[OLD] The Scorpion Mission (#2)

Ten

"Ash? Hello?" Seth snapped his fingers in front of Ash's face. Ash grabbed Seth's wrist and glanced back at the ground. His sister was gone. The scientist had been replaced by Claudia. Young Claudia. Claudia from Tyche Laboratories.

"Get back to training, Seth," Ash said. He released Seth and pushed him aside. As he approached Claudia, she disappeared. Just a figment of his imagination.

Was he losing his mind? His sister had died eleven years ago, just before he and Claudia had left Tyche to join Scorpion.

She had only been four years old.

~

Malcolm paced back and forth. His cell had been too cramped for his taste, so he'd fallen asleep. His dream was always the same: his old bedroom at Andrew's house. It helped him think.

There was a flash outside his window. Malcolm froze. That was new. He walked over to the window and peered outside. The darkness outside was interrupted by a small light, bobbing up and down in the black.

Malcolm hesitated. He never ventured beyond his room, too afraid of what he would find if he left the safety of his mind and moved into the Dream Realm. But he had never seen anything like this before. Cursing his curiosity, he hurried out of his room and walked outside.

When he approached the light, it moved away from him. Malcolm followed it as it led him out of the yard and into the street. The further he walked, the more the dream changed. Soon, he was no longer on Andrew's street, but in a forest.

The light led him to a large clearing. In the middle was a tall, black tower. Malcolm looked up, trying to see the top, but it was shrouded in darkness. The light zipped over to the tower and flew up the wall.

He definitely wasn't in his own mind anymore. Malcolm wished he had control in the Dream Realm. At least enough to reassure himself he was safe. Whatever was happening here felt dangerous.

Malcolm craned his neck, trying to follow the light to the top of the tower. The light grew larger, illuminating the tower roof. His eyes widened. Floating just above the structure was a Pyramid Fragment.

Malcolm shook his head. It couldn't be real. This was the Dream Realm. Nothing here was actually real.

But what if it was? It seemed improbable, but he had experimented with using the Dream Realm as a way to transport objects before, operating under the possibility that it did exist somewhere. He'd failed, but if someone else had figured it out, there was no better place to hide a Fragment.

The issue was getting to it. Malcolm couldn't reach the top of the tower if he couldn't gain control over this place.

Maybe he could find someone who could. With all the people on this stupid boat, surely there was at least one that had power in the Dream Realm. Just about anyone could learn to control their own dreams, but some had a natural gift for it, and in Malcolm's experience that control transferred over to the Dream Realm. Maybe if he kept them from realizing they were dreaming, he could trick them into helping him get the fragment.

Malcolm awoke and sat up in his cot. He reached into his pocket and checked that the second Fragment was still there. It was. Brushing a piece of hair out of his face, Malcolm glanced over at the hallway.

Just outside his cell, a tray of food was waiting. Some engineer working for Newman had thrown together a robot to carry food from the door to Malcolm's cell, so that no one would have to go near him. With a sigh, he crossed over to the bars and grabbed the meal. Dinner.