As soon as the darkness took me it immediately transformed into a blinding light from a lamp inside the tent. If memory serves the lamp itself should be quite dim, so something was clearly off with my eyesight. I was enveloped in deep exhaustion, exhaustion I shouldn’t be feeling after so long asleep in the ether ways. Yet I knew it would be impossible for my body to rest in the state it was in. My nerves surged with tense energy and my mind was sharp albeit floaty. It felt more like a lucid dream than being in the ether ways did. I looked down at my body and saw strips of cloth tightly banded around my arms and legs. Together they tempered my circulation enough to make my veins bulge only slightly. Small punctures with slight swelling, but not enough to indicate infection, could be seen around my forearms and shoulders. I was on my left side, with my left arm and leg bent in L shapes and my right hand placed where my head had been before lifting it.

  Dr. Aerk peers down over my unmoving body. There is still haggardness in his expression, but the obvious sores and sickliness had faded to only hinting shadows of what they had been. Leaving behind the ball and chain of the disease, I could immediately see he had a chipper yet nervous energy to his disposition.

  “Hold still, your body is in a terrible state right now.”

  A wet towelette was placed over my forehead. I had trouble telling the temperature of it. The Dr. pulled out a syringe filled with a light blue liquid.

  “This is going to feel unpleasant, like nothing you’ve ever felt before, but it’s necessary to balance out the tranquilizers we used to keep you inside the dream. We need to keep you awake or you’re going to be in trouble, but the mixture of drugs you’ve been given is dangerous in and of itself. You need to remain perfectly still for the next few hours regardless of what you feel. It won’t take much excitement to induce heart failure in the state you’re in. I know it will be hard to tell amidst all the sensations you are under, but I need you to alert me immediately if you feel your breathing becoming irregular or notice uneven palpitations in your chest.”

  He injected what I assumed to be some form of stimulant into a vein close to my elbow and quickly tightened the cloth tied around my arms and legs. I had assumed the cloth had been for making injections, but it seemed, at least to my uneducated speculation, they were being used as a means of controlling my circulation. My limbs were immediately overcome with a tingling sensation and waves of rushing nausea rolled over me. My sense of smell pitched then deflated with the beating ticks of a clock overwhelming me with a cloying acrid sting of antiseptic. My vision blurred but refused to relinquish a feverish alertness.

  In my delirium I heard the sudden scuffling of what must have been Dr. Aerk’s feet, though I could not lift my neck to confirm this.

  “Mr. Grillmin! Mr. Grillmin! I told you need to lay still.”

  Thomas must at least be sitting up in his cot if not right out trying to stand. Is this while under the effect of the same drugs as me? If so, I may have underestimated the gall of that oaf. If he felt the same way I do, moving at all was downright impressive.

  “Calm down doc, this might be the worse hangover I ever felt, but I’m not gonna die from it.”

  “Mr. Grillmin, it isn’t a matter of how you feel.”

  A groggy yet somehow still shrill voice interrupted him.

  “The arrogance of youth. You think you can get by stomaching through anything. Do you think your heart cares about your attitude. Listen to the expert you dimwit.”

  Rachel as well. There’s no way I could speak up and interject at the moment.

  “Ah, yes. As the kind woman says, you’ll be in real danger if you don’t hold still for the next few hours.”

  “Kind my arse”

  So, he said, but that was the last I heard from them for the next few hours. It seemed Thomas had grown surprisingly willing to acquiesce to Rachel’s nagging despite his protest. Drearily I tried to ponder on this endearing development against the migraine that interrupted my thoughts as a spiking conduit. I’m not sure if fighting it or accepting it made it worse. Every time I switched to the other method it seemed to make it worse, creating the illusion that my pain would increase exponentially beyond reason, yet it was not acceleration, but persistence that drove my queasiness.

  I felt that I would stay this way for an eternity and in my delirium remembered the stories of the demons. How would it be if they came to me now. If I were to live out all the world’s years in this wretched state. But no, I would have to allow it in the first place.

  Despite my doubt, reprieve did come with time. It only felt unbearable for the first hour. After three, I would not say I was fine, but it was much more akin to a hangover as Thomas had likened it initially.

  Groggily I finally got up from my bed when I was given permission after a few hours more. Mr. Grillmin let out an obnoxious yawn in conjunction with an exaggerated stretch before jumping to his feet. Ms. Plumelied sucked in a deep breath and gently rested her hands on her lap. Bennie rested his head in his hand with an expression devoid of his usual good cheer.

  “Another day like this and I’m retiring. I mean it.”

  Mrs. Rijtferd scoffed and eyed him grumpily.

  “It beats what we would have felt if the disease had fully set in. Buck up you lot, we didn’t even get the worst of it.”

  I’m surprised she would speak up for the sake of the soldiers on account of her outburst the other day, but maybe seeing their suffering firsthand had lightened her hostility. Either that or she just wanted to focus on the disease victims in remembrance of her husband regardless of who they were.

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  “Oi, he wasn’t makin light of the disease, man was just drugged to death's door, I think that earns him a complaint or two even if he’s exaggerating.”

  “Exaggerating? No but I think it’s alright that sh…”

  “Death's door my foot. Obviously, we were given a low dose of whatever that rubbish was. How else do you think it could have worn off in only a couple of hours.”

  “…Spoke right over me. How are you both so energetic right now? What are you even made of?”

  “A low dose…is not entirely wrong. Even just a moderate dose would have killed you. Speaking as someone who has just suffered through the disease and understands medically what was done to you, I’d like to interject and say that there isn’t much purpose in drawing a comparison. Suffice to say, we have all suffered a great deal, so if you could, I’d like you to simmer down and keep that in mind throughout the day. You’ve gotten through the worst of the danger, but you need to return to this tent post haste if your foreheads break out in sweat or you encounter any dizzy spells. At least for the two of you remaining here.”

  The two he referred to would be me and Bennie. Thomas, Rachel, and Karen would all be leaving for other camps after only being given enough time to stomach down a meal. The only good news is that the filth won’t have propagated as strongly in those other locations, so they won’t have to go through the same ordeal they did today. That is as long as we could keep everything on schedule.

  “For the rest of you, I want you to do everything in your power to keep from overexerting yourselves. One of the soldiers each of you will be sent with is an understudy that has minor medical training, but they won’t be able to help you in the worst case. And I want to be perfectly clear about one thing in particular. No matter what you see, feel, or are told, do not enter the ether ways until at least this time tomorrow, and if possible, wait until night. I know your escort is going to rush you, despite my warnings, and you yourself might feel inclined to act, but the situation will only get worse if you die.”

  Accepting his advice, we exit the tent back into the misty light of day that has been hidden away from us for well over a day, but for what feels like weeks to me. In that curtain of mist Karen spun with her arms splayed out, as if to welcome the world in a waiting embrace.

  “Finally free! Being bedridden was so stifling. The biggest perk of our job is supposed to be having more time to be out in the world.”

  I wondered if this burst of joy wasn’t inconsiderate in the current environment, but noticed the passing soldiers eyed the scene with amusement as warmth could be seen returning to their faces. So, I smiled warmly as well.

  “As much as its heartening to see our resident entertainer back in action, you might want to keep the doctors warning in mind before you start actually dancing.”

  How was it that her slight smile only ever seemed to widen. Shouldn’t it be splitting her face in half by now?

  “And I can’t tell you how heartening it is for our resident taciturn lump to show some concern for me. But at least I got you to finally smile.”

  …

  She isn’t as perceptive as I thought. I got scared when she called me out in the carriage, but she must have just been presumptuous. Her disconcerting smile had made me read too far into it. I was only giving her the same front I gave everyone else.

  “Well, we’re all bound to fold in the face of your persistence.”

  “As well you should. I can’t believe anyone could give such a sweet young woman the cold shoulder.”

  Of course, Rachel would hop to her defense despite the cold shoulder she showed all of us when we first met.

  I shrug, “You got me there.” That’s all it should take to feel like I’ve accepted her. Now I just needed to brush off anything deeper.

  “Obviously it’s cus…”

  And then Bennie’s arm was around his shoulder, interrupting Thomas’ speech.

  “You smell that? Hot piping tasteless grits. Let’s get to it boys.”

  It was an unbelievably fast save, but Mr. Grillmin was predictable enough that even I knew he was going to say, “obviously it’s cus the creepy way she was smiling in the ether ways.” Few have as little tact as this one, but would that have actually been the first time she’d heard it? Certainly, she understood what he was going to say as well. Why didn’t she say anything in return? Why did she just smile?

  We enter the tent filled with two rows of tables and sit down to slowly eat our way through a plate of identical mush-like tasteless grits just as Bennie had predicted. It was hard to force down, and I constantly needed to pause to keep myself from retching. Based on their faces, it seemed everyone was in the same boat.

  “You young folk call this tasteless, you just can’t understand the subtlety of its flavor. Probably ruined yourselves on sweets.”

  All except Mrs. Rijtferd who may as well have been eating a three-course meal of fine dining.

  Once the ordeal was over and our stomachs were settled, we at last came to say our farewells outside the camp’s gate. Each of us that was departing had a carriage and a dispatch of five soldiers. Among them, Terry was accompanying Rachel and Ben was with Thomas. Davis was staying behind to guard me and Bennie.

  “Don’t go missing us too much. It won’t be anything but a fleeting moment.”

  Karen said this with a wink, as usual, refusing to acknowledge the dire atmosphere of our situation. The troops, on the other hand, were anything but jovial as Lieutenant Togl addressed them.

  “I need you to be at your most alert. Don’t blink on the way. Don’t blink when you reach your destination. And most of all, don’t blink when the job is done. We have no idea what killed the previous scrubbers, and you lot are all that stands between a repeat of that tragedy.”

  In response they pounded their spears into the ground and clanged the flats of their swords against the plating on their shins.

  “Be careful out there. You don’t just have a potential heart failure to worry about, but also our unknown killer. Just like Togl told the soldiers, you can’t be too careful until everything’s over and we’re back home.”

  “Speak for yourselves, you’re in just as much danger at this camp as we are on the road. The killer’s more likely to know where you are.”

  So, he said, but Mr. Grillmin was uncharacteristically unsettled.

  “A killer, a heart attack, they kill the same whether we stay worried or not. But I’ll keep your warning in mind since you made it for us.”

  It was impossible to see a hint of fear beyond Karen’s slight smirk, but was there really none? I searched her eyes and found no answer.

  “Trust me to put this mess to rights. It won’t be anything but a bit of spring cleaning.”

  Only in Rachel was I certain there was no front. Most likely her mission was more important to her than her life after losing her husband.

  And with little else to say they were gone. To put an end to this disaster. The first recorded outbreak of the dream disease since the early days of abandoning the maiden system. I had only known them for a short time, but for better or worse, they had all left a strong impression on me. Was I really worried about them, the way I had sounded when I gave my last warning or was it just my normal front. The bare minimum to feign interest in the people around me. I don’t know if it was because they were fellow scrubbers, something about their personalities, or the weight of the surreal day I had just been through, but for the first time I couldn’t answer that question for myself clearly. Not even for the woman with the wicked smile.

  “So, it’s just you and me again. Almost makes it feel like everything’s returned to normal.”

  “You’re right. The initial cleaning should be the worst of it. Despite what I said maybe we can afford to relax and treat the days to come as normal.”

  But an uneasy feeling settled deep in my gut.