Perchance to Dream - 1

Not for the first time, hell... not even for the twentieth time, I pedaled past the abandoned three-story townhouse in Midtown of New Sactown, the one with the dark brown paint and the words spray-painted in white:

nogodNOgodnoGODngOdNoGoDnoGOdNOGOD

And not for the first time, I thought, not even the end of the world can stop late-stage free-market capitalism. Don’t know what one has to do with the other, but that’s the thought I usually have when I see those words.

Some nights, I’m super lucky, and the cloud cover keeps the moon from shining on the letters, and I get past the house without seeing those words and all their oversized, ultra-bright whiteness and get on with my deliveries without those words burned into my vision like a photo negative of staring into the sun. But this night was during the summer of silver smaug, so we hadn’t gotten a truly dark night in the last several months, what with all those shimmering clouds floating about occasionally turning people into scaled monstrosities. If you’re reading this down the timeline and either weren’t born yet, were still in your fugue from Armagodden Day, or had been smaugged and are one of the lucky ones that have since been cured, we started calling the little floating clouds, silver smogs. Then some of the old farts took to pronouncing it smaug, with an ow sound from how they call the dragon from the classic movie, The Hobbit, rather than smog with an aw sound. For some reason, it stuck. Point is, those clouds floated around the city at night, but only at night, shining their luminescence all around, and every night on my delivery rounds I saw those words...

nogodNOgodnoGODngOdNoGoDnoGOdNOGOD

This particular night I peddled on, with those words branded on my inner eye and bringing unbidden memories of Armagodden Day—screams explosions, mind-warping cries of anti dimensional beings, blood, violence, the more blood, driving that beaten up minivan through old Sactown and trying not to hit anyone, failing not to hit anyone... well, everyone who stayed on earth after Armagodden Day has something to trauma bond over.

Weeks before that night, my legs still had trouble with the slight slope a couple of blocks from the no god house. That night, and I recall it dearly, the slope gave me no trouble. Before I’d set out on my shift, my girlfriend commented on my weight loss. Really, everyone had slimmed up in these after times, what with food being one of the new major currencies, but add in half a night of deliveries via pedal mobile, and I definitely fit far more into the before time male gaze idea of beauty. Didn’t mean much to me, but Ellie did not like it.

“Em, I tried to snuggle against you last night, and your hips kept stabbing me in the but.”

Yeah, I’m Em. No, I won’t tell you what it’s short for. And she’s Ellie. Short for nothing. Together, that makes us Em-Ellie. Disgusting. But we were in love, and that's all that mattered.

In response, I had shrugged and suggested that I could stop my deliveries and all those perks that come with my job.”

My extra layers, despite the summer heat, didn’t hurt with burning calories. The sweat-soaked long johns clung to me under my jeans and hoodies, as did the handkerchief tied around my mouth and nose. It didn’t offer complete immunity from growing any scales, but it certainly helped. My developing strength and endurance helped me to avoid or outrun most of the silver smaug. The result was, at the end of each delivery shift, I had been peeling fewer and fewer scales off my body.

Three blocks past the rise, and two blocks to my next delivery, I spotted someone lying on a bus stop bench. The one with an advertisement for one of those ride-sharing services from the before. No, the irony was not lost on me, but I didn’t worry about that in the moment. Instead, I wondered what the hell someone was doing sleeping on a bench outside when plenty of houses were open to anyone who wanted one. Another great irony, considering the homeless population permeating the city in the before.

Someone was curled up under a blanket. Well, a little under the blanket. Part of the blanket hung off the bench. A pair of boots stuck out from under the blanket and off the end of the bench. I slowed to a stop, got off my bike, shook him awake, and said, “Best get somewhere inside.”

A guy groaned, rolled over, and blinked up at me. His skin was white. Not Caucasian. White. I stepped back a little, some things are still shocking when you first experience them, even after Armagodden Day. I repeated, you should get somewhere inside.

He kind of looked up and past me, blinked again, and asked, “Why?”

This time, I blinked. Then I looked around. A block and a half away, a small cloud of silver smaug floated out of an alley at the pace of a quick jog.

“Um, a cloud is coming.” I pointed in that direction.

“So?” he pulled the blanket over himself, turned away from me, and muttered unintelligibly.

“Well...” My mouth opened and closed a couple of times. I glanced at the silver smaug. Which seemed to have decided to come this way. “Good luck. I tried.”

I hopped back on my bike and hurried away past the darkened cars that had most of their windows smashed out and many had been gutted for raw materials. For a few seconds, guilt gnawed at my guts. After all, the silver smaug was floating toward the bench guy. Then I got over it. Most of us left on earth tried to look after each other as best we could, but we don’t have much patience for stupid. So, on I peddled to my next delivery.

Half a block from the townhouse, A candle flame flickered in the darkness... a quarter block away... And I saw someone sitting on the steps leading to the front porch. When I slowed to a stop, one of my clients, Arthur George, nodded to me. He was an older gentleman. Bald and white beard. And I mean the gentleman part. Always well spoken, groomed, and charming.

“What’s up, Art?” I asked.

“Love what you’re doing,” Art said. “But...” he looked away, up to the overcast and shimmering sky.

I glanced behind me, worried about the silver smaug on my trail. Couldn’t see it, so I looked back at Art.

“Buuuuut?” I asked.

Art blinked, shook his head, fixed his attention on me, gazed past my shoulders, and then looked at me again. He hadn’t freaked out, so I figured I was okay for at least a couple of minutes.

“You’ve given me the Blackbeard dream three nights in a row. I don’t mean to complain. It’s a good dream. Be happy to have it again someday, but I’d like to mix things up. Um... for at least a little bit.”

“Oh man.” I tried to sound as sorry as I should have been for not mixing up the cards as much as I should have. “Thanks for letting me know. I’ll make a note of it and do my best to keep things fresh. Shouldn’t happen again.”

“Thanks,” Art said. “I’ll get back to bed if you want to leave it on the door.”

“I’ll bring it back by at the end of my route,” I said. “It’s better if you’re already asleep when I slip it between the door and the door jam.”

Art went back inside.

I didn’t actually know if I had lied or not, but I didn’t want to get that far away from my bike at night with another person around. Nothing about Art made me think that he might try anything, but this was the world after, and it was nighttime. Can never be too careful.

The silver smaug from earlier hadn’t come into view. Weird. Even if it had infected the bench guy, it should have moved on again. I shrugged and got to pedaling. These dreams weren’t going to post themselves on my customers’ doors.

The rest of my route went mostly smoothly. The joyful highlights of the night as I remember them...

A couple of teenage boys were trying to herd a small cloud of silver smaug with leaf blowers. I can’t even imagine the ass-whooping they’d get from wasting such precious fuel on a pointless task. Yes? They managed to move the crowd cloud around, barely. Whenever they stopped flowing, the smaug moved toward them, quickly. After all, it was only a tiny cloud. Those little suckers could be hard for me to outrun on my bike. I watched with amusement for a few minutes and then went on my way.

The worst part of my night was when I had to get off my bike and walk up a flight of steps to a second story apartment, and a massive silver smaug descended from the sky to envelope the building. I held my breath as best as I could, but still it’s semi-sweet pine cone and pollen scent filled my nose. My lungs and throat burned by the time I got back to my bike. Even though I hated myself for it, I had to take a deep breath before I could get my bike up to speed.

A thought came to me. Maybe it wasn’t the scales that grew from people’s skin that turned them into monstrosities. After all, those popped off after a couple hours at most once you got away from the smaug. Maybe the true transformation of their minds and identities came from inhaling too much of the smaug and the scales formed on the inside where you couldn’t peel them away. Or maybe just an over-saturation of both.

When I finally rode free of the cloud, I gasped and wheezed for breath. Each breath brought a small coughing fit, but in those moments, I truly knew the joy of living. My skin prickled and tingled in a couple of places, mostly my extremities. A scale was already forming on the back of my left hand. I’d deal with them when I got home, even the one between my shoulder blades, even though that meant getting Ellie to help me pull however many scales grew on my back by morning. My hacking and coughing, maybe to expunge the bits of scales working to infect my insides, meant the rest of today’s deliveries would take longer . hopefully I’d make it back to parts and time to get him his new dream. Failing to give him a dream would be worse than giving him the Black Beard dream again.

Pedal... pedal... cough... pedal... gasp… wheeze... pedal... shove a card into the door jam of another house.... repeat...

When I got to the Chomsky’s place, a note with my name was waiting on the door jam. I opened it and read:

Em— last night we all got the same dream. One of the things we like about your dreams is taking talking about them when we have breakfast—thanks, Earl Chomsky.

I these two complaints had me wondering how many mistakes I’d made that other customers weren’t complaining about. I didn’t want to add organization to my list of tad daily tasks. Eating sleeping, and writing more dreams was all I wanted to have to do each day. However, if I wanted to keep enough clients to keep this as my primary gig, I'd have to create some kind of file system or flow chart or way to track who had gotten which dreams. Figured any number of stores would still have white boards and dry would have much call for them after the end of the world.

A bit past three am, I got back to Art’s place, and put the new card on his door. He should be deeply back to sleep by then, so I double checked the dream. Half an hour later, I carried my bike up the steps and through the front door as quietly as I could while everyone in the house knew what I did, and sometimes food fatigue made me noisier than I might otherwise have been. I closed the door with my foot, of course far louder than I had intended. My face scrunched up, and I instinctively glanced toward the stairs, even though had I woken at anyone, they would barely be rolling out of bed, let alone glaring at me from the second floor landing. I leaned the bike against the door a kind of as a kind of alarm system and deterrent in case anyone had decided to follow me home. Not the best idea for security. But it was something.

The bag of dream cards got tossed on the coffee table by the couch, and I tiptoed across the living room, through the kitchen, and into the laundry room. We didn’t have a washer and dryer. Well we did, just in the backyard because nobody had power. Instead, we’ve erplaced them with a big metal replaced them with a big metal tub. Ellie and her mother filled it each night so I could soak and wash the smaug schmutz off my body before crawling into bed with my girl. Back in the before, I used to hate—and by hate, I mean loathe with the proverbial every fiber of my being—any kind of cold water on my body. But after a few weeks of dream delivery, I grew to look forward to the soothing coolness of these baths even before I carried my bike down the steps to make my nightly rounds.

That night, within seconds of settling into the tepid water, likely half a dozen scales floated off me, shining a bit in the soft phosphorescent light glowing inside a cloud of silver smaug nudging against the window. I sighed. Not every night was like was this bad. Really, that one big cloud made this the worst so far. Usually, I only had a few scales. Usually, fewer than the number floating in the tub around me through the whole bath rather than just after I’d gotten in the water. But night seemed to be getting worse and worse.

Minutes went on. I couldn’t tell, not enough light, but I felt my fingers pruning. Sleep called to me, and my dream cards wouldn't work on me. Only sleeping with Ellie did anything to keep my nightmares at bay, and tonight was going to be a couch night. I didn’t want these scales rubbing against Ellie's soft, suit smooth, perfect skin. My eyes drooped. My head drooped forward. Hell, it might be asleep in the bathtub night. That would certainly make it easier to clean up the scales I shed during the night.

I registered the flickering light from the kitchen just before I heard Ellie’s voice.

“Em? You back there?”

I gave some kind of vocalized response that was supposed to sound like don't come in here until I’ve spent a night shedding. Yeah, she would have helped with some of the scales, like the one that kept pressing into my spine every time I leaned back against the tub. But that didn’t mean I wanted her to see me right now.

Somehow, the intention of my less-than-articulate grunt got lost in the translation. Ellie came in, stood over me, and gasp.

“Oh, Em...”

The silence of her shock lingered.

My stomach shrank and sank into my ass. I tried my best to turn away from her and fold in on myself.

“Oh, stop that.” She shook the shock had left her voice, and she regained her regular, almost sarcastic tone. “Let me light a few more candles.”

She did. I closed my eyes because I didn’t want to see her seeing my body like this. Ellie went to the kitchen and got a knife and some tongs. For the next hour or so, she explored my body, putting pulling and prying the scales away. Some just popped off. Others caused gasps and whimpers. When that happened, Ellie kissed my head and/or shoulder. Sometimes she nagged me, but it didn’t matter but when it mattered, she stepped up and took care of me.

Once most of the scales were in a bucket by the door. My pounding heart and extra wide smile made me forget all about my sunken stomach. Ellie dried me off and led me upstairs to bed.

Baba Yaga, a wolf, and a child—which is you—walk into a bar on Mars. You took a SpaceCar to get there. Doctor Teeth and the Electric Mayhem are playing the penultimate show of their Flabbergasted Vagina tour, guest staring, Gonzo the Great and the Chicken Candy trio. You’re watching the Great One lean over the mic. That hooked nose makes him seem so much more beautiful live than on the show. You press against the stage, so close you can see the beads of sweat dripping from the band members. You don’t care that they are muppets. It’s Mars after all, Mars after the end of the world. Everyone has learned exactly what the fox says. Even the wolf. Heck, even Baba Yaga is here, so muppets sweating is no big deal. Gonzo and Mr. Teeth are both looking at the child—which is you. They’re waiting for you to belt some mad notes, but you have no mic. They lift you on stage, and now you know why muppets sweat. You’re a muppet. Baba Yaga is a muppet. The wolf remains a wolf, not a muppet at all. The stage lights are liquid heat on you. Sweat drips from you too. You grab a mic and join the song. Vocal cords vibrating. Sweat dripping. “Nice set, bone daddy,” Baba Yaga says at the end of the show just before she leads you backstage, to where her chicken-legged house awaits.