OOC: Testing Dream Ideas

[stonyfaced]

DREAM 1

The room was pitch dark, and small. It took a moment for his eyes to adjust, but when they did, he could detect the change of texture in the shadows. There were three people. Two were at the door, and the third was in front of him.

"For gods' sake, men, light the candles."

"Sorry, captain." This came as a mumble. There was the sound of the man fumbling with the packet of matches, and the room sprang into light as the candles lining the room were lit. Once they were all lit, Vimes finally got a good look at his surroundings. It was non-descript as rooms went. A cold floor, four walls, and a table. The two men by the door were watchmen and their faces were obscured by the shadows of their helmets. The third person was seated at a table, and was nota man but a boy.

"All right, that's enough. Go on, you two are on your break. I can handle it from here." He took a seat.
Had he been in possession of all his memories, perhaps Vimes would have recognized the boy sitting across from him as himself. Perhaps not. Time changes everyone, and time has certainly changed him. As it was, the resemblance was small. There was a certain brightness to the eyes, a certain largeness to the ears, a certain innate grubbiness that has never left him and that was all. He was clad in simple clothing, very clean but very worn. He was very thin, and his face was dirty.
Vimes looked down at himself, well fed, well clothed and by all means quite comfortable. He felt ashamed of himself.

The boy spoke. "Me mum's dead."

The case suddenly flooded back to Vimes, as if he had known it all along, as if he hadn't been bewildered when the dream had begun. This was the way of dreams. "Yes," he said gravely. There wasn't much to say. "She is, son."

"Nothing can bring her back. Right?"

Vimes shook his head. "Nothing. I'm sorry."

The boy stared down at his filthy knuckles. Vimes could feel the anger coming from him in waves. It was as if it was coiled within him, bursting to get out in whatever way possible. Something in Vimes expected the boy to suddenly burst out with a scream of rage, but instead he began to cry.

"We caught the man who did it."

"The man I said who did it," the boy said, as sullen as ever and stubbornly ignoring the tears trickling down his cheeks.

"Same thing. Isn't it?"

"No." The boy sniffed. "'Cause if people listened to us in the first place, then she wouldn't be dead. I'm going to kill him."

"You're not going to do anything of the kind."

"He killed my Mum. He deserves to be punished."

"He will be."

"How?"

Vimes hesitated, but wasn't sure why. This boy wanted to kill the man. He wouldn't be fazed by something like this. "If the court finds him guilty, he will be hanged."

Perhaps this boy was young, but something in his face held shadows of someone very old, someone who had seen far too many things. "But he won't be found guilty. It doesn't matter how much evidence you got, or how much I say it was him. He was rich, so they'll let him go. And he'll go on to kill another poor woman, an' nothing will be done."

"I'll do everything in my power to make sure he sees justice."

"You can't do anything."

Vimes raised a brow, said nothing.

"He's got money. He'll bribe the judges. Don't say you can stop that, 'cause you can't, I know you can't. And then he'll get off, 'cause if he doesn't all the nobs will raise a big fuss and he'll get off some other way, like being a loony or maybe he'll just be guilty of havin' too much time on his hands an' he'll be sent out to the country or somethin'."

"We've got evidence. And we've got you. He'll--"

"My Mum will still be dead, and he'll be out there. I'm going to kill him."

Vimes couldn't argue. "You will not."

"What he did was wrong."

"Yes, it was."

"So he must be punished."

"He will be, somehow."

"How? If I don't kill him, everyone will go along their way like normal, because they don't want to be killed neither, but if they say somethin' then if they're not hanged they might get fired, and we're all starvin' as it is, and we don't wanna be under the boot of some nob. I'm going to kill him."

"Then kill him." The words slipped out before Vimes could help himself. He stared at the ceiling and counted slowly to five. "No. Don't kill him. That would be wrong."

"But it's not wrong if you kill him."

"What?"

"You said he'll be hanged. So if I know he's guilty, and then if people saw the truth he'd be killed anyway, then why is it wrong for me to kill him?"

Silence.

"Can't you answer, lawman?"

"Because you can't decide these things all by yourself." The flames on the candles around them were going out, one by one. Slowly. It was hard to notice unless he looked. "It needs to be the decision of many."

"But the many are wrong."

"Yeah. They can be."

"Is that all you can say?"

Vimes took off his badge, and set it gingerly down upon the table. AMCW 144. 144. That was who he was. Sometimes it didn't feel like enough. "I can say a lot of things, kid. The law isn't perfect. I don't think it ever will be. Your mother's dead, and nothing can bring her back, and I'm sorry about that. I'm sorry about a lot of things. But killing that nob won't do anything but put you in a bundle of trouble. I can't promise you that the man who killed your mother will be brought to justice, but I'll try. That's all any of us can ever do."

"He's evil."

"Maybe."

"Maybe?"

Vimes shrugged. "Sometimes bad people can be good. Or good people can be bad. Life's not simple, kid. You find something to stick to, and for me, that's the law. You choose something too, but you make sure it's something good. And you'll get by. You will."

The last candle went out.



The first thing Vimes was aware of was the chattering of young swamp dragons in the pen beside him, and a bag of coal clutched in his right hand. He blinked blearily, confused. One of the small dragons stuck its snout from out of the cage's bars and nosed hopefully at Vimes' leg.

He gave in easily and fed the dragon the coal. It raised its front legs into the air and let out a stream of rainbow flame, which somehow didn't seem as odd as it ought to have seemed. He leaned forward and lit his cigar on it.

"Sam!"

The voice sounded dismayed. Vimes straightened and took a puff on his cigar. He saw the figure the voice came from, clad from head to toe in protective, fireproof gear.

"I told you not to feed them too much of that. You'll spoil them rotten."

Vimes found that he could not speak. The figure took off her helmet. Unlike how things were supposed to be, there was no waterfall of shiny hair or an exquisite face free of perspiration facing him. Instead, there was only Sybil, hair trimmed short to avoid burning with smile lines at the corners of her eyes.

He smiled. "Sybil."

She gave him a strange look. "Well, who else would I be? It would be jolly strange if someone else was here mucking out the pens." She approached him, laid one affectionate hand on his chest and gave him a kiss on the cheek. Vimes was astonished to feel his ears burn until he realized how long it had been since someone had last kissed him on the cheek.

"You really ought to be getting more rest," she said, a light scolding note to her tone.

Something was wrong. Vimes knew something was wrong, but he couldn't see why. He was with Sybil, and that was right. That was good. And he was in the dragon pen, but he couldn't remember why the hell they even had a dragon pen in the first place. But it was here, so it had to be right. There was something missing, though, something he couldn't describe.

"Where is..." What was his name? What was his name? "...our son?"

She frowned at him again. "Inside, of course. Why would he be in the dragon pen? I've really got to see to it that you work less hours."

He relaxed. That made perfect sense. Why would he be in the dragon pen? Everything was all right. Everything was fine. This was how it was supposed to be.

"Oh. Yes, of course. Sorry, dear. I don't know where my head's at." He wrapped his arms around her, gave her a kiss.

He remembered this. A dwarf had just tried to kill their son. He had run in here and held his wife. Why was that the only thing he remembered? Should he not remember other things when holding her? He felt happy and off balance all at the same time, but the feeling was cut short when she pulled away.

"Now that you've got time, just you wait here. I'm going to go change out of my things and grab the pram. Don't you feed those little buggers anymore coal!"

Sybil re-emerged in a sensible dress and pushing their child along in a stroller. She cheerfully announced that she had knitted him a new woolen hat. It was in the black and white pattern of a cow, and it had a fuzzy bauble on top. When Vimes murmured something about making him look like food, he earned a small thwap on his arm.

They left and walked down the winding roads together. The cobblestones turned to dirt, and the buildings that lined the road turned to lilac trees. Suddenly, Vimes began to recognize their surroundings. They were in Edensphere, but just then, they weren't. But why wouldn't they be in Edensphere? Wasn't Edensphere their home? His tongue felt thick in his mouth.

They stopped in front of a graveyard. Sybil picked a piece of lilac from off of the tree and placed it lightly upon their son. The smell of lilac was almost overpowering, and Vimes had a sudden, visceral reaction to seeing the lilac there and picked it up. He stared down at his son and looked back at Sybil, brow wrinkled.

"Dear, I don't want you to be startled, but... what is his name?"

"Sam?"

"Our son. What is his name? I don't remember."

"It doesn't--"

"It matters. It does. What is his name?"

While the world felt as if it was spinning before, now it brightened in clarity, and things felt normal.

She looked down. "I can't tell you."

"What is his name? His name, Sybil."

Sybil looked heartbroken for but a moment, then wrapped her arms around him. He stayed like that for a moment, welcoming the warmth, welcoming the familiarity. This was how it was supposed to be.

"It was nice spending time with you, Sam," she whispered, "but you're very busy. It's all right. You can go back."

"Go back where?"

"Wake up."

"I am awake." He had to be awake. He was with Sybil, and... his son, whatever his name was. This was right. This was normal.

"No. No, you're not. Good bye, Sam."

He woke up.



It was snowing outside, but Vimes didn't mind. He felt his feet move him down the familiar streets and up a hill, up to a large house. The moon hung low in the sky, and his breath tinkled in the air. He opened the door quietly and took care to shut it as softly as he could, lest he wake the entire house up.

He stamped the snow from off of his boots and tread into the living room, only to find it already alight with the fire burning merrily away in the fireplace and Sybil, sitting dutifully upon the couch with a blanket spread across her legs and her feet propped up on a footstool. She was knitting something that Vimes failed to identify.

"You're up late," he said.

She smiled coyly. "Or up early, as it may be. Come. Sit for a while." She set her knitting aside and picked up a metal thermos of hot cocoa. They passed it back and forth in content silence for a while.

When Sybil began to talk, he couldn't make out a thing she was saying, but that didn't trouble him too much. He simply responded with the odd nod or murmur of assent.

There was a small voice from upstairs. Daaaaaa...

Sybil yawned. "It looks like I can't have you to myself, even here. It sounds like someone knows you're home. Go on, then. I'll be in the bedroom."

The room suddenly snapped into focus. He nodded and rose to his feet. For some reason, the rest of the house had faded away--instead there was merely a long corridor leading to a single room, its door slightly ajar. For whatever reason, this did not strike him as odd in the least and he entered the next room to see his son staring at him through the bars of his crib, eyes brilliantly blue and mouth opened in a delighted curve.

"Da." There was a small toy clenched in his fist. Vimes thought he recognized it as one of Nobby's, but that didn't matter. He picked his son up and walked over to the rocking chair, where a book lay. The book.

When he sat, he spoke. "You know, I used to read this to a little girl. Her name was Yachiru, but we called her Blood. I think she liked it as much as you do."

His son did not seem interested in this story. Instead he reached up the grab onto Vimes' lip and yanked. "Babababa, pfftfhhhhhh. Co'."

Vimes' fended him off. "All right, fine. You're ready, aren't you?"

He opened the book. "Where's My Cow..."

And the rest of the world faded away.




The sun rose red, a festering scab over the spotty darkness of night. The rays streamed down in jagged lines, distorted by the glass of the Sphere that encased them. Vimes stood at his window, hands slack at his side and tried to remember the rhyme. Red sky. Something about mourning. Something about warning. He realized that Blood’s belongings had mysteriously disappeared. Why?

He stepped outside and raised his face to the sun. He had expected warmth, but was instead greeted only with shadows. He gazed around, and saw that the modest homes of Edensphere had been replaced with great, towering buildings covered with ivy. Chill practically radiated from solemn carvings that adorned its surface and the gargoyles that glared down from above. He looked around to see if anyone else had noticed the oddities. They had. There were people he had never seen before, people of all shapes and sizes and races and species, all gazing up at the sky, slack-jawed and empty-eyed. That’s what a certain animal did when it rained, Vimes knew in a vague sort of sense of someone who had been told a lot of stories of a child. Some sort of fowl. That was what these people looked like now. Prey, perfectly prepared for the hunt. One of them was still clutching a flimsy coffee cup, its liquid spilled and congealing upon her hands.

He could see why they were fascinated. Behind the red of the sky was a spattering of darkness, like gravel filled mud smeared across a window. He had no time to ask, no time to do anything, he realized. Blood had run away. Blood was lost. He had to find her, that was his first priority. Maybe what was going on was important, but some things were important.

As he walked through the streets, it felt as if they were expanding around him, a lone figure silhouetted black against black. It wasn’t that the sun was non-existent. It was simply devoid of light and warmth. By contrast, he could feel warmth emanating from the ground beneath him. He realized belatedly that he was barefoot, but it was too late to turn back. His thin soles would not have made much of a difference in the end; the ground was getting rapidly warmer and swelled, as if it were a boiler ready to blow. He quickened his step and saw a flicker of pink to his right.

Stony.

The voice was quiet, but audible. He rushed towards the flash of pink, but found only a small bush of pink flowers, weakly sprouting through the cracks in the concrete. The further he walked, the more the streets began to expand, the further it seemed he had to walk. When he turned around, the path he had just walked upon was entrenched in darkness, and it caught up to him, snaking around his ankles in spiderleg-thin tendrils, tickling at the back of his neck, splashing upon his wrists.

He ignored it.

Stony!

Another flash of pink, another mistake. It was simply a pink scarf hanging on a clothesline, unable to dry without the heat of the sun. The people that had previously populated the streets began to dwindle. He could see them from inside their towering homes, peeking out of their blinds. None of their lights were on. They remained in darkness. He pressed on, but the heat from the ground began to burn his feet. It pulsed beneath him. The city was alive. He could feel its heartbeat. He understood it, but it would kill him in a moment.

Stony!

It just occurred to him that he could call out for her. He had forgotten that he could speak. “Blood!’ His voice sounded hoarse to his own ears, so he tried again. “Blood!”

A flash of pink again. A woman’s skin pressed against a window. Things were not how they seemed. It was as if he was trapped within a picture book. Where’s my ward?

He reached a crevice where the elevator should have been.

Stony!

That was where Blood was. It bounced off the walls and reached his ears as a whisper. Without hesitation, he took a step off of the edge and plunged into darkness. The fall brought him to his knees with a thump that rattled his bones and made his ears ring. He pressed on, but the ringing in his head did not fade. If anything, it increased, a siren of increasing urgency. Hurry. It was as if the ground were made out of hot coals and someone was stoking the fire, urging him to go faster. He broke into a run and felt his own heartbeat thrum along with the pulse of the city.

The flashes of pink brought him to the butcher’s. The moment he stepped inside, a chill washed over him. He glanced down at his own arms and realized that he would not be surprised if he found frost gathering in his joints. It felt like a freezer.

Zombie was slumped at the counter, sullenly counting the day’s wages, long nails flicking through the coins with an insufferable clicking noise, metal against metal. There were needles hung on the wall, as innocently as an oversized fork and spoon. His blood ran ice-cold. “Zombie. Where is Blood?”

Zombie stared at him, eyes-half lidded. His arms were splayed across the counter, elbows knife-sharp and gaze dull. “Why,” he said deliberately, “the hell would I know?”

“She was here. I saw her.”

He saw the pink of meat. Pink. He trembled.

“Get out of my way,” he said. He reached to his chest to grab his badge, but he had none. He pushed through and saw a gun lying behind the counter. “I’m taking this.”

When he entered the back, he entered ready to kill. The ringing in his ears sounded louder than ever, an endless litany of warning, warning, warning. It did not smell like a butcher’s shop. It smelled like a torture chamber.

“Fenrir,” he rasped, and held the gun out in front of him. He did not know how to use it, but he did not have to. Swords were for having. Guns were for killing. It was too damn cold in here. He could feel the tips of his fingers going numb, his toes, his mind.

It was eerily silent, as if the chill swallowed all sound. He moved slowly around the back, and for a moment thought that he saw Fenrir, but it was his skin. It was pinned to the wall just as he remembered, held up by knife after knife, savagely hanging like the empty shell it was. He looked like an old man, hanging like that.

Vimes closed his eyes, unable to bring himself to look inside the freezer. He knew what he found there last time.

“Boo.”

He whirled around, half expecting the grinning man from his dream. Carcer. Instead, he saw the all too familiar lopsided grin of Praise. He was sliding a knife from out of his boot.

Vimes acted on instinct, snatched Fenrir’s skin from the wall and tossed it over him, blanketing him in something even more vile than he was. Praise was squirming, swearing, screaming as if it weren’t skin of a demon that Vimes had thrown over him but acid. Vimes hoped it burned.

He ran outside, and looked up at the sky. The siren within his own mind still howled, but it seemed quieter now. Perhaps he did not care.

The redness of the sky was being peeled away in strips and fell to the ground before bursting into bright plumes of flame. They spread like no real flame could, trickling into every crevasse in every building like an ink drop spilled into a fishbowl.

“What are you going to do?” A voice beside him. Handmaiden. He could feel her eyes on him, but chose not to look.

He took out a cigar and lit it upon one of the flames. He knew what he was supposed to do. He knew what he had to do. He puffed on the cigar. He searched for that raging fire within him that pushed him forward, away from the abyss and only felt the chill of the butcher’s. When the redness of the sky peeled away, it revealed a different layer beneath. The darkness of night. Bright stars. A natural sky, he realized. He had missed it.

It was as if the anger that had boiled within him had been sapped out and transferred into the city. “The city is angry,” he said. “She knows we hate it.”

Handmaiden stared. She repeated her question. “What are you going to do?”

He deliberated.

“Wait.”



All the little angels rise up, rise up, rise up...

He hears the song before he can figure anything else out, like where he is, what he's doing and what's going on. All he knows is the song. That damn song. He does not know what memories it's supposed to stir up, but whenever it follows him, there's an ache deep in his chest that tells him that they are not pleasant memories. His eyes snap open. He is leaning against the barricade.

The people are singing.

He gets to his feet and looks warily around him. No one meets his eyes but a dwarf in a modest leather skirt, an axe hanging from one hand and the other planted firmly on her waist. "You there," he says, "What's going on?" He can feel himself trembling.

The dwarf crinkles her brows at him. "Sir?"

He steadies himself with one hand and checks himself once over to make sure he's in his proper uniform, badge and all and tries to stop himself from trembling. He feels hot. His joints ache.

"Sir, you're shaking."

"I am not. Tell me what's going on. Tell me who's in charge here."

The dwarf widens her eyes in surprise. "Why sir," she says, "you are. Are you feeling all right?"

"Fine!" He takes a deep breath, steadies himself once more. "I'm fine. Just tell me what's--oh, don't tell me it's those bloody zombies again."

"I take offense to that! Great offense!" A man separates himself from the crowd. His skin is ashen with just a shade of green, and the stitches that decorate him make it abundantly clear that he is a zombie.

Vimes stares blearily at the zombie and peers at the assortment of species collected behind the barricade. It's like the godsdamn multispecies circle. Trolls are guarding the small entrances, gargoyles are keeping watch, dwarfs are irritably swinging their axes around, gnomes are surreptitiously eating dropped bits of food from off the ground and there are more than a few vampires scattered about the place.

Something bad must have happened to get all these different species together and cooperating, particularly the dwarfs and the trolls. Though he can't tell, he's certain that there are one or two werewolves in their midst from the way a few of the stronger looking individuals keep on baring their teeth at the vampires.

He ignores the zombie and claps his hands. "All right, you mob, listen up! I want--"

"We're not a mob!"

"I take offense to that, bein' called a mob, I'm not part of no mob--"

"A gathering, that's more like it."

"I can't be having with being in a mob, if this is a mob I want no part in it, I tell you, no part..."

Vimes grits his teeth. He's not in Edensphere anymore. This is how normal people act. "Shut up!" He roars. "What I was saying is that I want a full report on the situation and what exactly you people want."

There is silence for a moment until a troll steps forward, knuckles scraping on the ground. "Dere's a great big hole in der square," he says mournfully. "People are inside. We're protectin' our kin from whatever's in dere. No one else is doin' anything."

"Is this true?" Vimes asks, and scans the crowd only to see everyone nodding and holding their weapons a little closer to themselves. Now he realizes that these aren't the actions of a group who is looking for revolution. They are simply looking for protection as they fear the unknown. And to bolster th

"Has anyone tried talking to the people?" He asks.

"Isn't that a job for someone official?" An older woman says, holding her young daughters close to her.

"Official," Vimes repeats. "Ah. That's me, isn't it? Sounds like a job for wizards to me, but I'll see what I can do, but I need someone to show me the way. And if I come back to any of you brawling amongst yourselves... let's say I'd better not come back to you misbehaving. Come on, now! A volunteer?"

The dwarf who he first spoke to glances warily around her, hands trembling, and then steps forward. "I will, sir. Follow me."

When he steps from out of the barricade, he can see why the people of the city were paralyzed with fright. The sun hangs low and red, half obscured by the dark storm clouds threatening to cover what little light remains. Behind the clouds and the sun is a smattering of darkness stronger than what can occur naturally, like some mighty god had grabbed a handful of gravel and splashed it across the heavens. The silence that permeates the world is far more disturbing than anything else. Vimes knows what it should sound like. There should be gossip amongst the merchants, clanging from blacksmiths, the steady beat of a butcher's knife on meat from the slaughterhouse.

Instead, there is only the footsteps of himself and his companion. The dwarf mumbles something in dwarfish quietly, and Vimes can only just make out a few rather foul curse words. She finally leads him to the square, and he peers down into the gaping hole. Some people say that within the Disc, there is fire. It is not the case here. The hole is rimmed with soft leaves and the innards are overwhelmingly green. "Looks like bloody magic to me," he murmurs, then shouts into the hole, but there is no response.

"The wizards are on it," the dwarf says, and points to a collection of men in pointy hats just around the corner. "It's closing up, sir! You didn't need to do anything here."

"Closing it? Doesn't that mean that they're trapped?"

"Sir?"

"I should at least take a look." He leans in closer. Something about it looks familiar, but he can't quite put his finger on it.

"It's closing now, sir. Let's go home and forget about it. No one was able to come up here anyway, though they tried."

Home. Yes, that's what he wants to do. Going home sounds good right now. Things will be clearer afterwards.

But he hears familiar voices from the hole, and they cry out, as if in pain. He can hear a child's voice. He doesn't hesitate. "I can't. Not if it means not doing my damndest to help. I'll be back."

He doesn't think he will, but he shuts his eyes tightly and steps into the abyss anyway. Above him, the hole closes. In another universe, he might have turned around and went home and would be happier for it, but he's made his decision. He lands heavily on the ground and scans the area.

There are buildings scattered everywhere, but they're corroded and quickly breaking down. Now that the hole has been closed, the sky is a great, bleak thing, not the sort of night you can adjust your eyes to, nor the brightness of morning but a bitter shade of grey that obscures the sight and dims the spirits. Similarly to Ankh-Morpork, there are barricades, but they are made out of ruined buildings, not stacked pieces of furniture. Like Ankh Morpork, it is silent, but it is not from a lack of people. There is a breathless sort of tension in the air. He knows there are people around, but they are hidden by the shadows. Something bad is happening here. People do not learn how to hide so efficiently unless there is something terrible to hide from.

Something yanks him behind one of the buildings. Someone. He turns his head only to see Ghost staring him in the eye, but then again, it's not Ghost. He remembers how old Ghost had looked, how tired all this time, but never like this. Now he looks defeated, and it's a terrible thing to behold.

"Took you long enough, old man," he says.

Vimes peers behind Ghost only to lay his eyes on other familiar faces. Wolverine is sitting there, shoulders hunched. There is a hole in each of his knuckles. Elsa as well, a bloodied plaster over her nose. West is sitting quietly over a book, a pallor to her green skin. Scales leans against the corner, gazing vacantly at the sky.

This is the land of the disappeared, he realizes. The land of the forgotten. His blood runs cold.

"What's going on here? What is this place?"

"We're not in the Tree anymore. No one's watching us. We can say whatever the hell we want." He laughs. It is an unpleasant sound. "Not that it makes a difference."

"Then why are you living like this, why are you--"

Wolverine speaks, though he doesn't look up from his knuckles. "It's a goddamn mess here. When we came, others were already in power."

West speaks next, voice brittle and angry. He can see the rage rolling like the tide within her. "Didn't you say good people weren't ever leaders? It turns out you were right. Still against revolutions, Stoneface? I'm sure everyone in Edensphere was very happy when some of these people disappeared. Did you ever think about where exactly they went?"

Vimes' blood runs cold.

"I didn't..."

"Yeah," Ghost says. "That's right you didn't. Nobody ever does, so now it's our problem. And now it's yours. Didn't you say a bunch of bullshit about protecting people? Does that just stop when you can't see them anymore?"

Vimes wants to speak, to defend himself, to apologize but his tongue lays useless and thick in his mouth. Ghost grabs his shoulders. "Blood heard you talking from up there. She went to go get you. What are you going to do about it?"

Inside, the Beast rages. Before they can say another word, he leaps to his feet and runs, though he doesn't know where to go. As he sprints past, he sees others by the barricades. He never forgot about them. He simply found it easier not to think about them. Fallen, East, Honour, Skulls, Tatsu, Nothlit, Trust, Truth... the list is longer than he'd like to admit, and even though he only sees them for a moment, they are in bad shape. He can see it.

He follows glimpses of pink. He knows that it could be a trap if anyone detests him enough to trap him, but he is beyond caring. All he knows is that inside him, the Beast howls, and he needs to see his little girl in front of him, safe and sound. He fears that it is too late.

The flashes of pink send him into a freezer.

Fenrir, Praise, Apostle and Zombie are sitting inside. Fenrir is perched upon a freezer, and there is a small hand sticking out of it, one Vimes doesn't dare look at for more than a second. There are headless bodies hung from the ceiling, like sacks of meat. Vimes prays that he does not know who any of them once were. Zombie stares with those dead eyes of his, and Praise's fingers skim the handle of the knife sticking in his boot. Vimes pants. He doesn't know what he's doing here.

Fenrir daintily steps off of the freezer. "Oh? What do you plan to do?"

Who is Sam Vimes? The law. But the law doesn't apply here. Who is Sam Vimes without the law? He is the beast. He knows this, and in that moment, he knows what to do. He unsheaths his sword.

"I plan to kill you," he says, and then he wakes up.