Chapter 7-Land of Nod Cold Mountain

London

Catherine woke up and howled in genuine misery, seeing her bitten mark with fiery veins encircling her arm. Her body was glowing from the inside out. She was frightened. For hours, she lay there alone, crying, and, worst of all, burning.

The morning sun shines through the tiny window, adding light to her hell, and the burn was unbearable, as she had been there all night and no one had heard her screams for help.A sense of grief washed over her at the moment. She was going to die here unattended.

Every minute her heart beat slower, and every second her slow death was near. The distress and burning hadn't ceased, but after being in agony for hours upon hours, her mind was no longer her own. The hardest part was that the burn took her to the verge of consciousness but never let her fall over into oblivion. She could still feel her body, yet she couldn't move it. So, she lay gazing at the window, awaiting death.

When she thought the pain and burning were the worst of it, a new twinge struck. A harsh bolt shoots from her head and extends to her heart, causing her to arch away from the bed. Her tired voice erupts in a howl that renders her insignificant.Her hands clasp her chest when it beats harder than before. She pulls her fists away and shouts in horror at the sight of her arms.

A fiery glow covered her veins, so bright she wanted to cover her eyes, but she didn't dare, and it stopped.Vanished It was the most frightening and worst experience of her life after so many years of visiting the Land of Nod. Her vision was fading and her eyes were hazy when a raw and luminous heavy tear escaped from them.

She blinks to clear them, but it doesn't work. Instead, she uses her shaky hands to wipe them clean. The substance leaking was clammy and glossy. She squints harder, forcing herself to see anything, and she sees the outline of her fists, then fingers, with the shiny tar-like substance coating them.

She opens her mouth to cry out, but suddenly, her throat closes up.

Not only that, but she needed to clear her mind. This was awful! So awful that maybe she was still dreaming? Yet, she was in her bed, in her room, and she retreated into her consciousness.

By nightfall, her phone rang.

And though she woke up screaming again in pain, so weak that she couldn't even answer her phone.

Her thoughts were quickening inside her head. She wishes they would slow down so she could breathe, but they won't. Her breaths came in gasps, and she felt like she would blackout. Her heart was throbbing inside her chest. The room spun, and she crouched on the floor, trying to make everything easy, something her brain and body could bear with. She needed to call an ambulance, but the phone was far away, too far away, blackness, wriggling blackness.

She was on the floor in a ball-fetal posture when her door opened with a loud bang. Sean was striding faster towards Catherine's room like there was a cyclone inside him. He was moving like his brain was urging him with the energetic expense of an athlete.

He was anxious. When he was back in London, he contacted her immediately. But he'd been calling her phone for ages, and no one answered, so he ordered his secretary and asked for Catherine's address, and all the way there, he called his cousin.

Catherine's eyes were vicious and when he made her sit, she rocked and rocked. Her cries were full of anguish. Her head was a carousel of fears whirling out of control, each one pushing her mind into blackness.

But she stopped.

"Help! It's painful. Help! She mumbled as Sean scooped her up.

Catherine, it's me, Sean. Are you okay? What happened? " He asked in a total panic.

Can you stop it? And this pain, save me! " She urged him as her vision was blurring.

Don't leave me, please! Don't go. " She drawled as she settled down in his arms, unconscious.

Hours passed.

Catherine was in the same bed as when he woke her only a short time ago.

Sean shut her door behind him, then with a steady stride, he walked to the bed. The covers were thrown off as she lay shivering. She opened her eyes weakly, feeling tired, but the pain was gone, and she felt wonderful.

Catherine was amazed and confused about what happened.

Sean, She thought. Sean was here in her room? Alone with her? She panicked, but she pretended to act cool.

"Fancy meeting you here?" She mumbled. Sean could feel the corner of his lip hitch up in response to her panicking, covering herself.

You are weak. "You should sleep to allow your body to recover from the shock," he told her. She nodded. He went to turn away, but she called out to him. "Wait," she said, paused, biting her pale lip, unsure what to say next.

"What happened?"

It stunned Sean. He could tell Catherine was in a lot of trouble earlier, but looking at her now, so bright and beautiful as ever, he seemed hopeful.

He stared at her since the look on her face was peaceful, her eyes gleaming with astonishment, and he was taken aback by the sincerity in her voice.

Not only that, but he didn't even understand that he had sat down until he went through her cold hand brushing against him. He took a bottle of water from beside her bed, and he ordered her to drink it. "Here, drink this." She seized the water and gulped it down in one go.

A minute passed. She turned to face him. She was gorgeous. Something strange had healed her, something had changed and given her a glow brighter than the sun.Catherine's green eyes had lost the specs of fiery glistening brown shine that burned with the same desire reflected in Sean.

He moved closer to her until they were noses to noses. Catherine's breathing hitched and Sean's heart hastened.

The need was a surprise within her, but it was different this time. It seemed more than a passion, it appeared as if they belonged to each other. It wasn't just what she desired, though her stomach tightened with this new feeling. And she doesn't know what to do.

Sean wanted her. At this point, he doesn't care; all he wants is to have those plump lips on his. She inched closer, becoming almost desperate for his touch. Sean gazed into her eyes as she moved to hold the thumb of his heart against his chest. It made him feel needed. Their lips were closed. She could feel his delightfully smelling breath on her face and she closed her eyes in anticipation.

Knock! Knock!

A soft knock on the door halted the trance-like state they were in. Sean jumped off the bed, backing away from her.

She seemed uncomfortable. She couldn't help but feel disappointed as he was eager to be away from her. The need she just felt vanished when he left her side.

He then opened the door and a small man walked in with a cell phone in his hand. He was tiny and nerdy. His eyes were like the blue-green of the mountain lakes, hues that could tell tales of sky and evergreen all the same. Not only that, but he reeks of happiness. His eyes were familiar to Catherine, making her feel like he knew him from somewhere.

Who are you? Why are you here in my room? " She then asked, "Watching the man."

"Oh! about that," Sean answered back, looking at her as he had already recovered from the trance-related state they shared earlier.

"He was one of us. He also went to the Land of Nod... my cousin." He added

"Your cousin?"

"Yes," he said as he approached her.

"Sorry to interrupt your moment, but the car is ready. Shall we go?" He was looking at them both with a smile on his lips. He gave a lopsided grin.

"Wait, who are you and where are we going?" She asked him while covering herself from embarrassment and looked for a shirt and put it over her head as she bit her lip.

"Okay, I'm Nathan, the better version of this guy here," pointing to Sean as he watched her put her rubber shoes on. He then led her to the door.

I'm his cousin, by the way, smarter than the two of you combined, and we all need some coffee, so, chap! chap! Let's go, hurry! I'm tired, and I'm dying for a cup of caffeine, "Nathan added while stepping away.

In the coffee shop, Catherine laughed as the sound washed over in a wave of nostalgia. Her laugh had made Sean feel giddy and flustered, and it brought back a few distant memories.

They explained everything to Nathan, as he had a lot of experience dreaming of something unexplainable while ordering something for brunch.

They told him all about what happened in the Land of Nod, and together they spent hours discussing their experiences.

It all comes back to us, doesn't it?" When I asked Sean, his brows snapped together.

Sean has been rationalizing the dream and subconscious memories from his visit to the Land of Nod. Nathan knew that his cousin's visit a while back was new to him, and he was asking both about his uncertainties. Sean, I know it confuses you, okay? But an obvious starting point of your inquiry is to ask me, Nathan, smart cousin of mine, what is the Land of Nod? "He continued sarcastically and went poker-faced.

"And yes! "I have to agree with Catherine that it sounds fancier than Dreamland."He scoffed while drinking his coffee and enjoying his cheese bagel.

Nathan added, "There are many theories and sources of knowledge about the conscious human mind. Okay? But let me summarize it for you. Are you following me? "

Both nodded as they savoured their food.

The first was introspection, which involves you focusing on your thought processes and discovering how they operate. For example, you might explore the nature of your subconscious mind and feelings or why you choose one course of action over another, "Nathan paused."

However, this consciousness is known as commonsense intuition, and the second is our behavioral consciousness, which is how we act and often tells us what we were thinking and much more.to make it understandable, our conscious understanding was private, in that you could never understand them in the direct immediate way that Catherine can. He explained it in such a way that it sounded like he was lecturing a child.

"English please," Catherine mumbled as she went for the blueberry cheesecake and a cup of coffee, enjoying the sweet-bitter aroma.

"Fine, what I meant was in the dreamland."

"The land of Nod," she rectified.

"Hmm... In the Land of Nod, whatever happens in your subconscious mind, whatever you experience there, it won't matter in the real world. It's like a lucid dream, or shall I call it a beautiful nightmare, but Catherine's here," he trailed off, implying to her, "... was a different story altogether." He paused.

As you very well know, there are certain elements we can philosophy about. You do not need laboratories or experimental settings to speculate on many of the most important factors, like what happened to her, "Nathan added.

But why do we experience the same dream? Sean, then after a more incoherent explanation from Nathan, the conversation went on in the assumption that everything that happened happened both in their dreams and the possibilities of many Nodders (Dreamers).

Now, Nathan was suggesting that it might not be just the two of them after all. It explains the circumstances in which these experiences happen in an alternate plane of existence and much more.

"Are you saying, we are not just the Nodders here in London?" Sean asked, almost horrified at the suggestion, choking in disbelief.

I am not affirming it. I am only suggesting it as a possibility." "

My God, that's impossible!" exclaimed Catherine.

"Why so?" Nathan inquired.

"B-because..." she added.

"... Because that would mean you have been dreaming alone and had the experience simply. Or somewhere in between? " Nathan responded.

If what I say is true, it will throw overboard everything you believe in. That somehow you are solely in the Land of Nod and yet here we are having coffee together discussing the possibilities of it and more Nodders. " He added

"How about my arms? They got bitten and swollen inside the Land of Nod, look..."He puts his arm on the table, frowning. "See that? That is a puncture wound. " Sean asserted

Ohm blimey Sean, that's my doing. When you were napping, I kind of made some payback, and I gave Krissy a little nibble on your arm. " Nathan conceded, almost feigning a childish sadness.

"You! What? " Sean was beyond terrified. His voice had taken on a furious edge as he stood up from the chair and banged her empty cup of coffee on the table.

I will murder you! You have one second to apologize, "he then added.

"Kids, kids, stop. We have crucial matters to discuss. Stop being childish. By the way, who is Krissy? " Catherine asked, smirking.

Oh, my sweet pet, my little python, it'll be interesting to see the outcome of this inconvenience, but okay. You have my apology, satisfied? " Nathan answered.

"I'm learning something new every day." Catherine grinned.

"Anyway," Sean added, ignoring their laughter. "And how on earth was Catherine's case so peculiar? How could she feel the pain of that bite in the current world? "

"What pain?" Nathan asked, frowning.

"Adah bit her," he retorted in a small voice.

"Catherine? You didn't mention earlier that you got bitten by Adah. "

They watched as color crept up Catherine's cheeks and her eyes turned hard.

"I forgot." She said before leaving, leaving behind her half-eaten blueberry cheesecake and a confused-looking Nathan.

"No, no, how can she forget those important details?" He called for Sean, frowning.

Sean then looked up at Nathan when he called about it and realized that Catherine was going. He stood up, causing Nathan to jump in shock. He then runs after her.