Darkside Dreams (Darkside Dreams - Series 1) Read online

  DARKSIDE DREAMS

  By A. King Bradley

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or person, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2019 by A. King Bradley

  All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever.

  For more information visit: www.kingbradley.com & www.twitter.com/akingbradley

  To Monica, Karol Christine, Audrey, and Aaron.

  And also in joyful memory of

  my dear friend and mentor

  Dr. Dawn DeVeaux.

  SOUNDTRACK

  ◆◆◆

  For the most complete experience be sure to download a copy of the Darkside Dreams Original Soundtrack:

  APPLE MUSIC

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  Contents

  Title Page

  SOUNDTRACK

  THE WITNESS

  CHAPTER 1

  CHAPTER 2

  CHAPTER 3

  EPILOGUE

  ME TOO

  CHAPTER 1

  CHAPTER 2

  CHAPTER 3

  EPILOGUE

  FAIL-SAFE

  PROLOGUE

  CHAPTER 1

  CHAPTER 2

  CHAPTER 3

  CHAPTER 4

  CHAPTER 5

  CHAPTER 6

  CHAPTER 7

  CHAPTER 8

  CHAPTER 9

  CHAPTER 10

  CHAPTER 11

  CHAPTER 12

  CHAPTER 13

  CHAPTER 14

  CHAPTER 15

  CHAPTER 16

  CHAPTER 17

  CHAPTER 18

  CHAPTER 19

  CHAPTER 20

  CHAPTER 21

  CHAPTER 22

  CHAPTER 23

  CHAPTER 24

  CHAPTER 25

  CHAPTER 26

  EPILOGUE

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  TWITTER

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  THE WITNESS

  By A. King Bradley

  CHAPTER 1

  ◆◆◆

  Seattle, Washington…

  – August 22, 2087

  The city was dark and quiet, awash in a cold rain. The usual miscreants seemed to be hiding away for the night; snuggled up tight in their crack dens and cheap hotel rooms. Even the rats were nowhere to be seen.

  Officer Raymond “Ray” Bridges looked skyward, narrowing his eyes. The rain just kept coming, and the unusually brisk winds that came with it brought forth a chill that he could feel right down to his bones. The cup of decaf in his hand helped a little, but it was already starting to go cold. Just like the fire in his belly. Nineteen years on the job would do that to anyone. Especially in this city.

  Ray moved away from the sidewalk and tucked himself into the vestibule of a dark shop, staring longingly up at the lighted windows high on the office building across the street as he leaned against the brick building to his left. Night owls and workaholics, still plugging away, even at this hour. Quarter to midnight, by his watch.

  Fifteen minutes until he could head back to the station and turn in. Only a few more days left on this god-awful night shift before the new kid arrives and takes over.

  Ray stood there, sipping his now cold decaf and listening closely to the radio chatter coming from his belt; hoping nothing would come in that he might need to respond to. It had been a quiet shift, mostly on account of the rain and the chill. He hoped it would have the courtesy to remain that way until after he was home, safe and snug in bed with a glass of whiskey in his hand and one of his late-night shows streaming at a low volume on his tablet. The perfect way to coax his overactive mind to sleep. Two different numbing agents, one applied through the optic nerve and the other through his gullet.

  Headlights suddenly flashed through the rain. Tires hissed over wet pavement. The car appeared, parallel parking with inhuman speed and ease in front of the apartment building. Ray narrowed his eyes, peering through the window of the car. No driver. None visible, anyway. Probably just a drunk in the backseat, who let his car drive him home. But best to check on it.

  He stepped out of the vestibule and back into the icy, insidious rain. He looked both ways, then jogged across the mirrored surface of the wet asphalt street. He pressed a spot under the brim of his hat, between his thumb and forefinger, and the PD insignia on the front of it lit up like a headlamp, shining a cone of light ahead of him.

  Ray rapped against the car window with his knuckles. A moment later, a bleary-eyed figure sat up out of the shadows of the backseat and reached over the center console to lower the window.

  "Officer," he said. "I'm not in trouble, am I?"

  Ray could have smelled the alcohol from a mile away. No sign of any illicit substances though, not that he could see. Technically, the guy wasn't doing anything wrong. Forty years ago it would have been illegal for a self-driving car to be moving around without a coherent, license-holding person behind the wheel. Just in case anything went wrong with the computer, but nowadays self-driving cars were so advanced that manual driving was essentially obsolete.

  "Been out drinking tonight?" Ray asked.

  "Yeah, officer. Yeah. Just drinking. Just a few.”

  "Nothing else, huh? No weapons or drugs in here, right?"

  Ray turned his head from side to side, playing his light through the car. It was a small cab. Nowhere to really hide anything.

  “No, Sir. Nothing like that. Just a few drinks.”

  "Okay," said Ray. "Have a nice night."

  Ray stepped away, walking back down the street in the direction of his cruiser.

  Just as he was sliding into the seat, a call came. It was the call he had been dreading. He sighed, glancing at the time - 11:57pm. He had almost made it.

  The call was for a reported disturbance at the Holy Rapture Center.

  Ray knew the place. It was the source of many rumors and local urban legends. A hidden compound, secluded at the edge of the city limits, near heavily forested state land. Highly fortified and very secretive. No one knew much about it, except that they supposedly performed "charitable and spiritual outreach”.

  Most of the stories were probably baloney. Reports of dozens of hooded figures in heavy robes chanting in some strange language, rumors of screams echoing from the compound. The official opinion was that the so-called screams were just the foxes that lived in the nearby forest and that if these people wanted to go around chanting in robes, there wasn't a damn thing anyone could do to stop them.

  The place had always given Ray the heebie-jeebies, mostly because his upbringing had taught him to be wary of organized religion. As far as he was concerned, the Holy Rapture Center was much the same as any other church, mosque, or synagogue.

  The call went out again, but Ray remained silent. He wasn't the only cop working the night shift so he was hoping that one of his colleagues would respond.

  They didn't. Typical for calls involving the Holy Rapture Center. One could easily find themselves on the wrong end of a giant lawsuit just by setting foot on the organization's premises, and they certainly didn't make any exceptions for the authorities.

  The dispatcher tried a third time, probably rolling her eyes and blowing out her cheeks in exasperation. By now the clock was about thirty seconds shy of midnight. Ray reached for his handset, then paused and thought long and hard. If he pressed that button, he was in it. Could be hours before he got home, depending on what was happening out there.

  The dis
patcher launched into her spiel a fourth time. Ray couldn't take it anymore. Too painful. He pressed the button.

  "This is Bridges," he said. "What's the situation?"

  "Got a call from a concerned citizen. They were out for a walk..."

  "Copy. Go ahead."

  "Said they heard some, quote, 'blood curdling screams' over at the Rapture Center."

  "Go ahead."

  "Nothing witnessed. No visual sign of any trouble. But the witness said it definitely wasn't animal noises."

  "A human scream?" Ray asked rhetorically. "Heard that one before. I'll respond. I sure hope I don't need backup though, since I'm apparently the only person working tonight."

  The dispatcher laughed. "Copy that, Bridges.”

  "Will the RP be there?"

  "Didn't say. Just hung up the phone on me."

  "Roger. En route now."

  He released the handset and turned to his dash tab. It was a large touchscreen built into the center, between two sleek air vents. There was a list of ongoing calls by code and time since they were called in, as well as the associated addresses. Ray looked for the one at the Holy Rapture Center, tapped it, and sat back to let his car do the work. The vehicle automatically switched on and took off at five miles per hour over the speed limit.

  “Maestro, light ‘em up for me, will you?” Ray said, speaking to the popular AI virtual assistant that was integrated with his standard issue police cruiser.

  “Done,” Maestro’s velvety, yet clearly synthesized voice replied through the police cruiser’s speaker system. “Should I start the siren as well?”

  “No need, Doll,” Ray answered as he leaned his seat back and made himself more comfortable. “Not much traffic between here and the Holy Rapture Center.”

  CHAPTER 2

  ◆◆◆

  Ray didn't realize he had dozed off until the nudge of a speed bump woke him up. The rain continued to soak the world outside his speeding self-driving cruiser as he quickly sat forward, blinked a few times, and shook his head.

  He was nearing the edge of the city limits. The car crossed a set of railroad tracks. Dark and desolate in either direction. The old station house stood nearby, decrepit and crumbling, and covered in graffiti. A few vagrants were probably in there now, tucked into the few corners that didn't have gaping holes in the roof above them. Enjoying their cheap bottles of liquor or expensive needles of heroin, or else shivering themselves to sleep.

  Past that point, Ray entered the place he often called no man's land; the more thinly populated outskirts of the city. A place that was covered mostly in creeping wilderness and homes abandoned at the height of the most recent market crisis. Technically, this area was under the jurisdiction of Ray's department. But, since most of the crime happened deeper inside the city, the few calls that came from these desolate areas generally took longer to be responded to.

  Even the road commission and snow plows seemed to ignore the place. It was autumn now, so Ray's cruiser didn't quite have to plow through snow drifts yet, but the ride was still far from perfect. The asphalt in this area was all but destroyed from many years of neglect. Huge cracks. Potholes the size of an extra-large pizza. The car dodged all the major hazards with expert precision. But it was still a bumpy ride. You never knew what sort of nightmare might spring up in front of your headlights out here in the middle of the night.

  Suddenly, the car slammed its brakes on. Ray's body strained forward against the seat belt. The car bumped and growled over the uneven road surface, and then came to a screeching stop.

  Glancing at the HUD, which had long since replaced the standard instrument panel, Ray saw that the car’s Maestro system had detected a collision threat in the road.

  Ray didn't see anything. Not even with the high beams on. He lifted himself off his seat, nudging his head against the ceiling and straining his eyes to see through the windshield.

  Suddenly, an old man appeared, rising from a low position just in front of the car's front grille. He squinted, raising a hand to block the light from his eyes. His face was deeply lined, etched with worry and exhaustion. He wore a long, neat beard and a set of voluminous robes, which included a hood that protected his head from the rain.

  By now the rain had lessened to a mere drizzle; the occasional flashes of lightning came from farther and farther away, the roar of thunder echoing with increasing distance and diminishing power.

  Ray shook his head, grunting in annoyance. He could already feel that this would be a long one. It was becoming one of those perfect nights where all the weirdos filtered out of the woodwork all at once. The rain had apparently picked a bad time to slow down.

  He rolled his window down but did not stick his head out. For all he knew, there might be someone coming up behind him now, ready to slam a baseball bat into the back of his skull. He had heard too many horror stories about hijackings that followed a similar M.O. Someone waits in the road and stops the car, asking for help. Someone else sneaks up and attacks.

  "Hey," Ray called out. "Take a step back. And show me your hands. Both of them."

  The old man complied, stepping away from the car and raising both hands, spreading his fingers. The billowy sleeves of his robe fell down as well, revealing surprisingly muscular forearms. Still, Ray was mostly satisfied, certain that the guy had no weapons on him.

  "Keep your hands where I can see them," Ray ordered. "Walk around near my window here. But keep your distance."

  Again, the elderly man complied, positioning himself where Ray could see all of him, but staying at a distance of about six feet.

  "You from the Rapture Center?" Ray questioned.

  The old man's face sagged even further. He nodded.

  "What are you doing out here?" Ray asked.

  "I was… praying," the old man answered, in a weary, grief-laden voice.

  "In the middle of the road?"

  "I apologize, officer."

  "I almost ran you over," Ray snapped.

  "No. You didn't. The Maestro would never allow that to happen. The… the technology. It saves… just as much as it destroys..."

  "Mister," Ray said, growing impatient, "you aren't making much sense. What are you doing out here?"

  “Praying.”

  “Praying for what, exactly?” Ray asked.

  "The souls I was forced to leave behind," the man replied, looking off to his left. Probably in the general direction of the Holy Rapture Center, which couldn't be more than a mile away now.

  Ray looked off in the distance, trying to see if he could make out the religious compound through the vast blanket of darkness that shrouded this part of the city.

  "Are you the one who called the disturbance in?" Ray queried, turning his attention back to the mysterious old man.

  “Yes, but that was… a mistake. I shouldn't have done that. It's not my place.”

  Ray gritted his teeth and studied the man's leathery face as the old fellow continued to ramble. This man was hiding something, Ray was sure of it. If there really was something bad going on at the Rapture Center, he couldn't sit around listening to this guy's unintelligible babble for much longer.

  "What's happening at the Rapture Center?" Ray demanded. "What have you seen?"

  The old man tipped his head back, staring up into the overcast sky. “It's Him. He… He's back. They've been judged and found to be unworthy. If it's His will then who am I to interfere?” the man replied, again looking in the general direction of the Holy Rapture Center.

  Ray grunted, as he followed the man's gaze only to see nothing in particular.

  “How about a real answer,” Ray groaned as he turned his attention back towards the man, only to realize that the man had disappeared.

  "Hey!" Ray called out as he spotted the eccentric elder darting away in the distance. "Stop right there! If you have information..."

  The old man was gone. Vanished into the night. Ray was in great shape for a man in his early fifties. He probably could have run the delirious old m
an down but something in the pit of his stomach told him that checking out the Holy Rapture Center was more important. A part of him also thought it would probably turn out to be nothing but Ray had to be sure.

  “Let’s go, Maestro,” he said, and the vehicle sprang back into action, climbing out of a pothole and trundling off toward the Holy Rapture Center.

  Out there amongst the silence and infinite darkness, it was easy to find the reclusive religious compound. Once it came into Ray's view over the black horizon in the distance it stood out like a beacon, a lighthouse in the unfathomable depths of night. Ray sat up straighter, took control of the vehicle, and manually steered up to the towering front gate. He squinted through the windshield, trying to see past the blinding floodlights that were positioned to converge at the edge of the property. The air was misty with humidity, and he could see nothing but indistinct shapes through the haze. A gazebo, a fountain, vine-covered trellises, benches that stood to either side of the garden path. All that, beyond the imposing steel gate that stood before him.

  A sign on the gate advised that the Holy Rapture Center was open to scheduled visitors between the hours of 9 AM and 4 PM, except on Sundays, when they were only open until noon. There was an additional sign which gave instructions for anyone who wished to request a meeting or speak to a center representative. Ray scanned the gate for a call button and finally spotted one on a keypad to the left side of the signage.

  "Sit tight, Doll," Ray said, giving his cruiser's dash a ceremonial pat. "I'll be back in a jiffy."

  He got out and stepped over wet pavement to the keypad by the gate. He pressed the button twice, keeping his other hand on the butt of his sidearm. Then he approached the gate, peering through with narrowed eyes, trying to discern anything at all in the mist. The flood lights up at the main building itself, thirty yards away, cut through the mist a bit and offered a clear view of the front steps but little else.