Dream Stalkers

by Tim Waggoner

  Years ago, before the Angler forced him to swallow the shuteye pill, Nathaniel had gone to art school. He’d tried to live a normal life, even with Mordacity as part of it, but the lure of Nod was too strong, and eventually he and Mordacity were recruited by the Shadow Watch. But in his current mental state, he’d gone back to his art, and, although his endless painting of his old historical scenes was disturbing, I was glad that he had his art to provide whatever comfort for him that it could. At least it was something.

  “What did you mean when you said what shuteye is really used for?” I asked.

  He didn’t turn to look at us, but for an instant – so fast that I wasn’t certain I’d really seen it – his features seemed to ripple, as if becoming momentarily fluid. I remembered seeing something similar happening to him right after he’d swallowed the shuteye pill. At the time I’d dismissed it, but now I wondered.

  Nathaniel applied several brushstrokes of white before answering my question.

  “It’s the Discarnate,” he said. “They wanted to find a way to return. And they did. They–”

  He broke off and doubled over, grimacing in pain. He dropped his brush and palette and clapped his hands to his head.

  “Stop it!” he shouted. His voice rose to a shriek as he repeated, “Stop it!”

  Mordacity and I both started forward, although what either of us thought we could do for Nathaniel, I don’t know. But, before we could reach him, the sound of weapons fire came from the corridor. I recognized the energy discharge of trancers, and I knew the guards were firing at someone. Was there a prison riot in the offing? Or had one or more of the inmates Jinx and I had put in Deadlock come looking for payback? Whatever the case, Mordacity and I had to get out there. But first I reached up and tapped the negator collar around Mordacity’s neck. The collar separated, went slack, and fell to the floor.

  “Thanks,” Mordacity said. As his power returned to him, he seemed to be more there. His presence became stronger, the color and angles of his bone armor sharper.

  Nathaniel was still holding his head and shouting, “Stop it, stop it!” but there was nothing we could do for him. Mordacity and I hurried for the door, Mordacity in the lead. I knew he intended to shield me from any stray energy blasts since he could withstand a hell of a lot more damage than I could, and, since I didn’t have any weapons, I was happy to let him.

  He threw open the door and we hurried into the corridor and found ourselves in the middle of a battle. No, battle is too dignified a word. This was a slaughter. Dr Tittering lay on the floor, most of her head gone. There was blood everywhere, and her body twitched spasmodically as it attempted to heal itself. As a staff member she hadn’t been collared, but, even with access to her full Incubus capabilities, it was doubtful she’d survive an injury that severe. Russell and Jinx hadn’t fared much better. Russell lay on the floor, his left shoulder a bloody ruin, the arm hanging by several shreds of meat. He’d lost a ton of blood, and his skin was almost as white as Mordacity’s bone armor. Bloodshedder stood next to him and she brushed her neck against the side of his face. At first I thought it was a sign of worry, but, when her negator collar touched his flesh, it sprang open and fell away, restoring her to full strength.

  Jinx stood in front of Russell and Bloodshedder, shielding them. Maelstrom energy beams slammed into his nearly naked body, the blasts carving out chunks of chalk-white flesh. His eyes shone with agony, but he laughed maniacally as the energy blasts whittled away at him. He still wore his negator collar, and I knew he couldn’t take much more punishment before he went down.

  The guards that had accompanied us stood shoulder to shoulder, trancers raised and firing one blast after another. Their helmet visors were up, and I could see the faces of Gingerdread Man and Demonique. Both held expressions of cruel glee and they continued blasting Jinx.

  Mordacity and I didn’t have time to coordinate our actions, but we were both experienced officers, and we knew what we had to do. Mordacity ran forward to put himself between the assassins and Jinx. I knew Russell could bleed out any moment, but I also knew his best chance of survival was if all our Incubi were up to full power. I rushed up behind Jinx to tap his negator collar, but, before I could reach him, the collar vanished. Literally. One instant it was there, the next it was gone. But I didn’t have time for more than a brief What the hell? before I was engulfed in fiery agony. While Jinx had been wearing the collar, our link had been shut down. Now it activated again, and I felt Jinx’s pain as if it were my own. Maybe it was an aspect of our Blending, or maybe Jinx just hurt so bad that I couldn’t help but feel it. Either way, I staggered to a stop and doubled over. My chest and abdomen felt as if they’d been splashed with acid, and the pain was so intense that I had to fight to retain consciousness. My vision grayed out, my head swam, and vertigo washed over me.

  When my vision cleared, I found myself in Jinx’s body again. I saw that Gingerdread Man had raced forward to intercept Mordacity. The speedster had armed himself with an M-blade, and he flew around Mordacity in a whirlwind blur, striking the multicolored blade against his bone armor with rapid icepick blows. Bits of bone flew off Mordacity as if he were a block of stone that Gingerdread Man was attempting to reduce to rubble with a handheld jackhammer. Mordacity kept trying to grab hold of Gingerdread Man and he raced around, but the Incubus was simply too damn fast.

  Demonique now held two trancers. I assumed Gingerdread Man had tossed his to her before rushing forward to confront Mordacity. She stepped to the side to get an unobstructed shot and then continued firing blast after blast of M-energy at me – or, more precisely, at Jinx’s body – an expression of frustration on her reptilian face.

  “Why won’t you just go down?” Demonique said.

  “Too stubborn, I guess.” I still felt the pain of the M-blasts, but it was less intense than before. Without the negator collar blocking access to the Maelstrom energy in the environment, Jinx’s body was able to heal super-fast again. Still, there was only so much punishment even he could take.

  I heard my voice shout, “Whistle!”

  I turned around, giving Demonique and Gingerdread Man a chance to fire at Jinx’s back for a change. Jinx, in my body, had straightened and was looking at me with an irritated expression.

  “Don’t ask!” he said. “Just do it!”

  I mentally shrugged, put my fingers between my lips, and let out a loud, shrill whistle. Nothing happened for several seconds, except for Jinx’s back taking some significant damage. But then I became aware of a strange sensation, a feeling of excitement and anticipation, as if something was about to happen. I felt more than heard a series of thuds, as if powerful impacts were occurring elsewhere in the prison. Then, over the sound of energy fire, I heard a slap-slap-slap. I turned around and saw Jinx’s clothes – clean and restored, looking brand-new – running down the corridor at break-neck speed. They were empty, of course, but they moved as if inhabited by an invisible body. Demonique and Gingerdread Man saw the clothes as they ran past, and they were so surprised by the sight that they stopped firing and gaped. The clothes ran straight toward me, and, when they reached me, they swirled around in a whirlwind of white, gray, and red, and the next thing I knew, I was dressed.

  “Right pants pocket!” Jinx shouted.

  Without hesitation, I plunged my hand into the pocket and felt a cold emptiness. I had the impression of an impossibly vast space, and then I felt an object in my hand, almost as if someone – or something – had put it there. It felt like the butt of a gun, and when I withdrew the object, I saw I was holding a trancer. Grinning, I tossed it to Jinx, and then I reached into his inner jacket pocket. I experienced the same sensation of cold and emptiness, and then a handle slapped into my palm. I pulled Cuthbert Junior free, turned, and, with a flip of my wrist, I sent the sledgehammer spinning horizontally toward Demonique. The hammer flew too fast for her to avoid, and it slammed into her chest. Despite the body armor that she wore, I heard an extremely satisfying crunch of breaki
ng bones, and I understood why Jinx loves that damn hammer so much.

  Demonique went down, and, an instant later, Mordacity finally managed to land a punch on Gingerdread Man, and he joined his partner on the floor. The assassins lay only a few feet apart, and Jinx ran over to them – although, considering how awkward he was in my body, hobble-lurched might be a better description – aimed the trancer and fired. A wide angle beam of M-energy sprayed the assassins’ heads. They’d been stunned, but were still conscious. Jinx, however, was attempting to remedy this. Trancers can fire energy beams of intense force strong enough to disrupt an Incubus’ natural M-energy, but, on lower levels, their energy can put humans to sleep. They can do the same for Incubi and Ideators, if only for a short time. The assassins tried to resist, but, since they were already dazed, they succumbed to the trancer’s sleep effect and closed their eyes.

  Now that the assassins had been dealt with, I could focus on Russell. I turned toward him only to see that Bloodshedder had grabbed hold of his shirt with her mouth and was dragging him across the floor toward a wavering distortion in the air. I could feel energy emanating from the distortion. It washed over me, making my body tingle, and for an instant I smelled fresh air and green grass, and I heard the sound of children laughing as their kites rose into the air. Before I could say or do anything, Bloodshedder backed into the distortion, yanked Russell in after her, and they were gone. A second later the distortion disappeared, and the only thing remaining was the smeared blood trail on the floor indicating where Russell had been dragged.

  The Thresholders – perhaps sensing how badly Russell had been injured – had transported the two of them away, and, although I hated not being able to help Russell myself, I knew his mysterious masters had a better chance of saving his life than I did. I would just have to pray that he’d be all right.

  Jinx lowered his trancer, and, satisfied the assassins would remain out of action for the time being, he walked toward me. He looked at me critically, then he straightened “my” tie and adjusted the gigantic lapel flower until it was to his liking.

  “I have certain standards to maintain,” he said. Then he inhaled noisily and hocked a loogie onto the floor.

  “I can see that,” I said. I hadn’t realized Jinx’s clothes could restore themselves, and I was about to ask him if he’d purposely left them tattered and gore-stained before to irritate me, when I realized Mordacity was gone. Jinx and I glanced around quickly, but we didn’t see him. I hadn’t seen him walk into the spatial distortion, so I knew he hadn’t been taken by the Thresholders.

  “Check on the doctor,” I told Jinx, and then I walked back to Nathaniel’s room. The door remained open, and, when I stepped inside, the first thing I noticed was that his walls – both those sections that had his conglomerate historical scenes and those that had been whited over – were splashed with crimson. The sight hit me like a punch to the gut, but it was nothing compared to what I saw standing in the middle of the room. The Incubus was male, thick-bodied and powerfully muscled, with four arms and two legs. He had long shaggy brown hair and a wild tangle of a beard. He had a single large green eye in the middle of his forehead, and he wore the shredded remains of a prison uniform. But it wasn’t the sight of a four-armed, muscle-bound Cyclops that disturbed me. What bothered me was seeing Mordacity, or, rather, what had happened to him. Two of the Cyclops’ hands held Mordacity’s legs and the other two held his arms. Mordacity’s crushed head rested beneath one of his feet, and the rest of his body lay on the floor close by. The Cyclops was drenched in blood, and when he smiled his teeth were a startling slash of white in the crimson mask of his face.

  There was no sign of Nathaniel.

  “He came back to check on his old friend,” the Cyclops said, in a deep voice. “Imagine his surprise when he found me here instead. I’ve been trying to take over for years, but Nathaniel always managed to resist me. Seeing you and Mordacity at the same time put him off-balance emotionally. It was exactly the opportunity I needed.”

  He then dropped the pieces of Mordacity as if they were so much trash. He took his foot off the crushed head and with a savage grin kicked the bloody thing into a corner.

  “I’ll give Mordacity this: he was strong.” His four hands curled into fists. “But I’m stronger.”

  I wanted to demand the sonofabitch tell me who he was. I wanted to force him to tell me what he’d done with Nathaniel. Instead I bellowed in rage and rushed toward him.

  And that’s when the alarms sounded.

  Eleven

  The Cyclops just grinned as I ran toward him, but vertigo gripped me before I could reach him. The next thing I knew I was back in my own body, kneeling beside Dr Tittering. My fingertips were pressed to her neck, but I couldn’t feel a pulse.

  A second later, I heard an oof! and then Jinx came flying out of Nathaniel’s room. He slammed into the corridor’s wall, bounced off, and landed face-first on the floor. He moaned something. It sounded like “Give a guy some warning next time,” but it was hard to hear with the alarms blaring.

  Up to this point, the corridor had been empty besides us and the assassins, but now staff members came running toward us. At first I thought they were coming to help, but they didn’t give us a second look, let alone pause in their mad dash. They were all heading in the same direction, and I had the uncomfortable thought that they looked like panicked rats deserting a sinking vessel. I stood and grabbed hold of the first person I could, an Incubus whose bald head was covered with flashing light bulbs. His eyes danced with electric sparks, and the nametag on his white coat gave his name as Jolt.

  “What’s happening?” I had to shout to be heard over the alarms.

  “Riot!” he shouted back, and then he pulled free of my grip and continued running like hell.

  Jinx had managed to pull himself to his feet, and the two assassins still lay in the middle of the floor where they’d fallen. I didn’t give a damn if they were trampled to death by the panicking staff. As a matter of fact, I kind of hoped they would be.

  The blood-soaked Cyclops stepped out of Nathaniel’s room, surveyed the chaos around us, and let out a booming laugh.

  Jinx stepped over to me.

  “Looks like the prisoners found out all their negator collars went poof,” I said.

  “Negator collars? Do I know what those are?” He frowned. “I seem to have a vague memory. More like an echo of a memory. It’s weird.” He shook his head back and forth rapidly, as if to dislodge the irritating thought.

  Jinx had holstered the trancer when he’d gone to check on Dr Tittering, and I drew it now, aimed at the Cyclops’ eye, and fired. I used the weapon’s highest setting, and M-energy lanced through the air and popped his giant eye as if it were a lightly poached egg. The Cyclops screamed and clapped two of his hands to his face, as if attempting to hold in as much goo as he could. It didn’t help.

  I thought seeing a sudden blast of trancer fire would freak out the staff even more than they already were, but none of them seemed to notice. I suppose when you work at a prison full of Incubi whose power-negator collars have ceased to exist, you’ve got bigger things to worry about than one woman firing a trancer in the middle of a corridor.

  The Cyclops continued howling in pain, but I knew his eye would heal soon enough. And, when it did, I intended to shoot it out again. Then maybe I’d question him to find out what he’d done with Nathaniel.

  Jinx went over to the two unconscious assassins to retrieve Cuthbert Junior. But, as he bent down to pick up his hammer, one of the assassins sat up, aimed a trancer at him, and fired. Jinx managed to dodge in time so that he was only struck a glancing blow on his left shoulder, but the impact was still enough to spin him halfway around. Both assassins got to their feet, but they were no longer Gingerdread Man and Demonique. The Incubi that inhabited their stolen uniforms were the bat-headed woman and the giant earwig, two of the three Incubi who’d gotten off the Loco-Motive with us.

  I muttered “What the hell?” o
r something equally incisive, and raised my trancer to fire at them. But there were too many people in the corridor and I couldn’t get a clear shot. The assassins, or whoever they were now, took advantage of the situation and jumped to their feet to join the fleeing staff. I didn’t bother trying to go after them. Nathaniel was still missing, and the Incubus that had killed Mordacity might be able to tell me where to find him. Besides, I really wanted to shoot out that goddamned eye again.

  I headed toward the Cyclops, who was still huddled in Nathaniel’s doorway, moaning in pain. Jinx joined me, Cuthbert Junior once more in hand, a black scorch mark on his left shoulder. I nodded at the Cyclops, and Jinx grinned and started forward. Although he wasn’t entirely healed from the assassins’ assault – even if I hadn’t been able to sense his condition through our link, the bloody spots soaking through his once-clean shirt were a dead giveaway – he was still more than strong enough to swing his hammer into the Cyclops’ chest and send him flying back into the room. Jinx and I stepped inside, and I closed the door behind us. Whatever was happening in the prison, I didn’t want to be interrupted.

  I did my best not to look at Mordacity’s remains as we approached the Cyclops. The fucker had risen to his hands and knees by the time Jinx and I reached him. His ruin of an eye was no longer bleeding, and, while he kept the lid down tight so I couldn’t see what was happening, I was certain a new eye was growing in the socket, slowly but surely.

  Just because he couldn’t see at the moment didn’t mean the Cyclops was helpless, so Jinx propped Cuthbert Junior against a wall, reached into a pocket, and pulled out a small anvil about the size of a softball with the words One Metric Fuck-Ton painted on it in red letters. He walked over to the Cyclops and dropped the anvil onto his back. The weight slammed the bastard to the floor and kept him pinned there. His head was turned to the side, and I crouched down next to him and placed the muzzle of my trancer against his closed eyelid. I pushed and I could feel the liquidy mush behind the lid give a little. The Cyclops gasped in pain, but he didn’t scream, another sign that he was healing.