Sleep Medicine - Appetizer
Treats of Final Plans
You’re snacking on In Different Color, a fairy tale.
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Beyond the driftwood sill of an adobe manor in the Panache countryside, The Thick and Sweaty Wind played in the cottonfruit fields. The puffy plants - dewy from a recent Rain Fish storm - rustled in her quiet, humid breath. A local man standing in the field sheltered his eyes from the plant mist. The cowsowhorse beside him dropped its cow-head between its sow-hooves, and munched on weeds. Both were glad of a rest.
Mr. Grey pulled back from the sill. He leaned in a cozy chair, in the warm manor. His eyes wandered without care; the dozenth time. They saw the same ceiling of engraved clay; Mr. Grey had its image - men and women hauling basketfuls of ripe cottonfruit - etched on his own mind now. His eyes dropped. They saw the same stone end table. A vessel sat atop, a limeware bowl; brimming, like the baskets on the ceiling, with rougey fruit. Next to the bowl lay a crumpled square of fabric with a dark, dry stain.
Mr. Grey turned from the table.
His eyes found Honeydew. She sat in her own pillowy chair and watched Mr. Grey. She spoke now, with an effort at enthusiasm. “Do you think there were pencil pushers in The Lost City?”
Mr. Grey eyes met hers without luster. “What?” he asked.
“Wondering about Glory Days history. Do you think the bubbles of epoch’s past were anything like today? Were they the same number? Same size. Same places?”
“I couldn’t say.”
Honeydew twisted her lips. Then she clicked; a click of brushing-aside. “Guess it doesn’t matter in the end. Where to next? How long can we go - how far, travel - on a visa?”
“The best route is a return to Starharbor.” Mr. Grey’s voice ran like an iceberg against the conversation. His eyes showed a vacant spirit. He turned and looked back through the window.
Outside, the man among the wet cottonfruit was knotting a thick leather harness around the thicker left leg of his cowsowhorse. The beast lowed and mushed the soil with a hoof. The man stepped away and gave the animal her tantrum. He wiped the wet from his hands on the dry inner fabric of his robe’s shoulder strap. He returned to work.
Mr. Grey heard Honeydew’s foot beating the dust on the tiled floor. She spoke again, in a firmer tone. “Mr. Grey- Alright, look, things went sour at Jodee’s citadel. Bad. It was bad. Wrong. But you’re not the mastermind. It was the Glorious Defense Force. *Click*. Those wolfmen carried the means; they’re responsible for the awfulness!”
Mr. Grey did not stir and said nothing.
“What about this,” resumed Honeydew. She spoke as though she’d lit on an idea. “Suppose your boss - Jack whatever - suppose he embezzled kings’ treasures. Are you part of the scheme crew because you push pencils in the same hedge? Of course not. Same thing here. You can’t control the soldiers. Hemorrhoids! You probably spared more tourists from ceasing existence. You stopped that big bull. Odds are it would’ve stomped Wargermopolis. Like a steam swan on a beanfield.”
Rather than listen-to or look-at Honeydew, Mr. Grey fixed his attention on the field man and the cowsowhorse. The worker jerked his arms to secure the thick leather straps of the harness tied around his beast’s haunches. Now he spoke a mantra, the words coming out with long-practiced rhythm. “May it be mine, beside the Rain Fish altar, to dig the great furrowing shell through her rows of cotton, while she floats smiling by the clouds and coral beneath her fins.”
With a final, familiar pat on his cowsowhorse’s rump, the farmer harvested.
The glass-bead curtain of the room tinkled. Mr. Grey turned from the window. He saw Ordus enter. The diegeonary looked up, noticed the room’s occupants were Mr. Grey and Honeydew, tried retreating, noticed an insistent look on Honeydew’s face, and reluctantly reentered. He wore his robe of belt buckles and the Sun Fish emblazoned armor, but he’d stowed his weapon and seashell trumpet.
Ordus rolled on the balls of his feet and scratched neck hairs. He said, “Didn’t want to bother. Seems like you’re busy, or want to relax. I’ll drop in some other time.” His voice still came out scratchy from its colossus steam-room scalding.
“We’re not busy,” said Honeydew. She flicked her eyes meaningfully at Mr. Grey. “We want some occupation. Have your soldiers found Jodee?”
“That’s the thing.” Ordus walked to the end table and took a fruit from the bowl. With a glance to make sure Mr. Grey wasn’t looking, he also took the stained fabric square and stuffed it in a pocket. Mr. Grey glanced at Ordus. The diegeonary wiped the cottonfruit on his robe with affected nonchalance. He held it out to Mr. Grey; a fruit like ripe salmon meat, in the shape of a giant piece of popped corn. Mr. Grey declined.
Ordus took a nearby seat and bit juicily. He resumed his thought amidst stringy chewing. “That’s the news I came to break. Yeah, it looks like she jumped the pond.”
“What?” asked Honeydew.
“Absconded.”
“How? Didn’t your soldiers… Didn’t you have the colossus covered?”
“Do you want to lead the Defense Force?!” Honeydew opened her mouth to respond, but Ordus went on. “She fled to Dreamland.”
“Which is different from sleeping then?”
“Obviously. C’mon musklady. It’s common knowledge that Dreamland’s just like Glory Days. Or, wherever you’re from. Starharbor. Not exactly the same, but you know what I mean. Odormoated.”
“Did she fly there? Tunnel underground?”
“Nah. She took dream juice.”
Honeydew arched one brow. “No idea what you’re talking about. Still sounds like sleep.”
Mr. Grey shook his head. “It’s like liquid in a copper ampule,” he said, accidentally cutting Ordus off. “The drinker falls asleep. But then they vanish. They’re teleported directly to Dreamworld’s immigration office.”
Mr. Grey returned to silence and set chin into palm. Honeydew’s eyes pulled wide; impressed; excited. She said, “How’d you know that?”
Ordus had an angry, husky shout ready. He caught another meaningful eye-toss from Honeydew, however, and let Mr. Grey say, “Starharbor’s Change of Address Department processed visas for Dreamland.” Mr. Grey’s voice didn’t brim with enthusiasm - small chance of that - but some of his old stoic patience sounded in the explanation. “There’s a special portfolio to fill out for medicine-based transportation. And also, we saw depictions of dream juice in the oracle’s temple. And in Museumtown. Remember?”
“I don’t remember any of that,” said Honeydew. She clicked, moodily.
“It was a lot of tocks ago.”
“That reminds me,” said Ordus. His hands ran across the buckles on his robe, searching for a pocket. He found a pocket, undid the buckle, reached his hairy fingers inside, discovered it was the wrong pocket and began the process again; repeating this exact series of steps such a number of times that Honeydew lost count; all while growing increasingly frustrated with himself, and all while Mr. Grey and Honeydew watched with divergent levels of patience; until at last, having unbuckled nearly every pocket on the robe, and left all the prongs dangling out like porcupine quills, he darted a doubtful hand into one on the chest, just over the heart; and he pulled, from this last fold, Mr. Grey’s ticker.
Ordus jumped to a stand, walked to Mr. Grey, and offered the device. “Figure you might want this,” he joked. “Forgot to return it after that Candlehead ruckus.”
Mr. Grey regarded Ordus. As if deciding. After a moment, he took the ticker. He felt its familiar, rhythmic beat against his heart as he laid it down in the old pocket. He turned again to the window - to the cottonfruit field beyond, dancing with The Wind - and the harvesting farmer.
Ordus returned to his soft chair. Honeydew made no sound. Mr. Grey, looking away, missed the oily gleam in her eyes. It seemed extended to the golden-lily-girt eyes on her robe, so that her whole body wore a vulpine squint. She said, “Wonder what she’ll do in Dreamland. Jodee, that is. She needs dealing-with. Fast.”
Ordus said, “The Defense Force doesn’t operate outside of Glory days.”
“Shame.”
“Alright, alright! We’ll send a message to the king, of course. But, well… Regular Sunshine Post, you know. Less regular beyond the Sun Fish’s broad beams, aren’t they?”
“Too bad. The more time she has, the greater the possible damage.”
Outside, the beast-pulled plow gave off a sharp crack. It had struck a hard coral shard. The plow grooved a deep rut and lodged in thick clay. The farmer said, “Blob Fish curse me,” but in a way that sounded traditional, rather than angry. He undid the plow, muscled it from the earth, and started again on the knotting process.
Mr. Grey left the farmer at his work. He turned his attention, firmly and finally, to Ordus and Honeydew.
Honeydew said, “You could take the message. You are a king’s employee. And I wouldn’t mind a Dreamland layover.”
Mr. Grey pinched his chin. He said, “Do you think we could bring luggage?”
This has been In Different Color, a fairy tale.
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