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

“Doesn’t matter,” she finally says, and pushes him out of the bedroom. “Lead the way.”

“Uh, I’m lost.”

“What?”

“Yes, sorry. I regained awareness, er, too late, I suppose. I was already in the middle of this mess. That’s how I found you. Pure luck.”

“Yeah, well, we’ll thank Goah later for that.” She turns her head, like a hound sniffing the wind. “This way!” She pulls his sleeve and they both run off.

They dash below and around trunk-sized flower stems of flashing colors, sprinting towards an imaginary point clearly painted in Edda’s memory—the bearing, the exit. Ximena can feel Edda’s certainty. She is most definitely not lost.

Just delayed.

It feels like a minute or two before they finally reach what Edda believes to be the geographical center of the arena. Spot on, Ximena thinks, as they stop on the edge of a small hole, size of a man, leading somewhere too dark to see.

A side movement catches Edda’s attention. Somebody is running towards them from their flank. She turns abruptly, fearing another attack, but it’s not the Smooks this time. It’s just Janson. He is alone, and his panicked eyes look like those of a hunted man, running for his life.

“Me first.” Gotthard pushes Edda aside. “My mission is more important than yours,” he says, and jumps into the hole before Edda can react.

“Son of a…!”

Janson is closing with the speed of a madman, eyes fixed on the black hole. He doesn’t even seem to realize Edda is standing there. He takes three last bounds and leaps forward…

“Oooh, shit!” Edda jumps, a mere fraction of a second before Janson plunges in headfirst.

Eighteen

Abracadabra

Aline is the first human to appear in the empty flatness of the staging permascape. She looks around, and all there is to see are twelve mares loosely scattered in stoic stillness, except for four of them that, clustered together, seem to be engaged in communication.

“Where’s everybody?” she asks Qoh, who is standing next to her.

“Patience, Woman Speese. You are alone because you are ranked human number one of twelve. I shall thread the other eleven qualified humans in short notice to begin your instruction in the Third Step of the Path of Light.”

“Number one… You mean I was the winner of the trial?”

“Indeed, you were. By a significant margin—your performance would have been very impressive even for a marai, Woman Speese.”

“Oh, really?” Her eyes widen with pride. “Number one!” She claps with childish enthusiasm.

“Indeed. Now, do be patient. I shall traverse and thread back human number two.”

Before Aline can reply, Qoh disappears, and a few seconds later, reappears in the exact same spot, next to a baffled Pieter.

“Piet!” She throws her arms around his neck. “You made number two in the trial; can you believe it?”

“Whoa!” He chuckles. “Did I really beat Edda?”

“Uh, it seems so,” Aline says, the hint of a frown appearing on her brow.

As they keep exchanging words, Qoh disappears and reappears anew with not one, but two humans this time.

The Smook siblings.

Almost a dozen humans have already been threaded into the permascape, and Ximena—and all other students for that matter—watch with increasing agitation the space where Qoh always reappears with a new candidate.

Edda is still missing.

In the last minutes, the scene’s camera has been gradually moving away from the candidates and closer to the four mares clustered together, to the point where Ximena can already make out the voices of Rew and Yog as if they really were made of vibrations in the air instead of reverberations in the mind.

“I find it curious,” Rew is saying, “that many remaining human candidates do reside in the same physical settlement.”

“Why would you find it curious?” Yog asks. “You did state that humans in Diamar have a notable propensity to enhanced Second Wake halos.”

“And that is correct. There is much talent scattered in the broader region. And yet, most humans that have made it to this stage are dreaming from the one settlement closest to Deviss.” Rew stretches an arm towards Aline. “Woman Speese, the strongest halo I have ever perceived in a human.”

“A traverser halo.”

“Indeed, and thus very rare. Then Elder Ledeboer,” Rew keeps gesturing with her arm, “Man and Woman van Kley, Redeemed Siever, and,” she points at a gaping Gotthard that has just materialized with Qoh, “Man Kraker. All native to the same human settlement.”

“Remarkable indeed.”

“I do acknowledge that we are only to instruct twelve humans in the last step in the Path of Light, Overseer Yog. Yet, I hereby request official dispensation for a thirteenth one.”

“A dispensation? Do clarify.”

“One of the humans that missed the mark in the last trial, Junior Elder Ledeboer, has a very unique halo. I do hereby request his reintegration.”

“Junior Elder Ledeboer… I do remember. He did not perform with much distinction. What type of halo makes this human so exceptional?”

“He radiates the halo of a thought piercer, Overseer Yog. The only human we have scouted with such a trait.”

“A human thought piercer… Is that even physically possible?”

“We shall never know, unless we do proceed with his instruction. Thus, this official request.”

“A human thought piercer,” Yog says. “Remarkable.” She pauses for a few moments, as if considering the idea. “And inconceivable. No, Walker Rew. We shall not waste resources on futile enterprises. Furthermore, I do fail to see how a thought piercer could benefit our goals.”

“That is a regrettable lack of foresight on your part, Overseer Yog. A human thought piercer could be deployed—”

“My decision is final, Walker Rew. We shall not discuss this matter any further.”

Their attention is drawn back to the surface of the permascape. Qoh has just materialized there, and next to her, Edda is scanning the area with eager eyes. She is wearing her usual outfit: the plain white tunic with the black, ornate belt of the Redeemed hanging loosely on her waist.

“The last human is here,” Yog says. “That is your human, Walker Rew. Quite the disappointment. An appalling performance, despite the amount of personal time you have misspent in her