The monster began to make its sound, which was even louder now that it was free of the closet. When it lurched forward, Isabel instinctively raised her hand and sum- moned her energy. Before the monster could take a step, Isabel released her power and hit it full force in the chest.

The creature betrayed a moment of surprise as it sailed backward into the darkness of the closet. As Isabel caught her breath, she sensed motion next to her. Then she turned to watch Jessica getting up and heading for the closet.

"Wait," Isabel said.

But before Isabel could act, the girl grabbed the closet door and slammed it shut.

Then Jessica looked up at her and said, "We should go.”

Isabel nodded and said, "All right.”

She took Jessica's hand, and they started walking for the bedroom door. They had only taken a few steps when Isabel felt the little girl jerk in her hand.

Looking down, Isabel saw that something was pulling Jes- sica toward the bed. A claw with three fingers had snaked from underneath the bed and had grabbed Jessicas ankle. She recognized it as belonging to the creature from the closet.

Jessica screamed, blind terror in her voice. "Help me, don't let him take me!”

Isabel pulled on Jessica's hand, trying to tear her away from the bed. But the creature was very strong, and Jessica started to slip down to the floor.

"Nooooo!" Isabel heard herself scream.

Then the world flashed around her, and Isabel found herself in a large room. No, not quite a room, she realized as her heart hammered in her chest.

She looked around frantically and saw that the creature was gone. She was relieved, but still felt the tension and adrenaline of the encounter in Jessica's bedroom. As she started to relax, she took note of her surroundings. She was in a… place that she had never seen before.

It wasn't a room.

It had a floor that was made of some sort of metal and a ceiling maybe ten feet above. But it did not have walls. The floor and ceiling seemed to go on forever on all sides until they just disappeared into the distance.

There were no lights that she could see, but there was light all around her.

Looking down, Isabel saw that Jessica was with her, lying on a low table. The girl had her eyes closed, but Isabel could tell that she wasn't sleeping.

The little girl's eyes were shut, but they were being squeezed shut tightly. Jessica was afraid, Isabel saw. She was as afraid here as she had been in her bedroom. Isabel decided that she couldn't let this continue. She would have to try to contact Jessica directly. It risked waking her up and expelling Isabel from the dream, but she had no choice. She wasn't going to learn anything in this place.

And the girl was terrified.

Leaning down, she took Jessica's hand and whispered, "It's all right. I'm here to help you.”

Keeping her eyes closed, the little girl shook her head and whispered back, "Don't make any noise, they'll come.”

"I've come to find you. My friends and I are going to help you," she said.

"No, run. They'll catch you if you stay," Jessica said.

The little girl's eyes opened. Then her mouth opened. She was locked into a silent scream, gasping in terror over Isabel's shoulder. Spinning around, Isabel looked up and saw the monster from the closet's face. This time it was huge, hundreds of feet across and looking down at them from above.

Jessica screamed again, and this one wasn't silent.

Isabel realized a sound was rising in her own throat, and then the world shifted around her again.

Isabel came out of the dream in the small room off of Johnny's Garage. Jessica's screaming still echoed in her mind as she shook her head to try to clear it.

Someone had her by the shoulders.

"Isabel!" a voice called to her.

She focused on his face. It was Max. All at once, the screaming stopped. She realized that it was she who had been screaming.

Her friends were circled around her, looking at her with concern. Their sympathy made it harder for her to keep her composure, so she stopped trying. She leaned into Max's arms and let him hold her. When she finally felt like she had control over herself, she pulled away.

"What happened, Is?" Max asked, his voice gentle with concern.

"She was having a nightmare," Isabel replied. She took a deep breath and explained everything she had just seen. When she had finished telling the story, Liz nodded and said, "Thank you, Isabel. I know that was hard for you.”

"Not as hard as it was for Jessica," Isabel replied. "Wher- ever she is, she's in real trouble and she's terrified. And I don't think she'll live long if we don't do something.”

"At the moment, there's nothing else we can do," Max said. "We still don't know anything that could help her.”

"I'll have to keep trying," Isabel said.

"Are you sure you want to do that?" Max said.

"I'm sure I don't," she replied. "But if I don't, Jessica will die, and she's…" Isabel thought about how to explain how scared Jessica was. She was in terrible danger, and she was just a little girl on the inside And there was something else. Jessica had gone back to the closet to close the creature in… something Isabel was sure she would be afraid to do. And she had told Isabel to run, to save herself in that room. Jessica was brave and had tried to protect her.

Isabel thought of how to explain that to her friends and decided she couldn't… not that it mattered. What she had to do, they couldn't help her with.

"Maybe there was something in the dream we could use," Liz said, turning to Maria.

"You used to interpret my dreams. What does the room mean? The monster?" Liz asked her.

Maria thought for a minute and said, "Well, her room symbolizes security. When we dream about home, it rep- resents a place where we can't be hurt. The fact that the monster is threatening her in her room is odd. Monsters usually represent the bad characteristics of the dreamer.”

She shrugged and continued: "The large room without walls is emptiness. It usually means disappointment that a lot of effort put into something has come to nothing. The fact that she's stuck on the table is pretty clear: helpless- ness. All in all, not very useful. Sorry.”

"What if some of the dream images are real?" Isabel asked.

"Which ones?" Max said, looking at her with surprise.

"I don't know… what if the monster is just the guy threatening her? No, not a guy. She said they," Isabel said. "And what if she really is tied to a table somewhere?”

"You may be right… you probably are… but that still doesn't help us," Liz said.

"I'll have to go back," Isabel said.

"But not tonight," Max said. "If she woke up, it will be a while before she's asleep and dreaming again. You need some rest.”

Isabel nodded. She quickly undressed for bed, using her powers to make her shirt into a longer nightshirt. She was barely aware of the others around her. She crawled into her sleeping bag and put her head down. Though she was tired, she found that she was reluctant to close her eyes. Finally, she did.

She only hoped that no dreams came.

Kyle and the others went to bed right after Isabel. After watching her dreamwalk and hearing her tell the story, no one wanted to talk or play cards anymore. That was just as well with him. It had been a long day. He had worked a full shift, and then there had been that business with Gomer.

Settling under the blanket, he was suddenly very aware of the short distance between himself and Isabel… barely a foot separated them. It wasn't that he'd minded. It was just that… well, he knew it was a necessity. There just wasn't room in the small apartment to give anyone much space on the floor.

Still, he found he was very conscious of her breathing next to him. And, as usual, she smelled wonderful. Then he realized that Dawn was nothing compared with Isabel. No, not nothing. She seemed nice enough but, she wasn't what he wanted.