The Land of Broken Roads

Since it was dark in his den, Dirt ran his hands all up and down the wooden person and found that it was only roughly-formed at best. Still, it made him marvel to think that Home had enough of an idea of visual appearance to do this at all. Or maybe it wasn’t sight? But either way, how did Home get the shape right?

The legs were fused together, more like one thing than two, and the arms were stuck to the sides. Its torso was more round than flat and the head was just a big lump. The whole thing was covered in the same flat, smooth bark as the trees, but it was a little crinklier. It was connected to the big root above him by a thin branch that came right off the shoulder.

Frankly, Dirt wasn’t sure what he was supposed to do with it.

Home had a space open in its mind for him and was sharing a few simple thoughts, most of which he couldn’t understand, derived from the tree’s alien senses. But beneath it was a sort of enthusiasm, perhaps, and… invitation? It wanted him to do something now?

Dirt sent the idea of a question and waited anxiously. Home conversed among its fellows for a moment, in their slow way, then placed two ideas in its mind: connection, and sleep.

It was still a little early to sleep for the day, so he sent ‘soon’, as clearly as he could conceive the idea, and ‘yes’.

Home replied ‘soon’, and ‘sleep’, and ‘question.’

‘Yes, soon, sleep,’ replied Dirt, pleased that it was getting easier to talk. The list of thoughts they could share might be shorter than the list of fingers on his hands, but it was still encouraging.

Dirt rested for a while, too tired to be bored. Home was content to wait, and he supposed trees were seldom in a hurry. It was so strange—how could their minds be so big and active, when all they did was just stand there, unmoving? What did they think about? Nothing in their incomprehensible thoughts gave him any clue.

After a while, he crawled back out and dug for some grubs. He paused, looking at their tiny minds. Were there emotions in there, if he looked hard enough? Probably. It wasn’t worth thinking about, though, because if he didn’t eat them he’d die. And the goblins sure didn’t care about his feelings when they tried to eat him. Maybe it would be good to understand grub thoughts someday, just to learn more about them, but right now they were food.

Dirt made a ball out of fern stems and imagined it was a tentacle monster. Then he found two more grubs to be Dirt and Socks, and made them fight, with sound effects. Over and over. When both grubs eventually died, he used twisted little lengths of fern leaves to be the boy and wolf instead of digging for more. The remaining hours of the day melted away so quickly the dimming of twilight surprised him.

He crawled back into his nest, relieved it was finally time. He could finally sleep, and maybe in the morning, he could try and figure out what Home was doing with the big wooden doll.

Dirt lay at an angle and rested one leg over the doll so they’d stay touching during the night, and let his mind wander until the nightly vibrations carried him off to sleep.

From one moment to the next, he became aware he was dreaming. No slow dawning of consciousness; instead, he was hovering in an endless kaleidoscope of thought-forms beyond his comprehension. He recognized the tree-dream, but it all looked different to his conscious mind than he remembered it in the mornings. For one, it was smaller, like it had folded in on itself.

His thoughts felt sluggish. Passive. In front of him hovered Home, shapeless and potent. It saw without eyes, gripped without fingers. It was holding on to Dirt’s dream-self and keeping him in place—subdued, but in a way he found pleasant.

Home made him look at himself and horror nearly knocked him from Home’s grasp. His body was all wrong—just jumbled parts. Isolated bits of flesh and hair, spinning and gyrating in empty space. One knuckle, just opening and closing. A toenail. And other things that were not flesh at all, which he couldn’t identify. Hard bits, flat bits. He was a cloud of pieces, not a person.

He held up his hand, or what should have been a hand, and tried to imagine it going back to normal, since that was how things should work in a dream. But it didn’t go. It wouldn’t change or come together.

Home took a firmer hold of him then and forced him back into passive calm, for which he was grateful. Then, satisfied he was subdued, it gently nourished whatever part of him lived in dreams. Life and growth gathered in his fingertips and began to fill in, creating new substance where before there was nothing. Bit by bit, all the pieces connected and expanded into what they were supposed to be. It was a slow process, but a peaceful one, free from any fear or doubt. Home had him, guided and protected him.

It tickled and itched as it grew back together, and after a time, he had a whole hand again, letting him rotate and grab and point.

The process started on the other hand, just as slow. Home kept him a little too passive for him to get excited, but he knew something good was happening. After all, Mother had said he’d been torn to pieces and Socks had asked him why he looked like this in dreams. But Dirt hadn’t fully appreciated what that meant until he could see it himself with full awareness.

And truly, he was a mess. His physical body was fine, even if it was much younger than it was supposed to be. But if the rest of him looked like this then it really was a miracle he was alive.

Dirt couldn’t read Home’s mind in the dream, which was surprising. “Hello, Home,” he said aloud. The words came out of space itself, and when he reached up with his good hand, he found his face was just as jumbled as everything else. Right now, Dirt was just a hand.

I must put you back together to see what you are.

Dirt almost missed the idea, which came from a place so deep inside him that it didn’t even seem like thought. He was almost startled, before Home forced him back into calm. “Was that you, Home?”

But the tree didn’t answer. Instead, it continued its work, drawing his attention back to his other hand so his memory could help it grow back like it was supposed to. What a strange dream this was. Nothing at all like the wolf dream, chasing all across creation with Socks and his brothers and sisters. Was this even real, in some way? Was Home really here?

This is a part of the dream that is beyond you.

Dirt watched his fingers grow back in, each joint in its place, bending just how it should. The softness of his skin, even the whorls of his fingerprints. The detail was perfect, far better than he thought he could remember.

Try to remember, not imagine.

It connected to the wrist now and began growing up his forearm, itching and tickling and stinging all at the same time. He watched it grow, placidly giving it all his attention, as it expanded and gathered up all the loose bits.

All the way to the elbow on one side, then on the other, and then it was time to stop for a while. Home gently released Dirt and the dream ended, fading into deeper sleep.

A short time later the dream began again, a fresh new dream just like the other one, and the process continued. More and more of him grew back together with Home’s gentle, nourishing, patient guidance.

Each time a new part grew in, he used it every way he could, bending and turning and twisting. After the third dream, when he had both legs, he walked and ran and jumped, even though he didn’t go anywhere. And after the fourth, when he had his whole torso, he rolled and spun and stretched.

In the sixth and final dream, he felt with his fingertips while his head and face grew in, since he didn’t have a mirror. Then he shouted and sang and looked everywhere, tasted and smelled and listened, and everything was right.

He woke in the morning with a heart full of warmth, comforted by the memory of so many healing dreams. Dirt smiled, laying still for a moment to hold on to the last of the placid happiness of the night before.

Dirt patted the doll and said, “Good morning, Home.” Then he crawled out to drink the morning dew and get ready for the day.

After he’d gone five steps into the cold morning fog, he heard creaking and cracking behind him.

He looked down into the hole.

The wooden person crawled out after him, then stood, unsteady and awkward, each new joint bending for the first time.

It opened its eyes.