In Dreams I Walk with You: A Mind’S Journey

By Barry Gilmartin

In an instant, Gene Finns wife is gone in a horrible car accident. With his life shattered, Gene eventually resigns from his job as an FBI agent and begins tailing husbands and wives to catch them cheating. After he grows weary of the bizarre dreams and sleeplessness that plague him nightly, Gene visits a sleep center headed by a doctor who promises to help him through therapy and dream analysis. Unfortunately Gene has no idea that he has just walked into the midst of a diabolical plot to take control of the world.

Maddie Vaughan works for a powerful lobbyist group in Washington led by her charismatic ex-lover. Although she enjoys success by day, at night Maddie is beleaguered by insomnia. When she seeks relief at a sleep center, Maddie is suddenly overwhelmed by strange dreams that begin taking over her life. After she and Gene meet and realize that someone is attempting to control of their minds, they must seek the answers within their dreams to save themselvesand humanityfrom a dark destiny.

In this sci-fi thriller, two insomniacs desperate for help unwittingly uncover an evil political plot they must attempt to destroy, before it is too late.

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Feb 16, 2017
• ISBN: 9781532015137

Barry Gilmartin

Barry Gilmartin found time to write his first book while waking up early to watch the sunrise. When he is not creating characters, he enjoys playing guitar. Barry and his wife live in Northern California.

Book preview

CHAPTER ONE

It is early November near Washington, DC. Outside it is a cold and frosty night. Snow and ice cover the barren countryside.

Doctor Mallory’s hands shook. Not believing what he had witnessed. How could this happen? The testing, preparations, when the possibilities of complications are so low. The phone rang and rang. Why won’t the damn fool answer? A voice came on the line. What?

Something has happened here. An anomaly in two test subjects, Dr. Mallory said.

The voice responded, What anomaly?

It’s similar but stronger.

Nothing, the voice came over the cell phone Anyone else with you?

Just Fredrick, he attended another patient.

Is he still there?

No, I sent him home.

Good, I am sending someone over. Don’t move.

Doctor Mallory puts away the cell phone. His nerve, rattled. He had sent everyone home early. Fredrick was in his room. He went over it again in his mind asking himself, how did this happen?

Patient Phil Cohen’s, vitals were normal and the experiment was going as expected. The subject entered R.E.M. sleep and the video visuals of his dreams appeared on the screens above Doctor Mallory. The use of electro and chemical stimulus to the brain using tissue activators and microinjections of cholinergic agonist or cholinesterase inhibitors induced a controlled R.E.M. sleep. This created a more receptive state for the suggestive dream sequences.

When the suggestive dream sequences transmit into a somnolent brain, something happened. Instead of the subject’s brain accepting the sequences, Phil Cohen’s brain activity increased and a new image began to materialize onto the screens. Fredrick called over from his observation of his subject. He said that something strange happened. Phil Cohen entered the subjects dream. Doctor Mallory saw the same thing on his monitor. This is impossible. It appeared that Phil stayed unaware anything happened.

Doctor Mallory double-checked to ensure it all recorded and instructed Fredrick to pull his subject from R.E.M. and slowly woke him up. As this, happened Doctor Mallory watched Phil Cohen’s monitor and as the shared dream faded, he went into another dream of his own.

Doctor Mallory decided to allow Phil to sleep longer, making the memory more difficult for Phil to remember. He asked Fredrick to process his patient. He saved the records on different computer. Dr. Mallory told him not speak of this to anyone. Fredrick understood. Doctor Mallory made his phone call.

CHAPTER TWO

Doctor Slausenhaugher pulled over. There were three men, a car blocking the road and a body lying there. One of the three men in an agitated state got the doctors attention. The other man grabbed the doctor and injected him with a substance. It took a moment for the doctor to pass out. In the moments of his unconsciousness, they placed him in the back seat of his car. They installed the remote accelerator in the fuel injection of his Chevy. The retrograde amnestic effect of the drug left him feeling disoriented, somewhat intoxicated. The three cars, off to the shoulder were pointing west towards Rosslyn Crossing over the Potomac. Two of the men lifted Fredrick put him back in the driver’s seat.

The car behind him gave his car a nudge to get him started. Fredrick pulled out and did his best to keep the car between the lines. His eyes kept watering, and he tried to wipe them clean with his sleeve.

Two black sedans pulled out behind the doctor and by remote control increased the speed of the doctor’s car. Doctor Slausenhaugher couldn’t figure out what was happening. Headlights came up fast behind him. He tried applying the brakes, but he kept going faster. Lights were right on his tail. One car pulled alongside. Jeeze he’s close, the doctor thought as he struggled to stay conscious. This guy must be drunk he’s all over the road.

Crossing over the line, the black sedan kept swerving into the Chevrolet’s lane almost hitting him. He kept swerving away all the time his speed increased. There were lights right on his tail. I can’t see, my eyes are all watery. The exit came up fast. I’ll get off and lose this lunatic. His speedometer read 90 miles an hour. I’ll run the car into a field or something. The car on his right swerves. An exit, a few more yards, the car from behind him pulls up. A shape on his left, moving toward him; he swerved, the car on his right cut off the exit. The last thing he saw, yellow impact barrels protecting the railing, but not the doctor on this night.

The impact was deadly – shattered glass, twisted crushed and mangled metal leaking gas with fire enveloping the front effectively destroying all telltale evidence of the remote accelerator or the doctor’s life. The black sedan on the right cut the doctor off, and disappeared into the countryside. The other black sedans disappeared down route 66 and on into the night.

CHAPTER THREE

Two weeks earlier just outside of DC.

This one will be better it’s time to move on and join the rat race. It’s easy for them; they didn’t lose their soul mate.

On that terrible night, ripped away from him, his young and beautiful wife. In his arms, her eyes looked up as her tear fell on his arm, the only warmth he felt as she grew cold in his arms.

It will be alright, won’t it? Tell me it will be all right. I’m so cold. Hold me Gene hold me tight, I’m so afraid of the dark.

It all happened so fast; the rain, the noise, and that crash. From out of nowhere the dark Buick, the sounds of shattering glass, and her screams as the car ran right into her side.

The other driver is pacing while waiting for the police.

My brakes wouldn’t work, He repeated.

I’m not cold anymore Gene, Samantha said.

Hold on baby, Gene said, help is coming. In an instant she was gone, his life shattered, ripped open, alone.

The loneliness remained even after a month off. Hard to stay focused on work. The Macready case began to suffer; his daydreaming hurt his ability to recant stakeout information in his reports. His otherwise precise reporting and near total recall escaped him.

The drinking didn’t help. A scotch and milk at night, at first a nightcap to help him sleep but sleep eluded him. One by one, he started to lose other things, short-term memory and his ability to focus. Was it depression or his just giving up?

The FBI put up with his deteriorating work for 6 months. It became clear either he would be canned or ask for early retirement, he chose the latter.

Now he follows husbands or wives that don’t trust each other or a shmuck’s girlfriend. The hours seemed to fit the insomnia. His job went with the night. Stakeouts in a cold car while this Joe bangs the shit out of this hot little dame and Gene got the pictures. Photographic evidence his wife could throw in her husband’s face yelling Divorce. His business cards read, Finn and Associates Private Detective Agency as "24 years’ experience with the FBI".

Gene had weird dreams. Dreams like the accident that night, or being drunk on duty and unable to save a person’s life. Not being able to get his gun out of his holster and when he did it fell into pieces in his hand. First, the bullets would fall out and then it came apart like him.

He knew these dreams were keeping him awake. Like so many others. He couldn’t get back to sleep. They waited for him, daring him to come back. Getting up and sitting in his chair by the window. The dark seemed like a better choice, watching the light capture the night.

The darkness again, he sat here before and pondered his plight, waiting for night to fade into light. He must be going crazy. His mind started to rhyme, repeatedly, he heard himself singing into the words.

"I can’t help it; it’s out of control

Why won’t my mind do what it’s told?

My vision gets fuzzy, my mind become hazy,

Sometimes I think I am going crazy.

Will I get stuck? Stuck in a rhyme?

To never get free; not for all time?"

Shake it off, he thought to himself.

He looked at the lonely world beyond the glass. The darkened road, few streetlights. A couple of cars on jacks abandoned for their tires or wheels. Stolen and stripped under blackened streetlights.

Across the street from where he lived there were other tenements and brown stone walk-ups. He considered himself lucky to be on top of the 8 units on 4 floors. The view helped him with the memories of his home with his wife in Alexandria. It seemed so long ago now. Mowing the lawn, raking the leaves, cleaning the gutters, shoveling snow, it all seemed so romantic.

He heard a crash of a trash can lid down an alley. Some cat looking for breakfast. The sound of a delivery truck and garbage trucks started to take away the quiet. Lights begin to appear in the windows along the street as people began their days, his began hours ago.

Cold wind whistled under the old wooden window, its chill raising the hairs on his arms. A soft light rose and covered the buildings, pushing darkness to gray. The roofs along the skyline in the alley, casting the first shadows of the day. In a window, another cat stretches and repositions itself unwilling to give up on sleep, not just yet.

If light could be heard, just think of the sound?

Would you hear the crunch of cold snow fresh to the ground?

Like clothes on a line as they move through a breeze?

Or the soft sounds of fall like so many colorful leaves?

Perhaps like the sound as her hair brushes my ear?

Could any of these sounds be what I would hear?

It may sound like an orchestra from one instrument to a chorus.

As the light fills the world and expands right before us.

Only to return to a soft undetectable sound,

Waiting for tomorrow, to come back around."

He had an appointment today at 8 AM at the Dream Center. He wanted to make headway.

When I wake from a dream I still feel like I’m sleeping. The realization that I’m not brings on stress. I think I am awake but I’m still dreaming.

He remembered when he first started to fly in his dreams. Flying like superman, up, up and away. He always flew right towards power lines and then he would awake. As a child, they told you if you died in your dreams you would die in your sleep.

Who makes this stuff up anyway?

He became better at flying in his dreams; he began to choose where he wanted to fly. Usually it’s over someplace like the Grand Canyon or a big city like Washington or Boston. His childhood wasn’t that great, and he tried to escape something he couldn’t control.

Rick Marino and Gene Finn were friends for decades. They met in Junior High in Rockland, Massachusetts. Gene cracked a dumb joke while in line one day waiting for lunch.

Rick’s family was blue collar like Gene’s. Right after High School and his stint in the Navy Rick married Gene’s sister Val. They’d been through a lot together, Gene and Rick.

Growing up the O’Reilly family lived down the street. Gene always thought they were the ideal family. White picket fence, parents both teachers. Gene remembers going to the O’Reilly’s house early before school so he could watch the 3 stooges while Johnny O’Reilly finished getting ready. Johnny’s mom always offered juice or a muffin or something. Unlike Gene’s, house, 6 kids, one bathroom, four sisters, all the screaming and yelling. On a good day, his dad said something nice.

Most days he choked up the crap from smoking Camel straights and the booze. He yelled at and about the crappy coffee. His real breakfast, a shot and a beer at The Grill before braving the elements to build a house for someone.

Gene’s dad died a couple of years after his mom threw him out and divorced him. Gene’s uncle said, He died from a broken heart

There’d been no love lost between Gene and his dad. His four sisters and brother were doing ok, surviving children of alcoholic parents. It is a challenge, even today.

The booze, it’s in our blood. always said at the holidays. That was generally before they spiraled out of control blaming each other for shit that happened years ago.

In those days’ people unknowingly self-medicated things away. Things we couldn’t explain, that woke us in the night. They wouldn’t let go and kept us alone even when we had a family that loves us.

Rick and Gene got out of Rockland and went to school together in Boston. First it was Boston College School of Law, Go figure after the shit we pulled and gotten away with as kids.

Quantico called Rick first; Gene applied. They went in together as freshmen. The class of 1973 FBI training, the second year Quantico was open.

To lead and Inspire, To Influence change and forge partnerships. That’s what he and Rick had a friendship and a partnership.

I’ve got his back, he’s got mine.

CHAPTER FOUR

Just as he did every day for the last five years, Doctor Mallory pulled into his parking space.

It’s 6 am.

Good morning Miriam.

Good morning doctor.

How is the coffee this morning?

It’s as terrible as always, Doctor.

He smiles at this because Miriam made the best coffee he had ever tasted.

Walking past the nurse’s station, he entered his office a small room with one window facing east overlooking the Potomac. There’s ice at the edges of its banks at this time of year.

Doctor Mallory sat at his desk his thoughts of when he first opened the clinic. He thought of Bill and the others. Bill and his son Nick asked him to help get it started again. The positive potentials of the therapy is known, but he didn’t trust its side effects. They shelved the project years ago, but he knew its damages and secrets, the evil it could bring yet here he sat.

Doctor Mallory a respected Doctor in his field. Graduating from Princeton with honors, studying medicine at Harvard he excelled in the study of the brain. He had won awards for his early research in brain functions.

Harvard is where Doctor Mallory first met Bill Richards studied political science. They became friends at school and kept in touch throughout the years. Bill had a great future ahead of him. He volunteered for many political campaigns. He ended up working at the CIA. That led to his ultimate association with William Jenkins and the campaign for the Governors’ Office of Oklahoma and now the White House.

Bill was with the CIA when Doctor Mallory got that phone call. Doctor Mallory didn’t know how deep he’d get or how he’d get out?

Progress was better than the first run of the program. Steady improvement in patients showed great promise for the therapy.

Other uses for the therapy proved inevitable. Mind control was too strong for those in government to overlook. Bill Richards saw to that. A steady stream of clients came for Doctor Mallory’s therapy. The imbedding of thoughts in patients was reminiscent of the programs first run so many years ago.

CHAPTER FIVE

The trees flew by as Gene moved deliberately through the curves. Four tires hugged the high side going into the turn. Accelerating out the other side set him up for the next set of twists and turns the road would throw at him. Why he still owned this black hole for electrical repairs was beyond him. There’s a back seat that’s large enough for two bags of groceries. A black walnut dashboard’s gauges displayed all the information in kilometers and miles. The only ones he watched were the tachometer, gas and oil. Gene loved winding it up on the open road along the water’s edge. Gene followed the Potomac along Canal Road NW towards Potomac Heights. The feeling of the air as it changed from the soot of the city to the salt of the ocean brought a smile to his face. Wind blew his hair and stress out the back, left in his dust. Gene drove M street out through Georgetown past the university and all the pretty co-eds. He’d have driven to Great Falls National Park but not today, today he had to dream.

Eight AM, Gene pulled his 1964 Triumph TR3B into the parking lot of the Center for Dream Studies. The feeling is the same each time Gene walked in, these people I see in my dreams. They don’t really belong there? Why are they there? Why don’t I feel compelled to mention them? My dreams are strange enough with my own baggage; these lost souls make it even more confusing. What do they want?

He got out and closed his car door as he headed for the clinic. Rick suggested this pace for Gene’s insomnia. Doctor Mallory and his team would hook him up to all their sensors and equipment and he would sleep.

Gene walked into the clinic, registered with the desk clerk and sat waiting to hear his name called.

Mr. Finn, Doctor Mallory will see you now, the attendant said.

Gene got up, and he led Gene to a small examination room. An examination bed dominated the room. There were counters and cabinets along the wall. A magazine rack with well-worn old magazines and other dribble people read while they waited.

The door to the examination room opened and Doctor Mallory walked in. A tall slight man about 60 years old Gene guessed. He had an easy manner about him, which helped in this line of work. Talking about what happened to you as you dreamed or laid awake is a large part of this therapy.

Good Morning Gene, how are you feeling?

Fine Doc, and you?

I’m fine Gene, Thanks.

So, we have finished the initial phase of treatments and I wanted to ask if you have any other questions before we get started today, Doctor Mallory asked?

Yes, Gene said, If you would review this process again because I am still a bit confused?

Certainly, Doctor Mallory explained, What we are trying to do here is give you the ability to work through these dreams as they are happening, thus giving you the ability to stay asleep. Insomnia is a byproduct of the stress in our lives or a trauma that happened that goes unfinished in our minds.

We work together with therapy to better understand your stresses and fears and attempt to understand how these feelings are played out through your dreams

And my dreams, you can see them as they happen? Gene asked.

Somewhat, Doctor Mallory responded, What we see are images like pictures and patterns that change and flow with your dream

These patterns show emotion; they show if I am agitated? Gene inquired.

Agitated or blissful, it’s like a lie detector, put in simple terms, like the needle jumping if a person is lying. We combine that with the video of your sleeping and eye movement measurements. Combined we get a pretty good picture of what’s happened.

And then what? Gene asked.

This therapy is experimental you must understand. We are in trials. To better, understand the effects on people. We use electronic pulses and amino fluids at specific places in the brain at certain moments to stimulate the brain. We think this can control and interact with the brain during dreams.

Am I getting a lobotomy?

No, not anything like that, we are enhancing the brains ability to experience and react during the dreaming process. Being able to will a different outcome.

Now as we discussed you should have tried to stay up. How did that work for you?

No problem Doc, I haven’t slept since 2 am this morning.

OK, as we did when we met last time, we will start by observing you’re sleeping patterns and hopefully your dreams."

They went into a room.

What did you bring to sleep in?

Gene put on his sweats and they wired him up like an EEG except there were all sorts of additional wires going to his head as well as his chest arms and legs.

Remember, we give you a sleeping pill that will help induce sleep at first, and then as you get more comfortable here we can hopefully use less.

An I.V. in his arm and a slow drip made him groggy.

This won’t hurt a bit, Gene, and you should remember very little.

As Gene began his journey through the stages of sleep until he’d reached full R.E.M. He thought back to when he met his wife Samantha. They were at Winterlude in early February at the Rideau Canal Skate way in Ottawa Canada. Each year they drained the canal enough to freeze the waterway for skating. On the frozen river, you could skate in one direction for over 7 kilometers on smooth ice. He remembered getting knocked down by this most beautiful woman. She stopped and helped him back to his feet.

Are you all right? I am so sorry; I wasn’t looking where I’m going. I am so sorry, Are you alright?

I’m fine, thanks. Gene answered.

He couldn’t stop looking at her. She had beautiful brown eyes and full lips and redness in her cheeks from the cold, little wisps of breath were visible as she spoke. She lost a couple of friends. She tried to catch up to them but she ran into Gene instead. They skated and talked for what seemed like hours. It’s funny how things like cold and hunger don’t seem to affect those that have fallen in love. They went back there many times after that first time.

The room above Gene’s sleeping room looked like a command center. There were six stations with people in chairs that were tilted back with five screens mounted above them in a sort of semi-circle above their heads. On their hands were gloves that controlled the computers. Their hands were moving through the air as if they were touching a screen, but they were not. Doctor Mallory sat in the chair observing Gene. He slipped on the gloves and protective glasses. He looked like a kid hooked up to a super Video game like those at one of these new arcades you see springing up all over Washington.

How long has he been sleeping, Doctor Mallory asked.

A voice came over the P.A. System.

It has been a little over an hour Doctor.

As the screens flickered to life, the center screen of the five began a scroll at the bottom, like a CNN news ticker but this one had Gene’s vital signs like, heart rate and blood pressure and others.

The main screen remained a bit fuzzy but it had what looked like a few cloud like images that were slightly out of focus. Doctor Mallory spoke into the microphone,

Testing, Testing.

Another voice All clear Doctor you are free to proceed.

The main screen flickered to life and an image came into focus, Gene, playing on a beach as a little kid, there were other people around but they were out of focus. Gene got up and ran towards the water and lifted from the ground and began to fly, but he moved towards some trees along the edge of the beach and as he ran into them the dream ended. Doctor Mallory worked the gloves like a pro moving them deftly through the air as the other four screens flicker to life.

Bring up the tapes from the last four sessions on screens two and all other session on screen one. If the patients only knew how much of their dreams we could actually see, they probably wouldn’t allow this, Doctor Mallory thought to himself.

The doctor’s hands were moving very fast now, initiating programs and software that brings the remaining screens to life. Images were filling the screens as ribbons of information ran across the bottom of each of the four foot by six-foot LCD screens suspended above the doctor’s head, his hands continuing their rapid movements in the air above his shoulder.

Claire, please put a CPAP mask on Gene in room four, his snoring is interfering with the signals".

Gene, Gene, he could hear a voice as he woke up.

Gene, this is Doctor Mallory. How do you feel?

Ok, I guess Doc. Where am I?

"You are still at the clinic Gene. You have been sleeping for 7 hours. We have had a very successful session.

CHAPTER SIX

Gene listed in and out of sleep, not knowing if this was actually a dream or if his mind was wandering awake. The frustration he felt was palpable as he lay in the dark with nothing on his mind except wanting to sleep. He lay there and heard the tumblers spin in his head hoping to stumble onto the combination that would allow the door to swing open and for sleep to grab him and pull him down, deeper and deeper. They spun and one clicked and stopped, they spun and they spun all over the place. Minutes become hours and Gene lay there half-drifting between being asleep and awake. He got up with an overwhelming sense of exhaustion. His head hurt, not like a headache but, like someone tried to cram cotton batten in his head, it felt thick and cramped at the temples and at the base of his skull. It’s hard to think, hard to focus and he had to sit there and gather his thoughts.

Gene had come across this woman in his dreams again.

He walked into a schoolyard. He looked left and right. What’s that? A shadow moved about a block away. He heard footsteps, a click, clicking sound on the street. A woman’s shoes, heals? Drawn toward the sound, click, clack, click, it’s further away? No, suddenly she’s there. Gene remembered the piece of paper the woman in his dr*eams had dropped, The Mcaufrey Building.

He shook