No, a meteor shower. I hadn’t seen anything like it in a while, so at first I just lay back, enjoying the show. Until the meteors flew off and were sucked into a deep, black well. With the spectacle gone, I became aware of a throbbing at the back of my skull and a buzzing in my ears. An alarm clock was going off somewhere, disturbing my well-deserved rest. I covered my ears and tried to get back to sleep, but the damn thing wouldn’t stop ringing. All right, all right, I said. I’ll get up in a minute. Just as soon as this headache goes away. “Probably concussed,” I heard someone say from what seemed like a great distance. “Sir, can you hear me?” Slowly, I became aware of a latex paw on my cheek, rotating it this way and that. Of course I can, I said. Just let me sleep a little longer. Someone else placed an evil-smelling thing under my nose. I had a momentary jolt of awareness, which only convinced me I should go back to sleep.
