Apocalypse Crucible (14 page)

Slowly, keeping both hands visible, Megan lowered herself to the floor in a lotus position. She’d studied yoga for the relaxation techniques. For the past few years, since Chris’s birth, spending time at that pursuit proved impossible. But the skills remained.

“You believe you’re dreaming,” Megan said.

A troubled look formed on Leslie’s face. “Of course I am.” She worked her jaw. “I mean, there’s no way all this is real. My mom couldn’t just … just …
disappear
in the middle of the night like I dreamed she did.”

“Do you remember being in group the day after your mom disappeared?” Megan had gathered all of the base’s surviving kids together with help from Jenny and the other counselors who hadn’t disappeared and had been on base.

Leslie shook her head. “I dreamed that.”

“What did you dream about that meeting?” Megan knew she couldn’t force the girl to remember everything to realize that what was going on now was real. Leslie bordered on being hysterical at the best of times, and the drug abuse and the recent events hadn’t helped her faulty grip on reality. She had to be led back to the now.

“You got us all together.” Leslie’s brow furrowed. “Told us that the disappearances didn’t just happen on base. That they’d happened all around the world.”

Megan nodded encouragement. “That’s right. I did, and they did.”

The statement caused Leslie to shake her head vehemently. “No. This is just a dream.”

“You were watching television that night,” Megan stated calmly. “Up past your bedtime.”

“I do that a lot.”

“You and your mother argued about that earlier.”

Leslie stared through Megan, nodding and starting to rock herself. “Yeah. We argued about that a lot. She hated—
hates—
trying to get me up in the morning.” She hugged herself with her free arm and gazed around the room. “Now I can hardly wait till she comes and gets me out of bed. Out of this. I can’t believe it’s taking so long.”

Megan ignored that and kept pushing Leslie forward. “You heard a noise that night.”

“My mom,” Leslie agreed. “I swear I heard her call out to me.”

“You thought you were in trouble.”

“Oh, yeah. I hit the remote and blanked the TV quick as I could.”

“But your mom never came to check on you.”

Slowly, Leslie shook her head. “No. And she always checks on me when she thinks I’m up. When she
knew
I was up late—when she
knows
I’m up late.”

“But not that night.”

“No.”

Megan made herself breathe despite the desperate tension and fear that filled her and thrummed like a live thing. She kept her voice low and hypnotic, neutral and no threat. Leslie had experienced trouble sleeping lately. She looked worn-out now. Because of the drugs in Leslie’s system, Megan hoped the girl would go to sleep listening to her voice.

“You went to check on your mom,” Megan reminded.

“Yeah.” Leslie remained a knotted ball rocking against the wall.

“What did you find?”

“I thought she’d be sleeping. I mean, if she wasn’t awake checking on me, she had to be sleeping. But I thought maybe she was having a nightmare. I wanted to check on her, make sure she was okay. She’s had it rough since the Rangers deployed. My dad being over there in Turkey—it worries her, you know.” Leslie grimaced. “I mean, of course you know. Your husband is over there.”

“Yes, he is. I worry all the time, and I’ve gotten to talk to him.”

Leslie focused on her. “Has he said anything about my dad? About whether he’s okay or not?”

“He hasn’t,” Megan said. “Goose is in Sanliurfa. Your dad is with a team in Diyarbakir.”

“I don’t even know where that is.”

“It’s is the eastern part of Turkey. Diyarbakir is a large area. An important place. Goose’s team is being kept separate and out of close contact with the Rangers stationed in Diyarbakir and Ankara.” Megan knew that from the news coverage.

According to the media, primarily OneWorld NewsNet, Sanliurfa was a lost cause, a sinking ship that the Americans, Turks, and United Nations were struggling to get to in order to rescue the border militias that had gotten stranded there. She also knew from her infrequent conversations with Goose that the story wasn’t entirely true.

“I wish I could talk to my dad,” Leslie said.

“Maybe we can make that happen,” Megan suggested. “Communications around the world are steadily improving.”

Leslie shrugged. “That’s just in this dream. Maybe when I wake up I’ll find out I was dreaming that, too.” She scratched her leg absently with the pistol.

Megan waited a moment then said, “Could we put that away now?”

“No.” Leslie hauled the pistol back into her stomach. “I like holding on to it.”

“It’s a dream, remember? You have all kinds of powers in dreams. You could fly out of this room. You don’t need that.”

“No.” Her features turned hard.

Megan gave up that front for a moment. “You went to check on your mom that night.”

“Yeah.”

“Do you remember what you found?”

Leslie tried to speak, couldn’t, then swallowed hard and tried again. “My mom was gone.”

“Yes.”

“I thought maybe she’d gone to the kitchen for a drink of water,” Leslie whispered. She looked through Megan again, trapped by the memory. “But that didn’t make any sense because if she’d gone to the kitchen I’d have heard her door open.”

“You were watching TV.”

“She would have heard the TV. She’d have come into my room to check on me and probably ground me for a week.” Leslie shifted her attention to Megan. “I looked in her bed and found her pajamas. That was weird. If she’d left her pajamas in bed, that meant she was walking around the house naked. And that would be like … like … just
gross.
”

Megan took in a breath and let it out.

“But she wasn’t walking around the house naked,” Leslie said. “She was just … just … ”

“Missing.” Megan tried to keep her voice low to lessen the impact, but she knew at once that the effort was futile. She’d tried to find a new way to talk about the disappearances for two days.

Looking totally miserable, Leslie nodded. She squeezed her eyes tight again and shook as she cried silently.

Resisting her maternal instincts, so sharp now because Chris was missing and Joey had left and Goose was in danger, Megan made herself remain seated instead of crossing the room to put her arms around the girl.

“I found Mom’s wedding ring in the bed, Mrs. Gander.” Leslie snuffled and wiped her tears from her trembling chin with a hand. “Mom never took her ring off.
Never.
She said Dad had put it on her hand and she would never take it off.”

“I can only imagine how hard that was for you, Leslie.” Megan struggled with her own memories of finding Chris’s clothes after Joey had told her of the disappearances in the base child-care facility.

“It was terrible. Worse than when our cat had kittens and I found one of them dead.” Leslie shrugged, looked up at the ceiling, and wiped mascara from her eyes, smearing black across her cheeks. “I’ve dreamed some pretty horrible stuff before. I’ve dreamed my mom has died in a car wreck, drowned in the ocean, and was in the World Trade Center on 9-11. I’ve even dreamed she was killed by monsters that came out of my closet.” She paused and glanced at Megan for reassurance. “I guess every kid has those dreams.”

“Every child fears the loss of a parent.”
Just as every parent fears the loss of a child,
Megan thought. After each of her boys had been born, months had passed before she’d gotten a full night’s sleep. She’d constantly gotten up to check on them, afraid that they’d called out to her and she hadn’t heard them, afraid that they’d stopped breathing. Goose had helped her with Chris, something her ex-husband had never done with Joey.

“But maybe not to monsters out of the closet,” Leslie suggested with a slight grin.

“Maybe not to that,” Megan admitted.

Leslie looked around the room. “It’s kind of weird, you know. How long this dream has lasted. Usually they seem to last only a few minutes. No more than a few hours. But this has lasted for days. Somebody once told me that you always know when you’re dreaming because you can never see a clock in a dream.” She gazed at the digital clock on the small nightstand by her bed. “I’ve been watching clocks and watches for days.”

“I don’t think that’s especially true. I’ve had dreams where I could tell time.”

“When the clock thing didn’t work, I tried other stuff. Stuff I knew would usually draw my mom down on me in a heartbeat. Stuff she usually has like mutant’s powers for, you know?”

“A mother’s radar.”

“Yeah.” Leslie shrugged helplessly. “But it didn’t work. Nothing I tried did. I mean, I thought that me filling the bedroom with food and dirty dishes would get my mom in here for sure.” Leslie paused. “She hated that.”

Megan surveyed the carnage. “Looks like you went all out.”

“I did.” Leslie gave an embarrassed grin at praise for something so blatantly wrong. “I figured even in a dream, Mom would be here in a second.”

“But she wasn’t.”

“No.” Leslie shook her head. “So I called Tori over.”

“Why?” Megan was curious about that, trying to put all the pieces together.

“Because Mom doesn’t really like Tori. Mom knows Tori smokes, which she doesn’t approve of.”

“But she didn’t know that Tori smoked pot.”

“No way.” A little calmer now, Leslie wiped her face. “If Mom knew Tori smoked pot, Mom would have never let Tori into this house.”

Megan was silent for a time. Rain continued to sluice down Leslie’s bedroom window. The amber lights mounted on the sawhorses outside streaked the running water as regularly as a metronome.

Lolling her head against the wall, Leslie yawned. She covered her mouth and said, “Excuse me. That one snuck up on me.” The effort seemed entirely normal except for the bullet hole in the wall that her movement had revealed.

The sight of the bullet hole jarred Megan. She tried not to focus on it. “You’re tired.”

“Yeah. Can’t hardly keep my eyes open.” Leslie shifted again.

“Have you ever gone to sleep in a dream?”

“That doesn’t make sense. You’re sleeping when you’re dreaming. So you have to go to sleep to dream.”

“No,” Megan said patiently. “Have you ever dreamed of going to bed and going to sleep? I have.”

“That would be too weird.” Leslie stifled another yawn.

Megan made herself smile, but she knew if she could get the girl to lie down for only a few minutes the present situation would defuse itself. After that, she’d have some time to think and plan on how to help her. “Maybe not. Maybe it’s like resting twice as much.”

Leslie struggled against the wall as if trying to find a more comfortable position. “That sounds stupid. I’m sorry if that sounds rude, but this is my dream. Maybe I won’t even remember it when I wake up, and I hope to God that I don’t, but I know for sure that you won’t remember it.”

The childish logic brought a smile to Megan’s lips, but at the same time the statement made abundantly clear the fact that the children on base were inadequately prepared for what had happened.

“Maybe you should try going to sleep,” Megan suggested.

Leslie stared at her from under drooping eyelids. “What?”

Megan gestured to the bed. “Try sleeping. Maybe you’ll wake up as soon as your head hits the pillow.”

After a brief hesitation, Leslie said, “That just sounds wrong.”

“It’s worth trying.” Megan gestured. “Turning your room into a disaster area and having Tori over didn’t seem to do the trick.”

Leslie frowned. “No.” She paused. “There was an MP in my room. I think I remember dreaming that.”

“Yes.”

“He took Tori.” She held up the pistol. “I made him stay away from me. He didn’t like it, but I made him.”

Megan nodded.

A frown knitted Leslie’s brow. “Is Tori in trouble?”

“Are you going to dream her into trouble?” Megan didn’t want to deal with the reality of the situation. She had no idea how the base officials would handle what happened here in the Hollister home tonight.

“No. Tori was just trying to get me to calm down. Before she came over, I was seriously freaking.”

Megan silently gazed at the bullet hole in the wall behind Leslie and doubted that things had drastically improved with Tori’s arrival. Megan stood and offered her hand, but didn’t try to encroach on Leslie’s space.

“Let’s get you to bed,” Megan suggested.

Looking at the bed doubtfully, Leslie asked, “What if it doesn’t work?”

“It will.”

“How do you know?”

Megan felt suddenly inspired. “Because you can dream me the power to put you to sleep.” She’d had those empowering conversations with Chris when he’d had night terrors, coaching him on how to train his subconscious mind to deal with his fears and worries. Working with Chris was easy, though. Her son had loved superheroes. She’d encouraged him to dream himself up superpowers.
And to know that God loves him,
she reminded herself.