Rem's Dream: Rem's Dream, #1

By Tim Niederriter

After a nightmare infects Rem's brain, her ambition of becoming a dream-scout seems impossible. Haunting visions threaten more than her goal. The nightmare pursues her at every turn.
She must struggle to uncover the truth of the nightmare and find the secrets of the dream world before her mind unravels forever. Strangers become allies. Friends become enemies.
Dreams become reality.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Mental Cellar Publications
• Release date: Aug 3, 2016
• ISBN: 9781536527254

Tim Niederriter

Tim Niederriter loves writing fantasy blended with science fiction. He lives in the green valley of southern Minnesota where he plays some of the nerdiest tabletop games imaginable. If you meet him, remember, his name is pronounced “Need a writer.”

Book preview

Chapter 1

REM AND HER BROTHERS ran along a street in Rome, completely unsupervised. Other tourists moved all around them. Rem didn’t notice them except when she darted around each adult and thrilled with the sound of her heart and her feet. Rome was fresh and new to her, despite being older than any city in the United States.

Her parents were a long way back, probably trying to figure out how Rem, Paul, and Travis had managed to disappear again. Rem smiled even as she pushed herself to keep running. Her brothers slowed, and she was grateful. She could have kept up the pace, but more importantly she wanted to look around.

Paul had just learned to open doors that came out in other places. His becoming a dream scout had other great perks. He glanced back at her and Travis, laughing. This is great! he said. We’re almost there.

She turned this way and that, taking in the city. The broad smile on Paul’s face looked less excited than either Rem or their younger brother. Travis, darted this way and that, circling through the crowd, his blond hair almost white in the warm sun.

All the buildings in this area were masked by dream replicas of the ancient city from history, but if she looked hard enough, Rem glimpsed the modern structures beneath the surface. Memories of the past mingled with the present throughout dream cities all over the world, but they were cooler in Europe than in America. There were more memories in this place than in any city in the United States.

Rem looked over her shoulder, but their parents had lost track of them almost as soon as they left the hotel, too slow to keep up even in dreams. Especially in dreams, Rem thought with a grin as she and her brothers turned down a narrow alleyway. Adults used to the old way of dreaming could never keep up with people who had spent most of their lives’ sleep in the stable dreamworld.

Paul had joined the Hennelen Corporation’s dream scouts last spring and found it easy to get Rem and Travis far away quickly.

He traced the outline of a door on one wall of the alleyway with the tip of his finger. The section of wall he outlined fell away, leaving a portal to another street. It looked smooth and went about as high as Paul could reach, like a tiny, close-ranged version of the doors that transported minds between the central pylons in each dream city.

Rem and her brothers stepped through the joining place. It only took a moment to step through, but a cold chill ran through Rem and a whisper of distant voices echoed behind her as she dropped onto the other side. She ignored the scary feel of the place between dreams. Everyone else did, she figured.

Paul sealed the door by tugging it shut from either side. He grinned. Let’s see if the parents can follow that.

Travis laughed as he looked in one direction, than the other.

They stood on a street similar to the one they’d left and just as full of people, but his street was far closer to the Coliseum. Rem glanced at Paul. You think mom and dad are close?

He smirked. Nah, no problem. Bet they’re glad they took us with them on this trip.

Paul’s joke sank in on Rem. Their parents traveled a lot for work, but they didn’t usually go so far, and they didn’t always bring Rem, Paul, and Travis.

She smirked as she remembered how they had explored dream cities back in the United States to see old forts and thin spots in the stable dreams, where the reality of wild sleep was close to the surface. Paul always took the lead in showing Rem and Travis things he had read about before each trip. But none of their parents’ previous work trips had been anywhere near this cool.

Let’s go, Remmie! Travis said, tugging at her pale green sleeve.

Rem grinned at Travis. He laughed and released her sleeve then set off running. Rem and Paul followed him at the same pace, dodging through the crowds of taller people all around.

The appearance of the buildings on this side had been restored from ancient memories of Rome. Tiled rooftops and plaster walls with arches and columns gleamed with sunlight. Rem felt as though they’d wandered into one of the books Paul liked to read about history, but even better. In the dreamworld, the colors were brighter and the size and shape of the structures felt more real, as if the people who had built them still lived here. And in the dream Rem could walk and run and see everything at different angles.

Rem ran again, ignoring the discomfort in her dream body easily as she focused on the city around her. She outpaced her brothers and reached the vast shadow of the famous Coliseum. She stumbled to a stop as she neared the gate. They’d picked a good time to come here, and the line of sightseers outside was short. Travis and Paul caught up with Rem.

In the shadow of the wall they looked so similar, yellow-haired and sharp-faced. Paul, two years older than Rem, stood a lot taller than Travis, who was four years younger than her. What Travis lacked in size he made up for with enthusiasm. His head practically spun as he tried to look everywhere at once. Eventually, he got dizzy and stumbled to one side. Rem stifled a laugh. He glared at her as he recovered.

She gazed up at the heights of the huge curving wall. Do you think birds go up there? The memories people had formed of them were clearest, and those appeared and sometimes disappeared. Even so, Rem thought she saw a few winged shadows circling over the heights.

Paul laughed. If we didn’t want to keep a low profile, I would fly up there and find out.

Travis pointed up at the top of the Coliseum. Yeah, but we can walk up there now, right?

Sure thing, brother. Paul smirked and then looked over his shoulder. The parents won’t catch up for at least another hour. That’s training paying off. He slipped his Hennelen Company scout badge from his pocket and tapped it in his palm. It’s not all fighting nightmares.

Rem glanced at Paul. The pylon that supported this part of dream Rome loomed behind them like a black spike in the earth. It towered over everything, the single tallest building in any city. The family had left the hotel near the pylon together and Travis had tried to see the top and gotten dizzy from the attempt. That had been before Rem and her brothers had escaped their parents. Rem shivered in the shadow of the Coliseum.

The line ahead of them disappeared as people passed through the gate.

Travis ran through the gate. Let’s go to the top! He turned and looked back at Paul. Which way is it?

Rem shook her head.

Paul just pointed upward. Rem walked up to Travis. Just use your halo, dummy. She pinched the air over one ear, feeling the edges of an unseen metallic-feeling ring there. Rem dragged the ring’s edge so it expanded around Travis’s head in a blue disk.

He shoved at her in annoyance. I can use my own halo, Remmie. The blue halo hovered around his head.

Then use it. Rem stepped back and folded her arms.

Travis, who was only nine, reached up and tapped the halo near his eyes. He smiled as his eyes moved over a map only he could see. Left! He ran off in that direction, up a curving corridor.

Rem took off after him. A few meters up she looked over her shoulder. Paul walked sedately behind. She waved an arm for him to follow. Come on, Paul.

Go on, I’ll catch up with you.

Rem shook her head but did as he told her. Either way, someone had to go with Travis. She sped up to catch her little brother. 

She and Travis raced past columns and up stairways. When they reached the top Rem had begun to breathe more heavily. She lost the focus she needed to simply let the dream take over. Imagined muscles cramped, in spite of her attempt to deny the sensation. She slowed as she caught up, and then stopped beside Travis, hands on her knees. They were in the high seats of the Coliseum, overlooking the arena.

Travis gazed down at the floor, eyes wide. It’s so big.

The floor of the Coliseum was restored in the dreamworld. Still, Rem wondered how much it looked like the one in the real world. The shifting forms of old memories and bloody sports moved below, not fully covered by the stable dreams because of the intense memories that lingered from times past. Entranced, Rem watched colors and shadows form into men with swords and vicious animals. The ghostly memories of lions and gladiators warred with each other. To her horror people were dragged before the snarling beasts. Dream lions pounced. Rem’s stomach lurched and she turned away.

It’s just old memories, just memories, Rem told herself. Those aren’t real people down there. But she knew they had been real, once, or they would not still be present in the new reality of the city reshaped by the dream machines inside the pylons.

She recovered a little and looked at Travis. He went on staring. She should have known the sight of the carnage would impress him. His imagination ran away with him easily, especially when dreaming. She approached the edge of the row and looked down at lower levels where adult sightseers came and went. Travis, what do you see down there?

He didn’t look up but shook his head slowly. Lions and gladiators... People really got hurt here.

Rem’s gaze faltered. She frowned. We’re on vacation. Don’t get serious.

Travis laughed. I got you! He skipped back toward the hallway and pointed at her. You thought I was being serious! You’re so gullible, Remmie!

Rem turned toward him, a retort forming in her mind, despite the fact that she was thirteen and should know better. Then she saw Paul coming up the passage behind Travis. He was grinning, so Rem grinned back, despite the remembered screams echoing from the arena below. You finally caught up.

Hey, I could have beaten you if I’d known it was a race.

Could not! Travis said. Rem didn’t catch me either.

I was talking to her. Paul chuckled. I know I couldn’t outrun you. Now let’s go. The parents are right behind us.

Rem frowned. How?

Ah, Travis said. But we just got here!

Apparently, they caught on quicker when we snuck away this time. Paul shook his head. No big deal if we don’t get caught too far from the hotel.

Rem glanced into the arena one more time. They really had just gotten here, and Paul had been looking forward to seeing this place for weeks. Something must be up. Travis sulked down the passage, but Paul waited for Rem. He stood for a moment then followed her into the row of seats. What’s wrong?

You didn’t tell Travis the truth, did you?

No, I didn’t. Paul tapped his scout badge. I just got a message from local scout command. A group of nightmares made it through the perimeter near here. There’s gonna be a public alert soon. But I thought better safe than sorry.

Rem looked up at his face, feeling a little better. Travis would have wanted to see the nightmares, I bet. And so would I.

That’s what I thought. Paul patted her on the shoulder. Come on, let’s get back to the real. I bet there’s a good museum nearby.

Is that a lie too?

Paul shrugged. A little bit of truth can go a long way, you know?

Rem laughed. Paul always knew the right thing to say. If I could be half as cool as him someday, I’d be happy. They went down the corridor together and met up with Travis. A high-pitched hiss came from behind Rem. She winced and looked over her shoulder toward the arena. Paul, what’s that sound? she said. Paul turned to Rem. Words began to form on his lips. Then they woke up.

Rem’s eyelids flew open and she looked to one side. The drab browns and whites of the walls in the dimly lit hotel room seemed even duller after the dream world. Her brothers and parents were waking. The family had been sleeping for less than an hour.

She sat up with sudden energy from a wake-up stimulant, dragging the cords attached to the small and unfamiliar Italian dream cap behind her. A dull ringing echoed in her ears. The wake-up stimulant wore off quickly and her head sagged forward over her legs.

One hand found the edge of her bed. She reached up with the other and undid the cap’s elastic bands. The cords fell to the bed with it. Rem’s hair was the same color in the real as it was in the dream but not as vibrant. Her reflection appeared in a mirror across the hotel bedroom. She used it to fix the blond hairs displaced by the cap.

Paul climbed from bed in his white sleeping suit. He stormed to the dresser where his other clothes and bags were piled. Rem frowned. Something must be wrong. Why is he hurrying? The ringing grew louder and shriller and Rem realized it was a warning siren. She rubbed her eyes. Travis groaned from his bed. Mom and dad got up slowly between him and Rem.

Paul was talking to someone on his phone. His face screwed up in agitation. He paced to the door and cracked it open. His face was bathed in red warning light from the corridor outside. The ringing became a single continuous whine.

Rem crawled to the foot of the bed. She forced herself to stand. The whine echoed through the room. Rem put one hand to the closet door beside the mirror. Paul lowered his phone. He looked back at Rem. Are you all right?

What’s happening? Rem couldn’t keep the fear from her voice. She looked past Paul to the corridor.

He glanced at the open door and then scowled. A nightmare translated over at the pylon. I don’t know why it came here. The red light flickered. Some shape had just passed between it and the doorway. Rem froze as Paul reached out to close the door.

With monstrous force, massive limbs surged into the room. Sickly pale flesh rippled with impossible muscle. Fingers, it had too many fingers. Two arms, each thick as dad’s waist, slithered through the doorway composed entirely of pale fingers. Paul dodged backward, wide-eyed. Rem took another step forward, staring at the monster. The nightmare’s arms lay still, like the limbs of a squid washed up on a beach.

Paul glanced back at her. Don’t let it touch you, he said.

Travis stared at the misshapen limbs. What is that?

Mom dragged him from his bed. Don’t look at it. She backed away from the nightmare, holding Travis. Paul, get back!

A guttural laugh sounded from the corridor, accompanied by a huge gust of hot wind that smelled like animal breath. Rem flinched. She squeezed her eyes shut and gripped a cabinet. The air roiled, and bass laughter echoed through the room. Rem trembled, but she kept her eyes shut. Gradually the wind died and the laughter trailed off. Rem opened her eyes. Paul stood between her and the nightmare as it emerged fully from the corridor.

It was at least twice Paul’s height but hunched over to fit inside. Saliva dripped from an inhumanly wide mouth over corpse-like lips. Black fluid oozed from the nightmare’s red, cat-like eyes as they fixed on Rem. A pair of triple-jointed legs supported the nightmare’s impossible frame.

How can it be so big?

One arm retracted. Fingertips emerged from within the arms and scrambled on the floor all along it from hand to shoulder. Rem clung to a closet and stared.

Her eyes met the red ones of the nightmare. Paul backed his shoulder into her. Rem, I’m going to try to distract it.

Rem put a hand on his shoulder. Paul?

Paul set his jaw. Don’t let it touch you, whatever you do. He pushed her back with his shoulder and then threw himself sideways. The nightmare’s grotesque arm shot straight toward Rem. She slipped into the gap between two closets. The hand scrabbled across polished wooden doors with the sound of thousands of fingers. Rem finally screamed. She covered her head with her arms and stepped back against the wall, cringing.

The hand closed around her sides, but rather than crushing her, it gripped her gently. Fingers pulled her arms back from her head. She stared into the nightmare’s eyes as it lifted her from the floor. Those eyes gleamed red with ferocity. The nightmare laughed again, vast and harsh. Small fingers caressed Rem’s neck and arms. She clenched her teeth to keep from screaming again.

She recognized the nightmare at that moment from thoughts not her own. This creature was a queen without a country, a queen called Challa. This nightmare had a name.

Her parents were yelling. Paul threw himself at the arm carrying Rem. He sank into the morass of sickly pale fingers. Rem looked down at him with an odd sense of disbelief. The arm threw Paul back a moment later. He sprawled onto the floor, shaking.

Rem watched as Challa drew her closer. The queen needs to feed, and she craves delicacies. She has finally found a human worthy of her palette. Rem struggled, shaking and twisting. This nightmare would not have her.

She couldn’t let it touch her, but too late for that. She looked down at Paul who lay sprawled on the floor. Too late for distractions.

A second siren resounded in her head. Images of lives that didn’t belong to her flashed through her mind, birth, pain, death. She screamed and kicked at the nightmare who continued to laugh. She hung only centimeters from Challa’s jaws.

Her nightmare grinned. Challa the queen opened her mouth to swallow Rem whole. Hot, stinking breath washed over her face. But the hiss of the nightmare inhaling scared her far worse. The hiss turned to a shriek. It dropped her and she hit cold tiles rather than scalding teeth.

Her eyes widened as the creature shrank before them. Multifarious fingers gripped at walls, ceilings, and closets, but it was no use. The nightmare fell apart into its components, a puppet with strings all cut. Within a moment even the pieces had faded to searing pink and gray residue.

Rem sat up gingerly. She looked around in a daze. Delirium reflections of red cats-eyes gleamed in the mirrors looking back at her. She fell onto her side, staring at the doorway.

Forms moved there, a woman in a black coat with strike police in armored vests and masks carrying thick barreled rifles. The woman walked to Rem and crouched down. She spoke calmly into a microphone. Situation secure. Send medical. We have civilians down.

Rem tried to sit up but fell on her back. She had to go to those eyes. She had to see the nightmare queen’s truth. She had to find her. Even as she struggled to get up again, shadows crept across her vision. She closed her eyes tight, but she knew Challa was still watching.

Chapter 2

THE DAYS THAT FOLLOWED were a whirlwind of tests and churning unstable dreams for Rem. She stayed in a hospital isolation unit, cut off from the stabilized dreamworld. She had never slept with unstable dreams for so long as far back as she could remember.

Mom took Travis home a week later. The last time he visited Rem in the hospital they had to pry his small hands from the plastic screen that separated them. Dad stayed behind with her in Italy. He never mentioned Paul when he visited, and she never saw her older brother.

Rem’s hospital room was white and all the video channels were in Italian. She longed for stable dreams, to wear her own dream cap again, and hoped every day they would let her go home as they ran tests and scanned her brain.

Half the tests involved lie detectors and stupid questions. Most of the others involved injections of small doses of medication. Small spots of pain dotted the back of Rem’s neck where the doctors insisted on injecting the drugs.

After a few more days of painful tests and nights of wild dreams, Rem was worse than bored or scared. Eyes of red haunted her nightmares every time she drifted off, alone in empty darkness. Every morning she woke shivering in the climate controlled room. Occasionally she thought she glimpsed those same red eyes in the masked nurses and doctors that came into her room. She told herself it was just her imagination.

Don’t let it touch you. Don’t let it touch you.

Two weeks after the nightmare queen had struck she was still in the hospital. The doctors continued to insist on her sleeping without a dream cap and completely isolated. Total containment. Apparently, they thought the nightmare’s toxic thoughts might be contagious. Even masks and hazard suits were not enough apparently.

Her dreams all happened in her own chaotic mind rather than plugged into the rest of the world. In the moments when the eyes of Challa left her, Rem’s dreams faded completely, leaving a sort of oblivion she’d never known before.

An old-fashioned paper calendar hung on the wall beside Rem’s bed. She crossed off the days with a black marker as October wore on. Rem once had plans with her friends at school for the coming Halloween. She dreaded it now.

They gave her a monitor cap for a night, and then, though the dreams were still chaotic and lonely they did not feature the red eyes of Challa. When Rem woke she looked at the calendar and found the marker’s line slashing through the entire previous week. Rem frowned. She did not remember making that mark. She decided not to tell the doctors about it, but part of her felt certain she had not drawn that line. Another week of nights where she slept wearing the dream cap went by, dreary, but peaceful.

The only sign of Challa was in the eyes of the nurses who came in with plates of food for Rem. Challa’s gaze watched Rem from the face of each stranger. She stayed firm. I’m not going to tell. If they think I’m crazy I won’t be able to go home.

Early the next Sunday morning, Rem watched dad talking to a bald Italian doctor on the other side of the transparent screen. They think I’m not going to make it. Every time dad looked at her she could see it in his eyes and his folded hands.

She hadn’t seen Paul for almost three weeks, though she asked about him whenever dad had visited. He sidestepped the question by changing the subject to Mom or Travis each time. She let him because at least those two were safe, and the thought of them gave her hope.

The bald doctor came in with a tablet and quarantine mask as if he could breathe in the nightmare. How are you feeling this morning, Rem?

She didn’t look at him. I’m alright.

The doctor tapped the tablet screen with a stylus. You’ve been sleeping restlessly. Have you had any dreams?

None that I remember. She’d seen those eyes every time she slept without the cap, and with them more and more others. The nightmare eyes came to her, all the same shade of red. They stared at her from darkness as broad as space and as deep as the ocean. Once she had stood on the cliff above them and looked down. At first, she had felt the urge to throw herself into them.

Rem nodded. No dreams.

The doctor tapped the tablet. I see. Can you remember what happened?

I was waking up. There was a siren and then the nightmare... Rem’s voice came out flat and she made sure not to say ‘Challa’. She knew the doctor would not trust her if she gave the nightmare a name. The nightmare came into the hotel room. It was laughing. She sighed. Why? Don’t you know what happened?

The doctor frowned and looked at his tablet. Nightmares don’t just attack anyone. Can you remember anything odd in the dream before you woke up?

Rem frowned as she considered that. They’d been at the dream Coliseum. Everything had seemed normal there. It was our first day in Rome. I don’t know.

The doctor nodded and looked at his tablet. You’re a very lucky girl, Rem. We can send you home. The doctor folded his tablet under one arm. If you have any unusual dreams, be sure to tell your parents immediately. Get dressed. Your father will be here to pick you up soon.

Rem stared down at her legs beneath