Steven Harper - Nightmare

"Now she’s gone," he finished. "I don’t know where she went."

"Dorna was still in the Dream when I left," Kendi said. "She couldn’t have been awake here. It’s impossible."

"Tell that to my crotch," Ben blurted, then flushed.

"Got you in the nuts, huh?" Jeren said. "Bitch doesn’t fight fair."

"We have to call someone," Willa declared. "Ben, try your mother again. Maybe she’ll answer this time."

Ben obeyed. This time, Mom’s face appeared on the wall screen. For the second time, Ben explained what had happened.

"Stay right where you are," she ordered. "I’ll be there in ten minutes." The screen went blank.

"You should get some ice for your stomach," Kendi said. "And for your-your-"

"My stomach, anyway," Ben said, flushing again.

He was still holding a damp towelful to his abdomen when Ara got home. Father Ched-Hisak was right behind her. Ara’s face was tight with worry and she made Ben explain the entire incident over again. She wanted to examine him, but he put his foot down.

"Everyone’s looking, Mom," he muttered. "And I’m not hurt that bad."

Ched-Hisak hooted and clattered his teeth. Ben, who had grown up on Bellerophon among the Ched-Balaar, understood the words better than many adult Children, though he had no more hope of reproducing the sounds than he did of sprouting wings and flying.

"I am sure we can take him to a doctor if his pain persists," Ched-Hisak was saying firmly. "We have other matters for discussion."

To Ben’s intense relief, Mom nodded. "Why don’t you get hold of the dorm and see if Dorna’s gone back to her room? I’ll talk to the others."

Ben shook off Mom’s guiding hand and took a chair on his own. She pursed her lips but didn’t comment as she turned to Kendi.

"You said Dorna was in the Dream when you left it," she stated. "But Ben says she attacked him before you woke up. That means there’s an overlap. Her body was awake and moving around even though her mind was in the Dream, is that right?"

Kendi nodded. "I guess. I thought that couldn’t happen."

"It can’t," Mom said shortly. "But maybe we can get a clue as to what happened. Start at the beginning, all of you, and tell me exactly what was going on. Why were you all in the Dream together? For practice?"

They all nodded in unison. Ben found himself drifting off, probably a side-effect of the painkillers. He was vaguely aware of Father Ched-Hisak rejoining the group and telling them that Dorna didn’t seem to be in her room or anywhere near the dormitory and that he’d ordered a search. Ben drifted again, soothed by the Ched-Balaar’s gentle presence. A startled shout from Mom brought him awake again.

"You split yourself?" she said incredulously. "How?"

"By accident," Kendi protested. "I didn’t mean to."

"A powerful thing," Ched-Hisak mused. "It will require much further study."

"Was that when Dorna woke up, then?" Mom asked.

Kendi squirmed. "Not exactly."

"Go on, then," Mom said, and Ben recognized the danger in her voice. He wanted to come to Kendi’s defense, but knew from experience that such a gesture would only make her angrier, so he remained silent. So did the other students.

Kendi falteringly explained how he had decided to go back into the Dream to see if he could call up the falcon again. Mom’s face got darker with every word until she finally exploded.

"What were you thinking ?" she shouted. "Good lord, Kendi-you haven’t even been entering the Dream for a week and already you’re experimenting with things no one knows anything about? Do you know how foolish that is? How stupid? What if you split your mind and couldn’t bring it back together? There would have been no one there to help you."

"I’m sorry," Kendi said meekly. "It just felt so … right that it didn’t occur to me that anything could go wrong with it."

"And you -" She rounded on Ben. "What were you thinking? Why didn’t you call me?"

"I tried," Ben said hotly. "But you weren’t available. Neither was Father Ched-Hisak or Grandfather Melthine. We couldn’t get hold of anybody at all."

"Then you should have waited," Mom snapped. "You should have-"

Ched-Hisak placed a hand on her shoulder. "Mother Ara," he clattered, "we do have other things to worry about. Perhaps many beratements can come later?"

Mom looked like she was going to say more, then apparently thought the better of it. "Right," she said.

Father Ched-Hisak turned to the students. His eyes were wise and gentle, and even though he was the size of a small horse, he somehow didn’t look imposing or seem like he was filling a fair chunk of the living room. For some reason, Ben found himself wondering what it would be like to have Father Ched-Hisak as his dad. The Ched-Balaar kept his head at human level and turned his gaze on Ben.

"Would you translate for those who understand not all my words well?" he chattered. Ben nodded, and Father Ched-Hisak continued. "Did any of you notice anything so odd about Dorna? Anything she said or did to seem strange?"

Ben translated and Jeren snorted. "This is stupid," he said. "We’re all Silent. We’re all weird in one way or another."

"We need to think, Jeren," Willa said.

"Look, I just want to go home before it fucking rains again, okay? Why don’t you ask her teacher?"

"We will do this thing, Jeren, but now we must have you think," Father Ched-Hisak said with Ben’s translation coming a sentence behind. "An odd thing happened here and we need to find the bottom of it. To repeat: have any of you noticed anything so odd about Dorna?"

Jeren rolled his eyes and the others thought. "Last week," Kendi said slowly, "she said she was having trouble sleeping because she had nightmares about people dying in the Dream."

"I remember that," Ben put in, glad to contribute something more than just translation. "You also said she talked funny. And there was that weird stuff she said when she woke up and hit me."

"That’s right!" Kendi snapped his fingers. "Sometimes Dorna changes the way she talks. As if she were someone …someone …" He trailed off.

"Yes?" Mom said.

"Something’s bugging me," Kendi said. His eyes tracked over empty air. "The way Dorna talked. It reminded me of someone, but I can’t quite place-" He bolted upright on the couch. "Buck. Sometimes she talks like Buck."

Ara blinked at him, puzzled. "Who’s Buck?"

"A guy we met in the Dream," Kendi said. "He gave me pointers on my falcon. And then that Zelda woman showed up." He gave further detail about them.

"Kendi," Father Ched-Hisak said intently, "you said you attempted to locate Dorna but found her in a pair of places."

"Yeah. And once I tried to tag someone I thought was her but it turned out to be Zelda. Another time I thought I had her and it was Buck."

"I wish this to be clear. You were sure you felt Dorna but you found someone else both times. You also felt her in pairs of places at the same time."

Kendi nodded. Father Ched-Hisak settled back on his haunches with a grumbling, muttering noise that Ben recognized as a symptom of careful thought among the Ched-Balaar, though he decided not to translate that.

"I have made studies of human psychology," Father Ched-Hisak said half to himself. "Humans have varied and fascinating reactions to tragedy so different from members of my species. I think this is one of those reactions."

"What do you mean, Father?" Mom asked before Ben could translate.

"It is possible," Ched-Hisak clattered slowly, "that your Dorna has a psychological problem known to humans as-" But the rest of the sentence was lost even to Ben.

"I’m sorry, Father," Ben told him. "I don’t know those words."