A Hair of Delphi - 4 - Dreams of the Lab

Author's Preface:

I don't have much to say on this page, outside of the fact that when I wrote this segment, I included a part that had to happen since I wrote the first segment. I'm sure you'll understand as you read.

To see previous installments, please check the index.Until then, please enjoy "Dreams of the Lab."

June 20, 1998

4 am. Restless pondering and a continuing ache in my stomach produced terrible images in my sleep tonight.

My dream placed me in Dr Jacob Abernathy’s lab. However, instead of finding his smiling British ruddiness, malice and sadistic glee was there. I fell back and tried for the door, but could not unbolt it.

Abernathy held the ax over his head, looming over me as I collapsed in fear.

Now, the careful reader may ask: “Where did Abernathy acquire this Ax?” And, to be honest, I do not know. It is the curious ability for nightmares to create more terrors out of the nothings than the somethings in life.

For, in reality, there was no ax in Jacob Abernathy’s lab—just a table, a cabinet, three shelves . . . And Martha.

The idea of Martha, that giant wall of technology, made me shudder in my dream. Its eight monitors were watching eyes, clicks came from the keyboards hooked to it. Abernathy was trying to force me into the man-size aperture of the machine’s scanning device! I knew that if I befell that fate, I would be dissolved like the hair sample from that afternoon.

Eventually, the demonized dream pushed me into the device and the plexiglass door came down with a horrifying “shunt” followed by the hiss of an air seal closing. I could not hear outside of my breathing in the chamber. I felt small and claustrophobic at the same time. I was close to being beyond the size limit of the chamber, it being seven by three by three in feet, and I 6’1” with 2’ wide at the shoulders.
The red laser began to scan me, much faster than it would in real life, I felt the heat, or I thought I did, of the beam. The laser turned blue, and I could feel the agony of my skin burning. I screamed. It echoed against the walls of the chamber. Abernathy was laughing, holding his Ax above his head in triumph. I could not hear it, but I could see his laughter. I looked down at my hands—they were gone.

I awoke to banging on my apartment door. I pulled my robe over my undershirt and shorts and shuffled through the living room and flipped the cheap latch. Mrs. Bell, the landlady, nearly wobbled over, still rapping against the door as I opened it. Some of her pink curlers flew from her head as she stumbled into my doorway.

“Mrs. Bell? What can I do for you?”

“Do for me? Lawrence, I came up here because Jenson said it sounded like someone was getting stabbed in here!” She gripped a handful of frizzy black hair out of her face.

“What?” I chuckled for lack of any better response. The draft of the hallway chilled my legs. My head and heart still pounded from the dream I was brought away from.

“He heard screamin’ and screamin’ and said that if I didn’t come up and check on you, he’d be busting in with his shotgun!”

“There was screaming? I was having an especially terrible dream, but I did not realize.”

“You were still screaming when I got here. I’m surprised you heard my knocking.” Mrs. Bell was a caring woman. She reminded me of my mother, but only in her attitude.

“I am sorry to disturb everyone.”

“No—no. It’s fine. Don’t you worry about it. We’re just glad you weren’t getting stabbed to death. I’d hate to have to file a police report.”

“Thanks, Mrs. Bell.” The joke made me feel better about waking the neighborhood with my terrible thoughts. I noted that my throat was sore now. I wondered how loud I was screaming.

“If there is anything you need, like a heavy sleeping pill, I can get it for you.”

“If I recall correctly, I prescribed you that medication when you came into the clinic last month.”

“Oh. I suppose you did.” She brought her hand over her mouth and looked up in a thoughtful pose. This was a common behavior when she talked herself into a box.

“Good night, Mrs. Bell.”

“Good night, Mr. Abernathy.”

I closed the door and latched it again. I walked back towards my bedroom but slumped into the pre-furnished recliner. I looked around the room, it was still and dark—peaceful in its own way. I did not feel like going back to bed. I was restless now—Not afraid, but restless.

I stared at the data disc Dr Abernathy handed me yesterday afternoon. It sat on the coffee table like a stagnant memory of the dream. But it is best to let those images leave my mind, and to bring the controlling calm back to my thoughts.

I pulled my computer bag and pulled the laptop out of it. After the usual two minutes to boot up, I pulled the disc from its sleeve and set it into the disc drive. The click of the disc drive closing into the laptop was satisfying for some reason. Whether it was that now I did not have to see the thing anymore, cloaked by the eight pound shell, or just that I was exerting my human mastery over technology by shoving it into my computer, I do not know.

The install file began its auto-run sequence once the computer recognized the disc’s presence. “OK to start Installation?” I clicked “YES” on the pop-up message.

“Program Space requires 1.9 Gb space: OK to start?” Wow. 1.9 Gigabytes? I checked my C:\ drive status. About 2.5 Gigs available. This Toshiba only had around 6 Gigabytes in its entirety, and that’s before the Windows programming. But that was alright, I usually kept my files on the Miskatonic server—it was safer from losing data anyway. I clicked “OK” on the second pop-up.

“DATA TRANSFER IN PROGRESS - - - -
00.12 % COMPLETE

ESTIMATED COMPLETION IN - - 08:15:32
00.12% - - - - 08:15:31
00.12% - - - - 08:15:30

I am no longer dwelling on the dream, but I still felt restless. I wonder what television comes on at 4 in the morning these days.