Dreamscape (Blake's 7 zine)
| Zine | |
|---|---|
| Title: | Dreamscape |
| Publisher: | |
| Editor: | |
| Author(s): | Esther Reese |
| Cover Artist(s): | Esther Reese |
| Illustrator(s): | |
| Date(s): | undated, but probably mid to late 1980s (after 1986) |
| Medium: | |
| Genre: | gen, very smarmy |
| Fandom: | Blake's 7 |
| Language: | English |
| External Links: | |
| Click here for related articles on Fanlore. | |
Dreamscape is a gen Blake's 7 40-page novel by Esther Reese. The zine is online here.
It was originally printed in 1986 in Interface #10.
Excerpt: The Last Paragraphs of the Novel
"Am I better?" Avon murmured to himself: Below him, Vila nodded, closing his eyes. Avon hoped that he wouldn't remember this conversation, and if he did, that he would chalk it up to the delirium. As for him, how could he explain to Vila he was wrong? How to admit to someone else what one could only barely, if that, admit to oneself; the anger recognized only in retrospect as envy at the easy laughter, the easy tears, the full living. Instinctively, Avon branded the thoughts and their conclusions nonsense. Foolishness bred by too much cloying emotion, mixed with grinding exhaustion.
Vila curled tighter, his body's trembling becoming less subtle, turning into a racking shaking. He would not cry. He could not take Avon's scorn, all the more because he knew it was what he deserved. He felt the fingers on his shoulders tighten and willed his muscles to rigidity. Despite his best efforts to stem his tears, they escaped, and he turned his head. away, swallowing, biting his lip, anything to curb the humiliating whimpers.
Avon stared down at Vila, desperately searching for words to say that would make it all right, that would make this fear go away. None would come, except the realization that if he had had Vila all those years ago, the pain, hurt and betrayal would never have happened.
He winced at the subdued whimper that reached his ears. Beneath his hands, Vila flinched away.
Something snapped inside of Avon. He didn't have the words to say -- words were not his way. He couldn't cry the tears -- tears were not his way. Carefully, as gently as he could, Avon fimed his grip around Vila's shoulders, pulling him up, nesUing Vila's face against the top of his shoulder, wrap- ping his arms about Vila.
Vila gave up trying to rationalize, and accepted the security and haven the solid warmth of Avon was giving so suddenly and so freely, sobbing like a child, indeed as he had never dared to cry as a child. Tentatively, he put arms around Avon, hesitant even now.
Avon's response was to tighten his own grip and to slide onto the bed, the better to support himself and the weakened thief.
The only thought in Vila's mind, besides the overwhelming knowledge that here no one and nothing would be allowed to hurt him was that he had been right; Avon could not have killed him.
After all, how many places are there to hide in a stripped down shuttle?
Reactions and Reviews
[Dreamscape]: Esther Reese's "Dreamscape" ("Interface" #10), is a the-4th-series-was--an-attempt-to-break-*Vila* story, and has a lot of overwrought emotion (I've warned you that I tend to enjoy that, right?) as Avon et all try to help a catatonic Vila back to sanity. (Makes a nice change from all the Avon-as-mental-health-poster-boy pieces.) [1]