Dream Engine

She was falling and falling fast.

But it wasn’t the free fall through the void that bothered her. She simply wasn’t dressed for it—wearing a black tank top and cotton pajama bottoms with a bold, rainbow-striped print.

Not that a different outfit would change the fact that she was plummeting meteor-like through the subtle layers of the universe.

And not that she would still care in a few moments’ time.

As she hurtled through the dark, her concerns peeled away from her like spirals of shedded snakeskin. The hours and days spent droning in front of screens—gone. The noise of talking heads cheerfully announcing the end of the world—gone. The incessant barrage of advertisers pitching the latest, greatest indulgence—gone.

No more worries about her dwindling bank account. No more empty room beside hers. No more steady beeping of monitors in sterile wards.

It was all a fading wake of stardust, leaving only one bright scrap of memory behind. She held her hands to her heart, fingers clenched tightly around that small slip of memory. It burned like an ember; but no matter how it scorched her, she held on… even after everything else drifted away.

*

Hephaestion.

She held up the crumpled scrap of paper, smoothing out the creases with her thumbs. Just the one word scrawled in black ink. She scowled at the enigmatic message, all the more irritated because she suspected this was her own handwriting.

Thanks for the obtuse message, she grumbled inwardly. What was she supposed to do with this?

As if she didn’t have enough problems, she was lying upside-down in a pile of luggage and the hard cases were digging into her back. Her head throbbed, her body ached, and the room swayed unsteadily around her.

She was onboard a train. Had to be. The cylindrical shape of the compartment and the rhythmic chug, chug, chug of heavy machinery was a dead giveaway. She knew precious little else.

Footsteps approached and she hunkered down into the luggage, crumpling the scrap of paper into her fist.

“Welp,” announced a metallic voice, “looks like we’ve got another one.”

Static hissed. “Another figment?”

“Looks like.” Then a pause. “We can see you, you know. Your pants aren’t exactly subtle.”

Someone poked her sharply in the ribs and she yelped.

“Wakey wakey,” the first voice sing-songed at her robotically.

With a muttered curse, she rolled over, upsetting the heap of bags and boxes as she kicked her legs in an attempt to right herself. She managed to flop into a sitting position, but the room wouldn’t stop moving long enough for her to get to her feet.

“Whoa, there.” The second voice sounded like it was coming through a bad speaker. “Steady now.”

“I’m not a horse,” she muttered.

“Nay, nay,” the static agreed cheerfully.

“But you did have quite a tumble,” the first voice reverberated. Kind of like someone speaking into a tin can.

She peered up at the two fellows standing over her and they peered right back at her. They were identical in size and shape, and they were wearing the same outfits—brown slacks, suspenders, and white shirts with sleeves rolled up to the elbows. The first one had skin made of gleaming plates of copper engraved with spiral designs. Gaps in the plating hinted at intricate machinery underneath. His eyes were iridescent white. The second one had shining silver plates with glass panels embedded in his cheeks and hands, revealing his delicate inner workings. His eyes were black and scattered with stars.

Twin automatons.

Twin works of art.

“Pomp and Gog at your service,” the first automaton said with a flourish. “Pomp here.” He tapped his own chest.

A speaker clicked like a radio turning on. “Gog to meet you!” the second one crowed.

She sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose. Works of art? More like works of snark.

Pomp bent closer. “And you are?”

She opened her mouth to reply, but just as quickly shut it.

Pomp quirked a copper eyebrow. “Can’t remember, can you?”

Heat bloomed across her cheeks and her chin jutted out defiantly.

Click, hiss. “Oh, she’s mad,” Gog noted gleefully.

“Very,” Pomp agreed with a smirk.

Eager to change the subject, she blurted out, “I suppose you want to see a ticket.” If they were going to throw her off the train anyway, she’d rather get it over with than prolong her humiliation.

The automatons traded a bewildered glance.

Pomp offered her a hand up. “Don’t worry, my dear, you’re not in trouble. You wouldn’t be here unless the train wanted you to be here.”

“Is that so?” She snubbed his offer of help and awkwardly hauled herself to her feet, dusting off her pajamas. “And why does the train want me to be here?”

Gog’s voice box crackled. “New hire.”

She stared at him. “The train wants to hire me,” she repeated, incredulous. She wondered if she’d taken a blow to the head. “For what? Where are we going?”

The automatons’ gears whirred.

Why did she get the impression they were laughing? What was she missing? Something obvious, probably.

Pomp motioned her over to the window. Tendrils of cloud-stuff skimmed along the glass in sinuous lines as the train cut through the fog of an endlessly-grey landscape. Pale light filtered through the ambient cloud forms, like the fog itself was glowing.

“Welcome to the astral plane.”

Her brow furrowed. “The astral plane?”

Gog stepped up on her other side. “You’re on an astral train cruising the astral plane.”

She let that sink on. Wasn’t the astral plane a whole different level of existence? Not an outer world, but an inner one? Somewhere in the collective unconscious? Honestly, she didn’t really know. “So you’re saying I’m… dreaming?”

“Yes and no,” Pomp replied. “The train is more real than any dream you’ve ever had.”

“Where’s the next stop?”

“It doesn’t stop for any of us, love,” Gog said.

It doesn’t stop? She swallowed thickly. “So how do I wake up, then? How do I get home?”

The corner of Gog’s mouth twitched. Voice box clicked. “Better take her to see the conductor.”

*

She held the scrap of paper close to her heart as she followed her escorts down the long body of the train. Sleeper car after sleeper car stretched in rumbling succession as the train snaked through the mist.

The corridor was lined with a series of private compartments on one side, each door unique. The doors ranged the gamut from traditional to modern—futuristic, even—and from simple to ornate. The materials were generous and authentic—lush paint, precious stones, finely honed metals. Materials she couldn’t even put a name to. Every detail was precise and expertly crafted to give an impression of the personality of their occupants.

None of the doors had handles or knobs.

And the occupants themselves—were quiet. Occasionally she caught sight of strange silhouettes moving behind translucent windows. Some of the shadows seemed human. Many didn’t. And more than a few suggested impossible scenarios, igniting both her curiosity and her fear.

She hugged herself and followed the automatons on.

Time passed, but it was impossible to know how long. There were no clocks. No sun or moon. Just a fog of perpetual twilight that gradually transformed into a storm. Black clouds enclosed the train; wind and rain lashed at the windows. Lightning struck out with roaring fury, and electricity crackled across the metal skin of the cars. The train shuddered through the turbulence, but it didn’t slow down.

She continued on behind her guides, past the endless parade of doors. When her mind drifted and her pace slowed, Pomp and Gog urged her to keep putting one foot in front of the other. She did, even as her feet began to ache and blister.

Then it was over. Just like that, there was no farther they could go.

A massive, circular iron door loomed in front of them and Gog knocked three times. The door echoed. After a short pause, a small indicator light switched from red to green. Pomp turned a wheel and the door groaned open.

Steam and stardust exhaled from the yawning doorway, revealing the train’s control station beyond. There were no windows in the small compartment, but there was an intimidating wall of levers, gauges, buttons, and dials. A network of glass tubes siphoned the atmosphere from outside, and miniature storms were being funneled straight into the engine. The machinery hummed loudly and contentedly, the train charging ahead at full capacity with no sign of strain.

The conductor stood to the side, holding a cup of tea over a saucer as he observed the workings of the engine. He was tall. Broad-shouldered. Beard topped by a perfectly curled mustache. Statuesque. He wore a grey suit and vest, and his jacket was neatly folded over the back of a chair. His sleeves were turned up much like the automatons’—as though the three of them had agreed this was an important part of the style of their uniform.

At least the conductor was human.

“Well, what have we here?” he greeted the trio amiably.

“New figment dropped into baggage,” Pomp’s voice vibrated.

Gog’s speaker popped. “She wants to know how to get home.”

“I see.” The conductor cocked his head and took a thoughtful sip of tea. Or he would have, except his cup was empty. His expression soured and he turned to the control station. He lifted a lever and a thick, oily liquid poured out of a tap, pooling heavily in the belly of his cup. Sparks of star-stuff and tendrils of etheric mist floated off the surface of the liquid, mimicking steam.

The conductor took a sip of the sludge and assessed her with a half-lidded gaze.

Okay. Maybe the guy wasn’t as normal as she’d thought. She folded her arms and looked down at her pajama bottoms. They could have offered her a robe or something.

The conductor set his cup back on the saucer. “Tell me, my dear, what dream guided you here?”

She bristled. “I don’t know what you mean.”

“No one falls onto the train without a reason,” the conductor replied.

“Yeah, well, I guess you’d know more about that than I would. I don’t even know how I got here.”

“You thought your way here.”

“But I didn’t—”

“You did.”

She held her breath on a scathing reply. “Your metal friends say the train wants to hire me. What is that supposed to mean?”

The conductor dipped his pinky finger into his tea and sucked away the viscous liquid.

She tried not to recoil.

“We’re in the business of bringing dreams to life,” he answered, licking his lips clean. “To do that, we need a spark—a figment—like you. We hire figments to take up residency in our sleeper cars. Once you have your own compartment, you’ll have the pleasure of experiencing your dreams as though they were real.”

She shivered. Why did that sound so ominous? There had to be a catch. “Why would you do that for people?”

“Why not?” He gave her a placid smile. “Don’t we all deserve to see our dreams come true?”

She was just about ready to scream. This conversation was about as helpful as the coded message she’d left for herself. Which was to say: not at all. She squeezed the paper in her palm.

The conductor’s gaze narrowed. “What have you got there?”

Her grip tightened. Nothing, she wanted to protest, but she couldn’t quite get her voice to work.

“Come now, let’s see it.”

Something in his tone compelled her to extended her hand. Fear bubbled in the pit of her stomach and her fingers trembled as she opened her palm.

The conductor took the scrap of paper and studied it inscrutably. “Does this word mean something to you?” he asked.

She rubbed her hands together anxiously. She didn’t feel right without the note in her hands. “I wish it did.”

He made an incredulous noise and handed it back to her.

She clutched it gratefully. “Do you know what it means?”

“No.”

Of course he didn’t. There were no answers here.

She glared at the scrawled handwriting again, willing herself to make sense of it. “This must be the reason I’m here.” The words came tumbling out of their own accord. “I need to figure out what this means.”

The conductor curled a corner of his mustache. “So. You’re interested in solving a mystery, then.” He took another drink and digested the thought. “Cliché, but hardly a crime. And certainly enough for us to build a compartment around.”

She looked up sharply. “What do you mean?”

He set his drink aside and gestured to the automatons. “Pomp. Gog. Why don’t you show the figment how things work around here?”

*

The iron door sealed behind them and the indicator light flashed red. Belatedly, she realized the conductor had never told her how she could get home.

She quietly pleaded with herself to wake up, but to no avail.

The train flowed forward endlessly and she flowed with it, caught up in its ceaseless momentum.

*

Pomp and Gog gave her a nickname—and the name was Nick.

Nick had a feeling she wasn’t the first figment to have that particular name, but it was better than nothing. It certainly could have been worse.

The howling storm outside eventually smoothed and settled into diffuse cloud-forms, but the sky never cleared. The landscape they traveled remained shrouded.

The two automatons escorted her back down the length of the train, pointing out the many doors she could choose from. Some of the previously-occupied compartments were empty now, their custom doors left standing like nameless markers for those who had passed on. She was informed that is was customary to build a new door for new figments, but she could use any vacancy she liked. No sense letting good real estate go to waste, after all.

Nick didn’t bother to ask what had happened to the previous figments. No matter what they told her, she wasn’t going to walk into any of these compartments of her own volition—even if they slapped a solid diamond door on it.

When she showed no signs of relenting, Pomp and Gog left her to her own devices. The storm had done some damage and they had maintenance to perform. They urged her to keep searching, but she sat down in the middle of the corridor instead. She rested her chin on her knees and hugged her legs close to her chest.

Hephaestion.

Her scrap of paper was getting soft around the edges.

Longing ached inside her ribs.

“I’m here because of you,” she muttered at the paper. “What do you want me to do?” She buried her face in her arms, allowing the motion of the train to lull her, just for a little while.

*

Nick wiped her cheeks dry before she got to her feet again. No sense in letting a pair of automatons know she’d been crying.

She took a steadying breath and turned to the windows, hoping the weather had cleared.

She found herself staring at a door instead.

A door on the wrong wall.

The outside wall.

Startled, she reached out to touched the painted wood. The surface was off-white and smudged with use, with a handful of rainbow stickers scattered at random. It was utterly unimpressive, but Nick trembled when she saw it.

She recognized this door.

It was her bedroom door.

Somehow she was sure of it.

And unlike the other doors lining the hall behind her, this one had a doorknob.

Nick checked outside the nearby windows. As far as she could tell, the door didn’t lead into a compartment; it opened out into the churning expanse of the astral plane. Her heart leapt. Was this a way out? Could she trust it? Even if it was a trick, what other option did she have?

“Oh, this is such a bad idea.”

She squeezed her eyes closed and turned the knob.

*

The door slammed open and Nick was sucked from the car by an explosive burst of wind. She was flailing, tumbling, careening wildly through the turbulent atmosphere. She barely had a chance to panic before she jerked to a halt, her chaotic ascent stopped short by a long silver cord tethered to the train far below.

She was flying.

Or… astral parasailing.

Something like that.

She gasped and held tight to the cord, which was anchored inside her, somewhere behind her navel. Was this the train’s idea of a safety net? If so, it was weird, but she grateful nonetheless. One glimpse into the infinite void above her was enough to convince Nick she didn’t want to look again.

With relief, she noted the wrinkle of paper still clutched in her palm.

Below, the train faded in and out of the cloudscape as it sped smoothly along a set of gleaming, golden tracks. The sinuous segments of the train responded with a lithe agility to the changing terrain, curving and undulating over an expanse of ever-shifting weather.

In the distance, the train was approaching a dark, curving gash in the clouds.

Nick’s brow furrowed as she tried to understand what she was seeing.

As the train rattled closer, the gash expanded—widened—opening up into a vast, deep pool. The round pool churned with whorls of stars.

The train nimbly skirted the edges of the cosmic sea, towing Nick behind. As she sailed overhead, she looked down into the galactic fathoms.

The fathoms swirled, focused, and looked back into her.

Understanding shook Nick to the very core.

It was an eye.

The cloudscape was alive.

As she met the steady gaze of the massive being, the being’s consciousness reached into her mind—gentle, barely more than a flutter of wind—but it was enough to unlock another door sealed inside Nick’s mind.

*

She remembered.

The time before the fall.

The two-bedroom apartment.

She and her roommate were having breakfast in the kitchen one breezy Saturday morning. Windows open, air flowing, sun shining.

She was manning the stove while her roommate stuffed his mouth full of pancakes at the kitchen table. His torso was wrapped in fresh bandages and he winced when he moved, still slow and sore from his recent surgery. Not that it had diminished his appetite.

“I had the weirdest dream last night,” he said, apropos of nothing.

“Aren’t dreams always weird?” she asked. “I don’t understand why people say dreams are weird when weird is just plain normal for a dream.”

He rolled his eyes. “Okay, then. I had the most normal dream last night.”

She chuckled. “And by normal you mean it was weird.”

“Do you wanna hear it or not?”

“Sure,” she said. “You’re convalescing. I’ll indulge you.”

He flashed her a cheeky grin and launched into the retelling. “So there’s this sleeping sky goddess tied up in gold chains—”

“Oh, boy, here we go.”

Her roommate barreled on undeterred, “—and the gold chains are actually a railroad track for a train, right? The train’s constantly moving. Never stops. Not for anything. But the train isn’t actually a train—”

“It never is.”

“—the train’s, like, alive. It’s a parasite or something. And the perpetual motion keeps the goddess tied up and lulls her back to sleep whenever she tries to wake up.”

“Sounds like a hostage situation.”

“Yeah, so, this train-parasite-thing is using the goddess for a base of operations, right? The parasite harvests her weather to power its engine, but that’s all her energy is really good for. The parasite can’t actually eat her energy. It’d be like you or me trying to chew on a wind turbine. Not so good for the digestive tract, you know? Same thing goes for this parasite. It needs a digestible food source—”

“So what does it eat?”

“Dreams.” He speared another bite of pancake with his fork and waved it to emphasize his point. “The train lures the minds of dreamers inside of it. Anyone with a big enough imagination, they get reeled in and locked up. And the train chows down on their creative potential until it’s all used up.”

“That’s kinda grim.”

“Apparently it’s the reason our whole society is stagnating right now. This otherworldly parasite is out there eating up our collective potential.”

“Oh, nice,” she said, bemused. “There’s a moral and everything.”

Her roommate made a noncommittal noise. Probably stuffing a bite into his mouth.

“Your imagination is bonkers.” She flipped another pancake. “I think the meds are scrambling your brains.”

He didn’t answer.

“So what happened?” she prompted. “Did you help free the sky goddess from this parasitic train, or what?”

The leaves rustled outside.

“’Lex.” Her roommate’s tone was suddenly soft and serious. He might as well have hit the instant-panic button.

She turned to him, heart in her throat. “What’s wrong?”

“Listen, I think it’s coming for me next.”

*

She hadn’t believed him. Not at first. But the day came when her roommate wouldn’t wake up. Unexplained coma, the doctors said. Unrelated to his surgery. Unrelated to his current state of health. They had no theories.

She did.

Hephaestion.

Her roommate had always been obsessed with history. Hephaestion was the name he used for all his avatars. He loved to play burly, ancient-warrior types. The nerd.

But it was the name that was key. Night after night she wrote it on a scrap of paper and held it tight to her heart, hoping it would somehow guide her dreaming mind to his—wherever he was trapped.

It took time.

Years.

The world grew in desolation and desperation around her. Hope dwindled, sickness rose, and more and more people lost their capacity to imagine. She began to truly believe the astral parasite was sucking them all dry.

Eventually, that belief became strong enough to guide her.

In the waking world, she was probably lying unconscious beside her roommate in some sterile hospital ward. Meanwhile, both of their minds were held hostage inside the guts of some disgusting inner-space worm.

*

Nick lashed the silver cord and reeled herself back to the train, casting one last look over her shoulder. The eye of the sky goddess drifted closed in the wake of the train’s passing.

She was real.

It was all real.

Pomp and Gog were waiting at the door. They caught her arms and hauled her back inside. The tether vanished. Nick’s heart hammered wildly—as if she’d been startled awake after a deep sleep.

“What were you doing out there?” Pomp demanded, his displeasure resonant.

“He’s here,” Nick replied, breathless. “He’s somewhere on the train.”

She rushed over to the doors of the sleeper compartments, searching for signs of her erstwhile roommate. There was a door with a Pompeiian-style mural. Definite history-nerd vibes. There was a zero-percent chance it was the right door, but she had to start somewhere. She cast about for a way to get inside.

“Nick-nack, darling,” Gog’s voice box crackled as he came up beside her, “you’ll never open a sealed door. Once a figment’s inside, they don’t come out.”

She scowled and pried at the seams of the door. “You were going to put me in one of these compartments!”

“Only if you wanted to go,” Gog tried to appease her. “Most everyone goes in of their own free will.”

“Most everyone,” Nick spat back at him. “But not absolutely everyone, right? Where do you put the ones who resist? Where did you lock him up?”

Pomp approached her gingerly. “Who are you talking about?”

“Hephaestion!” she cried.

Before she could elaborate, there was a loud pop and sparks flew. Both the automatons jolted as though they’d been struck by a bolt of electricity. Nick shrieked and covered her head as embers rained down.

When the commotion subsided, she peeked out from behind her arms.

The automatons stood frozen, smoke curling from their limp joints.

“What… just happened here?” she whispered.

Two light-forms coalesced around the automatons’ metal bodies. Gold rays trembled around Pomp; silver beams wavered around Gog. The light-creatures flared with a suggestion of wings and then sank back into the complex array of gears and gaskets.

The metal figures straightened, coming back to life.

“You aren’t automatons,” Nick said numbly.

Pomp wiggled his metal fingers to ensure they were in working order. “The astral plane is a big place,” he agreed. “Lots of room for things you wouldn’t even begin to expect.”

Nick’s mouth worked. “What are you then?”

“Astral guides.” Gog fussed at a scorch mark on his silver plating. “My job is to usher dreamers into sleep—”

“—and I usher them out,” Pomp finished.

“And the train is using you both to collect its food.”

“Yes,” they replied.

“But not willingly,” Pomp added hastily, “and not anymore now. The forced-compliance drives seem to have—ah—exploded.”

Nick’s head swirled with dizzying possibilities. She had to steady herself on the wall. “You’re saying the train trapped you here, just like it did to the goddess—just like it did to the figments.”

“Nasty things, parasites,” Gog commiserated. “Don’t do a thing for anyone, not even themselves.”

That was true, wasn’t it? Parasites liked to latch on and let their host to do all the dirty work.

“What about the conductor?” Nick asked urgently. Why did a living train even need a conductor? Unless the parasite needed him as a conduit to translate orders, create doors, and—

“The conductor is a figment,” Pomp replied carefully. “The train switches them out every so often.”

“After they burn out,” Gog confirmed.

Nick remembered the conductor sucking oil from his fingers. A chill swept down her spine. He wasn’t just in command of operations. “He’s part of the train’s digestive process.”

Pomp and Gog’s silence was confirmation enough.

She held her hands to her face.

Why had her bedroom door appeared when she needed it?

Why had the train saved her with that tether?

Why was it Hephaestion’s name that freed the astral guides?

It only made sense if it was Hephaestion’s mind undermining the will of the parasite. And the only place he’d have enough power to do that was from the control station.

Nick breathed out slowly, shakily. “Just one more question,” she said. “Can people change the way they look on the astral plane?”

Gog’s speaker clicked. “You can be anyone you want to be in a dream.”

So, that confirmed it.

Nick had the presence of mind to be tangentially annoyed that she could have changed her pajamas at any time; but more importantly—“That’s how the parasite got to him. It offered him the body he always wanted.”

The guides looked to one another quizzically.

“Come on,” she said. “We have to stop this train.”

*

Three knocks on the iron door.

The light switched from red to green.

A burst of stars and steam.

Then they were inside the control station and Pomp and Gog were wrestling the conductor to the floor—muscles no match for metal. The teacup shattered in the fray, spilling the thick nectar of condensed dream-stuff—a nutrient-rich meal for a bloated dream-eater.

“What’s the meaning of this?” the conductor snarled.

Pomp and Gog kept him pinned.

Nick knelt down beside him in her rainbow-striped pajamas and took his hand in hers. “You know, you never told me your name.” She tucked the scrap of paper into his palm meaningfully.

He snarled and tried to lunge at her, but the guides held him fast.

The engine ramped up and the car swayed dangerously. Outside the weather began to howl and the glass funnels churned with tatters of fog and wind. The engine roared in protest.

“Settle down.” Nick touched the conductor’s cheek. “Are you in there, roomie? Or is it just the parasite now?”

He shuddered and bared his teeth.

“I know it’s hard,” she whispered. “This thing’s eating you up from the inside out.”

He writhed.

“But I miss your voice,” Nick persisted. “All our late-night conversations and your madman tangents. Your stupid dad jokes. Game night. Movie night. Making breakfast together. All the dumb stuff we used to do to pass the time. I miss you, you nerd.”

Sweat beaded on the conductor’s stubborn brow.

“Hephaestion.”

His expression went slack and vulnerable, mouth trembling.

“I know who you are inside,” she said, “no matter what you look like on the outside. Just come back. I want you back. Please.”

“’Lex?” The word was small and scared, but Nick seized onto it.

“I’m here,” she said fiercely. “I’ve got you. And we’re going home.”

*

Pomp and Gog didn’t know how the control station worked—but they sure knew how to wreck it.

Nick helped Hephaestion to his feet and her roommate added finesse to the astral guides’ fury. With a flick of a lever, Hephaestion reversed the sickly flow of the dream-feed.

Then he ordered every single door in every single car to open.

*

Intertwining streaks of gold and silver light soared out of the engine and raced ahead of the train, skimming along the tracks. The light-forms banked sharply and crossed paths, and the glimmering gold track snapped in half. The line swiftly unraveled, bucking the train before it even reached the break.

The massive cloudscape sighed deeply and began swirling, expanding outward in one long, relieved exhale. The sky goddess was finally waking from her forced slumber.

Nick supported Hephaestion as they looked down on the scene from above. The wisps of hundreds—thousands—of dreaming minds swirled around them, eddies of imagination safely buoying each other up through the dark. As soon as Pomp and Gog returned, the dreams would all fly back to feed a starving world.

Nick smiled at her roommate and gave him a squeeze. “So, do you want pancakes when we wake up?”

He grinned and pressed his forehead to hers. “Sounds like a dream come true to me.”

*