Storm Dreams (The Cycle of Somnium Book 1) (13 page)

“No idea,” Cassidy said. “I’ve been playing it by ear so far. Can you fly this thing?”

Jayce shook his head. “The
Nubigena
? Not a chance. I’m ok with a bi-plane, but...”

Cassidy grimaced. “I watched Banner a lot.”

“You can fly anything,” Jayce said. “Banner went on and on about it before he picked you up. That’s why we came to get you.”

Cassidy ran a savage hand through his hair. “How did he pick us? Where did he find out about me, or even where I’d be?”

Jayce shook his head. “Wish I could tell you. He never told us how he picked any of us, either. The captain always seemed to know which bulb to go to.”

“Alright,” said Cassidy, as he stood and started for the control room. “We’ve just got to figure out where everyone is being kept.”

Jayce grinned as he caught up. “That we can do. Banner’s got a strong aura we can feel. Taught some of us how to find him if we ever got separated.”

Cassidy nodded and opened the door to the helm. “Wish he’d gotten around to teaching
me
that trick. Think you can handle being First Mate?” he asked. Cassidy flipped switches at the navigation console then moved to the helm. The engines engaged and the
Nubigena
tugged at its moorings.

“Can you handle being captain, Major?” Jayce asked.

Cassidy grimaced. Felt the
Nubigena
come alive as he gripped the helm and placed his feet against the firm pedals. She was accepting him. He hoped she’d fly the way she did for Banner.

Cassidy throttled the
Nubigena
forwards. A series of loud popping sounds came from the hull as the eroding tethers tore lose. Jayce sat at the navigation console, trying to make sense of controls he’d only watched others use.

“Do you feel Banner anywhere?” Cassidy asked. Though it had been simple to manoeuvre the smaller airship
Nimbus
between the slabs, he found the structure of the Everdream far more confining to the massive
Nubigena
, a vessel which exaggerated each tilt of the pedal and each spoke of the helm a hundred-fold.

Jayce looked up from the controls. “I’m trying to find him. We always used the trick on land in the Twilight and the
real
world. It’s more faint here. This place is dampening everything.”

Cassidy scanned the latticework of stone that stretched in all directions. Vast. Silent. Empty except for airships that seemed to keep their distance from the Zeppelin. The ship was apparently dangerous to anything it touched, but they gathered in mounting swarms. “Can you at least give me a direction?”

Jayce gripped the sides of his head, his eyes closed tight. “I’m sorry. There’s so many directions.”

The
Nubigena
moved as slow as Cassidy could set the engines, but missed the platforms and columns by mere yards. Cassidy narrowed his eyes. “Get to the side window and tell me what you see.”

Jayce moved from the console and pinned his face to the glass to glance different angles. “We’re melting things. I think you’ve already hit a wall or two, we just can’t feel it.”

“What? Damn.” He was a terrible pilot. What had made him think he could fly this ship? On the other hand... “Jayce, sit down,” Cassidy snapped. He brought the ship around and aimed at the heart of the skeletal planet where a cluster of slabs formed a hexagon. “Can you at least tell me where he’s not?”

Jayce shrugged. “He could be just about anywhere behind us, but I don’t feel him in front of us.”

Cassidy nodded. “Thought you’d say that. Makes more sense to keep everyone away from where they were keeping the ship.” Thousands of Armada fighters peeled out from around the purple and red airships. The
Nubigena
throttled forwards and slammed into the hexagon. The Zeppelin was a mere needle stabbed into an orange, but at full speed, the soft resistance felt like they were moving through thick water. Streaks of black liquid slid down the windows as the Zeppelin cut through the stone masses.

Cassidy reversed the engines, sliding out of the hexagon to make another stab. Armada fighters dove, slamming into the gondola as they exited the structure, but splattered like insects against the craft.

As the black liquid slid away, thousands of Armada ships stood surrounding the
Nubigena
on all sides. Cassidy pulled a large broadcasting cone from the corner and opened one of the windows. “I’m crew of this ship,” he hollered out at the fleet. “I don’t know what you want from us, or this vessel, and I don’t care. But if you don’t guide me to the rest of its crew and my captain, I’ll spend the next few hours turning the heart of the Everdream into sludge.”

The Armada ships remained motionless for several minutes before an inhuman voice grated back. It sounded as if whatever creature was speaking was not only un-native to the English language, but to spoken languages of any kind. “Come. Speak. Not harm,” the voice croaked.

“That’s not the Armada,” Jayce said. “I’ve heard them speak. It’s got to be the Everdream itself.”

Cassidy nodded. “Got to be.”

“Take you. Crew,” the voice grated.

Jayce glanced from the ships back to Cassidy. “Why don’t they just destroy us? They have thousands.”

“They can’t,” Cassidy said. “Not here. I think I know why they fear us so much.” He turned the cone back out the window. “I have a pilot who will stay at the helm. If you attempt to board, or if I’m not back in an hour, he’ll start flying.” Cassidy turned back to Jayce. “I don’t think they can step aboard here in the Everdream, but if they do, use
real
bullets. Nothing from the Twilight.”

Jayce nodded. “Makes sense. That’s what we’ve always used, but I guess here they’re even softer.”

Cassidy nodded. “We’re made of different stuff. Imagine tiny animals running around in your brain. That’s what we’re in. A brain. They may be like bones and tissue out there, but here there’s nothing but clay.” He left the bridge, moved to the main door and opened it up to the vast fleet. One of the smaller airships pulled alongside. An Armada pilot stood with the side door open and a bridge extended. The pilot looked squat and purple. Cassidy could only compare it to a withered dwarf with pale soft-looking skin. It motioned to Cassidy’s sidearm.

“I’m keeping this,” Cassidy said, clapping a hand to the wooden holster.

The creature motioned him to continue. Cassidy leapt past the melting end of the gang plank and climbed aboard, glad for the time being that he was a dream and wouldn’t slip through the deck into the abyss below.

The Armada ship looked different than the ones he’d seen outside of the Everdream. Whatever material made up this gondola appeared to flow, as if a coloured molten liquid rolled across the surface. When he touched it he realized why. The ship was only mimicking a solid object. In reality, it
was
liquid. Liquid and organic.

The Everdream really was an organism. He stood inside some kind of mind, and these ships were like cells. Outside the mind, it could solidify into dream structures, but within the Everdream’s inner boundaries, anything substantial was dangerous. The Armada pilots inside weren’t even as solid as dreams. Cassidy wondered how much power the Everdream was having to exert in order to hold Banner and crew.

The disembodied voice came again. “Is acceptable.”

Cassidy couldn’t tell if this was a statement or a question, but the ship moved away and back towards the fringes. He remained standing as it made its way through the many gaps towards one of the platforms near the outer membrane and landed. Both the ship and pilot melted away, and he was left standing on a surface about the size of a large room that looked like rock, but felt smooth as glass.

Brewster, Karl and Franz stood staring at him like a ghost. The Englishman stepped forwards. “Is it really you, Old Boy? Are you
real
?”

Cassidy couldn’t help breaking out in a hearty laugh. “
Real
? Are any of us?”

Brewster grinned and gave him a bear hug, which Cassidy returned with a strong squeeze. “Had to ask,” Brewster said, releasing him. “How did they get you? We thought for sure you’d gotten away.”

“I did,” Cassidy said. He gave Karl and Franz a quick salute, which they returned with claps on the back. “Ned and I got out clean.”

“Then why?” Brewster said, taking a step back. “My God, you didn’t come back on purpose, did you?”

Cassidy turned and surveyed the situation. The platform they stood on had sheer edges. No holes. No roots leading to other platforms. Nowhere to escape
to
. The Everdream didn’t have to exert much energy at all, just threaten them with a fall into nothingness. “Any idea why they haven’t killed you?”

“Absorbed us, is more like it,” Franz said. “I think they—
it
, wants to know something before that happens.”

“Where’s…Banner?” Cassidy asked.

“No idea,” Brewster said, shaking his head. “They’ve got him somewhere else. They seem rather upset about something with him.”

“Where’s Ned?” Franz asked.

Cassidy kept his jaw set. “He’s gone.”

“I thought you said he got away,” Karl said.

Cassidy nodded. “We got separated. I’ve no clue where he is now.”

Brewster shook his head. “Sorry to hear that. He was a good man. Perhaps we’ll find him back in Arcadia.”

“Perhaps,” Cassidy nodded. “Good news is, I’ve got Jayce back on the ship.”

“What ship?” Karl asked. “Jayce is dead.”

“He was never dead,” Cassidy said. He related to them how he’d gotten to the
Nubigena
and found the young man still reliving the nightmare of Nietzsche’s void.

“All that time,” Brewster said. He stared at the ground. “Poor bloke. Must have been torture.”

Cassidy reached into the belt beneath his flight jacket and pulled out two Webleys and a Luger. He handed Brewster and Karl the revolvers and Franz the automatic.

“I’m afraid we won’t be able to use them,” Brewster said, turning the weapon over in his hand and checking the cylinder. “They’ll never let us off this rock.”

“I’m not giving them any choice,” Cassidy said. He turned away and looked back in the direction of the
Nubigena
where it floated somewhere beyond the slabs, aimed at the heart of the Everdream. “I want to see Banner now,” he yelled.

The Everdream remained silent for several minutes before speaking. “Yes,” the disembodied voice croaked. “Banner.”

“I’m not sure I’m following you,” said Brewster, as they waited for something to happen. “You’re as trapped as the rest of us.”

Cassidy shook his head. “If you’re right, the worst they can do is reabsorb us. Either they can’t, or they’re afraid to.”

Karl raised an eyebrow. “Afraid? Why?”

Cassidy pursed his lips. “These Armada agents aren’t solid enough to kill us.”

Franz shook his head. “Perhaps, but they can do anything to us so long as we’re touching the Everdream. They immobilized us before we got here. The ropes snapped not long after they dropped us off, but we’re paralysed if they touch us.”

Cassidy moved that around in his mind. “Maybe, but they’re scared of the
Nubigena
. It’s
real
. It hurts them. Jayce’ll tear them up if they don’t let us out.”

“It still doesn’t make sense,” Brewster said, rubbing a finger over his moustache. “Why haven’t they just killed us? They’ve had nothing but chances before you got here.”

“It’s Banner,” Franz said. “They want something from him, and hope they can use us to get it. He’s different. We all know it.”

A similar airship to the one that dropped Cassidy off drifted towards them. It landed and melted away into nothing, leaving a limp shape that lay motionless on the platform. Cassidy rushed towards the captain, the others close on his heels. He knelt and turned Banner over. A shudder ran through Cassidy as blank eyes stared past him.

“My God,” Brewster said.

“He’s white as a ghost,” Karl said.

They knelt around their captain. Cassidy cradled Banner’s head in his arms. “Banner,” he said, trying to draw recognition from the distant eyes. “Banner! You’re here, Captain. It’s Cassidy. All of us.”

Banner moaned and flicked his glance around, but didn’t lock onto anyone.

Cassidy took a deep breath. “My name is Cassidy.”

Banner twisted up his features. He shivered, rolled off Cassidy’s lap and wailed.

“I know you know me, Captain.”

“I’m sorry,” Banner spat. “I should have let you all stay in the Everdream. I was wrong.”

Cassidy rolled him back over and shook him by the shoulders. “Maybe, but it’s done. We’re free men whether we like it or not and I’m not melting back in. We’re
your
men now.”

Banner’s eyes cleared a little and seemed to focus. “They’ll never let you go, boys. I’ve doomed you all. They’ll suck you in and do who knows what before that. I should have left you.”

Cassidy shook his head. “I don’t know what to believe anymore, but I’m sure as hell going to die on my own terms. Now we’re getting out.” He lifted his head and shouted out at the Everdream. “Take us to the
Nubigena
.”

“No,” Banner said. His voice dribbled out like a feeble child. Unlike Jayce had looked, Banner still appeared solid, but his skin was beyond white. Sucked dry of all colour. “This is what they want.”

An airship formed around them, melting up from the platform. Before Cassidy could stand, they were in the air and headed towards the place he’d left the
Nubigena
. The small craft manoeuvred back through the myriad of gaps and pulled alongside the Zeppelin. A plank extended to the main door, but stopped a foot away, the far edge melting as it came too close to the
Nubigena’s
hatch.

“Trap,” Banner rasped. “All of it.”

The airship jostled and began to fade as if forcing them to the plank.

“No doubt, but at least we’ll have the ship,” Brewster said. He helped Cassidy drag their captain, each taking a shoulder. Karl and Franz took Banner’s feet, and together they heaved him aboard.

Jayce met them in the bay hatch. “What’s wrong with him?” he asked when he glanced down at Banner’s white form.

“Tortured, I suspect,” Brewster said. “Don’t wish to imagine how.”

A harsh gale struck the ship. The crew carried Banner to his quarters as Cassidy and Jayce rushed to the bridge and engaged the engines. The savage wind was blowing them away from the heart, out towards the membrane. “Reverse the engines,” Cassidy shouted, as he took the wheel.