Dream a little dream with me

Under Professor Xavier’s recommendation, Emma Frost was quickly flown in to the Jon the Intergalactic Gladiator for President of the United States Headquarters to monitor my dreams.

“Now that you are comfortably dressed in that tight fitting body suit, Jon the Intergalactic Gladiator, you can now put on this monitoring device and prepare to sleep,” the mutant telepath said.

“I feel kind of ridiculous in this,” I said as I put the headband on. “Look at this thing! I look like I should be in Xanadu or something.”

“Oh you look fine,” she assured me. “Now, all you have to do is lie down here and the sensitive instruments connected to the headpiece and your tight fitting body suit will scan your dream and your body’s reactions during it. Are there any questions?”

“Yes, how do you keep those things up?” I asked.

“How do I--?” Frost looked down at her chest and then looked back at me. “I don’t feel that I have to answer that. Do you have any real questions?”

“Sure,” I shrugged. “Do you know that your toe is showing?”

“My what? No, my boots cover all of my toes.”

“No,” I answered. “Your other toe.”

“Once again,” she signed. “I don’t think that it’s appropriate for us to discuss this now. Do you have any questions that pertain to what we’re doing here?”

“No, but I do have another question,” I said. “Do you think that it’s appropriate for a female character in a medium written primarily for adolescent boys to dress in an overtly provocative and sexually suggestive manner? Do you think someone who dresses like this would actually be a strong character and female role model or just something that aims for the lowest common denominator?”

“I don’t feel that I have to answer that, either,” she answered bitterly. “Do you have any questions pertaining to what we are doing right now?”

“No, I was just askin,’” I answered.

“Fine, just lie down and go to sleep,” she growled.

“Can I get a drink of water?” I asked.

“Yes,” she hissed. “Then get to sleep. Do you want to participate in this or not?”

“Yes,” I answered. “I just don’t feel that tired right now. I don’t think that I can-zzzzzzzzzz.”

I must have dozed off for a second, but then I suddenly I snapped back awake and looked around the office. Everything seemed normal, but something just didn’t feel right. Then I felt a tremor.

And another.

“That’s odd,” I said to myself. “I wonder what that tremor could be.”

I felt another tremor, and it felt close, closer still. I looked out the window and I saw a giant creature with an ominous handlebar moustache staring through it at me.

Without a second’s delay, I leapt into action, springing through the window itself, shattering the glass into thousands of tiny glittering shards. The noise of the glass breaking was like the crashing of a cymbal by the gods themselves. My momentum carried my two feet right into the jowls of the giant man-creature who took the full blow and fell back from it, crashing to the ground with an earth shattering noise that sounded like a steel suspension bridge collapsing into a rock quarry.

“Whoa whoa! I say there,” the thing rumbled. “Stop your attack at once, I say!”

“You!” I answered. “You who stalk me in my dreams, you who stand before me in the form of this giant creature now beg me to stop?”

“Yes yes,” he answered, then shrunk back down to a less unusual size – which was still pretty big. “I am William Howard Taft and I have come bringing you a gift.”

“Are you going to make me fight you for it?” I demanded angrily. “I have already bested Washington, Lincoln, and Teddy Roosevelt and I’ll beat you, too!”

“No, no,” he shook his massive head. “I don’t wish to do battle with you for it. I feel that you have already earned it. I will now give to you Taft’s Sense of Justice. Use this wisely.”

“Really?” I asked. “You’re just going to give it to me?”

“Yes, of course you can have it,” he answered. “This was my greatest strength and now I bestow it unto you.”

“OK, I’ll take it, thank you,” I said. “Are you sure that you’re the right candidate to give me this though? No offense, but from what I understand you were rather bored as president and would rather go golfing than attend to your presidential duties.”

“This is true, yes,” he conceded. “But less than a decade after serving, I was called upon to become Chief Justice of the United States, and that’s where the Taft Man shined, baby.”

“Uh, OK.”

“That was my true calling,” he answered just a little wistfully. “Of everything that I did, I felt that I made the biggest difference serving my country its greatest voice of justice, and now it is yours.”

“Ok, cool,” I said. “Thank you very much.

“Use it wiselyyyyyyyyyyaaabbbbbbllllbbbbllllaaaahhh!” he said and then faded to nothingness. Everything around me faded as well and I soon found myself waking up feeling refreshed.

“How was that?” I asked as I looked over at Emma. She was she was standing over a monitor with a dazzled look on her face.

“Unbelievable…” she mumbled.

“So, what kind of readings did you get?” I asked. “Can you confirm that this is a spiritual quest?”

“I hope so,” she answered. “Otherwise you’re just going around beating up on dead presidents. It’s either a spiritual quest like you say or you’re going absolutely crazy.”

“Maybe it’s a little from column A and a little from column B,” I muttered.