Dreamwar and Other Diversions of Ignorance: The Dreamwar Corridor

This dream ties in with one from The Black Book of Fear. There’s another chapter from that same rough draft—although I don’t recall just now if it made it through the cuts.

The dreamdash has led us to this scene: a beautiful hotel—what your 21st Century eyes as neomodern revivalist and semi-futuristic, but has a kind of rococo rustic nostalgia to my fancy 32Cees—at the literal edge of which, war is being waged.

Now, whatever feeling your waking mind may have about this, remember: we are dreamwalking. So you are safe here, so long as you stay with me. Or, if your training wheels are off, as long as you stay within my dreamline. If you step outside, you’re on your own.

Who are the belligerents in this war? We don’t know them personally; that much I know. Some are designated as ‘militants’ and others as ‘soldiers’ but it’s all a mess. Such things always are.

But our principal concern is with the tropical frontier of Taruma Kivuli—an island to the far southeast from the frontlines of the conflict.

Taruma Kivuli is something of a mystery. There are large, pterodactyl-like birds there and—supposedly—humans that ride them; however, there is no confirmed recorded account of contact with these folks, so I remain skeptical that they exist.

What we know exists—and what has drawn us into this hellscape pocket—is the Death Cage at Taruma Kivuli.

What’s the Death Cage? you ask.

The Death Cage is exactly what it sounds like: A cage in the center of the island, made primarily of chain-link fencing and similar metals, in which sits multiple machinegun turrets. There are rumors that these are manned turrets, but I think they are probably automated.

People who go there—called jasari in the secretist dossier—believe that the war has opened up some kind of pathway to riches on the island, and that the Death Cage must be defeated in order to obtain this ancient wealth.

You may wonder if I believe that.

Absolutely not. I think people are greedy and stupid or desperate and are drawn to opportunities like this by avarice or some kind of existential crisis. The analyst brief says that the lore of the place is that the Death Cage exists to collect souls—what the Ministry identifies as ‘individual consciousnesses’—to power some sort of subterranean engine, possible a chthonic cannon or a macrotellurian drive.

You ask me what those are.

Not important to us, is what they are. But if you read A Galaxy of Submission, the cannon Teresa Anderson used in that one is similar to a chthonic cannon.

Wait, you go, aren’t you Teresa Anderson?

Yes, but I mean my bioidentical duplicate Teresa Anderson. The one from the end of Love Is What You Have.

I pause.

Have I not introduced you guys yet?

No, you say—unless, of course, I have.

Huh. Guess I haven’t written that yet. I’ll introduce you to her when we get back to the Brubaker. But don’t get too excited. She’s just like me, so.

You ask me if there are any other bioidentical duplicates you should know about.

I mean, there’s a ton. It’s a fairly common thing in the 32C. Or not uncommon, anyway. There was a Wendy dupe and a Mickie dupe …

Wait, a Mickie duplicate? you ask.

Yeah.

Could that have been who we were with in “Mickie?”

I mean, maybe, I guess. But I thought she got killed in Love? I dunno. Maybe. But let’s focus on this story path right now, m’kay? And on this crazy nexus of subpaths we have here in dream number fifty. Cos it’s a shitton and I have a life to live ontop of writing all this for you, babe.

What subpaths? you ask.

Oh. Right.

I pull a map out of the dossier, show it to you.

So we’re on the dream path now, right? But the dreamdash took us into the Dreamwar. Yay. So now we’re starting to get into the thick of it, in the shit, the suck.

As you can see, we have, like nine—I squint a bit—or maybe more stops in the Death Cage subsection. Then we have, like, ten over here. [Ed. If you can read the writing, see the footnote1.]

You look at me and say, Tee, I know you are prolific, but there is no way you’re going to write all this today.

I look back at you.

Yes, I know. But we’re gonna map it out, babe. And we’re gonna get there. Then, hopefully, we can get it written today and tomorrow. If not …

My face goes grim.

If not what? you may ask.

We lose the war.

How is that even possible? you ask. And what does that even mean?

Don’t … worry about it, babe. Failure is my middle name, m’kay? We’ve got this.

With that, I close the dossier and lead us onto the southern shore of Taruma Kivuli.