Feast of Your Dreams

Kip smiled as she took a deep breath, inhaling the scents of hot chocolate and stale tears that wafted through open windows. She leaned against the single streetlamp on Cedar Drive, listening to the tired fixture’s incessant buzzing. The orange light flickered. If anyone were to look out of their window right now, they might catch a glimpse of her.

Small and eerily skinny. Her long dark hair braided back into plaits which trailed down to her uneven hips. Beneath her black denim outfit, light blue skin flecked with pastel markings stretched over her distorted body. Ribs of different shapes and sizes sewn together to form a zig-zagging ribcage, fused to a curved spine. This caused the scaly spikes that protruded through the skin of her right shoulder blade to stick out dramatically. Her left shoulder carried a single wing. Jagged and coated in black and green feathers to match her left eye. Heterochromia dictated that her right eye should be orange, a yellow halo swirled around the black slit of a pupil. Both eyes seemed slightly too big for the rest of her face, giving her a permanently curious expression. Her nose tilted up like a snout, her turquoise ears pointed like an elf’s. And upon her head, rested two horns. The longer one curled. A corkscrew made of bone. Parts of her were made of plants, her veins, her eyelashes. Although you could not see them, her lungs were spare pieces of a pufferfish. Instead of nails, her fingers sprouted extra teeth. Some parts of her were not natural at all. Bits of machine worked into the creature where nothing else would fit.

Mismatched feet stuffed into odd boots tapped a crack in the pavement. Kip listened carefully for the murmur, the pitiful cry of a discontent sleeper who wanted nothing more than to be set free from whatever cruel trap their mind had concocted that evening. And then she smiled, for someone was calling her name. The streetlight flickered again, momentarily plunging Cedar Drive into total blackness. And when the feeble orange bulb switched back on, there was no one there.

Kip was now stood inside a bedroom. Decorated with emerald wallpaper and stuffed bears. In the corner, amidst a cocoon of sheets and cushions, a little boy cried out. His limbs flailing. Inside his head, a nightmare weaved various images. A trip to the dentist. A bad day at school. Trivial things. Hardly worth Kip’s time or talents. Nevertheless, she couldn’t resist the lure of fresh prey.

She reached into the child’s mind. Causing no damage as she scooped the nightmare out. Fangs gleaming in the weak light of the moon, Kip opened her mouth. The nightmare, a dark creature – barely larger than a grape – squeaked and struggled in her grip. Tendrils made from shadows lashed out, trying to free itself from her grasp. Kip popped the nasty little nightmare into her mouth and swallowed it whole.

But such a petty morsel after having to use her powers wasn’t nearly enough. Kip leaned closer to the sleeping boy, who had settled down now that his dreams were no longer plagued by fear. Which would make them taste that much sweeter…

She gobbled and guzzled and gorged. Stuffing spicy ambitions, sugary hopes and zingy daydreams down her gullet. Kip feasted, enjoying the flavour of every emotion, every aspiration. And with each one she devoured, the sleeping boy grew a little duller. Until he was just a boring shell. A being with no aims, no ideals, no dreams of any kind.

Kip wiped her grinning mouth, patting her bloated belly with a blue hand before skipping back into the shadows, which opened up like a trapdoor. She followed the next voice that called out for her and followed it. Dancing through a tunnel of darkness. She dropped through space, landing in a crouch in a completely different bedroom, inside a completely different house.

The room she had been drawn to was a vision of pink. Large posters advertising boy bands and fantasy films lined the walls. A butterfly lampshade dangled from the ceiling. The girl who whimpered and tossed and turned in her bed was almost a woman. There were various pictures of herself in frames on her desk. All showed her looking heavily made up and standing with friends who dressed in a similar way. The centrepiece of the collection showed all of them, clutching dainty glasses of champagne in front of a shiny banner with the number eighteen scribbled across.

Kip peeked into the girl’s mind and laughed cruelly.

‘So,’ she hissed, swooping her head down so that she could whisper into the girl’s ear. Her voice came out as a throaty sing-song.

‘You dread being left out, is that it? You could never bear the idea of looking different, of being alone. Your worst nightmare is my reality. Pathetic. Pathetic.’

She dropped back into the shadows, leaving an empty shell behind for the second time that night.

People just didn’t know what fear was anymore. Kip snarled as she stormed through various rooms in various houses, flats, hotels. Each sleeper who cried out seemingly less interesting than the last. Kip was starting to get tired. No decent nightmares to fill her up, so she indulged in the good dreams instead. There was a cost to that bad habit, however. Once Kip started eating a good dream, she always found it so hard to stop. But that was the price, she reasoned, the punishment for wasting her time.

She emerged from the darkness into another room.

Kip shivered in a sudden rush of cold air. Goosebumps prickled along her periwinkle arms as she approached him. A boy. He couldn’t have been older than eight, but even sleeping he seemed… mature somehow. There was something different about this one. A moan escaped his lips, a plea for Kip’s help, and curiosity pulled her even closer.

He dreamed of playing with another boy on a dark day. A little older than him, but with the same coffee-colour skin and dark hair. They both laughed as they chased each other. They were at a park. The rain seemed to be keeping any other visitors away, but the boys were having far too much fun to go home just yet. Kip sighed. Poor things. They had no way of knowing what was going to happen.

The river was high and surging along with a wicked current. The older boy stepped on the edge of the riverbank, loosened by the wet weather. And then-

The sound of the rain vanished. Kip watched through the boy’s eyes as his big brother tilted away from him, losing his balance. He didn’t have time to scream before the water claimed him. And then the rain started to roar.

It spoke to the boy.

It was all your fault.

You could have saved him.

You should have done something.

You let him down.

You let him drown.

Your fault. Your fault. Your fault. Your fault.

The rain jabbed at him like a thousand accusing fingers and Kip gasped as she jerked back, leaving the boy’s mind. Leaving him to face the nightmare alone.

She had tumbled onto the carpet and lay there for a moment, breathless. She was irritated that it took her a moment to recover. She was used to nightmares. She didn’t need to fear them, they feared her! And, she giggled, navy lips curving up to revealed sharp white teeth, this one looked particularly tasty.

Kip ran her tongue along her lips, savouring the last flavours of her meal. She grinned, hunger satisfied, and turned to leave. But something caught in her chest and she took one last look at the sleeping child. The nightmare was gone but his mouth was still set in a firm line, eyebrows still furrowed in pain.

Kip scratched her head, confused. She had let him keep the good things; his hopes, his ambitions. Wasn’t that enough?

She hopped back by his side and leaned over so that she could kiss his creased forehead. Instantly, the lines smoothed out and the corners of his mouth twitched.

‘There,’ she whispered, ‘now you can dream of something sweeter.’