Hegemon Solomon woke in a cold sweat, panicking as his dream shattered into oblivion. Billions of terrifying beasts had been nipping at his heels, chasing him down a cobblestone street in an unfamiliar city. He had kept just a hairsbreadth away from his tendons being devours in a most unpleasant fashion. Flashes of the devils’ breaths raised his hackles and he shivered, despite the artificial warmth of his bedroom. The whole experience had felt just a little bit too real to shake off as an everyday dream.
The Hegemon performed a quick search his bedroom, just to make sure he was safe from harm. He glanced under his bed, perused his wardrobe, and made sure the window was still latched. Nothing in his room was any scarier than usual. The tree outside his bedroom cast skeletal webbing on his floor and bedding, backed by a glowing moon. The stuffed clown his mother had given him ages ago still smiled grotesquely from on top of his bureau. The silver light of night reflected off the picture of him in his mother’s arms, in a frame placed next to the terrifying doll. Everything was in its right place, but he couldn’t shake the chill from his dream experience.
One demon, the most terrifying of all, had been at the back of the pack, driving the army before him. He was a great, black moose, as long as he was tall, with a shadowed crown of antlers as sharp as his teeth. A wild tongue lashed out at his minions like a whip, urging them onward toward their tasty prey, the Hegemon. All the devils cried Solomon’s name as they ran, beckoning him to slow for just a second and play with them.
Solomon hadn’t been raised to accede to any demands besides his own. He was the Hegemon, after all. His special training at the secret Bureaucrat Academy had served him well; he had acquired the strongest will on the planet. A few little nightmares should be nothing to him. His mother would have scolded him, if she knew how troubled he was by the dream. A stereotypical Jewish mother, she would have given him some warm chocolate milk, nestled him in her busom, and sent him back to bed feeling guilty for having broken her slumber.
Memories of his dear mother filled Solomon with a lost courage and warmth; the chill from his dream was finally dissipating. A glance at the moon revealed that the night was still in the witching hours; there was much sleeping still to be done. After one last, neurotic search of his room, the Hegemon crawled back into his bed, snuggled under the covers, and shut his eyes to get some rest.
After several sleepless minutes, he reopened his eyes and screamed. “Mother, may I!”
Looming above, inches from his face, was a mouth full of razor-sharp umbrage. The mouth was attached to a familiar face; a cold snout, molten eyes, and a jagged crown of shadows. The moose devil was standing on Solomon’s bed, breathing noxious vapors into his gaping mouth. His nightmare had manifested into a very corporeal beast.
“Your mother can’t hear you now, Solomon,” the moose rasped. His voice sounded like sandpaper rubbing flesh away from bone; his breath smelt the same.
“Buh, huh, mah,” Solomon stuttered. “Guards! Security! Get in here! Help me!”
“They can’t hear you either Hegemon,” the moose continued, “But you are safe, for the moment. I come to hold counsel, only. I cannot hurt you here unless you wish it.”
“How can I trust you?” Solomon said, “You were trying to eat me in my dream!”
“Yes,” the moose hissed, “and that was a warning of what is to come, Hegemon. That is, if you choose to fight me and my will. I am coming to play a game in your world, Solomon. If you follow my rules, I might consider sparing your life.”
“My life?” Solomon had sworn to give his life to save the world many years ago, when he first took his oath of office. The vow was only words, when it came down to it. “My life, well, you can’t threaten me. I’m the Hegemon.”
“A pretty title, to be sure. Many people respect your authority. I am not one of them. In fact, it’s best if you don’t think of me as a person at all,” the moose smirked. “And it’s not your life alone that you should be worried about. Think bigger, Hegemon. Imagine every spark of human life, extinguished by a single decision you might make. You hold in your hands the destiny of human existence. Will you play for my team, Hegemon?”
Solomon gritted his teeth to stop them from chattering. “I refuse to negotiate with terrorists.”
The moose laughed, a heaving tide of pestilence. “I am much worse than a terrorist, Hegemon. Or even a horrorist. Gods and devils have got nothing on me. There are no words to describe how sickeningly scared you should be. Allow me to elaborate for a moment.
“All the beasts in your dream, the ones slobbering for your flesh, are hungry to feed. They are very real, at least as real as me. It is only a matter of time before I can unleash them to hunt down you and every other warm-blooded creature on your planet. The cold-blooded beasts will make soothing desserts.” The moose’s pink tongue was beginning to shine with thirsty saliva. “I made them all with an insatiable taste for fresh plasma, Hegemon. They will drink until there is no more to swallow. I will ask you again, because I don’t think you understood me at first. Will you play with me or against me?”
Solomon gulped away his tongue’s paralysis. He thought it might not be a bad idea to listen to this anthropomorphic beast, at least for now. “Okay, moose. I will listen, b-but I’m not promising anything, yet. What would you have me do?”
“I have a few simple requests,” the moose smiled, drawing closer to Solomon’s face. “Oh, I’m so glad you’re willing to listen. It will make things so much easier on the both of us.”
Solomon could hardly breathe, the moose’s toxic breath filled his lungs in the stead of fresh air. “Ask me, already. I’m listening.”
“The first request, I think you will find quite disagreeable,” the moose said. “At a summit this weekend, there are a number of countries who are going to propose a motion to secede from the Hegemony. You must let them leave.”
“You can’t be serious! This will cause terrible repercussions. If I let them leave, countless others will ask to secede as well. The Hegemony will dissolve! The world will fall into chaos! Countries will be scrambling to assert their independence and will probably enter into meaningless war. The Hegemony was constructed to prevent this exact scenario.”
“Precisely,” the moose grinned. “It will be a beautiful disaster. I’m salivating just thinking about it. Don’t you want to know what will happen? Don’t you want to watch the world burn away?”
“Never! That goes against everything I’ve sworn to do. I gave my solemn oath to stand for order and justice! To protect the innocent from power hungry tyrants like you.”
The moose laughed. “Well, you might stand for all that silliness, but you will still fall beneath my raging armies. You saw them in your dream. Do you really doubt my might?”
“I do not doubt your strength, sir moose, but you are asking me to make a decision as though all hope is already lost. Perish beneath your soldiers or lose ourselves to our own devices. I can’t just give up hope at the drop of a hat. I’ve given my whole life to the cause of order.”
“And you will give it completely, if you resist. You will sacrifice the life of every organism my dark knights encounter. Can you shoulder that guilt? Come now, Hegemon, be reasonable.”
“But, my oath,” Solomon stammered. “I, my, I promised. Mother, I, forgive me.”
“Oh, don’t worry about that. You can pass the blame off to another,” the moose crooned. “In several days, you will be approached by the one who will replace you in your office. At this time you can be assured that I am walking the dirty ground of your planet. You will abdicate without resistance because, I assure you, any efforts to deny me will fail. This is my second request. I will not hesitate to annihilate every living creature if you try to balk me.”
“Why is that? Is this an emissary of yours?” Solomon asked desperately, pining for answers. “Do you want to rule the planet or do you want to destroy it? I don’t understand your motives. Why are you here?”
“My reasons are of no concern to you, mortal,” the moose crouched low and began to lick the Hegemon’s neck with a virile hunger. “All you need to know is that standing against me will result in infinite death. Have I made myself clear? Do you need me to draw you a diagram? I have big plans for this universe. Your world is an incredible source of power, so I’m giving it my utmost attention, for now. What I end up doing with it is my perogative.”His shivering tongue slithered up Solomon’s cheek.
The Hegemon was on the edge of tears, a monolith shattered. “Please, what else do you want? Just ask me and leave me to my peaceful slumber. I can’t take this anymore. I’ll do whatever you ask.”
“Poor little human, I have asked quite a lot of you, I realize. The last thing you must do is wait for me, your new master, to come. Spend your days fearing me and worshipping that terror. It will prepare you for the ultimate transition into my kingdom of chaos.”
“I promise!” Solomon sobbed. “I will give every waking moment to fearing your footsteps, mighty, oh, what should I call you, sir?”
“There is no need to burden you with that knowledge at this time. Just call me Master,” the moose said, licking Solomon’s ear, sending an icy dagger through the Hegemon’s soul. “The world will know my name when the time is right,” he whispered, before ripping off his prisoner’s ear with a terrific bite.
Hegemon Solomon woke in a cold sweat, panicking as his dream shattered into oblivion. The sun was shining and his alarm clock was blaring smooth jazz. He jumped out of bed to shut off the alarm and searched his room for any trace of the moose demon or his minions. Not finding anything suspicious, Solomon pinched himself to make sure he wasn’t still dreaming. It had happened again, the dream within a dream. He fell into that trap every other night, with the same demons chasing him to a false awakening. The moose demon came every time and every time he nearly wet himself with fear, forgetting his previous encounters. It didn’t seem right, that he could fall for the same trap over and over, but he did. He didn’t understand dreams or what they meant, but this recurring motif was really starting to bother him.
He went over to his bureau and picked up the picture of his mother, avoiding the disappointed stare of the smiling clown doll. He wished he could call her and ask her for advice. In truth, he knew what she would say. She would tell him that big boys don’t cry, that if he wanted to grow into a strong man he should forget about it and get back to his work. Otherwise, he would never find a good woman. His mother, rest her soul, did not understand that a Hegemon was not to be married under any circumstances.
Solomon sighed, wondering if these dreams were his subconscious mind’s way of telling him to start a family. Something told him that was just his neuroses speaking. Still, he knew these dreams were more than dreams; they were happening all too frequently. Today’s dream had been more realistic than ever before, his level of lucidity had been horrific. Some kind of action needed to be taken. Solomon’s will was fraying, he was losing touch with reality. Even if the nightmare army wasn’t real, he wasn’t fit to run the world anymore. Solomon put his mother’s picture back, placing it face down on the bureau, and gathered some pens and paper.
The Hegemon looked out his window to see a yellow finch tweeting from its nest in the spindly tree outside. Solomon envied its joyous celebration of freedom, its lack of responsibility, its lack of fear. He sighed longingly. This was a good day to write an abdication speech.
Just in case.
