A Fantastic Dream

The A/C hummed softly above me as I leaned back into my office chair. My pocket vibrated once again, likely another text from Janet. I didn’t dare to pull my phone out. Darren had already written me up once this week for phone usage, and I wouldn’t be caught out again.

Hopefully it wasn’t something urgent, or something to do with the kids. I felt like Janet would be calling if something truly terrible had happened. She was probably just sending me the grocery list for tonight’s pickup. Janet was finally going to make her famous Southtoast Chili, a surefire indicator that summer had come at last. My mouth started watering at the thought of the girls’ and my favorite meal. I could almost taste the savory spice on my tongue.

The very thought of such delight made my mouth water with excitement. To try and quench the desire I picked up the coffee cup on my desk and lifted it to my lips. As it approached, a sharp, stabbing sensation erupted from my chest. I keeled over in my office chair, the wind escaping from my lungs in a single, shocked breath. Was this a heart attack? Was I having a stroke? I attempted to refill my lungs with air, but my abdomen tensed further and fought me every step. I gripped the wooden desk in front of me, my nails digging into the wooden surface. With tears in my eyes, I blinked them shut, preparing to call out for help. Maybe one of my coworkers would know what to do? As I opened them once more, the world that I recognized was no longer there.

A blisteringly blue sun among a red sky greeted me as I stirred back to consciousness. I brought my hand to my head, attempting to shield my eyes from the incredible brightness above. Cold, steel gauntlets pressed against the skin of my face. Was I wearing armor? I peeled my hand away from my forehead, and sure enough, a black leather-clad hand adorned in silver chain-mail and steel plate came into focus above me. A sigil of a gold lion was crafted into the gauntlet, and various gold artworks traveled down my forearm across what appeared to be a bracer. It was quite possibly the most beautiful craftsmanship I had ever witnessed.

I squeezed my hand tight and the glove followed suit, squeaking softly as the fingers pressed into the palm. So this was me. My whole arm felt bruised and stiff, and the weight of the armor didn’t help things. A high-pitched ringing reverberated around my head. Where was I? I attempted to gather my surroundings, but was stopped when the sharp pain in my chest returned once more. I began to cough up blood, the iron taste very distinct in my mouth. Every breath was sheer agony. What the hell was going on?

I tilted my head downward to find what I assumed to be a long, black-shafted arrow protruding from my torso. The feathers of its tail blew softly in the wind. I was apparently wearing additional armor on my chest as well, though it had done nothing to stop the projectile now lodged between my ribs. I reached my gauntleted hand to my sternum and snapped the bolt in half. Had I been able to breath properly, I likely would have yelped in pain. I attempted to sit up straight and was now able to see the puncture in my breastplate. Once again, a golden lion was carved into the steel, the arrow narrowly missing the beast’s front paws. Where the arrow had struck was now a small hole the size of a quarter surrounded by a crater of steel where the force was absorbed. In the back of my mind, I realized the damage was reminiscent of a minor car accident. Car accident? 

I blinked, and found myself standing in front of my Camry in the parking lot outside of my office. The sky was blue, if not a bit cloudy, and minor traffic sounds echoed across the pavement from the road beyond. Peering down at my feet, I now saw that my favorite button-down, pressed and cleaned just this morning, was now coated in a large coffee blotch. The coffee was still wet, making the shirt stick to my skin in a liquid-cold embrace. I began to think to myself there was no way Janet would let me live this down. I have so few nice shirts back home.

My eyes refocused back on the vehicle before me, a large dent showed in the right side of my back bumper. The taillight was cracked, the crystal blue paint was scratched to hell, and a soft dripping of what looked like ruby coolant fell to the concrete. I was pissed. I loved this car like a childhood pet, and some idiot bumped my baby and didn’t leave a note! Drip. Drip. The coolant’s drip was slow at first, almost rhythmic like a heartbeat’s. I don’t know if I would have paid it mind otherwise, but it began to drip faster, and faster, forming a small puddle at first, then expanding and expanding until a thick crimson layer an inch deep coated the ground around me. I attempted to step away, but the soles of my shoes seemed glued to the substance. My heart began to race, and the pool below me grew. All at once, the liquid shot up past my head enveloping me, filling my nose, mouth, and lungs with the substance. All that I saw was red, and all that I tasted was iron. I am not a knowledgeable man. I work in insurance. But I knew I was drowning. My vision slowly went black, and that life was gone.

I shot up once again from my prone state in a fit of fear and found myself returned to the world with the blue sun; a world that had already ended for me. We failed. My armor and leathers were now soaked through with blood, casting the sandy terrain around me in a grim light. As I gathered my surroundings, I now stood witness to the armies of corpses that littered the desert. Whole dunes of sand replaced by bodies of the fallen, their viscera contributing to newly forged crimson rivers that followed the waves of the continent. These were my men, I remembered. This is my doing.

Pain still came in waves across my body, but my ability to feel was beginning to numb. I was not long for this life, my true life that I only now recollected in my mind. It was silly that a king could ever forget his purpose, regardless of his failures. But what was that other world? The one in my dreams? It felt so real to me, like a life that might have been.

I laid my head back on the dune where I was felled and prepared to take my final breaths in the desert that would soon become my tomb. For whatever reason, my last thoughts weren’t of my real family, or of my real kingdom, but of Janet and my dream daughters, of a life of quiet mediocrity, of technologies far beyond our capabilities, and the bitter taste of coffee, whatever that was.