Dreams of Destiny Pt. 04

Stephen was flying now on the vodka and cocaine. He lit the cigarette and took a couple of drags. Then he put it under the butane-soaked shirt on top of the clothing he had piled up. For good measure he lit a match in the flu of the dryer. He decided to stay for a little while to be sure the fire was well under way. He did two more lines and polished off the vodka. I haven’t felt so good in years, he thought. He stood and watched at the fire in the laundry area took hold and spread. The throw rugs began to smolder.

Stephen was mesmerized by the flames. He let his body bask in the heat of the fire that burned just a few feet from him. For a moment he was tempted to walk into the flames. They called and reached out to him. He could almost see a stairway leading down into the depths of the earth through the glory of the fire.

“Go ahead, jump into the fire. It’s where you belong” a familiar voice whispered in his ear. He whirled around. Kathy stood next to him. She was naked and her body was whole and beautiful. Her hair was a halo of fire. Her blue eyes were ice. She snarled, and again Stephen saw a likeness to a wolf puppy in her gaze.

“What the fuck?” Stephen swore. “You’re dead Kathy. Go on to where ever dead junkies go.”

“No. I’m not ready to leave yet. I have to see our child and deliver some messages to you.

“This is the first message. You have lost your soul tonight. Your dealings with Destiny and me have taken you beyond redemption. What you do from here on out is the business of a lower master. You are named demon and abomination, and will serve as such. Enjoy your time as a demon as you will. There will be a reckoning when the time comes.

“This is the second message. The master of the lower domain bids you to attend him with all haste. You will find the way. The passage is not easy. His enemies are now your enemies. He will undertake your immediate education before he sends you to do his bidding.”

Stephen was aghast. He’d never had much use for religion and had though the ideas of after life and reincarnation were narcotics for neurotics fearful of death. True, his dreams had whispered the contrary to him. But he had always thought that seeing was believing.

“Why should I run off in seek of this master of yours.”

“He’s not my master. He would have been, but fate dealt me a kind blow tonight. I’m to go to the higher planes to contemplate my past lives for a time. You should heed your master’s call. He will find you if you don’t. You can be an asset to him and he will treat you well. You can rail at your fate and he will char you to cinders. You can try for atonement. For that, you would have to be very strong. No one touched by the beast breaks away without a fierce fight.”

“This is the third message. Stay away from my child. If you touch him I will make the highest appeal and you will suffer for all eternity. You and I brought an unwilling spirit into this world and then failed him. It is in part for him that the events of tonight have occurred. If he is to reach his potential, which is great, you must not interfere. I will not let you interfere. You may be introduced to one hell tonight. I’ll drag you through all of them if you mess with Jeffrey. Do you understand?”

The fire grew brighter as the living room began to burn. Stephen began to back out towards the door of the trailer. “I asked you if you understood.”

“Yes, Okay. I’ve got it. Can I leave now? I have to get away before the fire is called in and my car is found. No one’s plans for me will be fulfilled if I end up in jail for murder.”

“Don’t be ridiculous. You must know by now that this has all been a dream. I overdosed last week. You didn’t kill me. Not in this dream line, anyway. It’s time for you to meet the master.”

“But if I didn’t kill you, I didn’t give up my soul.” Stephen reasoned. “I’m not a piece of property to be fought over by super beings.

“You are more at their mercy than you will ever know, Stephen. Bide well. I see the staircase down to your new domain. Why don’t you go find your master?”

Kathy was gone. Fire had engulfed the entire building in just minutes. Stephen tried to race for the front door but it was too late. Coughing and choking, his eyes closed and streaming with tears he headed for the only remaining exit. He entered the eerie looking stairwell and began his descent.

Funny, the staircase seemed familiar to him. It was bathed in red light. There was the ever present sound of rushing water which grew as he traveled downwards. The staircase itself was marble and soap stone and red jade.

The ceiling was rounded. There was a red and gray hand woven silk runner on the stairs. Around and down and around and down he traveled. He smelled of smoke and had soot and ash in his mouth. He was dying for a drink of water. He was suffering from a cocaine crash and he felt miserable. All right, he thought, I repent. End this now. He tried everything he could think of to wake himself up to no avail.

“You don’t repent, a silky, insinuating female voice said in his head. “You are just sorry you got caught. You’d do it again in a second”

“Just the thought of it makes you lust for more.” It was true. Like magic he saw himself killing Kathy again. He had no control over his body. His cock grew and rubbed deliciously against his briefs.

A hot wet tongue slithered into his ear. A voice whispered “you have an insatiable lust for power and control. You are aroused by pain.” Her fang pierced his ear.

To his dismay he came into his trousers like an adolescent. He was practically undone. He leaned against the wall to get his breath. In the darkness a snakelike figure slithered away. Blood dripped from his ear down his neck. He reached up and found a jeweled stud in his earlobe where the viper had bitten him.

He rested a moment and then continued down the stairs. He started to hear voices echoing through the stairwell. The staircase came to an end. Stephen entered a cavernous room made of crystal, or possibly diamond. At the far end there was a raised dais made of ruby.

There was no throne. Instead there was a huge black, oval table, polished to a high shine. The chairs were elaborately carved stone but had thick cushions with black and red leather covers. The one called the master was at the head of the table.

Seven other entities sat around the table. All were thoroughly engaged in consuming a meal of vast proportions. There was a whole suckling pig, horribly carved, in the middle of the table. On the ebony side board beyond the table was a roast lamb. Huge bejewel goblets were filled to the brim with wine red as blood. The dishes were made of precious metals -- gold, silver, platinum, bronze and brass. The cutlery was gold.

The entities were talking softly among themselves. Four were male, four female. Members of all races on earth were represented in the group. They were luxuriously adorned in robes of blood red velvet. The women wore elaborate masks and were exotically beautiful. Each male demon was more handsome than the next. But their facial miens were hard and cruel.

As for the one at the head of the table. Such dark beauty can barely be described. His eyes were black holes into eternity. His expression was not marred by evil as were those of his companions. Truly he had the face of a liar, for he was as fair of visage as his dealings were horrible.

There were spirits of every nature imaginable in the cavern below the dais. Some were obviously of this world. They were substantial and grounded to the plane. They could manipulate matter. A hierarchy existed among the natives but it was not easily determinable. Interspersed with natives were spirits like Kathy. Some would call them ghosts. Some of these were coma victims. These spirits were welcomed and treated with kindness and respect; like travelers at station, destination as yet unknown. They expressed no emotion. Their faces were unreadable.

Some of the spirits were projections of people whose astral bodies knowingly or unknowingly became temporarily separated from their hosts. Some came during meditation to explore. Some were accidental travelers who, just prior to sleep, slipped away and found themselves on the lower plane. Some were shadows that barely ever touch the floor and were ignored because they can neither be harmed or do no harm.

They were dreamers who viewed the cavern like moviegoers. Occasionally they become more real during their dream and able to manipulate dream matter and events.

Some were wispy little fetal spirits with no consciousness, who sometimes strayed during their journey home without proper direction.

None were like Stephen. He sensed this immediately, as did they. They steered clear of him, and whispered as he passed on his way to the dais. It took all of Stephen’s’ will not to cower on his way through the room. He stood tall and imagined he was a mountain lion on his way to a feast. He held his head proudly as he approached the table. He decided to act like a soldier reporting for duty.

Whether or not the master and his disciples were impressed is something Stephen would never know. He introduced himself to the entity at the head of the table. He was not offered a seat. He was dying for some food and drink. Even bread and water would do he thought. But he was damned if he’d grovel. He stood like a king receiving bounty from his subjects rather than a lost and confused spirit.

“So you are my new demon” said the one at the head of the table.

“So I am told. What is the story, anyway? I’m not dead. Kathy told me she overdosed a couple of weeks ago and that this is a dream.”

“That may be the case in her reality. But is it in yours? No. Did you get out of that trailer with your hide intact or did you burn to a crisp? You decide. I’m into free will. Whichever is better for you; so it will be. That’s the way the wheel rolls. Once you learn that you’re on easy street.”

“Why am I here?

“You have certain proclivities that interest me. That’s why we brought you here tonight.”

“You brought me! Who are you?” Stephen said taking the offensive. “Who the hell are you?”

“Let’s say we are partners in a broad scale, pan-global venture. You understand power and money, don’t you? Though how you will ever have either if you don’t clean up your act is beyond me,” the master said. “We go beyond money and power to the eternal.”

“My act is clean. And what business is it of yours anyway?”

“Sure, your act is clean. Two weeks ago you were shaking and puking from heroin withdrawal. Before that you flunked out of the army program because of codeine addiction. You’ve been on drugs, alcohol and tobacco since you were 14. You are only 20 and already your body is showing signs of depraved living. Now you’ve discovered a penchant for brutal killing that you think will save you. Your first killing was messy. That’s why I intervened. The cops would have been on you like flies on shit as soon as Kathy was found. So we jerked the dream line for you.”

“What to you mean you jerked the dream line?”

“We made an arrangement. Kathy got a second chance. We got the opportunity to give you an early education. The transaction changed a few things. It raised the stakes a bit.”

“What kind of education?”

“Finding dream lines, projecting yourself through the planes of the universe. clair audience and clairvoyance, recognizing dream loops avoiding repeating mistakes, seeing crossroads and manipulating alternative realities and dreamscapes. Those kinds of things.”

“Yeah, right. This is some kind of joke, right? What are trying to do, make me a black ops agent of the underworld? I couldn’t cut it in the army so I’m sent to hell where I become a dream cop? No, this has got to be a dream.”

“You wouldn’t be a cop. You would be an operative. With no rules or regulations You’d be working to further our agenda. Your loyalty would have to be unquestionable. You would live your own lives but act on our orders without question when asked to do so.”

“You might be one of us at the table eventually. In the meantime, there’s a cavern where you’ll reside when you’re on this plane. Outside, finish you education, take a job after your training. Make a life. Do what you want. If you don’t like a dream line, end it. Move around. Money, class and education won’t be a problem, but you should keep a low profile.”

“What do I have to do?”

“Stay here a while. Get used to the place. We’ll train you in ways the army would never conceive of. When you resurface, you’ll be able to handle most fluctuations in the dream currents. You’ll be a master at manipulation and interrogation. You’ll be physically fit.”

“What’s my alternative?”

“That depends upon you. It’s like I said, I believe in free will. Do you want me to read your cards?” the master said disparagingly. “I don’t do that kind of trick. But I can give you some probabilities based on current dream lines.

“Our scenario is that you died with your wife in the trailer fire. End of Stephen as you know him. What other scenarios are running in you brain? What are your dreams of the future?”

“I’ve dreamed I’m a middle aged lawyer in Washington, DC. I’m single. I work a lot. At night sometimes I go hunting. I’ve killed a number of women over the past twenty years or so. I’m careful and lucky. I’m well aware of the dream phenomena and often use it to my advantage. I don’t hunt in my back yard.

“Recently, I ran across Destiny at my firm. A loud bell went off in my head when I saw her. I had to have her and not as a kill. I felt as if she would make me complete. I wanted to take her the moment I saw her.

“I made advances but she was not interested. This angered me. I put her in an untenable position work-wise, then offered a quid pro quo -- sex for continued employment. In one dream she declines and leaves. In another she declines, but I force her. At the end of that dream she vanishes into thin air. She slips right through my fingers. I don’t know how to find her in either dreams and I wake up frustrated and angry.

“I sometimes dream I’m in a late-night car chase in Florida. I run Destiny off the road. She jumps out of her car. Sometimes she is naked. I pursue her. Our movements are hampered by the mud and vegetation of the marsh. She trips and falls. I catch her. I am about to plunge my knife into her breast when a man dressed in blue with black hair runs up. I realize it’s a dream and I awaken, again frustrated.

“There is also the amusement park dream where I stalk Destiny. Then murder a red head who looks much like Kathy in the House of Horrors. I amuse myself my scaring the daylights out of Destiny.

“Finally, and this is the most compelling of the dreams, I dream I am Esteban Rodriguez, an army officer on a tropical island in the Caribbean. There is a whole history that goes with this dream. The bottom line is that I am a bastard and the second son of my father who is a planter on the island. I despise my brother. My uncle is also in the military and has high political hopes. He has taken my brother, Juan under his wing and given him all advantages.

“But I, from an early age, have had special powers. I can manipulate reality, manufacture dreams, leave my body to fly through the night. I am an excellent hunter, but have not yet learned of the pleasure of the human hunt. I’ve used political connections to enter the growing drug and arms trade on the island. I’m also venturing into piracy, drugs and illegal arms sales I’m amassing political power and a vast fortune on the island. My uncle and brother know this but do not act against me. I think they are cowards

“That’s about it for what you might call my existing dream lines. There’s something extremely compelling about the island dream. Power, money, women, the sea, a brother to exterminate. What more could a man ask for? The others less real. Who wants the daily grind of a law firm in Washington, DC?”

“So what happens to me Mr.... sorry, I didn’t catch your name? if I decide not to take you up on your ‘employment offer’”

Nothing right away. Maybe nothing at all. Maybe you wake up in your bed and its yesterday and you have to go through today again. Get it right this time.”

“Yesterday wasn’t so bad” Stephen said. “ What else?”

“Maybe you get hit by a car next week. Maybe a heart attack during your next romp with a hooker. Maybe both in one day. Maybe I’ll keep you moving so fast you won’t have time to enjoy any of the things you like so much. That would be the worst, I think. You’d never have any sense of achievement. You’d never see how things turned out. You’d always be running and never getting any rest. I’d probably put one of my better assassins on you, just to make things interesting. I could make you die a thousand deaths in a day and feel the pain of each.”

“So why did you tell me you were giving me an option.”

“I am giving you an option. Eventually I’d tire of the game. You might out last me. You might get paroled. The universe might end. You don’t have to be a demon. You just have to take the hard road if you decide not to become one.

“Is there an appeal? Don’t I get a chance to talk to the other side?”

“Who said there is another side?”

“So you are the one to whom I must appeal and God and Dog are the same, is that what you are saying?”

“I’m not saying anything. I’m the Prince of Lies. Or did I forebear to reveal myself until this moment?”

“Yes, but I’m not stupid..”

“No, you’re not. So don’t act stupid. Sit, relax. You are thirsty. Its not every day a man goes through the fires of hell. The wine here is -- extraordinary” The prince poured a glass into a jeweled goblet. The other entities lifted their glasses. There was a silent toast. The pact was made.

“So, you don’t need my signature in blood? I guess I’m out of date.”

“Heavens no. We have your DNA on file.” The prince laughed. “I’m joking.”

Stephen sat back and soaked in the surroundings while food was piled onto his plate. He still couldn’t believe what was happening to him. All because of that stupid fall with Destiny.

“Why did you put the noose on Destiny?” He asked carelessly” He dug into a hunk of roast pork.

“To open your eyes to your darker side”

“What if she had died? Wouldn’t that have been a fly in your ointment? I’d never have come over to you if she had died.” Would he have? he wondered. He wasn’t sure.

“She wasn’t intended to die. The point is moot.”

“But if I can manipulate dreams, so can others. What if she had been so upset by what I did to her that she willed herself to stay on the rope. That could have happened, couldn’t it have?”

“It didn’t happen. But yes, some things would have changed. Kathy wouldn’t have gotten her reprieve because you would have been in jail. You wouldn’t be here yet so some of my plans would have been delayed. Destiny and Juan ...”

“What about Destiny and Juan” he asked tightly?

“That’s for later. You don’t need to know yet.

“Why not, and what do you want me for? I mean, why me? I’m really pretty average..”

“No, I think that over the years you will find that you are versatile, talented and rather extraordinary. But you must control your impulses. You’ve messed around way to long.”

“What the hell is that supposed to mean? We just met.”

The eyes of the prince grew dark like black holes in space. Stephen shuttered when he looked into them. For a moment he got a taste of what true eternity must be like. He was drawn in. A porthole opened. He could feel his essence being sucked forward. He was almost in the vortex. The prince slammed his eyes shut. The blackness lifted. The hole closed. Stephen could breath again. Do demons breath? he wondered.

“How long do you suppose we’ve known each other, Stephen?”

“Forever, Stephen said, despairingly.” Memories of past dreams, long forgotten, came rushing in.