Title: Frost

Author: tinhutlady

Universe: Invisible Man (TV- scifi channel circa 2000 - cancelled)

Summary: Darien does a little late-night mental musing.

 

William Dement was once quoted as saying, "Dreaming permits each and every one of us to be quietly and safely insane every night of our lives."  And that scares me, because insanity and I have been partners in bed before. I'm hoping that's the only place we share now: my dreams. So far so good on the cure for the madness the gland used to bring on. No more shots, no more red eyes, no more murderous monster in me, no more straight jackets Ð I'm all for that. Still, dreams like the one I just had make me wonder if I'm really cured or not. After all, that monster came from somewhere, right?

 

If you believe the Talmud, a dream which is not interpreted is like a letter which is not read. So I'll reread the letter and try again to make sense of it all.

 

I know it started off with the corridor, and I was looking at things like I was quicksilvered. Then the stuff shattered off and I was normal as I went through a familiar door. They were all there in the Official's office, all of them sitting around the table as if they were at a meeting I hadn't been invited to. And I walked around to all of them and shouted at them and they didn't even blink. Didn't move. And then I realized: they couldn't. They were covered in frost, like they'd been touched by something cold and heartless. Something that took them by surprise, yet they didn't looked surprised. Just natural. And when I touched Claire and Hobbes, they fell out of their chairs and shattered on the floor. When I ran to the Official and shook him, trying to make him believe I hadn't meant it, his head broke off and I caught it. There I was, holding the official's head in my hands, and then quicksilver came out of my palms and it disappeared. I think if I hadn't woken up, I would have had a heart attack. I know it was pounding in my throat the whole time I tried to convince myself it was only a dream.

 

So, do I feel I'm freezing them out? I don't know. They are my family now, even Eberts. They're all I have left, really. I guess I do wonder if I'll hurt them someday. Maybe I'm wondering about that too much lately. Or maybe I'm just remembering the time I had to use quicksilver to freeze some poison in the Official's cheek. That was a strange feeling Ð to use something alien inside me to help someone who had had it put there in the first place, and not for nice reasons, either. His eyes were filled with fear, like he knew he was going to die. Reminded me of the old man who had a heart attack when he found out I was a thief. I would never have been caught and put in prison if I hadnÕt stopped to give him CPR. And I would have rotted there if my brother hadnÕt thought to use me as his experimental guinea pig. I guess a lot of things wouldn't have happened to me if I hadn't been in the wrong place at the right time.

Sometimes I feel I'm not really here. Like it's an illusion the other way around. As if the gland wasn't the one making me invisible Ð I'm the one who's invisible and I'm only seen because of the gland. Maybe that's what the dream is about - that I'm not really there, or they're not really seeing me like I'd like to be seen. Maybe I'm angry about that Ð maybe a little.

 

It's something to think about.

 

In the meantime, I think I'll sit up a while and watch an old movie or something. Munch on some popcorn and mull over normal things, like does Hobbes sleep with a teddy bear, or does Claire like old movies, too? No sense spending all my time sleeping, right? Not with the enemy, anyway.