Nightmares Part 4

Larry made his way to the door, reluctantly allowing the five to be alone.  Howard and Debbie gave each other glances that said, “This is our chance”.  They were disappointed when Larry simply yelled, “If it’s important, come back later.”

He sauntered back over to the group and sat back down on his chair.  “As I was saying…”

Another couple knocks, this time much louder.  Frustrated, Larry stormed over to the door and opened it.

“What?”

From Howard and Debbie’s view, it seemed like his side exploded, as a bullet cut him down.  He fell to the floor, splattered in blood.  That’s when Heather stepped in.  She smiled at Debbie and Howard as she entered.  Clarissa reasoned whether or not to get up and bum rush the girl.  She didn’t have time to decide.  Heather pointed the gun at her and fired two to her chest.  She died almost instantly.

“Heather!” yelled Howard.  “It’s great to see you!”

“Is it?”

Howard’s face portrayed his puzzlement.  Heather pointed at him and commanded, “You are to return to the dream world immediately.  But first, we need to relocate you to some place safer.”

“What about me?” inquired Debbie.  “Shouldn’t I go with him?”

“No.  The Master doesn’t need you anymore.”

And with a quick motion, she fired one shot into Debbie’s stomach.  Howard yelled, “DEBBIE!”

He jumped up from the couch and fell to his face, due to the cuffs still attached to his hands and feet.  He began to weep, loudly.  Angie and Jake said nothing and did nothing to draw attention to themselves.

“Come now, Howard.  You didn’t think true love was going to prevail, did you?”

He was quietly sobbing, unable to move enough to even get up.  

“In case, you’re wondering, I’ve been a part of the Master’s plan all along.  He was just waiting for Clarissa to wear out her usefulness.  Then I was to take over.”

“Why?” Howard whispered.

“Because I’m the second piece of the puzzle.  You and I fit together more than you know.  Debbie was the other piece for the first part.  But that plan was abandoned, due to Larry’s treachery.  Now it’s my time to shine.”

“If you think I’m going with you, you’re crazy.”

“If you don’t, I’ll kill you and your friends now.  If you do, all three of you will live.”

“And why should I trust you?”

“Because you have no other choice.  And because we can still do this without you.  It’ll just be easier if you cooperate.”

Tears still fell from his eyes, as he thought to himself.  After a few minutes, he looked up at her, eyes puffy, and replied, “Okay.  I’ll do it.”

His voice was weak, and his face a mess of sorrow, but his body was still as strong and his mind as powerful.  Against her own suspicions that he might betray them later, she grabbed the keys from Larry’s bloody body and released Howard from his cuffs.  She took a step backward and tossed them to him.

“Release your friends and then follow me out.  Any funny business and I start shooting.  And I’ve still got about six bullets in here, plus an extra clip in my front pocket.”

Howard shook his head, without the heart to speak.  He unlocked Angie first and then Jake.  Together, the three of them followed Heather, who was walking backwards.  When they were out of the house, they saw a Ryder Truck in the front, with the back unlocked.  With a grin, Heather forced them into the back.  She locked the back up and headed to the driver’s side.  She slipped the key into the ignition, shifted to drive, and proceeded out of Larry’s neighborhood.  She surveyed the area, one last time.  “Nice neighborhood,” she said with a smile.  “For a nutcase.”

Then they left Larry’s neighborhood, forever.
                                                            -----

Larry stood, listening to the car drive away.  He was bleeding but not gone.  He moved to Debbie.  She was barely breathing, but still alive.  Taking her in his arms, he carried her upstairs, to where his surgery room was located.  His mother never understood his fascination with that surgery room, and why he’d bring home sick birds and nurse them back to health.  Now he was living at home alone, when his mother, the beneficiary of a large amount of money left to her by her husband (plus life insurance), died and left it to him.  Which was why he could afford college and the house.  His account was dwindling but would not be empty for some time.  

With the dying woman in his arms, he set her on the table.  He quickly bandaged himself up, since the bullet had pierced through his body.  Nothing else was necessary for him.  Debbie on the other hand needed a lot more.

He grabbed his hospital scrubs, which he’d brought back from the morgue at BU and some he’d had for a while and prepared to operate.  He wouldn’t need to rip her clothes, because he’d already made sure they were all in their underwear.  They thought he was crazy, but he needed to be sure that they weren’t hiding weapons.  Well okay, he just checked the guys but didn’t remove their clothes.  So what?  And now it came in handy, as he grabbed the scalpel and examined the area where she’d been shot.  The bullet had pierced the Anterior Axillary Line, the area running along the left side of the body just left of the nipple.  It was horizontal with the belly button.  Luckily, it was just shy of the kidneys.  Otherwise the operation would’ve been more dangerous.  In fact, the only reason she passed out was from the shock and pain.  As he worked to pull out the bullet without making too many cuts, she woke up.  He had just removed the scalpel from the hole to examine, when she sat up and screamed.  “AHH!!!”

“Relax, Debbie,” he replied.

But she wouldn’t stop fidgeting.  So he grabbed the sleeping juice and sprinkled it on her.  She slapped him.  So he took a closer look and saw that it was really laundry detergent.

“What’s going on here?” he inquired to himself.

She was still shaking, so he grabbed a quick aesthetic from his counter, plunged it into her arm, holding her down as he did it, and quickly she was out like a light.  It wouldn’t last long, however, so he worked fast.  It took about an hour, but he had the bullet out and her stitched up.  Wiping his brow, he examined his work.  Perfect!

He let her sleep, covering her with a blanket, and crept downstairs to determine the situation.  What he found amazed him.  Clarissa’s chains were glued on.  He broke them easily, causing her to tumble to the ground.  What he couldn’t find was where she stashed his sleeping powder.  No matter.  He could always make more later.  The question was whether he should.  Heather had the Original and his friends.  Obviously, the Master would not be hindered by a mere trickery of sleeping.

One thing occurred to him.  He obviously didn’t know as much as he thought.  But what he knew was enough to compel him to hatch a plan to defeat the Master and save the Overlord.  If there was still time.

He didn’t even hear Debbie come downstairs.  She was limping, but even in immense pain, she tackled him and threw him to the floor.  She started hitting him but stopped in the middle and began crying.

“I’m sorry, Debbie.  It wasn’t supposed to go this way.”

“You bastard!  How was it supposed to go?”

“I was preventing an evil villain from assassinating his leader.”

“Would you like to explain?”

“There’s no time.  I need you to trust me.”

“Why should I?”

“Because your friends are in a lot of trouble.”

She frowned.

“And because I saved your life.”

At this, she couldn’t argue.

“All right.  What do you need me to do?”

“I’m going to find Heather.  But I need you in the dream world with Howard.  Since Heather’s planning on taking your place, they’ll all be unguarded.  But the Master’s plans have almost come to fruition.  That’s why I need you in there.  You need to stop him.”

“I don’t even know what his plans are.”

“All right, I’ll give you an overview.

They sat down, and he told her as much as he dared.  If she knew everything, she’d never go.

“Okay, there are a lot of dream worlds.  Here on earth, we humans have a dream world.  The Overlord rules that.  And by the way, there are thousands of dream worlds throughout time and space.  And there’s an Overlord for every time and space.”

“So wait, the Overlords change every hundred years or so?”

“You’re thinking literal time.  I’m talking spatial time.  Other dimensions and so forth.”

Debbie grabbed her head as if concerned with the intensity of what she was being told.

“I know it’s a lot to take in.  So I won’t go into the aspect.  But let’s just say, there’s a lot of dream worlds.  And the Overlord of this time and space, known as “Earth” is a very tyrannical ruler.  He commands with an iron fist.  But he’s fair.  Well, the Master, who by the way rules over the dreams of Americans, decided he was tired of being a Master and wanted to be Overlord.  But the only time a Master can challenge an Overlord is during an eclipse…”

“But we have eclipses all the time.”

“No, you misunderstand.  An eclipse of their world.”

“Their world has a sun?”

“Of sorts.  They run on a stranger branch of time than we do, and only once a millennia our time do both worlds eclipse.  It’s almost time, and that’s why I was hoping to keep you asleep until time passed by.”

“And how long is that?”

“Well, since their days are over fifty times slower than ours, for me to be sure that he couldn’t still use you, I’d have to keep you in non-dream sleep for about fifty days.  You see, they just eclipsed, and their eclipse will last approximately fifty of our days.”

“So how was he going to use us to defeat this Overlord?”

“That, I don’t know.  Clarissa never revealed that part in her sleep.  What I know is what I got from her.”

“But you said you had other sources.”

“I was bluffing…”

She shook her head in disgust.

“Sorry.  But now I need you to sleep and imagine you’re someone else.”

“Why?”

“So that the Master doesn’t discover that you’re asleep.  See, if you imagine you’re someone else right away, he won’t even realize you’re there, until it’s too late.”

“Who should I pretend I am?”

“A famous celebrity?”

“I guess I can try.  But how will I find them?”

“The same way you did before.  Go through whatever dreams come to you.  If you go quickly enough, you’ll make it to their castle before you wake up.  See, people are allotted a certain amount of time for dreams by the Master.  So you’ll have eight hours of dreams.  But if you make them speed up, that gives you eight hours to find Howard, the Master, and Overlord, so you can stop them.”

“You were right.  This is a lot to take at one time.”

“I didn’t say it’d be easy.”

“Good.  Cause you’d be lying.”

“We don’t have much time.  Get to sleep.  I’ll try and find them here and wake them up.”

“Okay.  Good luck, Larry.”

“You too, Debbie.”

She lay down on the couch, still half naked and slept.  Larry sighed.

“Good luck.”

Sweating, he pulled a gun from his gun rack in his father’s old room and left in search of Heather.  He just hoped he wasn’t too late…

Chapter 17:
Dream Team

Heather pulled the truck into a run-down amusement park on the outskirts of Boston.  The amusement park came into a lot of debt and was slowly but surely thrown into chapter 11. It was recently deserted, although most of the decorations had not yet been removed. Parking out of sight of the street, Heather got out of the truck, walked over to the back door of the haunted house at the park and unlocked it. She then let her three captives out of the truck. Waving the gun at them, she ordered, “Go inside the building, then down the stairs to your left.” They did so, and she locked the door behind them all.

One of the downstairs rooms had been fashioned into a sort of torture chamber, with a rack, an electric chair, and some leg irons fastened to the wall. Heather motioned Howard to lie down on the rack, Jake to sit in the chair, and Angie to lie down on the floor between the leg irons. “Now, I’m going to put all of you to sleep,” she announced. “I’ll be using plain old knockout gas so you’ll be able to enter the dream world. Angie and Jake, you’ll be put someplace not too dangerous, so try not to die while you’re there. Howard, stay where the Master puts you, and I’ll join you in a few minutes.”

“Why do we have to be separated?” Angie asked fearfully.

Heather sneered at her. “You two would just get in the way. The only reason to bring you along was to force Howard to cooperate. Other than that, you are not important… no offense intended.”

“None taken, I’m sure,” Angie retorted.

Heather ignored the sarcasm. From a bag sitting on the floor she took a bottle of nitrous oxide with a hose and gas mask attached. “After you’re asleep, I’m going to tie up each of you, in case something unforeseen happens. If you wake again, don’t panic; I’ll let you loose right away. Because if you do wake up, then everything has gone according to plan, and I won’t have to kill you.” As the others were absorbing this piece of information, Heather placed the mask over Jake’s face and turned on the gas. Within seconds he had slumped in the chair and begun to snore. She followed the same procedure with Angie.

As Heather approached Howard, he cried out, “Heather, why are you doing this? What do you expect to get out of it?”

Heather smiled. “You,” she replied.

“Me?” Howard repeated. “After killing Debbie? In your dreams, Heather!”

Heather’s smile broadened as she placed the mask over Howard’s face. “Good,” she murmured. “You’re finally starting to understand.”
                                                               -----

After binding her three captives with ropes and tape, Heather locked the door to the room. Assuming a lotus position, she began to meditate. Through constant practice she had learned how to join the dream world while still keeping a small part of her mind alert for unexpected developments in the real world. The gun was in her hand; any attempt to break down the door would bring her back to full consciousness, ready for action. Thus prepared, she went in search of Howard.
                                                               -----

Howard found himself in a park setting with grass-covered lawns, groves of trees, and a small lake. Because of the tall buildings surrounding the place on all sides, he was able to recognize it as Central Park in New York City. However, it seemed washed-out somehow: the green of the grass was faded, the sky seemed dull, and although there were no clouds, the sun’s light cast only a few indistinct shadows. Most of the people he could see were more substantial, so he concentrated on them until Heather materialized next to him. She took his arm possessively, and nodded in approval when he did not pull away. “Walk with me,” she told him. “We haven’t got much time, and I need to fill you in on some of the details on this assignment so you’ll know what to do.”

“OK,” Howard agreed. “But first, can you tell me why everything is so blah? It wasn’t like this before.”

“That’s because the dream world is going through an eclipse.” Seeing Howard’s confused glance at the sun overhead, she added, “It’s not the same as an eclipse in the real world. Here, there’s an invisible energy source that supplies all dreams with their vitality. Occasionally something blocks off part of that source, and during this time, the Overlords are more vulnerable than at other times. They tap into that power too to maintain their positions. Unfortunately Masters are also affected. So the Master of this level needs help to beat the Overlord, and that’s where you come in.”

Howard’s attention had wandered, as he idly watched the crowds through which they passed. Suddenly he blurted out, “Hey! I think I just saw Christina Aguilera, and she was in her underwear!”

“It’s not unusual to see people in their underwear here,” Heather responded. “That’s a common source of embarrassment in nightmares. Try not to stare.”

“But, Christina Aguilera?”

“Even celebrities have nightmares. Now, pay attention, this is important. You’re what they call here an Original. That means you have the ability to change dreams. The nightmares you went through were designed to train you to use that ability. When we get to the place where the Master is confronting the Overlord, we’ll be in some sort of battle scene, and each will be attempting to alter the events of that scene so that his side wins. Your job is to weigh in on the side of the Master. He believes your influence will be enough to bring him victory; if it is, I’ll let you and your friends go free.”

“Why couldn’t you give Debbie the same chance?” Howard complained bitterly.
“Ah, yes, Debbie. She was necessary at first, because your talent was blocked. You tried to change the nightmare, but you didn’t really expect it to work, and so it didn’t. Debbie had the same ability to a lesser degree. Trying to protect her, you broke through that initial barrier and began to progress at an astounding rate. But Debbie would not have gone along with the plan, and the Master was concerned that the two of you, working together, would be too much for even him to handle. Besides, she and Clarissa were getting in the way of what I wanted. So now you’re on your own. I can’t change dreams, but I can guide you through this one… ah. Speaking of which, here we are.”

All Howard could see was a rock formation along the side of the trail they had been following. Heather started to climb it, with Howard trailing behind. When they reached the top of the formation, Heather instructed him, “Jump as high as you can and grab hold of the ledge, then pull yourself up.”

“What ledge?”

“You’ll see it when you jump.” With that, Heather stretched her arms upwards, jumped, and vanished. Howard did the same, and at the top of his jump, his hands banged into a rocky precipice. Startled, he lost his grip with one hand and hung precariously by the other, suddenly aware that the drop below him was considerably longer than the distance he had just risen. Somehow he was able to regain his grip and pull himself onto the ledge. Heather was already there waiting for him. “Come on,” she urged, walking carefully along the narrow pathway. Howard followed.

As they turned a corner, Howard gasped. He was looking out over a vast plain, punctuated with rocky pedestals similar to the one they were traversing. Howard recognized it from pictures he had seen. It was Monument Valley in the American Southwest. As before, the colors and focus were not as sharp as they should have been. “Why are we skipping around like this?” he asked.

Heather gave him no time to rest, continuing to set a brisk pace along the ledge. As he hurried to catch up, she answered him without turning. “The battle is taking place on a deserted tropical island in the Pacific. It’s normally a pleasant place for dreaming lovers to visit. For the moment, however, it’s been placed off-limits to humans. If we were to appear in the midst of the battle, our presence would be noticed immediately, and the Overlord might have a chance to counter us before we could size up the situation. So the Master has prepared this route to get us there without being spotted. That will allow us the element of surprise.”
Ahead of them, the ledge narrowed to a thin line on the cliff face. At a point where further travel would have been impossible, Heather ducked into a crack in the cliff that widened into a small cave. Darkness quickly overtook them; Heather produced a flashlight from her pocket and continued onward. The floor of the cave was uneven and slippery from water seeping onto it, so they had to move slowly and carefully. Howard tried to ask another question, but the echoes within the cave were so distracting that he gave up and plodded on in silence.

Eventually he became aware of a circle of dingy light in front of them. When they reached it, Heather turned off the flashlight and crawled through the hole. Howard followed. He found himself on the side of a hill overlooking a semicircular harbor. Again from pictures he had seen, he could place this location: they were on Catalina Island off the coast of California, and the harbor town was named Avalon. Half-jumping, half-sliding, Heather and Howard reached the bottom of the hill, and after dusting themselves off, proceeded into town. Heather began to instruct Howard again, but Howard interrupted her. “This time I spotted Brandi Chastain, the soccer player, and she was in her underwear too!”

“Please! We saw that at the Olympics!” Heather snapped.

“Oh, yeah, right. So, now what do we do?”

“The last leg of our journey is by boat. We’ll sail northwest until we’re out of sight of land. At that point things will get really weird, but don’t worry about it: nothing there will hurt you. Once we get through that area we’ll come to the island and try to make contact with the Master. If we happen upon the Overlord first, just attack him with everything in you.”

“But how do we get a boat?”

“We’ll have to steal it. And Howard, one more thing… Howard?”

Howard had been sightseeing again. Now he exclaimed, “Wow! There’s Velma Dinkley!”

“Who?”

“You know, Velma, from the Scooby-Doo gang? She’s right over there.”

Heather looked in the direction indicated by Howard, then turned away in disgust. “That’s a cartoon!” she sniffed. “It must be a product of your warped imagination. There’s no reason anyone would cast themselves that way in their own dream.”

Howard was not paying attention. Waving, he called out, “Hey, Velma! Over here!”

“What are you doing?” Heather cried.

“Well, Velma is smart: she always solves the mysteries on their show. So she can help figure out what to do next.”

“You don’t need her! That’s why I’m here, to tell you what to do next.”

“Maybe not,” Howard demurred. He reached into a pocket and came out with a handful of powder, which he blew into Heather’s face. Caught by surprise, Heather inhaled, pitched forward, and vanished.

Velma came running up. “Jinkies!” she exclaimed. “What did you do to Heath… I mean, the girl that was with you?”

Howard chose his words carefully. “There was a guy I knew that discovered a formula that put people into a dreamless sleep. Heather told me I could change dreams, so I changed this one: I decided that my pocket held some of that powder. When Heather was distracted, I used it on her. I thought it would put her to sleep here, but apparently it worked on her real mind as well, and the connection to the dream world was interrupted. Hopefully that will keep her away from us for a while.”

“And why did you call me over?” Velma wanted to know.

“Heather also said I was being trained to use my ability. Well, I learned from a certain Jabberwock not to take everything here at face value. You may have noticed that the things of this dream world are muted and dull; it’s because of some eclipse they’re going through. But people that dream their way here are still full-color and in focus, like you. The only reason I could think of why someone real would appear here as a cartoon was to hide her true identity. When you came closer, I somehow knew who you are. But it was a shock! I thought you were dead!”

“That guy you mentioned patched me up. He has a full surgery right there in the house. Can you believe it? I guess I misjudged him. Anyway, he told me to pretend to be someone else so the Master wouldn’t notice me. He suggested a famous celebrity, but what do I know about how a celebrity thinks or acts in private? On the other hand, I know a lot about Velma. I used to watch Scooby-Doo all the time on TV.” She smiled coyly at Howard. “I don’t suppose you’d consider changing yourself to Scooby, so we’d match?”

“Rrno rrway, Rrvelma,” Howard growled.

“Oh well, it was worth a try.”

“What’s the other guy doing now?” Howard asked.

“He went to track down Heather in the real world, to find where she took you and our friends.”

Howard frowned. “I wish we could send him a message! When we got out of the truck, I noticed a sign that said ‘Chucky’s Amusement Park’. We’re in the basement of a building there.”

“I don’t think he’ll visit the dream world any time soon. He’d be afraid the Master would get him. So, what’s been happening here?”

“I’ll fill you in on the way. Right now, we need to get moving.”

“OK, I’m with you. What’s the plan?”

Howard grinned. “First, we have to steal a boat.”

Chapter 18:
Dream On

Larry crept up to the old haunted house.  It was tough finding the spot, but he was almost certain this would be where they were hidden.  While sleeping, Clarissa had spoken of a third person involved in the operation.  She had also mentioned her childhood days in Boston, when she and her family used to visit this area, where the amusement park and haunted mansion/fun house sat.  It was only a haunted mansion around Halloween, and for years, she wished she could finally go in.  

Near Halloween one year, Clarissa’s family came to the amusement park, when she was about thirteen.  Her parents told her she was old enough to take care of herself, as long as she be accompanied by her younger sister.  The two sisters were so excited!

“But,” warned Clarissa’s father, “don’t go in the spooky house.”

“Why, daddy?”

“Because you two are too young.  It’s very scary in there.”

So they went around riding all the rides.  After a while, however they became bored.  And boredom led to curiosity.  With their last ticket in hand, they paid the admission and walked into the spooky house.  At first, there wasn’t anything really scary about it.  That is, until they arrived at the hall of Hell.

It was foggy and a red tint surrounded the place.  In the dark, something slithered by Clarissa’s legs.  She freaked out and ran right into the wall at the end of the hall.  Her sister went to get help.  But when they found Clarissa, she was unconscious and badly beaten up.  She needed ten stitches and was in the hospital for days.

She never forgot about that.  It haunted her nightmares for days to come.  Being in hell, that is.  She and Howard went there for their third date.  It was their last date.

In the same spooky house, they went into the hall of Hell and when the same slithering came by her leg, she freaked out.  Howard tried to hold her, but she scratched and clawed at him the entire time, as he tried to lead her out of the spooky house.  

(It was too much for Howard.  He was scared.  So he never called again.  Neither Larry nor Clarissa knew.)

It was only through sheer desperation that Larry came here.

And with the knowledge that Clarissa and Heather were sisters…
                                                                   -----

Howard was at the wheel of the power boat, while Debbie/Velma hung out at the back of the boat in a bikini and soaked up the rays.  Several times, Howard’s fantasies of Velma from Scooby Doo came back to him.  He wasn’t the only one.  There was something about Velma that most boys at that time and age found attractive.  And the fact that it was really Debbie in there was even more amazing.  He wouldn’t kiss her like that, though.  That would be just too weird.

The sea roared and billowed, as Howard maneuvered it through the rushing waves.  They hadn’t needed to steal it, due mostly to their power to change things in the dream.  He and Debbie/Velma simply put their powers together and made the fastest boat they could.  He wasn’t sure where he was going, but strangely, the boat seemed to drive him, rather than the other way around.

With a sigh, he sat back and allowed the steering wheel to go on its own.
                                                                      -----

Larry checked the main entrance.  Locked from the inside.  And judging from the door, he would have trouble trying to break in.  It was one of those old oak doors with a large 4x4 for the door lock.  Old fashioned.  Impossible to break down.  Entrance would have to be found somewhere else.  With a sigh, he traveled the perimeter of the building, before discovering a window, only eight feet above the ground, and its boards were removed.  Obviously, someone wanted ventilation but not an entrance for anyone except the very tall.  Drat.

Larry conducted another search of the grounds but could find nothing to stand on.  Disappointed, he tried jumping to reach the window.  When that didn’t succeed, he hesitantly left the window for another entrance.  But there was none.
                                                                   -----

It was a full ten minutes before Heather woke up.  She went through some of the greatest pain of her life and felt pulled in a million directions at once.  Howard’s sleeping powder had succeeded as he intended to put her to sleep in a sleep state, also known as a coma.  But the problem with comas are they’re unpredictable.  The person can wake up in five minutes or a fifty years, depending on their body and mind.  Heather’s mind was very strong, but even so, she could not immediately pull herself out of the spiral that had consumed her.  For what seemed an eternity, Heather fell and drowned at the same time.  The liquid which consumed her without cushioning the fall had the texture of nothing she’d ever known.  It was a cross between the moisture in a cloud with the thickness of maple syrup.  Without the stickiness.

When she finally woke from the comatose nightmare, she was disoriented.  This two minutes of disorientation was probably the only thing that saved Howard.  When she had regained her composure, she uttered an obscenity and disregarding the orders from the Master, pointed the gun at Howard.  Then she thought better of it and pointed it at Jake.  She was only able to get one shot out, which pushed through Jake’s leg and woke him up, before she was interrupted by Larry who, as luck would have it, found an empty old crate and risked it all to reach that window.  The crate broke just as he reached the window.  From there, he found the trap door that brought him into the room where Heather held the prisoners.  He assumed that there was normally padding for the customers, but as luck would have it, he landed on Heather.

Heather yelled and screamed, but Larry held firm.  She thought better of it and slipped into a very deep sleep instead.

“No!” he exclaimed, slapping her.  “No time to sleep!”

But she wouldn’t wake.  Her mind had taken over and deserted her body.  She lay limp, as dead.  But her vital signs were still normal.  She was in the other world.

Abandoning her for a minute with her gun tucked in the front of his pants, Larry attended Jake’s wounds.  They weren’t too horrible, but he needed immediate attention.  This was when Larry could’ve used a cell phone.  But he still didn’t carry one.  He checked Heather and found one in her purse.  He tossed it to Jake, who was breathing hard but able to speak.  Jake dialed 911 and reported the need for an ambulance for himself.  He gave them an approximate location, and they promised help would be there shortly.

While this was going on, Larry was confronted with a difficult decision.  With his own gun next to Jake in case, he held Heather’s gun to her head.  He looked away and put pressure on the trigger, but his conscience just wouldn’t permit him to finish her off.

“Why can’t I do this?”

Jake, now finished with the call, shouted, “What are you doing?!?”

“She’s in the dream world.  She’ll warn the Master, or worse, she’ll go after Debbie and Howard.  If I don’t kill her, she’ll cause trouble in there.”

“Wake her up!”

“She won’t wake up.  Her mind is trained for this.”

“So you’re just gonna kill her?”

“Do you have a better way?”

With a shrug, Jake looked away as Larry pushed the gun to Heather’s temple again and turned his head.
                                                                         -----

“Where are we going, Howard?”

“Well, Velma, I think it has something to do with World War II, because we’re near the Islands of the Pacific by now.  And there’s no other war I can think of that was fought around here.”

“You don’t suppose we’re going to Pearl Harbor?”

“I can’t say anything for sure right now.  All we can do is wait.  Since Heather is incapacitated, you could probably change back into Debbie.”

“I’m kind of enjoying this Velma body.”

“But I find it a little strange.  And I’d really like to kiss you.”

“Well in that case…”

With a smile, she changed back to her old self, still in the bathing suit which promptly slid off her more slender body.  “Whoops!” she commented, laughing.

In seconds, she was wearing a tank top and shorts.  “Much better.”

He leaned over and kissed her.  “I was devastated, when I thought you were dead.”

“I know.”

Their kissing detracted their attention from the boat which had been following them for several minutes.  Sniper rifle in hand, Heather aimed for Debbie’s head.  “It might not kill her, but it would take her out of the game,” she thought to herself.  “And then Howard and I can finish the mission.”

She squeezed the trigger and there was silence.  Debbie stood.  Heather didn’t.
                                                               -----

Angie woke up to Jake’s shaking.  “Wake up!”

“I’m up.  What’s happening?”

“We need to pray for Howard and Debbie.”

“Why?”

“Cause they’re all alone.”

She looked over at Larry, who was hunched over Heather.  She looked dead, but she was breathing.  And in Larry’s hand was the sleeping powder from before.  He grinned.

“What happened?”

“Heather went to the dream world, but I stopped her with this sleeping powder.  I’m not quite sure how it got in my jacket.”

He showed the jacket that he had grabbed along with the gun, on his way out.

“So what’s going on with Howard and Debbie?”

Larry talked as he sauntered over to her.  “They’re almost at the battlegrounds for the Overlord and the Master.  The Master hopes to use their power to change dreams to strengthen his attack against the Overlord.  Sort of like a wild card.  But now, his wild cards aren’t restricted by anything.  So Howard is going to have to make the hardest decision of his life.

“Oh yeah?  And what’s that?”

“Whose side he’s on.”

Angie’s face was a mix of shock and confusion.  For all she knew, they were in little danger.  But Larry was concerned.  He knew what the two lovers were up against.  And he wasn’t only concerned about the Master.
                                                                 -----

Howard pointed at the islands coming up.  “That’s where we’re going.”

“What is that?”

“Iwo Jima…”

Indicating the nearest island, he added, “…and they already know we‘re here.”

Both their faces were a painting of fear.  They shared one last kiss as the boat maneuvered itself toward a dock, which conceivably was never on the original island…