Mr. Sandman by Robert T. Jeschonek Read Free Book Online

hear me? I won't give you the attention!
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    Forcefully dragging the Dream Lord along behind her, she walks toward a scraggly, dead tree, against which a broom leans. Rats scurry away before them.
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    Page 5 (8 panels)
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    Page 5 panel 1
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    Mother thrusts the broom into the agonized Dream Lord's quivering hand.
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    Mother: You've got to grow up, Emmett. You have to learn responsibility. Your father won't reprimand you, but I will! Your father doesn't care!
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    Page 5 panel 2
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    Closeup of the Mother's face as she suddenly and briefly becomes quiet. She gazes away from the Dream Lord, off into the distance, thinking about her husband. She looks sad and thoughtful.
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    Mother (quietly): He just doesn't care about anyone.
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    Page 5 panel 3
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    The Dream Lord can't stand the pain anymore, and stumbles away from his mother. He is screaming and clutching his chest, about to collapse to the ground.
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    Dream Lord: Aaaaggghh! Help!
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    Mother: Emmett? You get back here, you little ham! That won't get you out of your chores!
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    Page 5 panel 4
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    Mother (trying to grab him as he hobbles away): You're pushing your luck, mister! I still haven't forgotten what you did with the TV last week!
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    Dream Lord (a surprised look on his face as he notices something ahead of him): Where did that come from?
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    Page 5 panel 5
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    A swirling portal has appeared in a hill, in a space cleared of corpses.
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    Dream Lord (off-panel): A hole...a way out!
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    Page 5 panel 6
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    Dream Lord (now crawling desperately toward the portal, his mother beating him on the back with her broom): If I can... get home... to the Dream Base...my power...
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    Mother (angry and crying at the same time): Get back here, Emmett! Come on, you have work to do! Stop running away! Emmett!
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    Page 5 panel 7
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    The Dream Lord manages to heave his shattered, bleeding body into the portal, and with a flash, he disappears.
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    Mother (racing after him, as his torso vanishes into the hole): Don't leave me...
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    Page 5 panel 8
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    Mother: ...alone! (She tries to hurl herself after him, but the energy portal has already vanished, and she slams into a solid hill of dirt and rock and bodies.)
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    Page 6 (8 panels)
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    Title (across the top of the page): Long Night's Journey Into Death
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    Page 6 panel 1
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    Narrator: He slips through a sea of gelatin, cold and slimy and airless. Around him, he can see nothing, just reaches of featureless plasma. Gasping for breath, he fills his lungs with the stuff.
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    Show the Dream Lord, in his torn, bloody costume, with the sword still protruding from his chest, floating through a vast sea of a murky green gelatinous substance.
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    Page 6 panel 2
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    Narrator: Nothing is familiar here. He had hoped the portal would lead him home, to regain his power and somehow undo the pain. He hoped wrong.
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    The Dream Lord is plunging forward through the gel, smothering and beginning to lose consciousness.
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    Page 6 panel 3
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    Flashback of the Bogeyman from the first chapter.
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    Bogeyman: I am your dream, Adams! I am your Bogeyman ! You have tried to forget me, to exile my memory as you set up your cotton candy kingdom in dreamland! But you could not...you never will!
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    Page 6 panel 4
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    Closeup of the Dream Lord's face as he chokes and turns blue.
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    Narrator: Once, he was almost a god, a king of dreams and guardian of life. Now, he prepares to die.
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    Page 6 panel 5
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    Flashback to Emmett's childhood. He is sitting, cross-legged, before a TV set (circa early 1960's), listening to his parents shout at each other while he watches Woody Woodpecker cartoons.
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    Mother (off-panel): ...and you aren't sick anymore! You can't always have your way around