Story: Oneiromancy, XVII

(Part O , XVI , XVIII)

The monkey barrelled down the hill on a bobsleigh, laughing. It was wearing tweed. Just before it collided with Stanley and Helen, the two twisted twenty degrees and vanished. The bobsled continued on, and the monkey screamed in frustration, before crashing inexplicably into a palm tree in a snow drift.

The venue shifted to a darkened and romantic restaurant. Helen was confusedly looking at the menu from a table for one, while Stanley hovered, waiting for the order. Suddenly the wine waitress appeared, brandishing a two gallon jug of milk as if were a lollipop, and wearing the wine menu like a tweed covered cap. As the jug came smashing down toward the table, Helen tipped her chair backward and Stanley twirled to face the attacker. He blinked and they were gone.

Stanley and Helen were in bed, watching television, and being bored by the antics of a Spanish soap opera on an obscure channel. The adverts rolled after the priest revealed the truth about his ancestral relationship to Cervantes, and the whole experience changed. The scene was a supermarket, an employee was offering free cheese samples to the customers, but then she suddenly looked directly at the camera. "Good evening, amigos, how are you? Como se va?" The expression became malevolent. "Now now, you can't get away that easily!" She gloated as the two hunted around for the remote control. Suddenly, Helen's memory kicked into gear and she rolled off the bed to pull the plug. The plug that was fused into the wall?! "Isn't it delicious?" Cooed the tweedy lady. "Don't worry, I've decided to not kill you. After all, why waste the entertainment?" Stanley mouthed the word 'fuse' at the Helen and they both went for a bedside lamp. "What are you doing?" The lamps were flung into the suddenly full bath in the adjoining bathroom and suddenly all was black.

There followed regular dreams, mostly about showing up for work on the wrong day, spending a few weeks as talking jellyfish, and the old classic of being arrested for cheese smuggling in the border Marches by a Daschund in a silly hat.

-----

The two woke up blearily in Goosing's flat - although 'palatial appartment' might have been a more accurate description - finally somewhat rested after days of stress. The professor looked at them with some relief. "Code words?"

Helen's dazed expression eased a little, and then she pulled herself together to say "Rutabaga", while Stanley was still half in dreamland. She nudged him from her bunk. "Code word, dopey!"

"Muffin", the teacher said dreamily, "You look pretty when you're half asleep, messy, and getting annoyed."

"Oh, go shoe a horse!"

Goosing's relief was hidden pretty quickly as he watched the two bicker. On another day it would have been tiresome, but on this occasion... "Well, children, are we all happy some of our training paid off?" He smiled. "Now, tell me all about it..."

To be continued...