Free Waking Nightmares by Christopher Golden

happy if it never came to that, but there was no denying that Nikki had attained a certain amount of fame. Viviane Chenot was having difficulty adjusting to having a celebrity sitting at her table, drinking her coffee.
    “How’s your brother doing, anyway?” Nikki asked.
    Viviane smiled at her. “Amazingly well. When he woke up this morning, his vision was a little blurry, and I’m going to take him to see a doctor if it doesn’t clear by tomorrow. Otherwise . . .” She frowned, shrugging. “His throat is sore and kind of hoarse. I’m not sure if it will ever go back to normal, but honestly, if that’s the worst of it, he’ll adjust. Everyone else is . . . well, they’re gone forever. And I’ve still got my brother.”
    Her eyes welled with emotion. Octavian shifted in his chair, a bit uncomfortable.
    Nikki laid a gentle hand on Viviane’s arm. “He was lucky to have you. If you had just brought him to a doctor and waited for them to realize they had no idea how to help him, he’d never have survived.”
    Viviane smiled, then glanced lovingly at the professor. “It’s Derek, really. When I told him . . . he was the one who suggested calling Mr. Octavian. I was totally out of my mind—just didn’t know what to do.”
    She grabbed the professor’s hand and tugged him toward her for a tender kiss. Octavian caught Nikki watching them and smiled at her. Tough as she pretended to be, Nikki had a profoundly romantic heart. She met his gaze, and a moment of sweet silence passed between them. Once, it had been this way all the time.
    “We should go,” Nikki said, as much to him as to Viviane and Derek. “Let you guys get on with your lives. I’m sure you’ve had to let a lot of important things fall into chaos this week. You’ll need to catch up.”
    Viviane nodded, squeezing Derek’s hand. “After something like this, your definition of what’s ‘important’ changes.”
    She rose from the table, and they all followed suit.
    “Thank you so much,” Derek said, shaking Octavian’s hand, and then Nikki’s.
    “I’m happy I could help,” Octavian said, as he and Nikki put on their coats.
    “Hang on,” Viviane said. “Before you go, let me just have a quick look and see if Michael is awake. I know he’ll want to thank you himself.”
    Octavian glanced at Nikki, who nodded. Her next show was in Portland, Maine, on Friday, so they had two days to make their way down into the States. No rush at all. They waited while Viviane went down the hall and checked on Michael, but now that they’d said their goodbyes it felt strange to linger.
    A musical trilling sound defused the awkwardness. Octavian had left his cell phone on its factory-set ring tone, but still it took him a moment to realize the noise came from the pocket of his jacket. Nikki looked at him expectantly—usually it was her cell phone that rang incessantly. Only a handful of people even had Octavian’s cell number.
    “Hello?” he said, pressing the slim black phone to his ear.
    As he listened to the voice on the other end of the line, he saw Nikki watching him and already he felt the distance between them returning, so much sooner than he had expected. He felt a twinge of guilt knowing he would be drawn away for a time, and resented the feeling.
    Viviane rejoined them. “Sorry, guys. He’s still . . .” she began, before she realized Octavian was on the phone and let her words trail off.
    “All right,” Octavian said. “I’ll call you from the road and give you an ETA.”
    He ended the call and tucked his phone into his jeans. The interior of the small apartment seemed to have dimmed, as though clouds had begun to gather outside.
    “What’s going on?” Nikki asked, making a visible effort to hide her disappointment.
    Octavian glanced at Viviane and Derek but then returned his attention to Nikki, the others in the room forgotten.
    “That was Keomany,” he said. “There’s trouble.”
    What more could he say? She knew that