The Oneiro Rangers: First Night (3 page)

Twigs snapped under heavy boots. The kids enjoying themselves in
the lake were too far away to notice, too preoccupied with their little
shenanigans. In the darkness, behind a pale tree, it watched. A single watchful
eye, glowing in a dim blue flame. A quiet growl, like gravel slowly popping
under a wheel.

And just like the gentle wind between the trees, it vanished, just
as soon as it had appeared.

Chapter 4

Heavy bells tolled from the academy’s four towers, signaling the
beginning of class. Students piled into their wooden desks, filling the room
with a clamor of individual conversations. Partially hidden behind the black
and white Normlock flag bolted above the blackboard, the words “
METRANSISTOR
LESSONS
” was written in big letters with chalk. Sitting at his desk, the
morpheus finished up the paperwork needed to start the day’s curriculum,
stacking it off to the side. Only a morpheus was required to wear a black
trench coat, the academy’s Baku emblem spread across his back; its jagged
wingspan reaching shoulder to shoulder and its long tusks curving around the
collar.

Roland and Errol sat down in the very back, slouching in their
chairs at the same time and spreading their legs out into the aisles. Both of
them still had slight welts and scuffs from fight training; anything that was
not on their face being covered by their school uniforms. When the young
morpheus stood up and cleared his throat, all of them sat forward at full
attention. Some nearly made their disbelief present, wondering if the man
before them–who was barely ten years older than they were–was truly their tutor
for the year. Ignoring the silent faces turning about and approaching the
blackboard, he wrote his name with a piece of white chalk.

“My name is Morpheus Clint Murnau,” he set the chalk down after
underlining his name with a fancy line, “and I’m going to be your morpheus for
your first year of hands-on training with the metransistors.” From his coat
pocket, he pulled out a walkie-talkie and a star shaped badge. “These will be
your most essential tools against the Nightmares. Without them, the Oneiro
Rangers would be nothing like they are. We probably wouldn’t even still be here
if it wasn’t for them. And that is why learning how to use them is the most
important part of your ranger training. Any questions?”

Nobody raised their hands, but some whispered to each other in the
back. Clint pretended that he didn’t notice, knowing that confronting it would
only waste time.

“Good.” Clint put them back in his pocket. “Now, before we start
anything, we are going to go on a small field trip. Doesn’t that sound fun?” He
smirked at his own sarcasm; the students unamused. “I’m glad everyone’s here.
That means nobody will have to go later,
alone
.”

Errol sat up, shooting his friend a gloomy glance. “I don’t like
how he said that,” he whispered.

“I don’t like how he said we gotta get up and go somewhere,”
Roland replied. “I just got comfortable.”

“You know the drill.” Clint directed everyone to the door. “Form a
line and follow me. The sooner we’re done with this, the sooner we can get on
with training.” His eyes shifted around, glaring at the majority who weren’t
getting up with the few who were. “Move it.”

The thirty-or-so teenagers in the classroom stood up and narrowed
into a single line through the door, lazily shuffling behind Clint. The grand
staircase lead them all the way down the four flights until the main hall,
tucked and folded into the very center of the hallway; their dress shoes
tapping softly against the clean marble steps. It seemed to be only them in the
entire building, everyone else in class; muffled lectures seeping quietly from
behind closed doors. There was little talking among the students circling down
the wall enclosed stairs, other than the pockets of people wondering what the
“field trip” could be about.

Crossing over the first floor hallway and entering the wider main
staircase, Clint took the right lip of the stairs and went into a never used
area behind the stairs, under the steps they just descended from. It would be
the perfect place to hide and skip class in, that is, if the Dog Drones
standing guard didn’t prevent intrusion. Made entirely of steel and with
exposed wires at the joints, the Dog Drone robots had the appeal of a large dog
with the skin and bite of a cold knife. The green beads of light from their
eyes floated still in the dark recesses under the stairs, inactive and on
standby. Once Clint passed one of them, its lights changed to an alert yellow,
its chest engine growling to life.

Exhaust puffed out of its nostril vents, masking the smell of
tottree wood with a dark cloud of spent diesel. “Presence detected,” it said in
a prerecorded voice from its mouth speaker. Its searchlight eyes swung over to
Clint’s back, scanning him with a loud electronic chirp. “Morpheus detected.
Returning to idle.”

With the Dog Drone’s head clanking back forward, its eyes faded
back to a green standby. Clint pulled out a heavy flashlight from his coat
pocket, lighting up the long forgotten hallway. His steps swayed the beam side
to side; the walls faded and torn, as if they’ve never been touched for years.
The thick metal door at the end was unlocked by lifting a steel bar that lay
across it, and the bar itself was locked in place with a giant padlock. Whoever
designed it made sure nobody would be able to break inside.

Or more so, to prevent anything from breaking out...

Keys jingled, Clint’s light focused straight on the padlock while
he spun his key ring around in search for the right one. The students were deep
inside the darkness, only their outlines visible from the faint glow struggling
to reach into the long crevasse they had clustered into. A sound echoed loudly
within the small space — a yell. Everyone turned back to see what it was,
Clint’s flashlight peeking over the back of all of their heads. Some of the
students gasped at the sounds of the Dog Drone engines growling, loud and
aggressive.

Roland came into view, doubling back as a one of the robot dogs
rammed his legs with its hard nose. “Easy, easy! Down boy! Heel, heel!”

Clint lowered the flashlight, shaking his head with a long huff.
“Unit forty-five, Aus!”

The Dog Drone instantly backed away and sat down, its engine
slowing down to a hum. Its ears fanned out at attention, exposing the
microphone holes on the inside of them. “Awaiting orders.”

“Setz,” Clint said, motioning it back to its previous place.

“Returning to defensive position.” Standing back up, the robot did
so, its paws clanking about and the joints whirling with the movements.

Roland stood there; all eyes on him. “... I lost my shoe back
there, was all.”

Clint glared down at the students, focusing on Roland. “Don’t
separate from the group,” he ordered sternly. “That goes for all of you. Next
one who tries something like that will have to outrun those robots.”

While their morpheus returned to his search for the key, Errol put
a hand on Roland’s shoulder. “Nice try, buddy.”

Roland shrugged off his friend’s hand, arms crossed in anger; his
perfect chance to wander around the place foiled. “Ah,
shya-dap
. Who’d a
guess this place would be built like a prison. Guard dogs, line-ups, bed time.
I’m surprised they even feed us in this joint.”

The steel door squealed open like the mouth of a beast, pitch
black inside. A soft and quiet sound escaped from the doorway, a howl or a cry.
None of the students could tell what it was, but everyone was certain that
nothing good could come of it. Clint’s flashlight revealed a flight of stairs
heading down into a faint red glow. He turned his head back, making sure there
were no more attempts like the last one.

“Almost there,” he said. “I hope this is the only time any of you
would have to go down here.”

They resumed their walk, heading down the cold concrete steps.

“I’m starting to hate the way he says things like that,” Roland
said dreadfully under the scuffling of shoes. He patted his stomach with a
fist. “It always gives me a bad feeling — right here.”

Boilers and other heavy machinery hissed and rumbled within the
large basement, the academy’s dark heart pumping away to keep the place
livable. Everyone was forced to use the rails to keep themselves from falling
down the short flight of stairs; Clint’s flashlight useless for the ones in the
back of the narrowed line. The invisible wall of heat at the bottom was enough
to make the air swim, as well as make the students sweat on the spot. Dim red
bulbs in front of each piece of machinery allowed their buttons and levers to
be seen, quickly washed away when Clint clicked on the overhead light that was
dangling from the ceiling.

Passing the bursts of steam and finding that the rest of the
basement was empty, the class bunched up before a door similar to the previous
one, a thick slab of steel with a stubby wheel in the center. In clear plain
lettering, the door was labeled with a sign that read:
KEEP
OUT
. With a quick twist, Clint turned the wheel, the locks unlatching
from the top and bottom. He held onto the twin handles, turning his head over a
shoulder.

“Now, what I am about to show all of you might be difficult to
handle and should be taken seriously. I want all of you to act mature about
this. Any horseplay and I’ll kick you out with my own boot.”

Some of the more cocky students snickered in secret, Roland being
one of them.

“How bad could it be?” a boy asked from the front.

“You'll see,” Clint stated simply.

Cranking the door open, a blinding white light lit up the whole
area, everyone needing some time for their eyes to adjust. Stepping inside,
they soon realized that it wasn’t the light that overwhelmed them; the long
series of numerous hallways covered entirely in white paint and tiles. If it
wasn’t for the wide windows lined up along the path, it would be nearly
impossible to tell where the walls ended and the floor began. Through the glass,
the students could see every bit of the padded rooms they passed by. Deep thuds
pulsed from all directions; the door they came from closing on its own as they
headed towards a crossway nearby for all of them to gather up.

“This is the Oneiro Asylum,” Clint introduced, “and I hope none of
you will have to end up in here.”

Everyone gazed all around at the different occupants housed in
their secluded quarters, each one filled with silenced activity. There were
speakers with buttons by the windows to allow two-way communication; the
soundproof glass hiding the countless laughter and screams coming from within,
reducing them to silent and sporadic movements. Most–if not all–of the cells
were heavily stained from numerous sources: food, dust, bodily fluids. The
ceiling was made up of large open fans, constantly circulating the air while a
hidden vent replaced it with that classic “hospital smell” of strong sanitizing
chemicals. Even with the large amount of clean air coming in, the place felt
stuffy and downright uninhabitable.

Each room had its own different and disturbing view. A man tried
to eat away at his already chewed up fingers, the metal mask over his face
preventing him from doing any more damage. A woman rocked herself in a corner,
her teeth chattering for so long they were chipped and cracked. Some wept
endlessly, others screamed. The only thing they had in common was the sense of
fear in their eyes... at least, the ones who still had them.

Clint led the class to a window on the right, the room completely
dark inside. Flicking a switch by the speaker, the morpheus shed light on
someone wearing a straitjacket. He sat in the far corner, looking down at his
feet and mouthing an endless stream of numbers. As if feeling eyes the
students’ eyes on him, he glanced over his shoulder and then shot up. Sprinting
towards the glass, he rammed into it at full speed.

Everyone jumped back, except for Clint. “Don’t worry about him
breaking through,” he said calmly. “That one-way glass can withstand anything
he throws at it.”

The restrained man growled and drooled like a wild animal,
colliding his body with the glass repeatedly. Each hit left a smear of spit and
blood, his face growing more and more beaten as he bashed it with all he had.
Giving up after a few more splattering impacts, he slid down and breathed
heavily, lying on the ground motionless. The class stood there in shock,
concerned chatter about whether or not the man was still alive. Streaks of blood
left on the glass dripped to the floor, hidden for good once Clint turned the
room’s light off.

“And that,” Clint stepped away, trying his best to avert attention
to the stained window, “... is why some of these rooms have the lights off. As
long as the light is off in their rooms, they can’t see us and we can’t see
them.”

“Why in tarnation didn’t he just tell us,” Roland asked quietly to
Errol. “It’d save the poor sap one mean headache.”

Errol hummed a chuckle. “Must’ve been a bully of his from back in
the day.”

Roland coughed a laugh, as sick as it was. “Good one.”

“Each and every one of the patients in here had been a fellow
Oneiro Ranger,” Clint continued to explain, “at one point or another. On
average, it takes about two years to develop a condition known as Panophobia:
the fear of everything. When you are in the line of duty, from the very first
time you encounter a Nightmare that carries it, the syndrome begins to develop
and take over your mind. It’s a slow process, but once it’s completed, you end up
here like the rest of them. Granted, it’s easily curable. After their brain is
examined and the infected area is found through a series of repeated tests–ones
that take numerous man hours–a quick memory wipe gets rid of the Panophobia,
usually followed by a retake of the hands-on training. All the while, they are
here, in the asylum, with every precaution and measure used to prevent too much
permanent damage. Not everyone will suffer from it but—”