Last Night I Dreamt That Somebody Loved Me

No hope, no harm. Just another false alarm.

Somewhere in the dark weeks, in the months my mind is missing, I must have met them. The Wailers, I called them. The Wailers are coming.

I was wrong. The Wailers were already here. When I rushed outside the bathroom -- which happened to be in a rest stop -- they were waiting for me. The Wailers were waiting.

(Ooh, you must be thinking, finally, some elite mooks. C'mon, give us all the juicy details and don't leave out any gruesomeness in appearance. I'm getting to that, so fuck off, will you?)

They didn't look gruesome. They looked almost normal. A man and two women. They didn't look like Grayskins -- they didn't have the ragged clothing covering up the fungus-covered flesh. Instead, they wore dark coats with symbols on them, something that looked sort of like a musical symbol.

They looked at me and smiled. Then they began to sing.

I hadn't put on my headphones, but I doubt they would have helped. All the other noises -- the buzzing of the lights, the hum of the air, even my own footsteps -- it all went away and only their song remained.

They were singing "Carry On My Wayward Son." How apropos.

Their song wasn't like the sound made by the Grayskins. It didn't hurt me, it didn't make me want to hurl. I didn't start bleeding from the eyes.

It made me feel at peace. It was like I was on the edge of a gentle slumber and all I needed to do to go over into a restful sleep would just be to let go. Let go and fall into the song.

So I let go. In point of fact, I let go of what I was holding, which was a small incendiary device I had packed into an empty can of pop. The pop went pop and exploded, which resulted in my getting a nasty cut on my leg, but also stopped the damn song from going any further.

Then I ran. With a bleeding leg, I ran from the Wailers and their Song. I tossed whatever I had on me -- smoke bombs, firecrackers, but not one molotov cocktail, which I shall have to rectify -- at them. I didn't think it would help me, but for some reason, they didn't follow.

I got away from them, but it was only luck that let me. I don't know if I will ever be so lucky. And still questions linger in my mind: what happened in those missing months?