his bedside cabinet. It was illuminated by the soft, red glow emanating from the digits of his alarm clock.
3:27am. He still had time, but the sweets were agonisingly out of reach. It had been by far his biggest ‘weave to date and the exertion had taken everything out of him. He stared up at the ceiling, taking short, laboured gasps as he fought to quell the horrible emptiness within him. As his mind crept tentatively back to what had happened a few moments before, a small smile began to form at the corners of his mouth.
I turned a golf buggy into a monster truck, he thought happily. Cool.
He looked back at the bag of sweets and tried to psyche his mind up to overcome his body’s limitations. His arms and legs felt feeble and limp, while his head was all but glued to his pillow, such were the complaints in his neck.
This is bad, he thought. How am I supposed to deal with this? Sleep with the sweets under my pillow?
It wasn’t such a crazy thought. In fact, he filed away a note to do just that the next time he went to bed. Also it would mean that his mum would be less likely to walk off with them, should she come into his room for whatever reason.
Ryan sighed. It wasn’t just that he felt physically drained; he was lacking motivation too. He just couldn’t be bothered. Even though the sweets were barely a foot out of reach, he couldn’t muster the desire to reach out to grab them. Only the irrefutable nagging in his stomach kept the thought alive.
Slowly the pain brought on a bout of nausea which, following Ryan’s experiences with his mum, was enough to prompt him into action. Little by little, moving just the upper part of his left arm and letting the lower half follow it, he began stretching out towards the bag of sweets. It was quite an effort, but the thought of him lying in a pool of his own vomit spurred him on. With his arm out to the side, he started to reach for the bag.
Just as he had thought; it was beyond his grasp. If Ryan had been sleeping in a single bed he wouldn’t have had the problem. But he had insisted on having a double so he could wallow about with plenty of space, and now it had come back to bite him. He was going to have to move.
He began to inch his shoulders to the left, trying to move as little of his torso as possible. The small movements did not raise many objections from his body, but it was extremely slow going, especially with the great pangs of hunger exploding wildly in his stomach.
Eventually he had positioned himself diagonally across his bed with the sweets within reach. He had to stretch out at an awkward angle to get to them, but as he closed his hand around the packet he could feel the chewy goodness within. However, when he came to try and pick it up he found he simply did not have the strength to grip it.
This is pathetic! he berated himself. What kind of man can’t pick up a bag of sweets?
He tried again and failed.
Okay then, time for Plan B, he thought.
His bedside unit was right up against his bed and he managed to drag the bag towards him so that it flopped down onto the mattress.
I should have opened this bloody thing beforehand, he reflected ruefully, staring at the sealed packet, now only a few centimetres from his face. To the casual observer his toils would have made for an hilarious scene, but in truth Ryan needed to get some food inside him, fast.
With a monumental effort, he managed to bring his right arm across his body, and in doing so he rolled onto his side. He stared at the bag of sweets, which did not stare back but betrayed an air of smugness as it sat there, tantalisingly close but resolutely sealed.
‘Bastard,’ Ryan said to it. The bag ignored him, but it made him feel a little better.
He reached out with both hands and tried to grip the top of it, but having failed to even pick the packet up there was no way he was going to get enough purchase to pull it open. His hands simply had no strength in them. They felt incredibly feeble and Ryan hated it.
‘Come on!’ he growled to himself in frustration. ‘All I need is a few of you inside me and I’ll be all right.’
He edged the packet even closer to his face and started chewing at the edges in desperation. Suddenly his teeth bit through one corner, creating a small nick that, with a little work, he was able to make big enough for the sweets to fit through. He tipped the bag up and several of its bright, sugar-coated contents tumbled out onto the mattress.
He vacuumed them up greedily without a moment’s pause, and then rolled onto his back and savoured the beautiful flavours and sweet goodness, as he slowly chewed away. Even before he had swallowed any of them he began to feel strength returning to his fatigued muscles. It was as though his body had been keeping just a small amount of energy in reserve, until it was certain that sustenance was forthcoming.
‘Oh my God, that tastes so good,’ said Ryan out loud, heaving a big sigh and reaching into the packet for more.
A kaleidoscope of flavours dazzled his taste buds, and he closed his eyes and revelled in the feeling of returning from the brink. Over the next few minutes the number of sweets in the bag dwindled, until finally the last fruity treat passed into Ryan’s greedy maw. He lay there for a while longer, sucking the sugar from the outside, before succumbing to the temptation to chew it up and swallow it. It passed down to join the others in his stomach, which growled its gratitude, and Ryan finally felt himself again.
Now, where was I? he mused.
With all the effort it had taken to get the sweets inside him the memory of his dream had all but faded. He racked his brain and suddenly Billy’s face appeared, wearing the same strange expression of approval that Ryan had seen earlier. It hung there for a moment, and Ryan, for a horrible, fleeting second, wondered why he was lying in bed thinking about Billy Richards. Then everything began to fall into place; the encampment, their capture, Captain Nibbles and their escape. He needed to get back there and help his friends.
He brushed the empty sweet packet onto the floor and rolled over and pulled his duvet up close to his head. Its softness and warmth felt nice and snug around him, but Ryan was very much awake, and the more he thought about how he had to get to sleep, the more alert he became. The quantity of sugar he had just consumed was not helping matters.
He tossed and turned for a while, his body refusing to let his attention wander and allow him to neglect it in such a way again. There was nothing Ryan could do. No amount of willing it was going to make him fall asleep. Bored and frustrated, he climbed out of bed and switched on one of his games consoles. If he was going to stay awake he might as well enjoy it. He sat for a while, waging a one man war on the occupants of some far-flung tropical paradise where some sinister research was taking place. However, as Ryan progressed, his face bathed in a bright swathe of colour, he found that his normally razor-sharp reactions were diminishing. His timing was all off and he was missing what would usually have been bread-and-butter kills for him.
As a distant sniper picked him off for the third time in succession, Ryan began to see the outline of a volcanic island mapping itself over the fading on-screen image of his body slumping to the floor. As he suddenly realised what was happening, his mind switched on again and he steered himself back to the river that led down from the gates of the Spire. The point where he, Daisy and Billy had entered the dream was somehow lodged in the back of his mind like a bookmark. He recognised it immediately, allowing it to fill with colour as he made his return to the Dream Isle.
18
He arrived back on the same wide, sweeping bend in the river where they had found the dream earlier. Ryan was now getting accustomed to his robotic form, and he smiled as a stone shattered beneath his foot as he stepped towards the water. He wished he could carry some of his traits back to the waking world, or even into the dreams themselves. It was certainly more fun than being himself.
He set off along the rocky bank, keeping his eyes – or whatever optical devices his head was fitted with – peeled for any sign of Billy and Daisy tearing through the countryside in a heavily modified golf buggy. Having expended so much energy in creating the thing,
Ryan thought it was rather unfair that he had not had the chance to enjoy it himself. After several minutes jogging along the water’s edge he caught sight of a familiar figure in one of the dreams. It wasn’t either of his school friends, but Tristram.
Ryan stopped and watched it drift lethargically by. He wasn’t sure what to do. Unless Tristram had left the dream and entered another it had to be the right one. He had not considered the possibility that he might end up rejoining it in a different part of the story. It was hard to get his head around.
Keeping pace with the dream, he watched it for a while as his tutor, sporting a German military uniform he had presumably magicked into existence, approached a checkpoint on the outskirts of a small town. He exchanged words with a couple of the hamsters manning it, who appeared indifferent to the fact that he was a human being, and passed on down a small stretch of track and into the town. It appeared quiet enough, so Ryan decided to make his move and dived into the dream.
He arrived on the road barely a dozen paces behind his tutor. The sky was dark, but a glow to his right suggested that morning wasn’t far off.
‘Tristram!’ Ryan hissed. There didn’t appear to be anyone about, but he decided that a little caution would not go amiss.
His tutor stopped in his tracks, and there was an