Once Upon a Nightmare

city of nightmares

vi: city of nightmares

 

When I wake up, I’m cold and uncomfortable. Cold because of the wind and uncomfortable because I’m sprawled in the dirt. I press a hand to my aching head, and feel relief as I do. The pain’s not nearly as bad as it was.

As it was.

I groan as recollection comes sliding back, easing into my limbs with another kind of pain entirely. I sit up and take in my surroundings. Past my extended foot is a cliff edge, and maybe another five or so feet beyond that, a current of blue and white light cascades from the black sky, creating a wall. It looks sort of like white static, only prettier. I don’t go to check, but I doubt the bottom of the wall is any more visible than the top.

It’s hard not to stare at it, and I do, for several seconds before looking to the right and left. The cliff edge extends farther than I can see on both sides. Seemingly in exact distance from one another, phone booths—old fashioned red ones, like the kind Clark Kent uses to become Superman—dot the never-ending ridge.

“Weird,” I mutter, and turn around. Behind me, there is nothing but a sea of gray sand. Though, upon examining myself, I think it may not be sand. I attempt to brush the grayish film off my arms and only succeed in smearing it in. It’s ash.

To the front: wall of electricity. To the sides: infinite rows of phone booths. To the back: wasteland of ash.

I’m doomed.

This is impossible, I think lucidly. But even as I think the words, they get no purchase in the realness of the world around me. I feel like I’m having a not-unpleasant drug experience. If this is a hallucination, it’s pretty high-res.

For the first time, fear constricts my throat. I cough. My chest still burns like there’s a fire in there—though it’s less a fire now and more a tiny flame, just holding to life.

“Where are you now, protector?” I grumble. There’s a spot in the center of my palm, a shifting pit of blackness I assume is the mark of death. I can’t feel it, really, so the process must have halted once I got out of my mind. The soul-curse may not hold Alexander responsible for my expulsion—but he eventually has to try and find me, right? 

I’m pondering the likelihood of Alexander actually rescuing me when a shout echoes from within the confines of the electric wall.

“Hally-hoooo!” it cries, just as a figure leaps out of the white and blue static, soars through the air and lands, a bit clumsily, on the ground. He dusts off his buttoned vest and adjusts his glasses, straightening to his full height, which must be at least seven feet. His black hair sticks out of his head like an overgrown dandelion and reflects the sparkling light of the wall behind him in odd prisms of color, like oil. His skin is the color of day-old mushrooms.

He waves at me and I manage to raise a quaky hand in response. Apparently not too taken aback at seeing a stranger sitting in the dirt, he doesn’t acknowledge me further and strolls to the closest phone booth. I watch as he picks up the receiver, says a few words and then—pop—he disappears.

I have two options. One, fume and wait for my new soul mate to feel the pull of nonphysical servitude and come to my rescue. Or two, follow this guy and see if it takes me somewhere more useful than a wasteland in finding help.

Before I can talk myself out of it, I sprint to the same booth and pick up the phone, unsure what to say. “Uh—hello?” I try, crossing my fingers.

“Velcome,” says a campy version of Dracula’s voice, “I’ve been expecting you.”

How quaint, I think, as a sensation of weightlessness washes over me. Gravity returns and I gasp in a different phone booth, receiver still clutched in my hand.