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Chapter 7

The outspoken Visitor looked unsatisfied with his guide's argument. Morit smirked to himself. Well, Chuck Meadows's personal map would end up being a very limited one, because he intended that this would be a very short trip for the Visitors. The guide, perpetrator and facilitator of this outrageous invasion, was as unwelcome as his clients. He must be caught in the upcoming disaster, too.

Morit settled back into his plush seat, concentrating on making it a safe place lined with shock padding to insulate him from what was to come. His confederates were not far away now. They were preparing their attack, the details of which Morit had carefully and lovingly worked out. The intruders would be surprised when the crunch came. And a beautiful crunch it would be. He felt a momentary twinge for Blanda, but decided her natural armor against annoyance would protect her from harm, and what was disaster but an oversized annoyance? He couldn't warn her. She admired the Visitors, the foolish female. She would want to tell them everything, and that would be the end of his long-plotted revenge against the Waking World. He glanced at her. She was intent upon the Visitors, and paid no attention to him.

* * *

"Look, I don't have to know everything about where we're going, but I like to be prepared," Chuck said, holding the map crumpled in his fist. It was still trying to make a break for it, but Chuck wouldn't let it go. "Can't you just post it here in the car so we can all look at it?"

"Would you just calm down and let the guide do his job?" Persemid snapped at him.

"I would say this is part of his job," Chuck said, rounding on her. "I don't like charging into the unknown blind."

"You're not blind. You can look at it as much as you want," Persemid said. "You just can't hog it to yourself."

"Please, please, friends," Keir said, stepping between them with his hands up. Having to deal with two aspects at once left him looking like a werewolf. "This is really not a matter to get so heated over."

"I say, aren't we going a trifle fast?" Hiramus interrupted. Chuck glanced out of the window. The telegraph poles were whipping by so swiftly that they were blurring.

"Sleeper's whim," Keir said, cheerfully. "We were creeping before. The engineer undoubtedly wants to make up for lost time."

Hiramus raised his eyebrows. "What engineer?"

Keir turned around to look toward the front of the train. To Chuck's surprise, they were able to see through the wall all the way to the tracks. Their car was now just behind the locomotive, with a transparent view of everything going on in the cab, as though that wall had turned into a picture window. Chuck stood up. He could see everything: the empty cabin, the controls, the chain hanging down from the steam whistle, the oil can on a bracket, the nose of the engine as she began to round a bend, and far ahead, the endlessly deep chasm where the tracks ought to be. Pipistrella pointed and screamed. Everyone turned idly to see what was the matter.

The next second the car was full of panicking passengers rushing all over the place. A few of them fell to their knees and began praying loudly. One man strapped on a parachute and goggles, and jumped out of a window. Women huddled into a corner with their children clinging to their skirts. Men dashed back and forth with fire hoses, axes and blueprints, getting in each other's way. Chuck pushed them aside so he could see what was going on. The train wasn't stopping. They were going to crash! Where was the crew?

At that moment, the engineer wandered back into the picture, carrying a cup of tea and a newspaper, his mouth pursed as though he was whistling. He glanced out of the windshield, did a double take, threw the cup in the air and lunged for the brake handle. He hauled it back mightily. A screeching sound filled the air. The cars jarred as the brakes skidded, throwing screaming passengers off their feet, into seats, the aisle and each other, but the train didn't slacken in speed at all. The engineer held onto the handle until it snapped off in his hands. The wind caught it away from him, and it flew out of the side of the cabin. The engineer grabbed the whistle cord and yanked it frantically. Shrill hoots split the air. Chuck felt his heart race like the engine. They weren't stopping!

"What happens if we crash here?" Sean Draper shouted over the noise. "Will we die in our normal bodies?"

That was so exactly what Chuck was thinking that he wasn't surprised when the two of them began to run forward at precisely the same moment, hoping to get to the front of the train. He didn't know what they could do to make it stop, but they had to do something!

They pounded on the picture window with their fists. Chuck was aware of Bergold at his side, digging at the glass with his hands, which were suddenly equipped with curved claws like a badger's. The little Historian muttered to himself about "Helplessness scenario." Chuck didn't know exactly what it meant, but his rushing brain was happy to put the worst interpretation on it. Would helplessness mean death, or could they hope for a last-minute rescue? They couldn't wait around to find out. The chasm loomed nearer and nearer.

Chuck dug frantically at the glass with his fingernails, and felt them break away. The train was only moments from plunging into the depths. He imagined a wild vision of himself and the others fleeing from the car, jumping just before the impact. Escape, that was it!

Before he could turn and run, Chuck felt a soft bar press into the backs of his legs, shoving him forward. His knees buckled, dumping him onto a seat that came up and under him, scooping him up off the floor. He tried to outrun the seat, but it was moving faster than he could. He dug his heels in and shoved back. Sweeping his feet right off the floor, the seat tilted crazily upward as though in the next moment it would propel him into the abyss ahead. Chuck's heart pounded in terror. He made an attempt to jump off the side of the seat. As he tried to rise, belts snapped around his wrists and waist while his legs dangled helplessly. He couldn't get away now. He was going to die, smashed to bits on the rocks below. What would his family say when they found his lifeless body in the morning? He had to free himself, but he couldn't tear his eyes away from the onrushing calamity. The break in the track came closer and closer. Chuck could see the sharp edges of the torn metal rails, the spikes of broken wooden ties, and the endless nothingness beyond. Children were screaming, and the engine noise was louder than ever, pounding like jungle drums in his ears.

"Backpedal!" someone cried. "Backpedal!"

Chuck felt heavy blocks bump up against the soles of his feet, like the pedals on his old bike, the one he got from his grandfather when he was small. He even felt the heavy rubber handlebars form under his hands. He curled his fingers around them, squeezing tightly. As surely as his grandfather's arms had when he was a boy, they gave him confidence. Chuck got up off the seat, suddenly narrow and hard against his bottom, and stood up on the pedals. Clinging tightly for support to the handlebars, he started milling his feet backwards, until he felt resistance against the pedals like the chain of a bicycle. The drag was heavy but not beyond his strength. Grimly, Chuck kept his eyes on the nearing abyss. He kept pumping his legs until the train screeched hotly to a halt only a few feet from disaster.

"He saved us!" Bergold cried, pointing at Chuck. The whole car erupted in shouts of joy and wild applause.

"Congratulations, Master Chuck," Bolster said, smiling his wintry smile from across the aisle. "You're a hero, sir!"

"You're a hero! You're a hero. Awk!" Spot, a handsome scarlet macaw, chattered, fluttering his wings. Mrs. Flannel just looked at Chuck adoringly.

Chuck felt his legs swinging freely, and found that the straps holding him in had become a rigid body harness, like those on an inverting roller coaster. A young man in a striped jacket and a name badge came by, unlocked everybody from their seats and pointed them toward a big red sign reading EXIT. Chuck stood on the moving walkway rolling along the aisle as the other passengers clustered close, slapping him on the back and shaking his hand as he went by. He felt foolish.

"It was nothing," he said.

"Your modesty does you credit," Bergold said, riding the runner behind him, "but your quick thinking averted a terrible disaster." He slapped Chuck on the shoulder. "Thank you, my friend."

"It really wasn't anything special," Chuck admitted, uncomfortable with all the faces staring at him. "I just did what Keir told me to."

Keir, a couple of people ahead on the moving path, turned and raised his wiry brows. "I didn't say a word to you, son," the guide said. "You might have heard one of your inner voices advising you. That often happens in times of crisis."

"No," Chuck said, thoughtfully. "It really sounded like it came from outside my head."

"Then who was it?" Persemid asked, poking him in the ribs from behind. "Not to steal from your amazing feet, excuse the pun. I'm just curious."

"Me, too," Chuck said, sincerely. "I don't know."

He glanced around. Those whose eyes he met shook their heads. He was puzzled. No one would admit to having shouted at him. It seemed strange that nobody would want credit for the rescue.

It was a rescue worthy of thanks. When Chuck walked down to the engine end of the train, he joined all the passengers looking down at the ravine into which they had almost plunged. He stood at the edge, feeling the giddy hollowness in his middle that comes from staring down from great heights, and whistled at the gap in the tracks over the sharp rocks. Tiny specks far below them swooped and turned in the air. He realized they were birds. The gorge must be thousands of feet deep. Persemid stood beside him, swaying slightly. He stood ready to leap for her if she started to fall over.

"We almost rode straight into that," Persemid said, her round face pale. "The track is just gone." Chuck nodded, silent, glancing around for any clue as to what had happened to millions of square feet of land. He swallowed uncomfortably. The engine had only been a few yards from the edge.

"What happened to the land here?" Hiramus asked, gazing down into the depths. "It doesn't look like an avalanche or a subsidence. It seems as though something took a huge bite out of the landscape."

"Look at that terrible destruction," agreed Mrs. Flannel, holding Spot on her arm, as they surveyed the damage to the track. The parrot gripped her sleeve tightly, and let out a long whistle as he dipped his head to look down. "What a nuisance!"

"My hat, that's a deep one," Bergold said. He consulted a small book that he took from his coat pocket, and made some notes in it with a gold pencil. "I don't think it was a nuisance, madam. They're rarely this destructive."

"It's eaten away the tracks," Persemid said. "How are we supposed to keep going?"

"It won't last for long," Keir assured her. "The Sleepers like their provinces the way they made them. It'll heal itself pretty soon."

"I hope it is soon," Hiramus said, concern wrinkling his forehead. "I do not wish to be held up here. There is so much more I wish to see on our journey." He peered around, stroking his beard with one hand. Chuck followed his eyes, and frowned at the scenery around the tracks.

"What's wrong?" Persemid asked.

"It's still blurry," Chuck said. "Just like it was out of the window." He pointed to the telegraph poles, unnaturally thin and close together, with wavy wires strung between them like spindly hammocks. Instead of narrow blades, the gray-green grass on either side of the train was a mass of wide, thin sheets, one in front of the next. The picket fence that marked the right-of-way blended together into a single expanse of serrated white. The farther away from the tracks the more normal the scenery looked.

Persemid looked at it, and pursed her lips in amusement. "I wonder if it is ever that way at home."

"If I ever jump out of a moving train I'll let you know," Chuck said.

"You can here, you know," she said, with a mischievous glint in her eyes. "You should try it. It might be fun."

"No, thanks."

"Oh, that's right," she said, with heavy irony in her voice. "You like to know the outcome of everything in advance."

Peeved, Chuck was about to ask if she had ever thought of taking a flying leap herself when the conductor came by with his gold watch in his hand.

"Boo-oard!" The conductor nodded firmly to the two of them. They fell into obedient step behind him as he marched toward the passenger car.

Pipistrella wandered toward the steps, blinking back at the damaged rails. "How can we keep going if there's no track?"

The angel Keir was at her side in a moment, offering her a hand to help her up into the car.

"I'll explain everything, dear," he said. He glanced back at Chuck, and tipped him a sly wink.

As Chuck came back into the car, a woman ran up and clasped his hand warmly. Other passengers clustered around again, patting him on the back, praising him and his heroic deed. A man doffed his pearl gray top hat and bowed deeply.

"We are much obliged to you," he said. Others chimed in with their thanks.

A young girl with a very shrill voice piped, "You're just wonderful!"

"Thank you, sir, thank you!"

Chuck felt rather pleased with himself. "Well, thanks, but it was nothing," he said, shy and elated at the same time. "It's only a dream. Not like you could die or anything." All the people fell quiet, regarding him very oddly.

"But we can," Bergold said, into the silence. "That was literally a moment of life or death for us. We are affected by the events in our world. If the situation becomes inimical to us, we cease to be. We discontinue existence." Chuck stopped in the middle of the aisle and looked around at all the solemn faces.

"Really?" he asked.

"Oh, yes," Bergold said. "If not for your quick intervention, we would have had to deal with the aftermath of a potentially fatal accident."

"Oh," Chuck said, shocked. A horrible thought struck him. "Just you Dreamlanders, or all of us? What would have happened if we'd gone over the edge, Keir? Keir!" The guide was still ministering to Pipistrella, who sat listening to him like a little child. Chuck wanted answers! No one had told him he could get killed here. "Keir!" The hysterical note in his voice drew the little man to his side at once. "Could we die in this dream?"

"People who dream they are killed don't really die, you know," Keir said, maybe a trifle too hastily. "Otherwise, how would we ever have heard about their dreams in the Waking World? Dead men tell no tales!"

"What about those myths that if you dream that you die in your sleep, you'll wake up dead?" Sean asked, his slate-blue eyes wide open with fear. The guide assumed the guise of Sean's mother and sat down beside him.

"Oh, that's just it, they're myths, my lad," Keir said, with a trilling laugh Chuck found unconvincing. "In the normal way of things, nothing would happen. It'd be just a dream. Of course, you must recall you are not asleep. This is you, here, now. That makes things a little different."

"Different how?" Chuck demanded. The deep blue eyes looked up at him with just a hint of the sharpness of Chuck's avatar.

"Completely different," she said.

"So we can be permanently harmed?" Sean pressed. Keir put a forefinger to pursed lips, and Sean sat back, looking at the image of his mother with an expression of frustration. He started to speak, but the guide shook her head.

"Ah, ah, ah!"

Sean pressed his lips together and looked away.

So the old story of dying in his dreams wasn't true. That was the good news. Chuck was relieved. The bad news was that this wasn't a dream. He was in a trance state. He couldn't be as rash or as adventurous here as he had hoped. Mistakes would cost him heavily. A fatal accident here would really kill him. No matter what demons had visited him while he was at home, he didn't really want to die. Chuck couldn't help but stare out the front of the car at the ravine beyond the engine, and feel the sinking of his stomach as he contemplated its jagged depths. They would have died if the train had crashed. He ought to have felt exalted at saving them all. Instead, he felt subdued.

"Isn't there some way we can hide that?" he asked, more snappishly than he intended. The conductor stepped forward and pulled a curtain across the window.

* * *

Morit was perturbed the train had not gone into the chasm. While everyone else had run around like hysterical chickens during the emergency, he had sat tight in his crash couch, ready for the long fall and following impact. How Chuck Meadows had prevented the disaster he had no idea. But the attempt had achieved a minor success. The Visitors were shaken up. They'd be a good deal more cautious, but caution would do them no good at all. They were marked for destruction, and he meant to ensure that they were destroyed. But not all of them. One had to survive to bring the word to the Waking World. But Morit was determined that that survivor would not be Chuck Meadows.

All but one must die this tour. The next time all the Visitors and their guides. After a few massacres, guides would be actively discouraging travel here by Visitors. When word of the attacks got back to Mnemosyne, there would never be another incursion from the Waking World. The Dreamland would be left in peace.

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Framed

Back | Next
Contents

Chapter 7

The outspoken Visitor looked unsatisfied with his guide's argument. Morit smirked to himself. Well, Chuck Meadows's personal map would end up being a very limited one, because he intended that this would be a very short trip for the Visitors. The guide, perpetrator and facilitator of this outrageous invasion, was as unwelcome as his clients. He must be caught in the upcoming disaster, too.

Morit settled back into his plush seat, concentrating on making it a safe place lined with shock padding to insulate him from what was to come. His confederates were not far away now. They were preparing their attack, the details of which Morit had carefully and lovingly worked out. The intruders would be surprised when the crunch came. And a beautiful crunch it would be. He felt a momentary twinge for Blanda, but decided her natural armor against annoyance would protect her from harm, and what was disaster but an oversized annoyance? He couldn't warn her. She admired the Visitors, the foolish female. She would want to tell them everything, and that would be the end of his long-plotted revenge against the Waking World. He glanced at her. She was intent upon the Visitors, and paid no attention to him.

* * *

"Look, I don't have to know everything about where we're going, but I like to be prepared," Chuck said, holding the map crumpled in his fist. It was still trying to make a break for it, but Chuck wouldn't let it go. "Can't you just post it here in the car so we can all look at it?"

"Would you just calm down and let the guide do his job?" Persemid snapped at him.

"I would say this is part of his job," Chuck said, rounding on her. "I don't like charging into the unknown blind."

"You're not blind. You can look at it as much as you want," Persemid said. "You just can't hog it to yourself."

"Please, please, friends," Keir said, stepping between them with his hands up. Having to deal with two aspects at once left him looking like a werewolf. "This is really not a matter to get so heated over."

"I say, aren't we going a trifle fast?" Hiramus interrupted. Chuck glanced out of the window. The telegraph poles were whipping by so swiftly that they were blurring.

"Sleeper's whim," Keir said, cheerfully. "We were creeping before. The engineer undoubtedly wants to make up for lost time."

Hiramus raised his eyebrows. "What engineer?"

Keir turned around to look toward the front of the train. To Chuck's surprise, they were able to see through the wall all the way to the tracks. Their car was now just behind the locomotive, with a transparent view of everything going on in the cab, as though that wall had turned into a picture window. Chuck stood up. He could see everything: the empty cabin, the controls, the chain hanging down from the steam whistle, the oil can on a bracket, the nose of the engine as she began to round a bend, and far ahead, the endlessly deep chasm where the tracks ought to be. Pipistrella pointed and screamed. Everyone turned idly to see what was the matter.

The next second the car was full of panicking passengers rushing all over the place. A few of them fell to their knees and began praying loudly. One man strapped on a parachute and goggles, and jumped out of a window. Women huddled into a corner with their children clinging to their skirts. Men dashed back and forth with fire hoses, axes and blueprints, getting in each other's way. Chuck pushed them aside so he could see what was going on. The train wasn't stopping. They were going to crash! Where was the crew?

At that moment, the engineer wandered back into the picture, carrying a cup of tea and a newspaper, his mouth pursed as though he was whistling. He glanced out of the windshield, did a double take, threw the cup in the air and lunged for the brake handle. He hauled it back mightily. A screeching sound filled the air. The cars jarred as the brakes skidded, throwing screaming passengers off their feet, into seats, the aisle and each other, but the train didn't slacken in speed at all. The engineer held onto the handle until it snapped off in his hands. The wind caught it away from him, and it flew out of the side of the cabin. The engineer grabbed the whistle cord and yanked it frantically. Shrill hoots split the air. Chuck felt his heart race like the engine. They weren't stopping!

"What happens if we crash here?" Sean Draper shouted over the noise. "Will we die in our normal bodies?"

That was so exactly what Chuck was thinking that he wasn't surprised when the two of them began to run forward at precisely the same moment, hoping to get to the front of the train. He didn't know what they could do to make it stop, but they had to do something!

They pounded on the picture window with their fists. Chuck was aware of Bergold at his side, digging at the glass with his hands, which were suddenly equipped with curved claws like a badger's. The little Historian muttered to himself about "Helplessness scenario." Chuck didn't know exactly what it meant, but his rushing brain was happy to put the worst interpretation on it. Would helplessness mean death, or could they hope for a last-minute rescue? They couldn't wait around to find out. The chasm loomed nearer and nearer.

Chuck dug frantically at the glass with his fingernails, and felt them break away. The train was only moments from plunging into the depths. He imagined a wild vision of himself and the others fleeing from the car, jumping just before the impact. Escape, that was it!

Before he could turn and run, Chuck felt a soft bar press into the backs of his legs, shoving him forward. His knees buckled, dumping him onto a seat that came up and under him, scooping him up off the floor. He tried to outrun the seat, but it was moving faster than he could. He dug his heels in and shoved back. Sweeping his feet right off the floor, the seat tilted crazily upward as though in the next moment it would propel him into the abyss ahead. Chuck's heart pounded in terror. He made an attempt to jump off the side of the seat. As he tried to rise, belts snapped around his wrists and waist while his legs dangled helplessly. He couldn't get away now. He was going to die, smashed to bits on the rocks below. What would his family say when they found his lifeless body in the morning? He had to free himself, but he couldn't tear his eyes away from the onrushing calamity. The break in the track came closer and closer. Chuck could see the sharp edges of the torn metal rails, the spikes of broken wooden ties, and the endless nothingness beyond. Children were screaming, and the engine noise was louder than ever, pounding like jungle drums in his ears.

"Backpedal!" someone cried. "Backpedal!"

Chuck felt heavy blocks bump up against the soles of his feet, like the pedals on his old bike, the one he got from his grandfather when he was small. He even felt the heavy rubber handlebars form under his hands. He curled his fingers around them, squeezing tightly. As surely as his grandfather's arms had when he was a boy, they gave him confidence. Chuck got up off the seat, suddenly narrow and hard against his bottom, and stood up on the pedals. Clinging tightly for support to the handlebars, he started milling his feet backwards, until he felt resistance against the pedals like the chain of a bicycle. The drag was heavy but not beyond his strength. Grimly, Chuck kept his eyes on the nearing abyss. He kept pumping his legs until the train screeched hotly to a halt only a few feet from disaster.

"He saved us!" Bergold cried, pointing at Chuck. The whole car erupted in shouts of joy and wild applause.

"Congratulations, Master Chuck," Bolster said, smiling his wintry smile from across the aisle. "You're a hero, sir!"

"You're a hero! You're a hero. Awk!" Spot, a handsome scarlet macaw, chattered, fluttering his wings. Mrs. Flannel just looked at Chuck adoringly.

Chuck felt his legs swinging freely, and found that the straps holding him in had become a rigid body harness, like those on an inverting roller coaster. A young man in a striped jacket and a name badge came by, unlocked everybody from their seats and pointed them toward a big red sign reading EXIT. Chuck stood on the moving walkway rolling along the aisle as the other passengers clustered close, slapping him on the back and shaking his hand as he went by. He felt foolish.

"It was nothing," he said.

"Your modesty does you credit," Bergold said, riding the runner behind him, "but your quick thinking averted a terrible disaster." He slapped Chuck on the shoulder. "Thank you, my friend."

"It really wasn't anything special," Chuck admitted, uncomfortable with all the faces staring at him. "I just did what Keir told me to."

Keir, a couple of people ahead on the moving path, turned and raised his wiry brows. "I didn't say a word to you, son," the guide said. "You might have heard one of your inner voices advising you. That often happens in times of crisis."

"No," Chuck said, thoughtfully. "It really sounded like it came from outside my head."

"Then who was it?" Persemid asked, poking him in the ribs from behind. "Not to steal from your amazing feet, excuse the pun. I'm just curious."

"Me, too," Chuck said, sincerely. "I don't know."

He glanced around. Those whose eyes he met shook their heads. He was puzzled. No one would admit to having shouted at him. It seemed strange that nobody would want credit for the rescue.

It was a rescue worthy of thanks. When Chuck walked down to the engine end of the train, he joined all the passengers looking down at the ravine into which they had almost plunged. He stood at the edge, feeling the giddy hollowness in his middle that comes from staring down from great heights, and whistled at the gap in the tracks over the sharp rocks. Tiny specks far below them swooped and turned in the air. He realized they were birds. The gorge must be thousands of feet deep. Persemid stood beside him, swaying slightly. He stood ready to leap for her if she started to fall over.

"We almost rode straight into that," Persemid said, her round face pale. "The track is just gone." Chuck nodded, silent, glancing around for any clue as to what had happened to millions of square feet of land. He swallowed uncomfortably. The engine had only been a few yards from the edge.

"What happened to the land here?" Hiramus asked, gazing down into the depths. "It doesn't look like an avalanche or a subsidence. It seems as though something took a huge bite out of the landscape."

"Look at that terrible destruction," agreed Mrs. Flannel, holding Spot on her arm, as they surveyed the damage to the track. The parrot gripped her sleeve tightly, and let out a long whistle as he dipped his head to look down. "What a nuisance!"

"My hat, that's a deep one," Bergold said. He consulted a small book that he took from his coat pocket, and made some notes in it with a gold pencil. "I don't think it was a nuisance, madam. They're rarely this destructive."

"It's eaten away the tracks," Persemid said. "How are we supposed to keep going?"

"It won't last for long," Keir assured her. "The Sleepers like their provinces the way they made them. It'll heal itself pretty soon."

"I hope it is soon," Hiramus said, concern wrinkling his forehead. "I do not wish to be held up here. There is so much more I wish to see on our journey." He peered around, stroking his beard with one hand. Chuck followed his eyes, and frowned at the scenery around the tracks.

"What's wrong?" Persemid asked.

"It's still blurry," Chuck said. "Just like it was out of the window." He pointed to the telegraph poles, unnaturally thin and close together, with wavy wires strung between them like spindly hammocks. Instead of narrow blades, the gray-green grass on either side of the train was a mass of wide, thin sheets, one in front of the next. The picket fence that marked the right-of-way blended together into a single expanse of serrated white. The farther away from the tracks the more normal the scenery looked.

Persemid looked at it, and pursed her lips in amusement. "I wonder if it is ever that way at home."

"If I ever jump out of a moving train I'll let you know," Chuck said.

"You can here, you know," she said, with a mischievous glint in her eyes. "You should try it. It might be fun."

"No, thanks."

"Oh, that's right," she said, with heavy irony in her voice. "You like to know the outcome of everything in advance."

Peeved, Chuck was about to ask if she had ever thought of taking a flying leap herself when the conductor came by with his gold watch in his hand.

"Boo-oard!" The conductor nodded firmly to the two of them. They fell into obedient step behind him as he marched toward the passenger car.

Pipistrella wandered toward the steps, blinking back at the damaged rails. "How can we keep going if there's no track?"

The angel Keir was at her side in a moment, offering her a hand to help her up into the car.

"I'll explain everything, dear," he said. He glanced back at Chuck, and tipped him a sly wink.

As Chuck came back into the car, a woman ran up and clasped his hand warmly. Other passengers clustered around again, patting him on the back, praising him and his heroic deed. A man doffed his pearl gray top hat and bowed deeply.

"We are much obliged to you," he said. Others chimed in with their thanks.

A young girl with a very shrill voice piped, "You're just wonderful!"

"Thank you, sir, thank you!"

Chuck felt rather pleased with himself. "Well, thanks, but it was nothing," he said, shy and elated at the same time. "It's only a dream. Not like you could die or anything." All the people fell quiet, regarding him very oddly.

"But we can," Bergold said, into the silence. "That was literally a moment of life or death for us. We are affected by the events in our world. If the situation becomes inimical to us, we cease to be. We discontinue existence." Chuck stopped in the middle of the aisle and looked around at all the solemn faces.

"Really?" he asked.

"Oh, yes," Bergold said. "If not for your quick intervention, we would have had to deal with the aftermath of a potentially fatal accident."

"Oh," Chuck said, shocked. A horrible thought struck him. "Just you Dreamlanders, or all of us? What would have happened if we'd gone over the edge, Keir? Keir!" The guide was still ministering to Pipistrella, who sat listening to him like a little child. Chuck wanted answers! No one had told him he could get killed here. "Keir!" The hysterical note in his voice drew the little man to his side at once. "Could we die in this dream?"

"People who dream they are killed don't really die, you know," Keir said, maybe a trifle too hastily. "Otherwise, how would we ever have heard about their dreams in the Waking World? Dead men tell no tales!"

"What about those myths that if you dream that you die in your sleep, you'll wake up dead?" Sean asked, his slate-blue eyes wide open with fear. The guide assumed the guise of Sean's mother and sat down beside him.

"Oh, that's just it, they're myths, my lad," Keir said, with a trilling laugh Chuck found unconvincing. "In the normal way of things, nothing would happen. It'd be just a dream. Of course, you must recall you are not asleep. This is you, here, now. That makes things a little different."

"Different how?" Chuck demanded. The deep blue eyes looked up at him with just a hint of the sharpness of Chuck's avatar.

"Completely different," she said.

"So we can be permanently harmed?" Sean pressed. Keir put a forefinger to pursed lips, and Sean sat back, looking at the image of his mother with an expression of frustration. He started to speak, but the guide shook her head.

"Ah, ah, ah!"

Sean pressed his lips together and looked away.

So the old story of dying in his dreams wasn't true. That was the good news. Chuck was relieved. The bad news was that this wasn't a dream. He was in a trance state. He couldn't be as rash or as adventurous here as he had hoped. Mistakes would cost him heavily. A fatal accident here would really kill him. No matter what demons had visited him while he was at home, he didn't really want to die. Chuck couldn't help but stare out the front of the car at the ravine beyond the engine, and feel the sinking of his stomach as he contemplated its jagged depths. They would have died if the train had crashed. He ought to have felt exalted at saving them all. Instead, he felt subdued.

"Isn't there some way we can hide that?" he asked, more snappishly than he intended. The conductor stepped forward and pulled a curtain across the window.

* * *

Morit was perturbed the train had not gone into the chasm. While everyone else had run around like hysterical chickens during the emergency, he had sat tight in his crash couch, ready for the long fall and following impact. How Chuck Meadows had prevented the disaster he had no idea. But the attempt had achieved a minor success. The Visitors were shaken up. They'd be a good deal more cautious, but caution would do them no good at all. They were marked for destruction, and he meant to ensure that they were destroyed. But not all of them. One had to survive to bring the word to the Waking World. But Morit was determined that that survivor would not be Chuck Meadows.

All but one must die this tour. The next time all the Visitors and their guides. After a few massacres, guides would be actively discouraging travel here by Visitors. When word of the attacks got back to Mnemosyne, there would never be another incursion from the Waking World. The Dreamland would be left in peace.

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