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Part 3-13: Dream
I rode in the backseat of Jimena’s cruiser, wondering how long it’d been since I’d been treated to this particular view. A few years, at least. I also wondered what Fergus would think of this whole snafu. He’d be off work in under an hour and be expecting to prep for our forest raid. I hoped Dack would fill him in on the way to wherever we were going—Jimena’d confiscated my phone.
I’d asked her about our destination, and she’d only told me ‘somewhere safe,’ which did not necessarily rule out prison. I’d expected her to grill me with questions, but she’d slid the divider closed after my inquiry. I heard her chatting into her radio rather frequently, which bothered me further.
Adding to my discomfort: I was very hungry. Not normal supper time hungry, but ‘recently teleported into doomsday realms’ kinda ravenous. I wasn’t keen to try again this evening, but doubted we’d have the chance anyway.
As these frustrations grated on me, I watched the roads fly by outside. About fifteen minutes in, I realized that I recognized many of them. She was heading toward the Walkerby’s place. Did we tell her about it? I couldn’t remember getting that far into the story, maybe Dack had? The diner rushed by, then we slowed to stop, parking right in front of the forest road that we’d traveled the night before. Dack’s car and ‘Luxe’s ride crunched to a stop behind us.
The plastic slammed open and Jimena glared at me. “Say the first thing that comes to mind,” she commanded.
“How? You, did Dack tell you about this place?” I said.
She turned back, hands on the steering wheel. After a second, she whipped around again.
“What’s down there?” she asked.
“The woods, and… there’s a lot of trees,” I said, like an idiot. “And and, we saw wriggling vines and a big tree, with bigger vines. Eden’s little pearls or whatever they are, demons, minions, they have the trees. The Minder wants the Walkerbys.” There, that should clear everything up perfectly for her.
“Demons, wriggling vines,” she whispered, and shook her head. “Me cago en la leche…”
The driver’s side window whirred down, she stuck her hand out and twirled her finger, then hauled an aggressive u-turn back onto the road. When I recovered from being smushed into the door, I said, “How did you know where that road was? From the police reports? Dack?”
My phone came flying back through the divider. I managed to snag it with my left hand before it bounced around.
“No reports. No Dack,” she said, watching me through her aviators in the rear view. “I have never dreamt so clear as I did but a few minutes ago, chica. Head down on abuela’s back table, no less. Vines and trees and that path, one I have passed many a time on patrol. How is it I dream with such vividness, eh? Something someone put there. Someone is you, am I right?”
“Oh, shit,” I said. I had thought about the vines indeed. And the road.
“Mierda is right, Alena Bisk. Our friend Dack promised me a tall tale, and I regret I underestimated the scale, so it seems.”
We took a sharp turn into the diner’s parking lot. My stomach twitched with joy, then in concern when I saw another police cruiser parked there.
“So… you’ll help us? And not arrest us?” I ventured, as we pulled up beside it.
“We will… investigate. I will not investigate alone, for that is the height of imbecilic police work, you understand,” she said. “I do not think I have a good case for assault of a police officer, so no one has broken the law—too severely—as of yet. Come.”
She got out and opened my door. Dack had just pulled in, Deluxe’s bright purple Lotus gliding after him.
“Your relationship with the girls in the whip?” asked Jimena, following the sleek machine as it found a spot between a rusted Civic and an old F-150.
“Driver’s my roommate, best bud. Passenger… well you know how I told you about the strange girl in the office building?”
“The ghostly one, who changed the rooms, whose brother was possessed by the magic clock and also fits the description of a recent suicide victim, if memory serves.”
“Yeah—I hadn’t covered Willy yet but, yeah… that’s her. Persimmon.”
“Dack’s detainment was the same night that victim was found delirious at Henderson Recreational,” said Jimena, looking up at the sky.
“Yup,” I said, glancing at the man himself, who’d gotten out of his car and came towards us.
She spat, and took off her shades. “This all fuckin’ stinks, Alena Bisk.”
“I mean, I’m not exactly having fun, no.”
She pointed at Dack as he arrived and said, “You four get a booth, out of the way. Wait for me.”
She went into the diner, and I gave an incoming Deluxe and Persi a weak wave.
“This,” said Dack, “is not going as I expected.”
I was too hungry and tired to snip at him, so all I managed was, “When does it ever?”
“Sir, ma’am,” said Deluxe, “I request a debrief. The complete W5 pretty please, because we are so very, very off script presently.”
“You didn’t fill her in on the way over?” I said.
“I wasn’t going to drive and use my phone while sitting right behind my angry—” Dack coughed, “—police friend, now was I?”
I rolled my eyes and said, “Dack called in backup, I ghosted into her and made her dream of vines, oh and I also had a lovely chat with the Minder and got marked for death by a street gang. You guys get your electronics?”
Then I stomped into the diner in search of a menu.
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