The Dream Jumper's Secret

by Kim Hornsby

  Milton nodded curtly. “Not exactly. The worst part is the time between deep sedation and being awake when we think he might be able to dream jump and relay information. Today we will take him out of sedation just a bit at a time. You’ll keep trying to jump. This is also an experiment to see how much sedation is too much to dream.” He looked at Jamey and pursed his lips, thinking.

  Jamey waited, familiar with Milton’s methods.

  “If you suspect the dreamer is trained in resisting you, he’ll try to turn things so he has control.”

  The team waited for this next part, and Jamey froze.

  “We believe that last time, the prisoner took control of your jump because of the drugs we’d given him to fall asleep. Today we’ll be going with the old standby and using different methods.”

  Jamey nodded. The strategist on Freud’s team took over to map out the plan. For twenty minutes, Jamey listened to his team talk about how to manipulate the dream, and what information they needed. He was to be on the lookout for anyone who looked like they might be a real person, anyone who’d been pulled in the dream by Atash. That was one of their biggest fears and Jamey was to kill him.

  “It’s very important that the dreamer not relay information of any type to someone up top.”

  When they were done, Jamey asked the million-dollar question. “Won’t he recognize me from last time? Remember, he called me ‘Dream Man’?”

  Milton jumped in. “Well, here’s the tricky part. He would, if you looked like you. Or rather like last time. But we want you to change into someone else. Can you do that?”

  Jamey thought about it. Maybe. “Yeah, I think so.”

  “If not, summon a disguise. If that doesn’t work, jump out, especially if you think he has control of the dream over you.” Milton chewed his Nicotine gum. “If you can turn yourself into a young Taliban fighter like him, do it, and say that you need to know where the American reporters are being held. You have an important message for Amuk Ahmed. We are looking for a location. Understand?”

  The strategist interrupted. “We think Atash might have contacted someone recently and knows where the hostages are. That’s why you were brought here. You need to find the safe house where the reporters are being held, probably in Kabul or Kandahar. The reporters don’t have a hope in hell of getting out of there if Forcers don’t find these guys.”

  Milton added. “The American Government will not trade hostages so you need to get coordinates. If he takes you there, which would be best-case scenario, listen, look for anything, signs, anything you can see, hear smell. Insist he show you on a map, if you can.”

  Jamey looked around the table. All eyes were on him. These people were counting on his ability to manipulate the dream and procure information. And they were counting on Atash cooperating. What was this team doing while they kept this prisoner under sedation for so long? That Jamey would be back to try to find the Taliban munitions cache he’d eluded in his last dream jump? Was everyone just waiting for him here in Kandahar while he made love with Tina on Maui?

  The army needed him. Reporters who’d probably been tortured for weeks needed him. This new mission trumped the old one they’d given up on. Two American hostages. There was very little time to waste, especially knowing what the Taliban did to Americans.

  “I just hope I can get in to his dream,” Jamey said, and everyone nodded. Much depended on that one detail.

  The group stood up from the meeting table, and collectively moved to where Atash lay in the hospital bed. Guard #2 stood by the prisoner’s head, watching the young man sleep. Everyone else gathered around the foot of the bed. First, Jamey would try a jump while the prisoner was under sedation. Then, they’d turn off the drip, and Jamey would attempt every few minutes.

  Milton spoke before Jamey sat beside the prisoner. “Remember, don’t give away that you are American. Or a jumper. That’s what got you in trouble last time.” Milton knew too much, but Jamey had to be perfectly honest with his mentor and superior. Jamey wouldn’t try to convince Atash that Americans are the good guys this time. If he hadn’t said those last words about the motives of the American Army, Jamey wouldn’t have found himself racing through an Afghani village with a blood-sucking monster behind him. “I’ll do my best, sir.”

  The room was quiet as Jamey seated himself beside the young man’s head. He extended his hand and slipped it behind Atash’s neck, a place where he got the best reading for a dream. Once he felt a connection, he began to match his breathing with the prisoner. As his heart rate slowed, Jamey couldn’t help but think of Tina and how she was able to jump from miles away, without having physical contact. They weren’t sure how or why, but his theory involved an inherited ability, something her grandmother called “dream visits.” He breathed in and out slowly for several minutes, but nothing happened.

  The nurse stopped the drip to the dreamer’s arm, and Jamey kept trying to jump in every few minutes as the prisoner’s sedation wore off. He didn’t know how long he’d been sitting there, but eventually he felt the familiar pull of his body being sucked backwards. Then he fell into another dimension, and into a dream where he would be a young Taliban jihadist, fighting for the same cause as the prisoner.

  ***

  Tina rinsed the conditioner from her hair and turned off the shower. She was just stepping onto the bath mat when she felt the sucking sensation of being pulled into a dream. “No,” she whispered, and quickly grabbed her robe from the counter as she disappeared from the bathroom. She fell into a tunnel of total blackness, leaving her house behind. Blinking didn’t help to reveal anything as she sped along. Was she jumping her mother’s dream? Or Amy? They were the only two people in the house. And why would a dream grab her when she wasn’t even sleeping? Or trying?

  A light presented itself up ahead. A sign she was arriving. Making a mental note to remember the portal, she watched the light fill the tunnel and the scene of a dusty marketplace bazaar come into focus.

  It looked like the evening news’ photos of Afghanistan. Or, at least, the same area of the world. She wore a long blue robe, her head was covered, everything but her eyes. A burqa. Thank goodness she wasn’t naked, or landing with only the bath towel.

  She stood near a shack with a sign written in a foreign alphabet. Judging from the smell coming from the booth and the look of the food, it probably said “gyros.” No one noticed her.

  Mostly men moved through the marketplace but the few women she saw, wore a burqa like her. Someone yelled something to her, then moved on, suggesting she wasn’t invisible. It was hotter than hell, but, in the long robe she was well-disguised. No one would know she was American. The other women in the bazaar were accompanied by either men or boys. Maybe females weren’t allowed in public without the accompaniment of a male escort.

  She fell in beside a man, one step behind. The setting looked like a very densely populated midway at a fair, except the men wore turbans or circular hats. Some wore robes, most had scarves wrapped around their necks. All had dark beards and moustaches.

  She stayed close to the man in front, just in case. Maybe it was too crowded for anyone to notice that she was in public without an escort. Another young man walked in front of her and stopped at a produce stand. She stopped too, using him as her new cover. Looking around, she grabbed a clump of carrots to examine. Was this Jamey’s dream? If so, where was he? She kept an eye on the portal, prepared to run back and jump out.

  The market was elbow-to-elbow people, stalls jammed up against each other, produce, clothes, even livestock, but she didn’t see a tall, muscular man with piercing blue eyes. She continued along, behind the same young man who accompanied a second young man and now appeared to be in a hurry. She’d only go to the end of this block, then head back and jump out. Whose dream was this? The likely choice was Jamey, but where the hell was he? Tina’s sandals were impossibly uncomfortable on her feet. Looking down to her footgear, she bumped into the dark-haired man in front of her when he and his friend st
opped. “I’m sorry,” she said.

  The man turned, his gaze questioning, and gripped her arm so tight, she almost screamed. He put his mouth up to her ear.

  “Tina?” he said.

  It was Jamey’s voice. What the hell? “Yes.”

  “It’s me, Jamey. Come with me just for a bit. Remember your portal.” His words were short.

  Hearing Jamey’s voice from this foreign man was freaky, but she let him pull her over to the friend he was following. He said something in another language, sounding upset. They agreed and Jamey took her along with him. As they rushed through the market, she tried to remember if Jamey said the jumper could change appearances. Did he customarily disguise himself on a mission?

  They ducked behind a small structure that advertised espresso. Tina smelled the glorious scent of brewing coffee. The young men spoke again, the friend pointing to a jeep and taking off towards the vehicle. The older one, who was Jamey, whispered to her. “Tina, honey, I don’t know how this happened, or if you’re really here, but you need to leave. This is not safe. I told the guy I’m with that you’re my sister, and now I’m saying goodbye to you. Go back to your portal. Jump out. I love you.”

  He looked nothing like Jamey, but she had to say it before she left. “I love you. I’m sorry about leaving you. Come home soon.” She leaned to kiss him, forgetting her veil, and he moved away.

  “No smooching in public, Burqa-Girl.” The stranger grinned. “I’ll see you when I come home in a few days. Say hi to Pops.” He turned and ran across the road. After watching him drive away in the jeep, she returned to the exact spot where she’d come in, and jumped out.

  She woke on the floor of her bathroom, the towel and bathrobe barely covering her torso. “Holy Cow!” She stood and looked at herself in the mirror. Naked, Tina. No burqa, no Jamey. What had just happened? Next, she called Pops.

  Chapter 23

  Jamey leaned over and spoke to Atash as the jeep roared to life. “I have to deliver a message about the hostages,”

  “Pigs, the Americans,” Atash said.

  “Self-serving murderers,” Jamey added. His disguise seemed to be working. But then, last time, when he dream jumped with Atash, things went south fast, and he’d almost died trying to get out.

  Although the temptation to speed things up might have had them suddenly in front of the place where the prisoners were being held, Jamey held off. If Atash was suspicious, he didn’t want to jeopardize any part of this operation. “I don’t know where they are,” Atash said.

  “The message is for Abuk Ahmed. He’s with them. Do you know where that is?” Jamey spoke perfect Afghani in these dreams.

  Atash nodded, and they took off, driving south of the Kandahar bazaar, taking narrow side streets so they wouldn’t run into the American military.

  Atash had an AK47 on his back and looked like he was itching to use it. So far, he believed his friend was Taliban and Jamey had no intention of changing that. The two young men drove past dilapidated neighborhoods, blown out buildings, and houses with bars on the windows. The mountains loomed in the background, reminding Jamey that this was a diverse country of geographical beauty beyond the desert, and heat, and stink of the war.

  Navigating the streets of Kandahar, Jamey tried to memorize the route, just in case these streets were the real way to the house. And, thinking he might need to get back to the portal to jump out if something went wrong. Climbing a narrow dirt road lined on both sides with cement houses, they continued to the top of a hill and parked in front of a large compound with a wall around the perimeter. An electric fence and barbed wire ran along the top of the barricade. Three guards with M4’s stood at the gate. That was a very good indication that something big was worth guarding inside.

  “Here we are.” Atash jumped out of the jeep and talked to the guards, while Jamey memorized the look of the house, the angle of the sun, the proximity to the mountains, everything he could take in, just in case this place was real. If Atash was familiar with the compound, this description might help find the hostages.

  After what looked like an argument between Atash and the guards, the young man returned and they drove through the gate. Jamey tried to match Atash’s confident impatience as they walked from the jeep to the front door.

  Although it would be an added bonus to ID the hostages, Atash wouldn’t know what they looked like, only that they were with Abuk Ahmed at this house. Jamey reminded himself that this town was from Atash’s imagination, or memory. And that the people in the dream were controlled by Atash. It was entirely possible that this house didn’t exist and that Atash didn’t know that the Taliban had taken hostages, unless, like Milton said, Atash had jumped a dream recently and obtained information. This whole mission was based on a hunch that Milton had about Atash being able to reach someone through his dreams. If this was the actual look of the house, they’d hit the jackpot and Jamey needed to get back to the portal to deliver the information. He now had enough information to direct the American military to the house. But before he did that he still had to pretend to deliver the message.

  “He has a message for Abuk Ahmed,” Atash said to one of the guards. Something about Atash’s tone, his movements, didn’t add up. Jamey looked over and didn’t like what he saw. He imagined an AK47 in his own hands but nothing appeared. What the hell? If he couldn’t summon shit, it wasn’t his jump. Was it possible that Atash jumped someone else’s subconscious, someone outside the base, and Jamey had only piggybacked the dream jump? That would be very bad news. He needed to get out. Fast. But the portal was miles away. If Atash was on to him, Jamey had to play it cool.

  When the front door opened, a young woman in a burqa appeared, her eyes questioning. Atash spoke harshly to her, saying he had a message for Abuk Ahmed. Jamey wasn’t sure why Atash was still playing along with the dream but his Spidey alert senses were on full-alert, waiting for some kind of ambush. As long as they didn’t kill him in the dream, he might still make it out okay.

  When the girl brought an older, stout man to the door, Atash told him the message was for Abuk Ahmed and the older man nodded. “I’ll tell him,” he said. Atash looked at Jamey like this next moment might determine Jamey’s fate. He decided to take a big risk.

  “If you don’t hear what you want by tomorrow, cut off an ear,” he said, hoping his face didn’t betray his fear. The likelihood of this message actually getting to anyone up top, anyone who was actually holding the hostages, was slim. But, if it did, losing an ear would be better than both reporters dying when the American government refused to bargain for prisoners. Jamey needed to jump out now, and describe the house to Milton. Get Delta Force in there. Just in case someone was going to lose an ear. Or their life.

  “Who says?” the stout man asked.

  “Mullah Omar,” Jamey said. The leader of the Taliban would pack a heftier punch than Bin Laden, Jamey guessed.

  Both men looked shocked. Atash took a step back, his eyes widening, like he’d underestimated Jamey and once back in the jeep, Atash appeared to have new respect for his comrade. “You are with the leader?” he asked almost reverently as they drove back through the Kandahar streets.

  Jamey didn’t speak, knowing it would be completely foolish to talk about Omar with a peon like Atash.

  They drove in silence until they reached the bazaar, which was emptying out now. Most vendors had packed up and left. The once-crowded street of a hundred people now had thinned to maybe thirty vendors who were mostly packing up goods and wheeling carts away. Jamey had to get to the portal.

  They abandoned the jeep behind a building with the windows blown out. “What will you do now?” Atash asked, looking at Jamey sideways.

  “I will go to pray soon.” The sun would set in another hour.

  That seemed to satisfy the young man and they walked through the street purposefully. Why was Atash coming with him? Jamey stopped and nodded to Atash. “I’ll go now. Praise Allah.” He meant to take his leave, but as he walked away, Jamey f
elt the man’s eyes on his back. Not wanting to get shot in the back, Jamey stopped and turned. Atash was still watching. Jamey was ten feet from the portal. So close. Atash stared at him, probably wondering where a messenger from Omar would go. He could continue walking, but it was too risky. Jamey swiveled, like he was looking for someone and took a few steps towards the portal. Atash touched the gun. Shit. Jamey had to get out before a shot was fired. He sprinted to the portal, jumping over his scuffmark before anyone had time to fire a bullet in his back.

  When he landed in the dirt, he knew it hadn’t worked. He turned and jumped again. He remained on the Afghani dirt. Atash had drawn his AK47 and would kill him in seconds if he didn’t keep running. Jamey took off.

  Machine gun fire flew by, missing him, as he ran to seek cover. Atash now knew the man he’d led to Abuk Ahmed was the dream jumper. Shit. Jamey kept running as the bullets whizzed by him. He dove behind a pile of cement blocks to gather his wits, and looked around. No one followed him. He was running for his life again with the same man who screwed up his last mission. This kid might look innocent, but he wasn’t. He was a jumper! Without control of the dream, Jamey was screwed. He wasn’t sure how much power Atash knew he had in a dream, and that might be the thing that saved Jamey. If he was smart, the kid would summon a swarm of bees or a flood to flush out the enemy hiding behind this bunch of rubble.

  If he didn’t take that kind of control of the dream, Jamey would have to lay low until Atash left. Then he’d wake up. Damn. Although he didn’t see Atash following him, Jamey continued running through the streets, hiding in doorways, getting as far away as he could, finally hiding under an overturned corrugated roof that looked like it blew off in a windstorm. Jamey crouched under the metal roof, watching the street in front of him, and considered what to do. Last time he jumped with another jumper he couldn’t get out on his own. If this was a dream where he was unable to get out, he might have a long wait ahead of him. Especially if Atash intentionally left him, like Tina had.