Voices

Near Dark, back when <PERSON>'s actual age was close to his apparent age. He and <PERSON> are in a motel room with a guy who appears to be a friend - not like them, exactly, but not someone they intend to kill either. This guy's offering to teach <PERSON> to play poker, and <PERSON> says he already knows, but it is no fun because he has to give <PERSON> all the money he wins afterward. (Woke up at 5:51 am, after going to bed at 4:30. Back to sleep.) A young man has somehow traveled to another world, one populated almost entirely by vampires. They subsist off each other's subpar blood, donations are required and a vital part of the economy. Unaware of any of this, the guy from another world has walked into a store run by this world's equivalent of a friend of his, the magician who sent him here. She is not a magician in this reality, and cannot help him. It takes her a while to realize that he is human, they are so rare and unexpected, but she can smell his blood and when she figures it out, she has him in a trance before he realizes he is in danger. At that moment, her equivalent in his reality pulls him back to his own world - but the vampire follows him. (Woke at 7:37. Back to sleep.) A fragment of a scene involving <PERSON>, theater, and mythogenesis, using that term specifically. A woman genetically engineered as a mate for a certain clone. The clone leads a double life, with a job and a wife who is unaware that he is anything other than a normal human, but he is also in close contact with the doctor who created both him and his 'brother', who he is somewhat obsessed with, and he suspects his genetically-engineered mate is secretly in love with that 'brother' - the brother is entirely unaware of any of this and believes himself a perfectly normal human, although the genetically engineered woman has recently appeared in his life and dropped some cryptic hints. The clone pulls the genetically engineered woman into his lap, which she tolerates, and demands that she tell him why she likes him, him specifically, "not the other one." She, with a charming accent I cannot place, says it does not matter, and it is clear she is bored with his insecurity and instability. (Woke at 9:40. Back to sleep.) Three people whose lives are connected, although only one of them realizes it. The first: A young man who recently beat cancer, legal guardian of his two younger sisters. One of them's been acting out in school recently and he is jokingly threatened her with calling in his biological mother, a woman who works with delinquents. But he is seriously wondering whether he should arrange for them to get together casually and talk - he does not mind her skipping classes but he is worried about what is going on in her mind. The second: A teenage girl in a cancer ward, the same place where that man had been treated. Her death has been predicted to fall within the range of (the note said either April or August, I could not tell which) 10-24. She has nightmares where this death is accompanied by a swarm of wasps. She does not fear death, but she hates wasps. The third, and the one who is aware of the connection: A man who visits the hospital and watches the girl and the angel who lives there. The angel's voice can shatter glass, and it is going to kill this man someday - but it will not do anything until after that girl's death. (Woke at 12:10.)