around and start running. One driver, though, inches forward, like he’s trying to squeeze his car past the crabs. He doesn’t seem to grasp the idea that, sometimes, it’s okay to go the wrong way on a one-way street.

I point her out to Valeria, and suddenly her car falls up, up and away. She sets it down gently, away from the mess, pointing off down a side street.

Now spider-lizards are joining the fun, along with a bunch of not-quite minotaurs. Better and better.

But the rest of the chosen are arriving, too. Michelle flies in, carrying a girl I don’t recognize. Until she sinks into the ground and comes back up encased in stone, that is. Lightning bolts zap in from two different directions, and Tim and Helen are there. Within a minute, the gang is all present and accounted for. And we’re facing an army.

“We just need to hold them off until the National Guard gets here,” Alan says. He floats a few inches above the ground.

“If the National Guard has to deal with this, there won’t be much of downtown left when they’re done,” Tim points out.

Unexpected wisdom from Tim. I’m glad I’m not the only one who feels that way.

“We need to at least take out those guys,” I point at the crabs, “They’re the ones with ranged attacks. They could bring half these buildings down.”

“What about the dragons?”

Crap. Two dragons had just emerged from the pillar and started circling it, fifty feet up.

“Okay, the crabs and the dragons, at least. Any arguments?”

“We’re only supposed to hold them off,” Jay says. If I’d said we should hang back, he’d already be yelling “Leroy Jenkins!” and charging right in.

“Hang back if you want. Everybody else ready?”

Nods all around.

I don’t wait long for someone else to give the go ahead. If no one else is going to step up, I’ll have to do it. I point Beth, Michelle and Greg at the dragons. Greg and Michelle are fireproof (hopefully the dragons aren’t), and Beth’s force field should protect her from the breath. She can’t exactly fly, but she should be able to get to them.

Valeria and Alan are going to squash anything they can, but focus most on anything trying to leave the area. They’re both okay with that. I divide everyone else up among the crabs. Except Jay. I don’t see any point in giving him directions he’ll just ignore.

We charge.

I’ve been through several battles since the last time I fought the crabs. Not only do I know what I’m doing a lot better now, but I came back from my ocean getaway a little better than I had started. Now that I don’t have to worry about overloading, I’m free to use my abilities to their fullest.

It’s a slaughter.

The moment we head their way, the monsters go on the attack. I only get the chance to destroy one of the crabs. The others are smashed to bits, zapped to slag, flipped over and smashed to bits, and sliced to pieces within the first ten seconds.

Both dragons fall out of the sky a few seconds later. Jay is still swooping upwards, and the three who took out the dragons are on their way back down.

TMI was a decent fill-in, but I’m glad to have Molly back in action. I dream the weights into fifty pound axe blades and wade into a swarm of spider-lizards, spinning her around my body in a whirlwind of doom.

This time, the minotaurs don’t get the benefit of the doubt. I destroy four of them without breaking a sweat. A wrecking ball with twelve-inch spikes turns out to be quite effective against them.

But monsters keep coming out of the beam. My senses aren’t as sharp as they were on overload, but as I get closer, I can feel the doorway at the base of the pillar. That needs to be closed, but I don’t have the foggiest idea how.

I’m barely paying attention to the fight at all, but not having any trouble. Sure I’ve gotten better, but not that much. Something is up. It’s like---

“They want this to look hard, but they don’t want to risk us getting seriously hurt,” Valeria says, dropping down near me.

My thoughts exactly. “What happens if we stop fighting?” I ask.

“You really want to find out?”

I don’t. Before I can tell her that, her eyes suddenly fix on the beam. I don’t see anything special about the spot she’s staring at.

“What?” I ask.

She starts moving toward the pillar. So do the others. The monsters swipe ineffectually at them as they pass.

Crap. This is it.

I jump up and grab Valeria in a bear hug. I want to just knock her out and drag her away from here. It might work. But that would leave the others at the mercy of the impostors.

“Take me with you!” I yell at her, “Remember the plan.”

I’m not sure how much of that gets through, but I feel her power wrap around me. Now we’re both going into the pillar. I shift our positions. I have to go in first.

I close my eyes and twist the world. I had practiced this a few more times after last night. It’s easier with her right here, though.

Suddenly there are two Valeria’s, but no Parker. I can’t even let myself think like me. I let myself be confused by seeing my own face just inches away, even though it’s really hers. My/her power flows around me/us. I trace the line connecting me/us to something far away in an unimaginable direction. I pull TMI from behind the other Valeria’s back, and enter the pillar.

I could have fought it, but that would defeat the purpose of me being here. I almost do anyway. What if this doesn’t work? Or, worse, what if it only half works? But at least Valeria will be saved. She’d be alone against the others, but she’d have a chance. So instead of fighting it, I help it. Instead of just letting myself be torn away from my body and the world, I practically leap out.

I am being sucked through a straw by a very thirsty God. Outside the barrier that forms the ‘straw’, I can dimly feel the depths. There’s something out there calling me. Whoever or whatever it is, I’m glad the barrier is between me and them.

Something or someone passes me, going the other way. That’s Valeria’s would-be body snatcher, I guess. It’s tempting to try to do something to them, but by the time I have the thought, it’s too late. Anyway, I need to concentrate on keeping my nonexistent right hand in a death grip on its contents, at least until I reach my destination.

And, here I am.

I’m in a compartment that matches Valeria’s description of her dream. My body is wrong, and it aches. It’s dark, except for the dials in front of me, marked in some unknown language.

My thoughts are fuzzy. I’ve never been drunk, or high, but this is what I imagine that might feel like, without the fun part.Among the various aches and pains, there is a sharp pain in my upper left arm, like I’d just gotten a shot. Crap.

These losers had injected themselves with something. Probably something fatal. Not instantly so, since I’m still here, but my guess was I don’t have a lot of time.

I shove on the lid above me with all my strength, which doesn’t seem to be a lot. It’s enough, though. The lid falls open, and I heave myself out of the chamber.

I’m in the room I’d seen from the other side of the barrier when I’d been captured. I’m clambering out of the box I’d seen not-Valeria climb out of the last time I was here. There are eleven more like it, lined up in a row.

I look down at myself in the shiny surface of a nearby equipment cabinet. Ugh. I’m old. At least in my forties. Maybe even fifty. Not particularly attractive either. But the face is familiar. It’s the one woman who wanted to let me go (and then make me look bad).

Just in case, I try to touch my abilities. No luck. I had hoped I would be able to. It would make everything easier. But I hadn’t counted on it. On to plan B.

The transparent barrier is still there, thank goodness. In the small chamber on the other side, I can feel the hole left by my sudden departure. It’s just a rip, hanging in mid-air. Good. I look for a way to drop the barrier. There are buttons and dials and switches, but all labeled in that weird script. Oh well.

On my way back over to the box I’d arrived in I hear faint stirrings and voices coming from the other boxes. I’d like to help them, but there’s no time for that. I step back to the box I came out of and reach in, hoping the next part of my plan had worked. 

It had. I grasp the handle of TMI and pull it out, although it takes a couple of tries. I can barely lift it. I’d created it lighter than usual, but this body is weak. It would have to do, though. I drag it over to the barrier. It’s physical, not some weird energy field, so that’s good.

I heft TMI and swing with all my might, which isn’t a lot right now. A normal axe wouldn’t have made a scratch, but TMI is no normal axe. The edge is a few molecules thick. Sharp enough to cut through virtually anything.

I gouge the barrier slightly. Crap. I had expected it to go right through.

I swing again. Another gouge. And another. My arms are about to fall off. My back feels like I’ve been hit by a sledgehammer. One more swing.

Crash. A jagged section of the barrier caves in.

I can feel the sharp edges digging into me as I force my way through. If my plan doesn’t work, I won’t have to worry about whatever I’ve been drugged with. I’ll bleed to death way before that.

I crawl the last few feet, to the point just below the rip. It’s just out of my reach, lying there on the floor. With my last bit of strength, I force myself onto my knees and stick a hand into the depths.

Ah. That’s more like it. Even with my old reflexes back, I barely snatch my hand back in time, before the Depths can take me again. Put me back into supercharged mode. But barely is enough.

I twist the world, and I’m back. The real me. But time is running out. I’ve been here at least two minutes, and I doubt any of the other kids would have been able to hold out much longer than that. Some maybe not even that long. I hope that the impostors need a minute to get their bearings before they leave the pillar with their stolen bodies. And if they don’t, that Valeria is taking care of her part of the plan.

I toss one end of Molly into the depths, and dive back through the jagged hole into the main chamber. Molly stretches out behind me, giving me an ever-so-faint connection to virtually unlimited potential.

The language on the dials and switches is childishly simple to me now. For a second, I can see the purpose of each control, each machine. I can see that the real machines aren’t here. This was just an interface. I can almost reach across to the real thing. If I just---

I pull myself back. If I go too far, I could become a ticking time bomb again, despite --. I stop that line of thought before Doppel-me can show up and warn me off again. Anyway, I can do enough.

I see how the impostors had set up the exchange. I can see that five of the twelve are complete. Three by only a few seconds, but two had completed before I even broke through the barrier.

There’s no reverse switch. That would have been way too easy. But I don’t care. I’m in full cheats mode, now. My hands fly across the controls. There, all I need to do is flip one more switch.

I find a microphone for an intercom into the boxes. I set it to connect to all of them.

“No questions, guys. When you get back, keep everyone in the beam as long as you can. If anyone has already left it, get them back in. Whatever it takes. Except Valeria. It's the only way to get everyone back where they belong.”

I flip the switch.

As far as I can tell, it’s working. As the remaining chambers show complete, I repeat my instructions and send them home.

Beep. Beep.

Two of the chambers are showing no connection. There are no bodies on the other end for them to link with. Crap. There’s nothing I can do about that from here. I hope the others manage to drag them back in.

While I wait, I study the machines some more. I don’t want these people screwing around with my world anymore. I’m rifling through their systems to figure out how to just turn the whole thing off when I find them. Their records. Who they are. How they got here. Before looking at those, I check the transfer controls.

Three of the chambers showed complete a second time. That means the people in them are the impostors. I can hear someone shifting around in one of them. Uh oh. I hadn't thought about what to do with them. Hopefully they’ll stay put for a few minutes.

Beep. One of the connections is back. Good. Somebody has been dragged back into the light. And three more transfers are complete. Halfway there.

Back to the records. There are a lot of them. I should just ignore them. Figure out how to set this whole system to shut down once I leave. They’re the bad guys. It’s simple. I don’t have time to learn their sob story. Unless—

The lid to one of the chambers falls open. I need to stall, somehow. Got it. I shift my borrowed body back to its original appearance. I leave the improvements on the inside, though.

A man sits up in the open chamber. “Argle gargle flibg” 

I pull a little more juice from the depths. 

“. . . doing?” he continues.

That’s better.

“Something went wrong with the machine. I'm trying to bring it back online.”

He looks dubious. He’s unsteady as he climbs out of the chamber. Good.

“Let me look.”

I step out of his way to let him at the control panel. The confusion on his face deepens. “This can't be right. What did you---”

He collapses. The sharp blow to the head I just gave him is most likely responsible for that. Another of the chambers opens.

“What's going on?” A woman this time. She looks at the body on the floor.

“I don't know. He went crazy or something. I found myself back here, and he was standing over the panel, laughing. I had to hit him with this.”

I hold up a wrench. I hope she doesn’t notice that I wasn't holding it a second ago.

I glance at the panel. Nine transfers complete. One connection still missing. Crap. Someone is going to be stuck here if the others don’t get his or her body back into the light.

The woman doesn’t look entirely convinced. Or convinced at all.

“It was you. You couldn't talk the rest of us out of it, so you took matters into your own hands, didn't you?”

“You got me. It was wrong to steal the lives of those kids. I couldn't let you do it.”

I might as well go with that story. If she doesn’t know who I am, I see no need to tell her. I just need to stall a little longer. I glance again at the controls. One more completed transfer. So ten of the twelve us are back in the right place. That leaves me and whoever is in chamber seven.

More chamber doors open. More people are climbing out.

“She did it!” screams the woman I’ve been talking to, “She reversed the transfer!”

By now there are eight people staring at me, muttering among themselves. They look like they’re getting ready to charge.

I need a plan. Some way to give myself more time. To give the others more time to get the last impostor back into the light. Something clever. Subtle. Got it.

I run around the room and punch everyone unconscious.

“What’s going on out there?” says a voice from chamber seven.

Still no connection.

“Just a little delay. And some punching.”

“Who’s that?”

Right. I’m myself. I shift my borrowed body back into my preferred form.

“It’s me, Parker. Who’re you?”

“Like you didn’t know. You’re just going to leave me here. Aren’t you?”

Of course it’s him.

“Jay?”

“Who else?”

“No, I’m not leaving you here,” I say, “But the machine can’t find your body to connect to. I can’t send you back until it does.”

“So we just wait?”

“Well . . .”

“What?”

“The beam isn’t going to stay much longer. Maybe ten minutes. When it goes out, if we’re not home, we’re not getting back.”

“What happens to us?”

What would happen to me, is I would step through the hole over there into the depths. Maybe the dolphins survived and would find some pieces of me, to remember me by. If Jay steps into the depths, he’ll be torn apart instantly. There’ll be nothing left of him. If he hangs around, he’ll probably go insane or die within the next couple of days, due to this body’s brain not being up to having a new mind shoved in it. He doesn’t have a response to that. That was a pleasant change.

I carry the unconscious impostors to the barrier and carefully deposit them on the other side. They’ll be able to get back through (if they don’t wander into the depths) once they wake up, but not quickly, and I’ll have time to deal with them if needed.

Bzzzz.

I rush to the instrument panel. Maybe Jay’s body was back in the loop.

No such luck. The beam is failing. In a little under seven minutes it will be gone. Maybe as little as five.

Am I going to leave Jay here? What good would it do for me to stay here with him? None, except for giving him the satisfaction of seeing me suffer, too. I wrack my brain for some way to get him out of here. There has to be some way. But there’s only one connection.

The one back to my body. Crap.

I have to make the offer. I have no idea whether he’ll take it. I hope he doesn’t. Then I can go back to my life in somewhat good conscience.

“Jay.”

“What?”

“We’re running out of time.”

I wait for him to be his usual self. To say something to make it okay for me to give up on him. To leave him here.

“I’m sorry, Parker.”

Bastard.

“I’ve been an asshole to you, and here you are trying to save me,” he goes on.

“How do you know I’m not lying to you?”

“What would be the point? You could be long gone and I’d never know the difference.”

“There might be a way, but you won’t like it.”

“Tell me.”

“You can get out of that chamber and get into the one I showed up in.”

“What good will that do?”

“It’s still connected to my body.”

“So I’d go through your body to get to mine?”

“There wouldn’t be a ‘through’.”

I give him a few seconds to digest that.

“So I’d be you.”

“No, you’d have my body. Probably no powers, except being stronger and faster. Also, you might look like Valeria instead of me. I’m not sure if my body would have reverted when I left it.”

He isn’t stupid.

“Then I might be the old you? Not a girl?”

“Sorry, no. The old me is out of the picture.”

I didn’t know it until I said it. Another random piece of knowledge, I guess.

“But what about you?”

I don’t know. Not for sure. I’d said I would go into the depths, but maybe I could stay here for a while first. See if I could use these machines to find another way home. I’d have to keep the impostors locked up somehow while I did it, but I could do that.

“Decide now. The transfer could take up to a minute, and the beam only has two to three minutes before it loses alignment.”

“What’s it like being a girl?”

“I love it. It’s what I always wanted. But I was never really a boy, and hated pretending to be one. Maybe you’d get used to it. Maybe you’d be as miserable as I was before.”

I’m tempted. I could leave it at that. I could even come up with something to say that would piss him off, make him turn down my offer. I don’t have to go through with it. Crap.

“Either way, there are people who would help you out.”

I am a horrible person. I don’t remember who started it all, but I suddenly realize that the last two years of misery I’ve put up with from Jay is as much my fault as his. He isn’t stupid, but he is so easy to provoke. And I’ve taken advantage of that, over and over, including a few nights ago on the roof. Double Crap.

It looks like being a girl isn’t enough to keep me from turning into my father.

“I . . .” he can’t decide.

I had to make up for it.

“Last chance. If you don’t come out of that chamber now and get in mine, I’m going to get in and go home. Just because I’m giving you this chance, doesn’t mean I’m willing to be stuck here with you if you don’t take it.”

The chamber lid opens. The man who climbs out looks nothing like Jay, of course. He’s old, probably the same age as the woman whose body I’m in. He shuffles over to me.

“I was holding this when I got here,” he says, handing me a piece of paper. He looks around at the boxes. “Which one?”

He walks to the one I point at and climbs in.

“Don’t try to fool anyone into thinking you’re me,” I say, “That’ll just make them think you’re one of the impostors. And tell Valeria I’m sorry.”

“For what?”

“Just tell her.”

I close the lid on him.

I don’t even have to press a button. I’d set the trigger to be the closing of the lid, since I wasn’t supposed to be out here to press any buttons. A light comes on and the transfer starts. He should be fine. Even if the transfer takes a full minute, he’ll probably have a minute or two to spare before the beam has a chance of failing.

The piece of paper is an apology to Jay from the impostor who tried to steal his body. He swore he’d tried to talk the others out of the whole thing. He begged forgiveness. Cheap stuff, considering he went ahead and did it anyway. And it looks like he’ll be the one of them that actually gets what they all wanted. Asshole.

Crap. I still haven’t done anything to make sure these people leave us alone. I turn back to the console. The records are still there. There are still a lot of them. I still need to shut this stuff down. And I need to figure out if there’s some way, any way, that I can get home. 

I have a very bad idea. I can remember what it felt like to almost come apart on my first trips through the depths. And almost what it felt like to actually come apart—but I cut that thought off before I can get another visit from sad me. I don’t want to feel that again, but I’m not immersed in the Depths now. I’m pulling power through Molly. I pull more.

There are two of me standing at the consoles now.. It’s not like before. The other isn’t as real as me. She’s an echo. A really powerful echo. I don’t have to give her instructions; she knows her job is to sort through the records and dump anything I’d want to know directly to me. Meanwhile, I try to figure out what to do with this machinery and see if there’s any way it can get me home.

These people had no idea what they were doing when they started this plan. The systems they set up to grant the powers, to create the monsters, the transfers, all of it is a mess. None of it makes any sense. There were so many easier ways they could have done all this. It’s like they were fumbling around in the dark. I’m just going to turn it all off, permanently. Then echo-me finishes with the records. Suddenly, I understand. 

These poor people. They’ve been here since they were kids. Alone. On a dead world. None of that excuses what they tried to do. What they did. But I understand. I close my eyes for a moment, overwhelmed by the rush of information.

Beeeep. My eyes flash open.. Maybe the last body is back in the beam! But no, the light still indicates no connection. I’m turning away when I realize that it’s failing at this end. Which makes sense, because no one is in chamber seven, Jay’s chamber. And the beam is going to fail in less than a minute.

But there’s a way home! It takes me ten seconds to configure the transfer to happen when the lid closes. I take five seconds to pump more power into echo-me and give her one purpose. Fix this. Another five seconds to get in and slam the lid. I can feel the transfer pulling me out of this body. I hold tight to Molly, like I had to TMI on the trip here, as if my life depends on it, because it might

I’m rushing through the straw again. The Depths are still there, just on the other side of the barrier, and the barrier is breaking down. The beam is failing. I push myself harder in the direction I’m already going. A presence shoots past me. It’s not going to make it before the conduit dissolves. That isn’t my problem, but . . .

I shove the entity as hard as I can. Maybe they’ll make it now, maybe they won’t, but I need to focus on holding onto Molly, and on dealing with whatever the something is that is suddenly in my way. I slam into it with all my might and everything comes apart into white light.

I’m standing in the intersection, surrounded by the disintegrating remains of monsters. And also Beth, Alan, and Greg. They don’t look happy.

“---n’t get away with it,” Beth is finishing.

“Get away with what?” I ask.

In Jay’s voice. Ugh. Was I able to keep hold of the connection? I reach for it. Yes! I grabbed reality by the short hairs and twist myself back to the real me.

“Parker?” All three ask at once.

“The one and---”

Past Beth, I can see Valeria and Michelle trying to get some sense out of a cute red-headed girl, who looks like she’s barely holding it together. Suddenly, I don’t feel so great.

“Yeah,” I say, “It’s me.”

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