Debts (Doors of the Dreamer, Chapter 10)
Self-interest
Author’s note: For the month of July I am challenging myself to write and post one chapter a day every two days with minimal planning and outlining. You can read the first chapter of Doors of the Dreamer here.
David fell into a feverish, restless sleep.
He could not move or speak. He was looking through dirtied glass at a world he left behind. His parents, his sister, Oliver, they had all moved on without him. Then he saw Lance. The knight stood alone, battered and bloodied, but a conqueror. Everyone else had found their peace. That meant he could rest now, right?
Something wouldn’t let him. It bound him, and he was suspended in a void between two realities.
“Cleric,” it spoke, “you must let go of these things. You have blinded yourself. Even now it is your own hands that confine you.”
David tried to speak, to scream, but his body refused.
“You desire freedom. It is only human. I can give that to you, but you must come to me.”
The voice was impossibly smooth and resonant. It was androgynous, lacked any kind of accent or inflection, and seemed to come from everywhere at once.
“Leave the knight. You and I both know his cowardice will only slow you down. His obsession with strength is his weakness, and that terrifies him. But you do not shy away from weakness, do you?”
David strained his mind, desperately trying to regain control of his body. His chest burned.
“The path you walk does not lead to freedom, it leads to suffering. There is only one exit. It is here, with me.”
An alabaster door descended from the darkness above him.
“You will come to me, or you will die. I would rather you live, cleric. Spare yourself the trials on the road ahead, and come to me. Open the door.”
A white butterfly flew by his head. When it reached the door, it opened, revealing a bridge of light that could cross worlds.
David jerked awake, his heart pounding and covered in sweat. He was in a tent with a high ceiling supported by a wooden pole. He looked down. His shirt was gone, and a bright pink scar ran diagonally across his chest. He was sitting in a bedroll of some kind, and a bowl of water with a rag in it sat nearby. David realized how dry his throat was. He retrieved a bottle of water and began sucking it down. He drank too quickly, however, and started coughing.
Shortly after, a woman wearing a dress made of hides pushed through the flap of the tent. She looked to be in her thirties, with gentle eyes and tanned skin. She turned to someone behind her and said, “He’s awake.”
Lance followed the woman into the tent. His bearded face somehow looked even more weathered than the last time David had seen it. He sat, and the woman knelt beside David. She slowly raised her hands to his face. David let her touch him, but his body remained tense. She gently pressed against his jaw and looked into his eyes. The only sound was that of her bead bracelets clicking against each other. Without saying anything, she got up and left.
For a while, neither Lance nor David spoke.
“Seems like I owe you my life again,” David said eventually. “And I never properly thanked you the first time, so… thanks.”
Lance shook his head. “You owe me nothing. In both cases, I acted in my own best interest. If anything, I owe you an apology.”
David gingerly touched his new scar. “You know, my dad once posed an interesting question to me: Is it possible for a human to perform a purely selfless act?”
Lance considered it. “I would say no. Even the man who runs into a burning building to save someone, even if his conscious motives are altruistic, is moved by self-interest to some degree. Perhaps he is a firefighter who works for a salary, or he simply does not want to bear the guilt of having done nothing.”
“I was young and naïve at the time, so I told him the answer was yes. My dad said the answer was no, but that it was okay because selfishness could become selflessness.”
“Meaning?”
“Meaning, acting in your own self-interest often corresponds to acting in the interest of those who care about you.”
“Your father is a wise man.”
“He is, but for a long time I disagreed with him. Or rather, I wanted him to be wrong. I wanted there to be such a thing as true selflessness.”
Lance was silent.
“So, where are we?” David asked.
“Right. I managed to find a vagabond camp while I was escaping the dullahan. We’re about a half day’s walk from the apartment complex, but we don’t have to worry about monsters while we’re here.”
“Vagabond camp?”
“Yes. As in, the NPCs from Doors of the Dreamer.”
“Oh, I remember now. I wouldn’t have expected them to exist here.”
“What do you mean?” Lance frowned.
David blinked. “Ah. That’s right, you’ve been… away for a few years. The developer removed vagabonds several months back.”
“What for?”
“Uh.” David scratched his head. “I guess some people felt that they were a negative portrayal of certain real-world demographics.”
“Hmm.” Lance thought for a while, rubbing his beard absentmindedly.
“I don’t think it’s that deep of a critique, the developer just removed it to appease the crowds.”
“I know. I hadn’t given much consideration to how updates to the game may or may not affect this world. I found the black door only two weeks after it released.”
“Can’t help you there. I’m pretty new; I only heard about the vagabonds thing because it made the rounds on social media.”
Lance nodded. “How’s your wound?”
“Tender, but there’s no pain.”
“I think you manged to cast heal on yourself. That probably saved you, or at least kept you alive until I got you to the shaman.”
“That woman a minute ago—she’s the shaman?”
“Yes. I suppose you wouldn’t know—vagabonds had a few roles in the game. They could heal, buy and sell certain items, give quests, et cetera. It’s much the same here, but…”
“But she seemed real.”
“More real than the zombies at least.” Lance shrugged. “They seem to have desires, fears, entire personalities, but they aren’t human.”
“How do you know?”
“They look human, act human, and speak our language, yet there is a limit to what they are capable of. I don’t know how to describe it. It’s as if they’ve not quite mastered the art of emulating humanity. They’re safe, just don’t let yourself get too attached, they’re moving camp in three days.”
“How long was I out?” David asked.
“Almost twenty-four hours.”
Lance told David to get some rest and left him with a new shirt. David laid down, but kept his eyes open. He wasn’t tired, and he was in no hurry to risk another nightmare—or vision, or whatever it was. He laid like this for what felt like a very long time.
At some point, he heard voices outside his tent. He struggled to stand, fighting his stiff legs. Wondering what time it was, he retrieved his phone, but before he could check, it started vibrating.
He was getting a call. The screen read “Oliver.”