It was his first night in Texas and Sergeant First Class (SFC) Ernest Palmer could not sleep due to nightmares.
He had made remarkable time, having crossed the state line and even passing through a few small towns before nightfall, despite his ruined left leg. He had last treated his injury during his return to Bleak Street. He was now, however, unsure of its condition. For this reason, SFC Palmer travelled the last 200 miles by motorbike.
Stepping off his -cycle, Palmer felt he would never again walk without crutches. He somehow stumbled into an unlocked home and laid to rest his tired body.
- - -
In his dreams, Palmer was alone in an old, dusty classroom, seated uncomfortably in an old wooden desk chair. Projected before him on a peeling classroom wall was time-lapse footage of a decaying elk carcass. Coiled up and broken, it quickly fell apart; melting, reanimating, melting, reanimating. Disintegrating. Palmer remembered its eyes and how they decomposed differently than the other parts.
It seemed to be happening so quickly -- but so slowly that Palmer began to feel woozy. But this was the same feeling he'd felt all along. He had forgotten why he was sitting in the classroom.
The projector hummed louder and louder until the sound became a helicopter, a train, a helicopter and a train. He was surrounded by such an unbearable measure of sound until he burst.
- - -
Sergeant First Class (SFC) Ernest Palmer awoke in the morning to find his regurgitated dinner lying in bed with him. He wiped himself clean and slumped to the front door.
