David held still as Sandra burst into the room. Enigmatic, without expression, he hid unfathomable black eyes behind designer shades. His hair, raven-black, was secured at the nape of the neck by a silver pin and a curl of hand-tooled leather. He wore an expensive Italian suit, his usual armor.

      The Dream Quest director was an older version of the younger man--raven hair was streaked with gray, weathered face, and eyes that were washed out disks chip of polar ice. The director raised a single eyebrow in half-hearted inquiry. “What are you doing here?” He asked.

     “I was going to ask you that,” Sandra said, “about him,”
she stared at David with cold contempt, her finger stabbing his way.

     “I invited him--”

     “He’s a hack you know. Don’t we have enough under-funded projects without you wasting money on this glory-hound?”

     The director flushed with anger, but kept his voice level. “It is not your place to question my judgment, or to insult my guests, Sandra--even if you were once married to him.”

     “That’s got nothing to do with—“

     The director continued, running over her words with relentless methodical efficiency. “You’ve already made three attempts at extraction and failed. We need an experienced breaker in on this, before the family brings in a legion of lawyers.”

     “But I’m so close. Next time for sure—“

     “We’re almost out of next-times, Sandra. Extractions stress the mind. Too many attempts can shatter a personality. This is our last try, and if you go in again, you go in with David’s permission. He will be in charge. Now, if you can’t handle that, then go away. This is serious work, and we’ve no time for territorial posturing or hormonal-driven mood swings.

     “I’d like to see the client now,” David broke in, his voice mellow and untroubled.

     The director climbed to his feet, gesturing grandly toward
the door with one hand. Sandra fumed a moment, stomped a dainty foot, and stormed out the door. David followed her with a sigh. He caught up to her at the interface station, a glass coffin holding Mitch Ryder’s comatose body.

    A massive blue-chrome sphere was suspended over the glass booth by telescoping booms jutting out from a wall of machinery. Silver wires dangled from the orb, making it a high tech dream-catcher. The wires ended in self-adhering leads that touched the client’s head, monitoring the brain’s electrical activity at various centers, as well as the heart’s action.

     Ryder’s breathing was deep and slow. His lower face was thick with newly sprouted beard. His eyes moved rapidly, indicating he was deep in a dream. Otherwise, he might have been a corpse. David ran a quick check on the man’s vital signs.

     “That’s not necessary,” Sandra said. “When there are significant changes in his condition, Watchdog here,” she gently slapped the blue-chrome sphere, “will alert us.”

     “If the machines worked right,” David argued, “this man would be awake now.”

     “Our best techs have gone over this set-up time and again,” the director said. “The problem is in the wet-ware--the human brain--it’s an organic failure that keeps him from waking up.

     It’s going to take one hell of a Prince Charming to awaken this sleeping beauty from his self-imposed exile.”

     “You have an extraction room prepped for me,” David asked.

     The director nodded. “Through the double-doors, you’ll find the usual set of contour couches with watchdogs and cyber- links to this station here. You have a game plan?”

     “Yes, meld into the client’s dream and break it.” David shifted his shielded glance toward Sandra. Young, pretty, earnest, and angry all at once—David felt love surge through him for this rather complex woman. “Are you coming?” he asked.

     She hurried past him, taking care to avoid actual contact. He followed to the extraction room. She took her place on a couch, looking like a high-tech marionette with all the wires and leads in place. David settled in next to her without another word or glance her way, his professional face in play.

     Soon, he was tied into the system. Reclining on his couch, David threw a switch. The lights dimmed. He closed he eyes, losing himself in the subtle hum of the machinery. Let it work this time, he prayed. Let failure teach her a needed lesson. The ability to play God with the souls of others is a gift. You either have it or you don’t.

                                            * * *

     He faded into a bleak and barren moonscape. Several inches of gray dust stirred underfoot as he took an experimental step. He was lighter than normal in the reduced gravity, and took a few moments to adjust to it. He froze, eyes caught by a bright blue-white sphere, lit by an unseen sun. The beauty was overwhelming. Earth—Home—more fragile than we suspected.     A hand on his shoulder pulled him back from abstraction. He turned slowly like a figure underwater, discovering Sandra--naked—sprouting gray-blue angel wings from her back, radiating anger.

      David shook the transition shock from his mind.

     “What the freakin’ hell do you think you’re doing?” she asked, as a white linen wrap faded into existence around her narrow waist.

     “It’s not in-put from me,” David said, checking out his own set of midnight blue wings, extending them experimentally. “The system has integrated us into the logic of the dreamscape now that we’re inside. Obviously, since people can’t stroll around here without space suits, we’ve been turned into celestial beings. What’s the big deal, anyway? You haven’t got anything I haven’t seen before.”

     Sandra growled deep in her throat and drew a deep calming breath. She released it, and continued in a less strident tone.

     “But angels?”

     “What were you before, a fairy-queen or lunar sprite?”

     “A winged unicorn if you must know.”

     “Hmmmmmm.  That’s insightful. You see yourself as the highest and purest of creatures.”

     “Let’s get on with the mission,” Sandra suggested. There’s a ruined city at the center of this crater. You can just make it out,” she gestured, “…over there. And for-the-love-of-all-things-small-and-furry, cover up, will ya!”

     “What? Oh, sure. If you’re uncomfortable.” David grinned the old familiar grin that used to melted her like butter in a hot skillet. It had no effect. He closed the door on his personal pain and sadness, calling himself back to the job. A golden shimmer of star-points appeared around his lower torso. The glittering wind solidified into a loincloth covering his private parts.

     David took a step, using too much force, breaking contact with the ground. Sandra enjoyed the sight until David smoothly compensated, spreading his wings, invoking a motive power that went beyond the natural order. His awkward sprawl became a graceful low-altitude glide. He discovered that his desire to fly tied her into an unseen force that sustained him. He only had to angle her wings to direct the exodus of power from some strange new dimension deep within.

     It wasn’t long before he touched down in the white marble ruins of an ancient civilization. At the center of the city ruins, the palace was mostly intact. They picked their way carefully over rubble. “This is as far as I’ve ever gotten, Sandra said. “Any time now, we’re going to encounter the royal guard.”

     “I know. I wouldn’t attempt an extraction without doing my research, developing multiple lines of attack. Despite what you think you know about breakers--”

     Whatever he would have said was lost in the piercing shrieks of five top-heavy blondes in fur bikini bottoms. Silver cups modestly restrained bouncing breasts that were also adorned with necklaces made of claws and miniature animal skulls. The women bristled with numerous bladed weapons strapped everywhere, in sheathes and seemed eager to use them.

     “Hummmmph!  This is typical, barbarian moon-maidens with gluts of steel. Whatever happened to loving a girl for her keen mind and pleasing disposition?” Sandra asked.

      “Never-mind that, we better do something quick!” David said.

      “Got it covered this time for sure,” Sandra said. She held out her hand and a sword of woven flame appeared in it. The fire didn’t harm her. The sword’s red-gold hilt nestled snugly in her fist as she screamed in feminist fury, swinging the weapon like a baseball bat. The fire sword sliced through the steel blade that met it. It was the logic of the dreamscape; magic weapons are always stronger and sharper than regular ones.

     The moon-maid ducked under Sandra’s weapon, springing into grappling range. David watched the moon-maid turn sharply and sweep Sandra over a hip, tossing her far away in the lunar gravity. She snapped her wings open, turning her tumble into an upward climb through the nearly airless void. She peaked with a flip that brought her diving headfirst back toward the women, fire sword extended. David nodded his appreciation. It was a good recovery for an amateur breaker.

     At the last moment, the moon-maidens scrambled out of the way, letting her shoot through them, toward the damaged palace. David saw Sandra looking for his approval over her shoulder. She turned her face forward again a second too late, sailing straight into a marble column.

     Stunned, She lay crumpled in a heap. David willed a small change in his appearance as Sandra propped herself up, lifting her head. The woman closing in on him slowed, lowering their weapons. He went with over to get Sandra. Surrounded, she looked up at him through a cage of long, shapely legs.

      Sandra groaned loudly. Her brow creased in confusion at David’s achievement, and her sword extinguishing itself for lack of attention. David knew she would soon place his borrowed face despite the animation he brought to it.

     “Who are you supposed to be?” she asked.

     David pointed at a nearby statue. It was pitted and dusty but recognizable, a rendering of Ryder rendered in heroic proportions, now fallen! “I deduced that the woman were an honor guard created to protect Ryder and give us a challenge. I reasoned that they would not hinder me if I became their lord.”

      “So you finally got the harem you always wanted,” Sandra shouted, rising to her feet. “Congratulations, you son of a—“.

     One of the blond warrior women slapped Sandra for her disrespectful tone. Sandra’s head rocked on her shoulder. Blood trickled out of the corner of her mouth. She brought her face back around, letting her hate spill from her eyes, though staying safely silent.

     David sighed, walking past her into the palace. She was dragged along like a broken toy in his wake. Soon, they reached a hall feebly lit by giant phosphorescent moths clinging to the ceiling. At the center of the space, was a great glass coffin, similar to the one that held Ryder’s real body.

     David stopped before the case, resting his palms on its transparent lid. He felt Sandra’s eyes drilling into his back. The moon-maidens were whispering questions to one another. He spoke to the prone figure as if he could hear. “Death is no safe refuge, only a door, an interruption of an endless journey. It is time, Mitch, to leave the arms of darkness, and fall into the light.”

     David began to glow. A fierce light burst from him, smashing out against the gloom. The light was thick, warm, nearly plasmatic, washing everything away. Sandra screamed

     “Noooooooooooooo!”

     The protest went unheeded. The light dimmed and the women vanished. The palace was gone. The glass coffin was gone.

                                          * * *

        David yanked the wire leads off of him, bolting upright. He ran from the extraction room, back to the room with the client. The director was still there, watching Sandra. 

      Still asleep--I failed again, David realized. He reached out to touch the dreamer. “Reset the extraction devices,” he said, wearily. “I’ll try again.”

     “She’s not coming out,” the director said. “She won’t accept a world where a man can do something better than she can. You’ve done all that’s possible, David. You need to stop before you kill yourself. I guess there are some dreams that can’t be broken. I’ll have her moved to a care facility until…until…”

     “I should never have let her try the dreamscape,” David said. “There were warning signs she was too unstable. I just didn’t see them in time.” He bent over the glass coffin, kissed her lightly, and withdrew, leaving her to her dreams.