THE DREAMER, Part 1: Awakening [2nd Draft Edition]

CHAPTER XXIV: March to the End; Part 1

Date: August 3rd. 4011 AD. Location: Saharan Crescent. Near the Underworld.

"It should be just up ahead," Jenna informed, reading her wrist scanner and flicking it to make sure it was correct. The trio walked the way to where the scanner lead them, but when they got there, there was no cave nor any other noticeable entrance to the Underworld. Jenna sighed. "I knew it was broken; I just didn't want to believe it."

"No harm in looking around for a while," the Dreamer suggested. Look around they did, but they could not find anything, just sand and more sand. "Dig."

"How do you expect us to..."

Andrew cut Clyde off. "I'll do it. I didn't mean to speak out loud; I was kinda just talking to myself."

"Oh, alrighty then."

Gathering up energy from the air around him, Andrew gradually built up enough power to enact a repulse large enough to send literal tons of sand flying out of place, and he released it. What was revealed was a crater... of sand. Andrew fell backwards flat on the ground. "Nope. I give up. It's not here."

"Fine," Jenna sighed, "I'll scan again."

"Let's just... let's just rest for a while."

"Are you tired? Why are you tired? I thought you had an intense amount of strength."

"Oh, yes, of course, but not an intense amount of endurance. I'm tired from non-stop action for the past... gosh, I don't know how many days. Unending torture alongside continuing to see my co-workers die..."

"Shut up," Clyde shot.

"Exc..."

"Shut up! You sound exactly like Joseph! 'Co-workers.' What do you mean co-workers?! They were your friends. We are your friends. You're better than this! You're better than Joseph Wendal, and I'll even bet you're millions of times better than Nightmare Beuller."

"Ruler."

"Whatever. Look, point is we're gonna get that..." Clyde paused, trying to think of the right term for someone trying to destroy the world. "Guy... and smack it to 'im, even if it takes all our lives to find 'im!"

The Dreamer shot up. "That's right. I'm here not just for me; I'm here for my friends. I'm here... for you." The ground shifted. It cracked. It gave way. The soft sand beneath their feet began sliding to Jenna's right. A wall of sandstone exploded out of the ground, looming dozens of vectors above their heads. The rock split open, bending and creaking, creating a hole in the shape of an archway. A smooth boulder in the exact shape of the curving passage filled the opening perfectly before it was sliced down the middle by a beam of light. The two halves hinged outwards, releasing dusty old sand in its windy wake.

An average-sized stout fellow walked out to greet them. While most definitely older than the Dreamer, he was a mere few inches taller than Andrew, whom was only about two vectors tall already, making the man seem not much of a threat, at least through Clyde and Jenna's eyes. Their height met around two and a half or so vectors, and even they considered themselves short. If this man walking out to greet them really was the Nightmare Ruler, he did not look at all like the stuff of nightmares. And this itself could all be another nightmare of its own, Jenna thought paranoidly, another deadly trick for us to fall into.

The man spoke. Before he breathed a single word, Andrew started getting suspicious of who he was. "Sorry, eheh, I heard you knocking and got here quick as I could." They stared at him for a moment. "It's really hard to find your way around in that maze," he explained, gesticulating his arms in twisted, waving movements and nodding his head back towards the cave from which he'd come. "Haven't really had to travel this way before. Seemed a bit... unnecessary. Until now, of course! I was hoping you'd come!" The man seemed enthusiastic and hopeful, hardly showing any glimpse of evil at all. Andrew began to think he was wrong. Maybe this man wasn't who he thought he was.

"Eheh, well, since you were knocking so brutally," he went on, "I could only assume you're all very eager to come in! Why don't you..?" They took a step towards him. He took a step back. A bead of sweat trickled from the root of his dark grey hair down to the edge of his eyebrow, where it evaporated. But it didn't look like he was scared; it was more like he was ecstatic. He shivered in his overwhelming excitement, eyes looking like they were about to pop. He couldn't hold it in anymore. His smile twisted into something like the face of a madman. "Eheh." He turned his heel, walking quickly towards the doorway, fumbling with his hands as if he didn't want his appendages to be there and had no idea what to do with them.

"Who are you?" Andrew called out.

The man stopped, looked at them with one eye wide and the other shut tight, and tilted his head to one side. It looked painful for him to say the next few words, but it also looked like he enjoyed the pain. "They - eheh - call me Nightmare." That was enough for Andrew. He charged at the Nightmare Ruler fist raised for the kill, but the villain exploded into a puff of smoke and vanished. Their enemy was once again currently out of their reach, but now the path was clear. The Nightmare Ruler's clutch on the world's inevitable destruction was at its end.

"Jenna, Clyde, let's go." The Dreamer led the way.