Dreamworms Book 1: The Advent of Dreamtech by Isaac Petrov (drm ebook reader TXT) 📕

voice, although her eyes beam with the same intensity as Edda’s.

“But we had the same exact dream, yeah?” Edda is pulling Aline from the sleeves. “We saw the same exact alien floating out of the same exact spaceship, Goah’s Mercy. Promising the same goahdamn… powers, yeah?”

“A shared dream. That’s all.”

“That’s all?” Edda shakes her head and scoffs. “We shared the same fucking dream, Goah’s Mercy!”

“I know, I know. But that’s my point. A shared dream is… wow! Rare enough. I… I still have problems accepting it. But aliens? Aliens that are trying to save us from,” she shrugs, “whatever? Nah, that’s too much to take, sister.”

“Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, yeah?”

“Yes! Nicely put.”

“Not my line. And a pile of bull! What more evidence do you need than the fact we did share a dream, huh?”

A sudden, shrill bleep makes Edda and Aline—and Ximena—jump in place.

“ATTENTION, LUNTEREN!” A loud female voice echoes deafeningly off the house walls along the street. “STOP YOUR CHORES, AND LISTEN.”

Aline swaps a stupefied glance with Edda. Ximena pinpoints the source of the commotion on a small loudspeaker set up on the top of a power pole down the street.

Another loud bleep makes Ximena cover her ears in reflex.

“ATTENTION, LUNTEREN! THIS IS YOUR QUAESTOR SPEAKING. ATTENTION, THIS IS NOT A REGULAR CALL TO SERVICE. I BRING NEWS OF THE HIGHEST RELEVANCE TO OUR COLONY.”

Yes, it is Marjolein Mathus. But Ximena can hardly recognize her voice, so exultant, shaking with raw emotion.

“AFTER MONTHS OF TIRELESS REQUESTS TO MY SUPERIORS, MY INSISTENCE HAS FINALLY BORNE FRUIT, GOAH BE PRAISED. REJOICE, LUNTEREN! FOR I HAVE JUST RECEIVED RADIO NOTIFICATION FROM FULDA, DIRECTLY FROM OUR CONSUL’S OFFICE, THAT OUR COLONY HAS BEEN BLESSED TO HOST THE OFFICIAL NEW YEAR’S FESTIVAL!”

As she pauses to take air, Edda gasps and Aline falters. She must hastily hold herself to the adorned table, before meeting Edda’s wide-eyed gaze.

“REJOICE, LUNTEREN! IN TWO WEEKS’ TIME, THE DAWN OF THE TWENTY-FIFTH CENTURY WILL BE BROADCAST TO EVERY SOUL IN GERMANIA FROM LUNTEREN! THIS IS THE MOST IMPORTANT EVENT—EVER!—IN THE HISTORY OF OUR COLONY.”

Another pause. Edda takes Aline’s hand into her own. Their wide-eyed gazes meet with the explosive force of realization. It happened! It really happened! Ximena feels the exhilaration like it were her own. Even her heart pumps faster. The joy—the implications—are so overwhelming…

“I WILL BE HEADING AN EMERGENCY COMMITTEE TO BEGIN URGENT PREPARATIONS. IN THE MEANTIME, I ASK ALL OF YOU TO EMBRACE THIS ONE-IN-A-THOUSAND-YEARS HONOR WITH GRATITUDE FOR GOAH’S BLESSINGS. LUNTEREN, WE ARE THE STEWARDS OF GOAH THIS YEAR. MORE THAN THAT, WE ARE AWS AGENTS ON EARTH THIS CENTURY! I ASK YOU TO DO WHATEVER IT TAKES SO THAT GERMANIA NEVER FORGETS OUR NAME. NOT IN A HUNDRED YEARS. FOR LUNTEREN! QUAESTOR MATHUS OUT.”

Edda and Aline, wide-eyed, begin to speak at the same time into each other’s faces, but their voices are drowned by a tide of chaotic shouting and cheering along the street. Some nearby tables kick up their music, and the passersby jump to the bass blasts, hands in the air, in celebration.

The scene closes in on Aline as she embraces Edda fiercely. Both are now laughing wildly.

“It was you!” Aline shouts, locking her friend in a bear hug. “Goah has Mercy, it was you!”

“It was, yeah?” Edda laughs louder, so overjoyed her thoughts melt in disarray, unable to speak—just laugh, hug, and feel. Ximena’s eyes mist over.

“Oh!” Aline releases Edda in shock from the sudden impact of her bottom being smacked.

A teenage boy—tall and muscular, with white-tanned skin, dark blond hair, and blue eyes—is standing right behind her. “Aws Blessings to you, Woman Speese,” he says with a wide smile. “And to you, Redeemed van Dolah. Happy Pontifex’s day!”

Aline laughs and hugs him. “Aws Blessings, my Man Ledebour!”

“Blessings, Piet,” Edda says, laughing. “What are you doing to my friend? When you’re around, she turns into this melted, horny shadow of herself.”

“What can I say? The irresistible attraction of fishermen. No, please—no fish-smell jokes.”

“I like fish!” Aline says, kissing him and biting his lower lip.

The greeting goes on for a while until Pieter finally escapes Aline’s embrace, both laughing.

“Some news, huh?” Pieter says. “Lunteren picked for the New Year’s Festival. Those aliens ain’t fooling around!”

He knows! Ximena thinks with surprise, but then she realizes that Edda is not surprised at all. Then she remembers. During the First Contact section, as she was psych-linked to Gotthard, she saw this boy talking with Edda and Aline in the distance. He was there too.

“Did you sleep with her?” Pieter asks Edda.

“What?” Edda stops smiling.

“That aws Head woman—Consul Levinsohn. Did you….?” Pieter makes an obscene gesture with his hands.

“Piet!” Aline slaps his broad shoulder.

“What!” He frowns in mocking complaint. “Edda was obviously very convincing! Perhaps more than that alien, what’s her name again?”

“Rew,” Edda says. “And let’s just say I did what I had to do.”

“That’s all? No details?”

“Piet!” Aline slaps anew.

“Okay, okay,” he chuckles. “Sorry, Edda. Didn’t mean to… But say, why did you, er…” he wets his lips, “… insist on bringing the Festival right here to Lunteren?”

Edda shrugs. “Was more of an impulse.” She meets his curious gaze. “It sure as Dem opens possibilities, yeah?”

“Like what?”

“Don’t know.” She shrugs again. “But our colony will have the complete undivided attention of the entire country for a few minutes.”

“Uh huh.” Pieter turns his face to Aline, and back to Edda. “So… say, are you mensas going to, er, learn that stuff the aliens are promising?”

“Sure,” Edda says. “All the way! I can use those persuasion,” she wiggles her fingers, “powers of theirs to convince my dad to stop his Joyousday.”

A slight frown crosses Aline’s forehead. “Aren’t you afraid of what they will ask us to do in return?”

“Why? I bet they know what they’re doing, sister. They’ve helped us since, what did they say, like ten thousand years ago?”

Pieter nods. “We scratch their backs, they scratch ours. Fair and square. I for one want to stop all those Siever factories for good! You with me,