Revisionist history

Ed Cavendish slept, and it was not restful.

Dreams rushed at him like very large amounts of water falling from a very high place. Just when he thought he had his head up, his consciousness was beaten down again by a confusing mix of images and sensations, full of obvious metaphor and tortured imagery.

His subconscious was being pulled and twisted as the world around him clamored for his attention. He fell into plot holes, got strangled by loose ends, and spent the better part of an hour arranging guns on mantelpieces.

At one point during this troubled evening, Ed was dining with Benjamin Franklin and Sigmund Freud on the fairway of a golf course. They were eating tea and little cakes off the back of a naked Albert Einstein. Benjamin Franklin was talking about rock and roll while Sigmund Freud knitted a sweater. Einstein was playing thoughtfully with a dandelion, kicking his legs playfully.

"But Ben," he said, "Ze White Album, it is just too long, ya? Abbey Road iz more coherent, a more pleasurable experience, I think."

What Ben Franklin might have retorted to this, Ed did not get to find out. Sigmund Freud suddenly jabbed the knitting needles he was using into his head, so they stuck out like antennae.

He turned to look at Ed. Blood ran down the sides of his head, and his features began to contort, changing.

His voice was feminine and rimmed with years of cigarettes.

"Sometimes a knitting needle is just a knitting needle, Ricky."

The not-Freud began to float a few feet off the ground, legs in the lotus position. Ben Franklin became transparent and began to glow inwardly. The glow grew slowly and softly.

He nodded at Ed, touching the brim of an invisible three-cornered hat. "Ed, I believe I'm about to explode. It was sure nice to meet you."

Benjamin Franklin shattered into multitudinous shards which began to swirl and glow around the non-Freud. Albert Einstein stood up, the tiny cakes and tea set sliding off his back with a clatter. He took off down the fairway, skipping and throwing dandelions.

He turned and yelled back at Ed. "Don't take any wooden nickels, ya? Reality is quite a bit softer than I imagined!"

Albert Einstein then made a standing jump and dove into a sand trap with a splash.

The fairway and all of visible reality disappeared with a plorp, leaving Ed in a black void with a floating, meditating Sigmund Freud who had two knitting needles sticking out of his head, surrounded by the glowing shards of Ben Franklin. The creature spun in slow circles contrariwise to the shards. It grinned an impossibly large grin. It seemed to be a hungry one.

Ed patience with having his reality messed with was very short at this point. He folded his arms and looked up at the shiny, terrifying legend of psychoanalysis. His tone was curt.

"God damn it. What the hell people."

The thing did not answer, and continued to spin slowly, grinning. The features of the thing that wasn't Sigmund Freud changed with every rotation, becoming clearly feminine. The exploded bits of Ben Franklin looked less and less like shards of the clothes of a late 18th century intellectual. The blood running down the sides of the creatures head had dyed the hair, which was now in a bun, a shocking red. The knitting needles stuck out from the bun, keeping it in place. The creature was dressed in a kimono, was now definitely a woman, definitely a 50's TV legend, and the shards had very clearly become diamonds.

Lucille Ball spoke to Ed, and her voice was kind.

"Ricky, there's a lot of explaining to do."

Ed sighed and sat down in the void, ready to listen.

----------------------------------------------------

Ed felt like a kindergartener at a very progressive school, seated Indian-style five feet below a floating Lucille Ball. The swirling crystals didn't help, and neither did the inky void that they somehow managed to stay suspended in.

"Waaaaah," said Ed.

"Oh, don't be so melodramatic, Ricky. You should accept by now that strange things are going to happen, and on a regular basis. In fact, you should be suspicious if anything normal happens from this point on. "

Ed pouted as hard as he could up at the floating television icon. He stuck out his tongue.

Lucy smiled down at him. The diamonds swirled and shone as she spoke, responding to inflection in her voice and the gestures of her hands. It was elegant and graceful in the way that only a dream can be. Ed decided to listen.

"Things are never going to be same for you again, Ricky, even if you manage to make it back to Earth. Do you think you can go back to overlit computer monitors when you've ridden on the back of a giant talking caterpillar and copped a feel off Alice in Wonderland?"

Ed pondered this. It was a pretty cool thing to touch a fictional breast.

"You are living the dream of every lonely, disaffected person who ever wanted to have a magical adventure. Believe me, that is a lot of people."

She smiled down as benevolently and lovingly as it is possible for a being to smile.

"Try to make the most of it, you old sourpuss."

These thoughts had not actually occurred to Ed. They made him feel special and good, in that place in the stomach where the butterflies live.

It also made him feel afraid and alone.

The butterflies of fear live next door to the butterflies of joy, and they are not cool with parties.

"This is true, Miss Ball..."

"Please, call me Lucy, or Mrs. Ricardo, if you prefer."

"Mrs. Ricardo...Lucy...jesus."

Ed ran a frustrated hand through his hair.

"I agree that I have seen things today that, really, no one should have to. I have had my sanity groped by the greasy hands of reality, when all I wanted was to carve out a comfortable corner of being. I never asked for a grand adventure in my life."

Lucy smiled.

"Then what do you want, child? What's your motivation?"

Ed pondered, biting on a cuticle. He looked down at his fingers and remembered that he was in a dream. In a dream and biting his fingernails. Would his nails be ragged when he woke up? Would they attacked by maurauding manicurists and be forced to visit a land of hangnails?

Ed was tired of this.

"I want to go home."

Lucy beamed so brightly that the diamonds seemed jealous.

"That's my Ricky! You are going to have yourself one hell of a time in this story. Fun, danger, self-discovery. Oh boy, you aren't even going to know what to do with yourself."

She paused, as if hearing something far off.

"Listen, Ricky. You're about to wake up and start your journey. Chances are good that we will speak again. Oracles make wonderful plot devices."

She gave Ed a conspiritorial wink and continued.

"But until then, you need to remember a few important points in your time here. These are your rules of engagement, as much as I can give you right now. Too much information can be more of a hindrance than a help."

"One: You can do pretty much whatever you want, as long as you can rationalize it, make it fit into the plot. Your very presence in this world has already put in motion a dozen different story lines that you have total control over, should you decide to exercise it."

"Two: Exercise this control at your own risk. As an Author, control is your right, and we would not exist but for your kind. But remember, this is not your world, and while we are born of the minds of humanity, here we live our own lives. As you would not wish to be forced into slavery or to commit acts against your will, so too do we feel about plots. Those of this world hate narrative as much as your kind hate these other concepts. Force has its uses, but beware."

"Three: Readers love a martyr as much as they love a hero. Do not think yourself safe from harm. If you put yourself into a situation against overwhelming odds, or with difficult personal decisions, you can and probably will die. Sequalia Amalgamated has at their disposal monsters and weapons as well as lawyers and money. If they discover that there is an Author loose in our world, they will spare nothing to kill you. Nothing. There is no plot in the world that would let you survive an onslaught of zombies, vampires, cowboys, librarians, dragons, gods, and vicious men. All arrayed for your destruction, with no backstory to protect you. Keep yourself on the Q.T. until you can give the reader a reason to care whether you live or die."

Ed gulped.

Lucy smiled kindly and floated down close to Ed. They were face to shining face.

"Mostly, have fun, kiddo."

She kissed him on the cheek, and plucked a diamond from her aura. She pressed it to his palm.

"Take this and keep it safe. I am not really a part of this world, but I still have power. I am a kind of god, a god of...connections. Potential. Things not under the sun. I did not exist until you came here, but I have always existed in both worlds."

Ed had no idea what the shiny woman was talking about, but he trusted her.

Ed looked at the diamond in his hand. He clenched it tightly and put it into his, well...His dream pants.

There were voices, as though heard from another room.

"We must part here, for now." She began to rise faster and faster, higher and higher into the void. Her voice became like that little balloon man, far and wee.

"Remember! Have fuuuuuuuun!"

Lucy disappeared into the sky, diamonds and all. She disappeared with a bright, far-off twinkle of white light. The light looked like it was laughing.

The light continued to shimmer, growing larger and larger, erasing the void.

Ed had never felt such awesome peace in his life. There was laughter, deep and booming, filling his mind. He felt a warmth spread throughout his body.

The light separated, and he was in the Forest Primeval.

Ed was face to face with Alice, who was holding his hand in a warm glass of water.

Pill's laughter echoed throughout the forest, deep and booming.