A Exercept from My Current Novel, Figment

by Max (The First) in where she feels like she belongs

Joey screamed from his little crib now the fifth consecutive night.

"I'll be back alright. Joey's having another rough night."

"Again?" I pushed a few strands of her hair behind her ear. "Poor kid."

Slowly I arrived back in my bedroom, barechested and in a pair of basketball shorts. I rolled over, knicking my head on the wall and glared at the ceiling from my back. I was just on a beach with the prettiest girl I'd ever met and now it was gone. Whitney pushed my door open and sat on the edge of my bed. Her 14 year old brain working at hyperspeed.

"Jesse!" she whisper-yelled; "You awake?!"

"Whit...I'm blinking." She glared at me as I growled sleepily at her. "Go make him stop."

"Mom just went in there." She ran her fingers through her tangled mess of hair. "You sound like you haven't slept for days."

"Cause I haven't. His crying fits are going to kill me." I clicked the lamp on, Whitney's strawberry blonde hair was in more of a mess then I orignally thought it was. She marveled at me. My shirtless craved chest, my icy blue eyes with the deep dark bags underneath that clearly proved my lack of sleep, and my tossled blonde hair as I stood up.

"If you weren't my brother...I'd idolize you."

"Go away Whitney."

"Cranky!" I jabbed my foot at her and she stepped back. Dad's voice cut throught the air.

"What do you want here!?" I pulled Whitney to my chest and held my hand over her mouth. I peaked out the doorway, black clad police officers stood in the front hall; handcuffs linked to their belts. One of them held a breifcase. My sister struggled, wanting to see.

"mmph!"

"Shut up Whit!" I let her go and she poked her head out to see. Joey started crying again. I pulled a shirt from my desk chair and slipped it over my head before walking out into the hall to approach the two men. My father's face warned as he saw me heading their way. I stepped back toward Joey's bedroom door, and my mother yanked me inside, shutting it behind her.

"What are you thinking?! They're from the government! You touch either one of them and they'll throw your butt in a prison cell."

"Why are they here?" her eyes were striken with fear, as Joey slowly fell asleep in her arms. She set him back down into his crib and came back over to me, running her hand down my cheek like it was the last time she was every going to do it. I didn't understand. "Mom?"

"Jess..." She sobbed into my chest. the two cops from the front hall burst into the room, grabbing my arms and ordering me to coorperate. A woman came running in after they seemed to get some kind of control of me to talk to my mother as I struggled against the two idiots dragging me into our family room. My father sat on the couch completely relaxed even though his hands were behind his back and his glasses were cracked slightly. Once the hand cuffs were snapped around my wrists, they pushed me to the floor and left the room.

"Dad...?"

"Why did you fight them Jesse? Your coorperation would have made this whole thing a lot smoother."

"What?!" I looked up at him from the ground. I was afraid to sit up, the little black breifcase lay on the coffee table above my head. He didn't answer as a woman and a girl my age floated into the room; with two of the policemen next to them. My mother and Whitney stood behind them.

"James West, and Jesse West. The Antimagic division of the FBI has been hot on your tails for awhile now." I glared up at Dad, what the hell? ran through my mind a few times. Then I remembered."Both of you are what we call Dream-Weavers. Both of you can enter the subconscious and make anything you desire happen." She looked down at me as I attempted to grab the bobby pin on the floor next to me. Her stilletto buried itself in my hand before letting my body drop back on top of it in pain.

"Boys, you're going to be coming with us." The policemen came at me again, pressing me into the carpet as the girl went into the little breifcase; filling a syringe with a clear liquid.

"What are you doing?! You didn't say anything about drugs!" My dad pulled his arms away from a policemen.

"Just for your son Mr. West. He obviously doesn't want to do his country any good." The needle pierced my upper arm before I even noticed that she moved. I felt my entire system slow down...my breaths relaxing, my muscles unwinding, and my heart beat slowing. I slipped into my own subconcious and her hands shook my shoulders as I slumped to the sand on our usual beach.

"Jesse! Jesse! Answer me! Jesse!" She eased me onto my back and held my head in her hands as the sedative took effect. In both the real world...and the dream world.