Watching Erin step into Momoka’s dreaming body hurt Teddy Finch’s eyes. Both women occupied the same space at the same time, a fact his mind told him was impossible. But he saw it regardless of years of innately understanding the laws of physics.
Erin was taller than the Japanese girl, her blond hair longer. This meant Momoka’s brown eyes stared at him from Erin’s chin while Erin’s words were formed by lips set in Momoka’s forehead. These lips moved now, Erin’s voice issuing forth.
‘Let’s go get it.’
Teddy opened his mouth to answer but the red-haired woman touches his arm.
‘She’s not talking to us,’ she says. ‘We’re hearing what she’s saying in the real world.’
‘Like the reverse of talking in her sleep?’
‘She’s talking to Pike,’ Momoka said from lips in Erin’s throat.
‘What’s Pike?’ Teddy asked.
‘My boyfriend,’ she answered. The fact she was speaking Japanese did not stop Teddy from understanding her. ‘We were together when the monster attacked.’ With desperation in her voice, she added, ‘Will he be okay?’
Unsure of what to say, Teddy turned to the redhead. The doubt in her eyes chilled his soul.
Erin pulled herself from the floor which took a few seconds less than she expected. The ceiling seemed higher than it should be and the man beside her towered over her.
‘Are you okay, Momoka?’ he asked, gazing down at her.
Looking into his youthful face, Erin realised he was just a boy, still in his teens. He only appeared tall in comparison to the slight body she currently inhabited. She felt an innate fondness for him and had an unfathomable desire to call him America.
‘I have to stop the minotaur,’ she said. ‘Did you see it?’
His mouth moved though no words came out.
Looking around, Erin saw a ragged hole in the wall opposite them. Assuming this led to the monster, she rushed to it and squeezed through. She stepped into a dark chamber, lit only by eerie green lights. Terrified screams came to her through a hole in another wall.
She was about to move forward when she noticed a large figure lurking to one side, startling her. She hadn’t expected the pursuit to be this easy and now she realised she had no idea how to banish the minotaur. Straightening her shoulders, she looked at the silhouette and paused. Something was different about it and it took her a few moments to notice that the horns had vanished.
A loud clatter behind her announced the entrance of a two-seat carriage into the room. The empty car trudged along a tracked route, drawing closer to Erin and the creature. When it reached a certain point, it triggered a switch which illuminated a spotlight on the two of them. The beast rushed forward with a recorded howl and Erin saw it was a model of a werewolf.
Cursing herself for the time she’d wasted in this ghost-train room, she ran to the jagged opening and pushed out into the night.
Despite the lateness of the hour, the air was warm and redolent with the smell of popcorn and spices. She looked around at the stalls and the rides of the fair. Lights of all colours spun and flashed. Upbeat pop music spilled from speakers. But there were no people.
Clamouring yells reached her from a distance but, under the piped music, she was unable to discern the direction. Thankfully, the minotaur’s passage was clearly marked. A demolished hook-a-duck stand stood before an overturned food stall. Erin followed the path of destruction, past shattered tents and trampled soft toys, easily finding her way to her quarry.
The minotaur stood at the base of a forty-foot high Ferris wheel, bellowing its rage at the slowly rotating ride. Three of the five carriages contained people. Their screams washed over Erin, the language unintelligible but the emotion all too clear.
Scraping its hoofed feet against the ground, the minotaur rushed the wheel. Its head crashed into the lowest car, mercifully empty, twisting the thin door into scrap metal. The whole structure groaned. Rivets popped and fell around them.
Still unsure of how to vanquish the beast, Erin called out to it.
‘Leave them alone.’
The minotaur shook the torn door from its horns and turned its head to her. Its eyes narrowed.
‘You have to go now,’ Erin said.
The creature snorted, breath billowing from its nostrils.
‘You don’t belong here,’ Erin tried.
Taking a step back, the minotaur moved itself to align with her. Its head lowered.
It charged.
Erin was unable to release a single curse before the beast was on her. She felt the collision in every bone of her body. She thought she may lose consciousness from the force of the impact but a searing pain in her chest kept her alert. The world moved around her, the floor leaping away from her feet as the surrounding attractions pitched ninety degrees. She was dimly aware that it was not the ground that was moving but she that had been lifted from it.
The taste of blood filled her mouth as she fell over the minotaur’s head, impaled on a horn.
Momoka’s eyes widened in terror as, an inch higher, Erin’s mouth swore.
‘What’s happening?’ Finch asked the redhead.
‘She can’t do it,’ she answers as concern etches deep lines into her forehead.
‘You said she could quell nightmares.’ His voice was high.
‘Nightmares, yes. But she’s not in the dreaming realm. She’s in the real world.’
The Japanese woman’s mouth parted and spilled blood. Superimposed as they were over Erin’s neck, the effect was that Erin had been slashed across the throat.
‘It’s my fault,’ Finch cried. ‘I made this happen.’
‘It wasn’t you,’ the redhead says. ‘He used you.’
Finch ignored the woman’s ramblings. He took a deep breath and stepped forward.
‘I have to make this right,’ he said as he entered Momoka’s body.
Draped over the minotaur in a mockery of a fireman’s lift, Erin watched as the blood from her mouth dripped down onto the creature’s back and legs. With a momentous flick of its head, the minotaur pitched her from itself. She landed awkwardly several feet away, hearing the sharp crack of a snapping bone.
A chill filled her chest and her stomach fluttered, but she felt no pain. She twisted, trying to get her arms under her to push herself to her feet. All she achieved was turning herself around to face the monster. It stomped slowly toward her.
‘Go away,’ she gurgled softly, still vainly attempting to banish the nightmare.
She opened her mouth to say more, but stopped as something pressed against the top of her head. Her scalp goose pimpled as the pressure passed through her skull, entered her brain. The thought I have to make this right flashed in her mind, though not in her usual inner voice.
The sensation seeped through her, past her shoulders, down her arms, expanding into her chest and stomach, taking her pelvis and legs. Her bones ached; every organ felt inflated; each joint creaked.
‘Am I dying?’ she wept.
‘I have to make this right,’ Finch repeated in her head.
The minotaur was close now. It bent over Erin and roared, spraying her with hot spittle.
Without her triggering the action, Erin’s arm reached for the creature. Unbidden, her fingers clutched the thick neck. From her throat came a guttural yell of fear and frustration.
When the echoes of the scream had subsided, a young Japanese woman lay alone in the mud as a young American rushed to her aid.
The lecture theatre of Momoka’s dreamscape exploded with activity. Finch and Erin fell from the body of the Japanese student. The minotaur popped into existence at the back of the auditorium, releasing its anger in a bellowing rage. The red haired woman takes several steps backward, collides with the lectern and knocks it to the floor. Unperturbed, the professor continued to deliver his lesson on the merits of Manga cartoons.
Erin climbed to her feet and gaped at Momoka. Her face was drawn and pale and tendrils of blood leaked from her mouth. Erin realised that while she had not suffered the injuries sustained on Earth, they had affected Momoka.
‘Get the minotaur,’ the redhead says.
‘What’s the urgency?’ Erin asked. ‘It’s back in the dreamland again. It’s just imaginary.’
As if to contradict her, the beast tore forward through four rows of seats. Wood and metal rained around them. Shrapnel embedded into Erin’s cheek, dangerously close to her eye.
‘Dreams are given power by the dreamer,’ the woman says. ‘While we’re in Momoka’s mind, we’re vulnerable to all her imaginings.’
‘What if we wake her up?’ Finch suggested.
The minotaur pressed forward, now halfway to them.
‘If she wakes up,’ the redhead says, ‘this dream will vanish and may take us with it.’
‘How do I banish it?’ Erin asked. She glanced at Momoka, terrified the woman would awaken at any moment.
‘Do what you do – you’re the dream catcher.’
Crashing through more chairs, the minotaur was now close enough for Erin to smell its rancid odour. She remembered the feeling of being impaled when she had inhabited Momoka’s body and did not want to experience it for real. Her hands were shaking; playing pat-a-cake was out of the question.
Momoka turned to face the man with the bull’s head and screamed. The room shook at the sound, the broken furniture rattling in the tumult. Building dust fell from the ceiling.
Words came to Erin from a hidden corner of her memory. In a rasping, off-key voice, she sang:
‘Once upon a time there was a little white bull. Very sad because he was a little white bull.’
Hearing Finch chorus, ‘Little white bull,’ Erin continued.
‘When he asked his mama if the little white bull.’
The minotaur slowed its advance, cocking its head at Erin.
The redhead joins Finch as he sang, ‘Little white bull.’
Nostrils flaring, the minotaur glowered at each of them in turn.
‘Ever had a chance of turning black,’ Erin croaked. ‘His mama said, “You silly little bull.”’
The creature’s heaving chest slowed. The rage in its eyes dimmed.
‘“You're a pretty little bull.”’
It stepped forward gingerly.
‘“You're my little bull.”’
Dropping to all fours, the minotaur crept to Erin’s feet, curled up and fell asleep.
Epilogue
‘So it’s over?’ Finch asked. ‘Now he’s calmed, there’s no more nightmares?’
The red-haired woman looks at him. Her eyes are grim.
‘It’s not over,’ she says quietly. ‘It can never be over.’
‘But you said he had used me.’
‘Not the minotaur,’ she says. ‘That was just a dream figment, a pawn of his bidding.’
Finch looked at Erin, his face perplexed.
‘Who is ‘he’?’ Erin asked.
‘The original dreamer. A Great Old One, with an octopus head and claws at the end of its limbs.’
Erin smirked. ‘It sounds like you’re describing a Lovecraft monster.’
‘Lovecraft got his stories from his dreams,’ the redhead says. ‘And who do you think provided him the insight?’
‘But Lovecraft said Cthulhu came from outer space.’
‘No,’ she corrects. ‘Lovecraft said he came from beyond the earth. The earth was created in the light. Before that there was eternal darkness and that is where he reigns. He rules in the night.’
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