Dream Park

'Almost absolutely. I understand that your people have mysti­cal ways to reach out and seek such information for yourselves. Perhaps you would care to try?'

'Too much energy expenditure, too soon. The snake drained a lot of energy from two of my players...' Chester gazed toward the mountain peaks shimmering in the distance, and the dense for­est growth between. The guide could plead ignorance, but he couldn't lie.

Chester raised his voice to be audible to the entire group. 'We're heading north. Eames, you and Leigh up front with me. Mary-em and Acacia, take the rear guard. Don't spread too thin, people.'

The fifteen Garners and Maibang formed into a line, Eames leading as they chopped their way into the brush. The big man's arm rose and fell tirelessly as his sword served machete duty, filling the air with shredded green chaff. 'We must follow these mountains,' Maibang assured them. 'There should be a trail up ahead just a little way, and then the going will be much easier.'

Chester grunted a reply and kept watching the terrain carefully.

Tony hung back with Acacia in the rear of the column. She cut brush for the first few minutes, but as initial progress was slow she soon tired and slipped her sword back into its sheath. They found a trail and the going became easier. Maibang kept them heading toward the 'mountains'... which, Acacia suspected, were slowly shifting position to keep them traveling in an expanding spiral.

She couldn't come close to naming all the varieties of plant and animal life. Birds of all kinds, their plumes ablaze with color; parrots with purple and bright orange feathers, birds of par­adise with impossible combinations of gold and red and electric white swirling on their wings and tails. Acacia recognized coco­nuts and what looked like rubber trees, but beyond that the under­brush was a tangle of greens and dark purples and the yellow of dying shrubs; of vines and trees, leaves flat and shiny, invisible against the forest growth or exploding with flowers. Small snakes

slept on branches or wriggled from underfoot. Creatures leapt through the branches just out of sight.

One parrot, gorgeous in its purple plumage, kept pace with her for what seemed a kilometer, always just out of reach. She watched it, watched it land for an instant on a branch to nuzzle beneath its wings for a fat mite, watched it cock its head at her curiously, and found herself wondering if it was real. It looked real; it sounded real, its untutored voice croaking tunelessly except for sharp whis­tles; and she wondered.

The air was hot and sticky and smelled oppressively green. They had tried holding hands, but contact with another human body only made the heat worse, and they gave it up. Sweat rolled from Tony's face in grimy drops, and under his cotton shirt dark damp spots were forming under his armpits and on his chest.

He pointed off to the side and asked, 'Is that...

A small clearing surrounded by one species of bush, outlining a crescent moon. 'That's it. Shall I stop the others?'

'I'll only be a second.' Tony stepped off the trail and into the clearing and faded out. Acacia kept moving. Presently he was behind her again, pushing his pace until he caught up.

'I feel as if we've been walking for hours,' he said to her, pant­ing sincerely. Some of the bounce was gone from his walk, and frustrated fatigue showed in his face. 'Come on... where's an­other beastie? Anything's better than this.'

Acacia moaned sympathetically. 'Poor baby. Just try to re­member that your discomfort, like everything else here, is only make-believe.' She patted his cheek. 'There, now. Don't you feel better now?'

'Yes, Mommy,' he said absently, and quickened his step to catch up with Gwen and Ollie. Sheen of sweat or not, the blond Cleric hadn't released her hero's arm for an instant. Tony clapped Ollie on the shoulder. 'Good going with the water snake, Offie.'

'Call me Oliver, would you, Tony?' His hand rested easily on the grip of his sword.

Tony tried to laugh, but suddenly there was nothing soft about Ollie, not his eyes nor his carriage, and certainly not the way his palm caressed his sword. Gwen had changed too. She was still at­tached to Ollie. But instead of his leaning on her, she seemed to be drawing strength from him. Tony sensed that he was out of his depth.

Gwen's laugh was of quiet challenge. 'Oliver is a noble name, Tony. Oliver was one of Charlemagne's greatest warriors.'

'All right... Oliver. I like the way you handled the water snake. It was a class act.'

Tension eased. 'I almost got killed out there,' Oliver growled. 'When I went off the side of the boat, I thought I was dead. I was just waiting for the jolt from my neck tab. If Lopez had really wanted me, he had me then. That thing could have crushed me before it took enough hit points to roll over and die.' If he believes in the Game Master, how can he believe he's Oliver the Frank? Tony shrugged inside his mind. Schizo. Well, maybe I'll have to be schizo too. 'Oliver, what is it exactly that Thieves do? It's easy to see what Warriors and Clerics and Magic Users do.'

'Thieves steal, mostly.' Gwen skipped a half-pace to keep her step even with Oliver's. 'You skulk around, and you're practically invisible to your enemies. You're not much with weapons, except maybe a throwing knife. It's loads of fun. You'll get a chance to try your hand later today, probably. That's about all I can think of. Chester can fill you in on anything else. Don't worry, we won't let you get killed before you learn the rules. It won't get really rough for a bit yet.'

'Yeah, well, I guess you haven't had a chance to bless anything yet, either.'

'Not true. I blessed dear Oliver before he engaged in mortal combat with that overblown water worm.'

'Behind every man, et cetera,' said Oliver. His persona cracked for an instant, and he bounced on his toes and was Offie again, smiling bright as sunrise, saying, 'I am having so much fun. I really hope you can get into it, Tony.'

McWhirter smiled and nodded. He dropped back to Acacia's side.~ 'Happy as two fleas in a bottle of blood, they are.'

'What do you want out of all this, Tony? What will make you happy?'

'Just a little of something that I can't get anywhere else, I guess.'

She fluttered her eyelashes at him.

'Well, you, of course. But, you know. Breathless adventure, ex­otic sights, heaps of fabulous gems... all that.'

'All that. But you do value my friendship, don't you?'

'Sure I do, Cas. Besides, I can't afford what you charge

strangers.' He hugged her with one arm as they moved down the trail, the shrubbery closing behind them like a healing wound. 'I'm a city boy, Cas. What am I supposed to want? Six days from now I'm back at work copying blueprints eight hours a day. Hell, I

guess my expectations are a little unreasonable. I can't really expect an amusement park to undo in a week the damage a dull job does in fifty, but I do.' He gently turned her face to him and spoke in all seriousness. 'Help me, will you, Cas?'

She looked half puzzled, half pleased. 'You know, hombre, every once in a while you're such a decent human being that I might as well have left my hip boots at home.'

'How ‘bout if I tickle your butt next time you're facing down a giant snake?'

There was a shout up ahead, and several of the Garners had broken ranks, running forward to a clearing 100 meters up the trail. Acacia half-drew her sword; then she saw and relaxed. The first half of the journey was over.

In a few seconds they were out of the jungle and into a culti­vated area, where knee-high and waist- high plants grew in neat rows. She could see men and women working in the fields, weed­ing and irrigating. 'Please!' Kasan Maibang's voice rang out. 'Stay on the path. The young tubers are very delicate.' Acacia immediately wondered how far the cultivated area really went, and where the Dream Park magic took over.

Some of the land had been irrigated into marshiness, and men waded knee-deep in the mud planting and setting up stakes to in­dicate private plots in the community garden.

Acacia recognized sweet potatoes, yams and sugar cane. In the distance banana trees and breadfruit grew, and the air was full of the scent of rich wet earth and growing things. Like Tony, she was a child of the city, but a granduncle in Mexico owned his own ranch, and she and her two brothers had spent glorious summers there helping with the cows and pigs. She knew something of wide spaces, and working in the open air, and remembered the