When Todd Phillips fell asleep on the night of April 14th, there was nothing to indicate he would soon find himself embroiled in war, locked in a monumental battle for his very existence. The night was calm, the street outside his apartment was quiet, and there was no noise except for the occasional creaking of the building.
In fact, to everyone else in New York, and indeed most of the rest of the world, no massive war took place. This is largely due to the fact that the current geopolitical situation between the great powers of the world is a lot more stable than Hollywood action movies and best-selling first person shooters would have you believe. Also, we’ve yet to make contact with any vast armadas of belligerent aliens looking to stir up trouble.
And, of course, the war was taking place entirely in Todd Phillips’ subconscious. That might also have something to do with it.
The second he fell asleep, Todd found himself in one of the most vivid dreams he had ever experienced. He was standing in the middle of a green field, and in the distance a red caldera rose out of the ground. Before he could take in any more of his surroundings, the ground rumbled. He turned to see a legion of horsemen on white steeds, clad in plate armor and riding under the banner of a blue cross on white. As they rode towards him, there was a boom from the caldera, followed by a puff of smoke and the whistling of a shell.
The riders passed right by Todd, who stood there feeling like a rock in a stream, and continued across the field. The bombs hit the ground and detonated on the vanguard of the advancing force, covering them in a sticky purple substance. The horses whinnied in fear and tried to turn and flee, but both they and the knights commanding them found themselves unable to move. The shells had had the desired effect.
A cacophonous blare resounded from the caldera, which soon resolved itself into what Todd recognized as a few notes from the bridge of a Muse song. This was met by movement at the foot of the rock base. Though at first only specks could be seen, the shapes moved impossibly fast, and in mere seconds it seemed as though the aggressors were practically upon the knights. It was one of the most bizarre and frightening sights Todd had ever seen. A horde of malevolent shadows, some of them bearing faces but most of them only possessing toothy grins, sat astride gigantic wiener dogs that propelled them to the trapped knights. When they closed the distance, they drew sickeningly curved blades and showed no mercy, the massive canines eating whatever their rider’s swords missed. It was at about this point Todd decided to try and leave.
He found himself faced with either being trampled underfoot by the advancing reinforcements thundering to the aid of their ensnared comrades or facing down the dogriders. Neither of these was an attractive prospect, but Todd reasoned that the men on horses hadn’t tried to kill him so far and had already avoided him once, so they seemed the safer bet. As he ran at their ranks, he found that once again they moved to accommodate him. He couldn’t really tell where he was headed, but at the moment he was willing to settle for simply “away”.
Soon enough, he found himself tumbling head over heels into a ditch. Raising his head out of the mud with a perhaps-too-cartoonish “squelch”, he found himself not in a mere ditch, but rather a trench. Infantry swarmed around him, wearing the uniforms of the British soldiers in that World War One documentary Todd had watched out of boredom sometime in the last week. Their equipment wasn’t quite period accurate, though, judging by the M16s they were using and the iPhones hanging from their belts. As Todd got to his feet, someone finally noticed him.
“Oy, ‘oo’re you?” asked the soldier who approached him. “Some koinda special agint or summat?” Todd deciphered the horrible Cockney accent as best he could.
“Todd,” he said. “I’m not an agent or anything, and I don’t know anything about any summit.”
“Well, ye don’t look loike any soldjah oi’ve evah seen. Whatchoo dewin all the way out heah?”
Todd made it halfway through “ I don’t know” when a man wearing an officer’s cap and brandishing a vuvuzela strode over.
“What’s all this, then?”
“Says ‘is name’s Todd, sah,” said the soldier. “Not an agint or anyfing. Dunno why ‘e’s out ‘ere, really.”
“Todd? Todd Phillips?” asked the officer, turning to him. Todd nodded, and the officer’s eyes bugged out of his face.
“Private Jenkins,” he ordered, pointing at the man with one hand while using his other one to settle his eyes back in his sockets. “Send a text to command at once. This man is a VIP who is to be escorted to the capital at once. Understood?”
“Yes sah!” Jenkins unclipped the iPhone from his belt and was in the middle of sending the text when silence suddenly reigned. The officer jerked his head around and swore under his breath.
“Let’s go, lad. Gotta get you to a car. If they’ve stopped fighting over there, it can only mean one thing.” Right on cue, the cry pierced the air, flowing down the trench from soldier to soldier.
“BANANAMEN!”
Todd vaulted over the other edge of the trench while the soldiers on the opposite side opened up with their rifles. But Todd turned and saw it wouldn’t be anywhere near enough. A swarm of smiling banana people wearing striped pajamas had reached the trench and were beating the soldiers there to a pulp, in some cases tearing them to pieces with their bare hands. Todd’s heart nearly stopped, and he would’ve stayed there frozen if the officer hadn’t been there to urge him on. He had always hated that show as a kid. The officer ushered him into a waiting taxi commandeered by his freshman year physics teacher, and together they sped off down the road.
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