Nightmare's Edge

by Bryan Davis

  Francesca took Amber’s hand. “I noticed, too. She didn’t fade at all.”

  “Then perhaps she has taken Kelly to a place of safety. She indicated that Nathan could travel with her to find his father, so we have to trust that all is well.”

  Nathan gritted his teeth. Yes, he had to trust — otherwise he’d go crazy. Maybe the Simons and Gordon would know where Kelly went.

  “So where are we now?” Daryl asked. “Someone else’s dream?”

  “No, but we are still in Earth Yellow’s dream world.” Amber swept her arm across the darkness. “It is an infinite universe with infinite horizons, and it abounds with countless visions of the night. If we were to walk in most directions, we would soon come upon another dream, but, for now, we are in an area void of the imaginations of mankind.”

  “Most directions?” Francesca said. “Not all?”

  “No, not all. One direction will take you to the barrier that separates the dream world from Sarah’s Womb. It is difficult to see it when you are actually within a dream, unless you know what you are looking for.”

  Daryl’s gaze drifted across the expanse. “It’s like being on the holodeck in Star Trek.”

  “So what do we do?” Nathan asked. “Now we have two people to look for.” He almost said “three people,” but with Kelly missing, searching for the new gifted one didn’t seem so important, no matter what Patar thought. They would have to find another way to the misty world.

  “We have no choice but to return to the observatory.” Amber tilted her head as if listening to something in the air. “The music is dying away, so I have to take us back.”

  A few seconds later, the darkness faded. Light filtered in, brighter with each passing second. Soon, the telescope room came into view, still dim and now without the sounds of two violins.

  “They’re here,” someone called.

  “I see only five.” The second voice was closer, deeper.

  Nathan searched for the source. Solomon Yellow stood next to Francesca Red, his finger lifted in a counting pose. “Kelly is missing.”

  “Nathan!” his mother called. “Where is she?”

  Lights flashed on from the perimeter of the circular room. Nathan narrowed his eyes as he shuffled toward her, his legs weak and wobbly. “I don’t know.” He took in a deep breath before continuing. “She got sucked into a dark hole with a girl named Felicity, and I couldn’t follow her.”

  “That’s terrible!” Francesca Red looked at Solomon. “Is there a way to find her?”

  “Maybe.” Solomon picked up the empty candelabrum and reached for Nathan’s candle. “Does she still have her light?”

  Nathan gave him the candle, still burning and now about three-quarters its original size. “I’m pretty sure she does.”

  Solomon blew out the flame and showed Nathan the lower end. Something circular and dark was stuck to the bottom, like a thumbtack driven into the wax.

  “A transmitter.” Solomon dug his fingernails around the circle and plucked it out. “As long as she hangs on to the candle, Dr. Gordon should be able to track her movements.”

  “I have a signal,” Dr. Gordon called. “It’s weak, but it’s definitely hers.”

  Solomon turned toward him. “Can you locate what realm she’s in?”

  “The computer says the echo signature isn’t like any we’ve encountered, so I can’t determine its origin. But she seems to be moving, so I assume she is alive and well.”

  A cold sweat dampened Nathan’s shirt as relief swept through his mind. “So if you can’t find her using the tracking device, can we go back and look for her?”

  “That depends.” Solomon laid an arm over Nathan’s shoulders and led him toward a row of desks that abutted an outer wall. “Amber is capable of taking you back to the dream world, but even she would have no idea where in the dreamscape you would go.”

  Nathan looked at Amber, raising his eyebrows in a questioning way.

  “He is right,” she said. “If I am physically with a dreamer, I can easily find his or her dream, but if we jump in from a random place, we are more likely to enter a gap than anyone’s dream. It would be like jumping into the ocean, hoping to find a specific fish.”

  “So,” Solomon continued, “it would be better to try to find the fish using its tracking device. And now that we’re not detecting any nearby dreams, Amber’s entry would likely be in one of the gaps she mentioned. We could wait for another dream to come close enough for the computers to pick it up, but unlike planetary orbits, intersections can’t be predicted. But be patient. I think we will be able to show you a new searching option in a minute.”

  Nathan nodded. He didn’t really have much choice but to follow along. Now that Kelly was gone, their plans seemed to be falling apart. How could they get to the misty world without the Earth Blue mirror she’d been holding? That realm and its healing violin seemed farther away than ever.

  Nathan and Solomon stopped near a desk where Dr. Simon Blue sat in a rolling swivel chair. Next to him, Simon Yellow sat facing an adjacent desk, while a man who looked like a younger, heftier version of Dr. Gordon attended a computer screen on a third desk.

  Simon Blue spun toward Nathan and gave him a wide smile. “Upon meeting Dr. Gordon of this world, my counterpart and I were able to combine his technological knowledge with our experience studying the various cross-dimensional phenomena. We have also been in contact with the Earth Red Dr. Gordon through a digital channel that gives us clear transmission, and he added to our understanding, enabling us to deduce how every thing works.”

  “Is Gordon Red okay?” Nathan asked. “Does he know how Clara’s doing?”

  “They’re both doing well, considering the circumstances there. Clara wanted to join us, but we had to decline. We have been able to receive inanimate objects from Earth Red using the digital channels, but transporting humans is far too risky.”

  Gordon Yellow pushed back, rose to his feet, and rolled his chair toward Francesca Red. “Please. Rest.”

  The two Simons followed suit, offering their chairs to Francesca Yellow and Molly.

  Dr. Malenkov strolled into the area, his violin now tucked at his side. “If you no longer need me,” he said, “I should go.”

  Francesca Yellow ran to him and gave him a hug. “Is Mother well?”

  “She has fallen ill.” He pushed her back gently and offered a weak smile. “I trust that God will heal her, but even if he chooses not to do so, she will merely fly to his arms and be healed there.”

  “I will pray for her.” Francesca kissed his cheek. “And I’ll come to be with her as soon as I can.”

  His smile withered. “I will tell her. She has longed to see you again.”

  Nathan laid a hand on his back. “I’ll pray for her, too.”

  “Thank you. The fervent prayers of a righteous man availeth much.” He turned and shuffled to the tourist entry, looking older than ever.

  “Well,” Solomon Yellow said, clapping his hands. “Shall we get on with it?”

  Nathan tried to keep from scowling. Didn’t Solomon Yellow have any sympathy? This version of his father was getting worse all the time.

  Dr. Gordon handed Solomon a page of printed data. “The experiment worked perfectly. We captured the energy flow and imported its fingerprint. If we assume that the other dream worlds have the same format, we can shift our instruments to read and reproduce them, perhaps even in a holographic image.”

  “Then our theory is correct?” Solomon asked.

  Dr. Gordon pointed at him. “It was your theory. Let’s give credit where credit is due.”

  “What theory?” Nathan asked. “And what does this have to do with finding Kelly? We can’t stand around and pat each other on the back while she’s stuck somewhere in the great beyond. And we still have to stop interfinity.”

  Dr. Gordon eyed Nathan for a moment, his expression making him appear a bit annoyed, then returned his gaze to Solomon. “It will take a few minutes to align the telesc
opes and search for the signals. Perhaps you should take that time to explain the situation to Nathan.”

  “Very well. I will start at the beginning.” Solomon reached for an iPod on Simon Blue’s desk and extended it to Nathan, letting the ear buds dangle. “Here is the key, perhaps literally in one sense of the word.”

  “I’ve seen it before,” Nathan said. “It holds the music that opens dimensional portals.”

  “True, but we added a very important piece that has a different function. Have a listen.” While Solomon slid his finger along the iPod’s wheel, Nathan caught the ear buds and inserted them. Within seconds, a violin played the simple melody of “Foundation’s Key”, but it was more than a rote recital. The violin sang with majestic fervor, a brilliant rendition that only one person in the world could have created.

  Nathan looked at his mother. Obviously, she couldn’t have recorded it. She had been with him or in Mictar’s clutches the entire time. As the exquisite music continued, he turned to Francesca Yellow, now holding hands with Solomon. She gave Nathan a timid smile.

  Returning the smile, Nathan nodded. Of course. That Francesca could play like this. No doubt about it.

  Solomon turned off the iPod and retrieved the ear buds. “After many nights of experimenting, we learned that Francesca’s playing of that piece protects sleepers from dreaming about the future and blocks Mictar from entering their dreams. We think it somehow interferes with the open channels that the wounds created. How does it work?” He shrugged. “I don’t know.”

  “So what did you do?” Nathan asked. “Distribute it on the Internet?”

  “It’s nineteen ninety three. The Internet isn’t nearly as widespread as it is in your world, and the circumstances we’ve lived with have delayed its progress, so we sold the recording the old-fashioned way — in WalMart.”

  “So are the worlds still running in parallel? I mean, with all the disturbances we’ve caused, I guess nothing is really predictable, is it?”

  Simon Blue took the iPod and laid it back on his desk. “You are correct. In fact, accurate next-day dreaming would likely have ceased on its own. Fortunately, when Solomon invented the cure, it was still a huge concern, so we sold hundreds of millions of copies and made a fortune.”

  Nathan tried to hide a frown. Was this all a moneymaking venture? It couldn’t be. The man who eventually became his father couldn’t be just a greedy profiteer. Yet Gordon Blue was obviously in it for the money, even though Gordon Red wasn’t, so maybe . . .

  Solomon laughed. “And nearly every penny went to finance this observatory.” He patted Nathan on the back. “Did you see that jalopy I was driving? You’d think I’d keep a few dollars to get a better car.”

  “Yeah. I saw it.” Nathan lowered his head. Better to withhold judgment about Solomon. He obviously wasn’t a perfect gentleman, but he had some good qualities.

  Simon Blue spread out his arms. “And as you will soon see, it is a vastly improved observatory from the ones you knew on the other Earths.” Nathan looked around. So far it didn’t seem much different. In fact, the laptop computers were bulkier, obviously an older technology, and the smaller screens forced them to feed the video signal to large stand-alone monitors. Those looked pretty sharp, though they were an old style, not the flat screens that would come out in a few years.

  “Now here’s an interesting invention.” Simon Blue opened a drawer and pulled out a device that looked like a walkie-talkie with a video screen. “We call this an interworld audio receiver and transmitter unit. It’s so new, even Dr. Gordon on Earth Red doesn’t have one yet. The only three in existence are here in our lab.”

  “An interworld what?” Nathan asked.

  “Interworld audio receiver and transmitter unit.” He set it in Nathan’s hand. “Just call it IWART. That should be easy enough.”

  Nathan suppressed a grin. That was really an awful moniker, but he was right. It would be easy to remember. “What’s it do?”

  Simon Blue touched a round plastic knob at the center of the IWART’s front casing. “This switch has three settings, one for each of the three Earths. For example, if you use the Earth Yellow device while you’re here and turn the switch to the Earth Blue setting, you will be able to talk to someone holding the Earth Blue device while he is in that world, regardless of the difference in time passage. First, you press the talk button.” He pointed at a black button on the side. “Then you say something and let the button go. It transmits the sentence or paragraph or whatever in its entirety, allowing the receiver to play it at a normal rate. The only drawback, of course, would be for the person on the faster world. It would seem to him that the person on the slower world is taking forever to record his reply.”

  “Sure,” Nathan said. “That makes sense.”

  Simon pointed at one of the computers on the desk. “We have the same technology in our transmissions between the laboratories, but this allows someone to be mobile; that is, he would be able to use it outside of the lab. You would still, however, have to be stationary for it to make cross-dimensional contact. It doesn’t work while you’re moving, but since it also has a built-in GPS receiver, it might come in quite handy for many applications, don’t you think?”

  “Definitely.” Nathan eyed the switch on the IWART. The three settings were labeled “Yellow”, “Blue”, and “Red”. “What happens if the Earth Yellow device is set to the Earth Yellow position?”

  “It contacts us here in the observatory, and, as you might expect, the Earth Red device’s Red setting would contact Earth Red headquarters, and so on. We will be sending the IWARTs to those worlds soon. But now we must turn to other matters.” Simon Blue nodded at Dr. Gordon. “Is the Scotland mirror locked in place?”

  “It is. I can show them the local energy emission first. Perhaps by the time they synchronize, we can look deeper.” Dr. Gordon leaned over his laptop and tapped a few keys, then turned toward the center of the room and pointed upward. “As you watch, I’ll explain what you’re seeing.”

  Nathan looked at the ceiling. As he expected, a curved reflection of everyone in the room looked back, their heads tilted. Soon, the mirror darkened, and pinpoints of white light dotted the purple canopy — stars twinkling in the night sky. Then, the darkness in a third of the mirror broke apart and scattered, like oil droplets on water. They changed into oddly shaped globules of various colors, much like the patterns at the other observatories — shapes that represented the noise gathered from space by the radio telescope. It seemed that a wedge of dark pie had been removed, revealing part of a circle covered with crawling, multicolored worms.

  “Instead of one radio telescope,” Dr. Gordon explained, “we have three. With the wounds in the cosmic fabric, we can hone in on the sounds from each universe and compare them to see how they function as a tri-universe whole. What you are seeing is the noise generated here in Earth Yellow. As you might expect, it has the strongest signal. The computer will lock on the closest dream and interpret its sound emission. Then we should be able to see a visual representation. All the light energy we collect is now sent through the mirror Tony brought from Scotland, and we believe that is the key to viewing the dream world. This should allow us to visually search the three realms safely. And I hope we will eventually learn how to open a portal to the stalkers’ world. From what I have learned, eliminating those creatures would help our cause greatly.”

  “Can you play the transmissions out loud?” Nathan asked. “I’d like to hear them.”

  “Very well, but it will be severely garbled until we translate it.”

  “I’d like to give it a shot, if you don’t mind.” As Nathan continued to stare at the scene above, static began buzzing from hidden speakers. He concentrated on the noise, trying to pick it apart and decipher the tune as he had once before.

  Francesca Yellow scooted toward him. “You don’t have to tax your brain, Nathan. The computer can do it.”

  “I need to get better at this. Without Kelly around, I might
need it.” He closed his eyes and imagined a blank musical staff floating in front of him while a mental vision of himself held a violin. As he caught each note from within the static, his imagined self played it. A black spider formed on his strings and flew to the staff. After a few seconds and many more notes, a page of music filled his mind.

  During his previous try, he had a real violin and played the piece out loud. This time he wanted to do it all in his head and really get the hang of interpretation, something his mother was able to do without any effort. If he was gifted, too, he should be able to learn this skill.

  When his mental picture played the first measure, he hummed along. The static began to clear. Just like last time, his physical ears heard what his brain composed.

  Dr. Gordon’s voice broke through. “Shall I begin the translation? Nothing will happen without the appropriate music.”

  “No!” Francesca said sharply. “Let Nathan do it. He must do it.”

  Someone shushed her, and then static blended with the music. His eyes still closed, Nathan concentrated. He had to get it back.

  Soon, the melody flowed once again, and it took only seconds to recognize it — “Be Thou My Vision” — the same piece that had cleared the air during Daryl Blue’s nightmare. Yet, this didn’t sound like a choir of angelic singers. It was more like a duet — a violin and a piano, beautiful in passion and haunting as each piano note echoed in perfect precision with the violin’s long strokes.

  Someone slipped a violin and bow into Nathan’s hands. “Now play it, son. Play it with all your heart.”

  He recognized his mother’s voice. “But my hands, they’re — ”

  “Play it anyway!” Her voice sharpened. “Let the pain flow. Without pain there is no passion.”

  Nathan rubbed his fingertip across the violin’s smooth wood grain. It felt good . . . very good. Maybe his mother was right. Maybe he could still play. “Okay. I’ll try.”

  Keeping his eyes closed, he raised the bow to the strings. His mother’s voice smoothed to a poetic cadence. “Only sacrifice draws a holy flow from within, and only a bleeding soul can reach down deep enough to find the blazing fire — the God-given inferno that purges every particle of dross that spoils the master’s silver.”