d Brunei. "Besides, how can it exist
when we're asleep, when it doesn't really exist to begin with?"

"Semantics, Ollie, semantics."

Brunei took a bottle of Omnidrene out of his pocket. "Time to charge
up the old batteries again," he said.

He passed out the pills.

"I notice Marsha is still in her cabin."

"Yeah," said Lazar, "she keeps to herself a lot. No great--"

Just then, Marsha burst into the garden, screaming: "Make it go away!
Make it go away!"

Behind her slithered a gigantic black snake, with a head as big as a
horse's, and bulging red eyes.

"I thought we agreed to leave our private hallucinations in our
cabins," snapped Brunei.

"I tried! I tried! I _don't want_ it around, but it won't go away! Do
something!"

Ten feet of snake had already entered the garden. The thing seemed
endless.

"Take it easy," said Lazar. "Let's all concentrate and think it away."

They tried to erase the snake, but it just rolled its big red eyes.

"That won't work," said Vera. "Her subconscious is still fighting us.
Part of her must _want_ the snake here. We've _all_ got to be together
to erase it."

Marsha began to cry. The snake advanced another two feet.

"Oh, quiet!" rasped Lazar. "Ollie, do I have your permission to bring
my dragon into the garden? He'll make short work of the snake."

Brunei scowled. "You and your dragon.... Oh, maybe it'll work."

Instantly, the green dragon was in the garden. But it was no longer
five feet long and bovine.

It was a good twelve feet long, with cold reptilian eyes and big
yellow fangs.

It took one look at the snake, opened its powerful jaws, and belched a
huge tongue of orange flame.

The serpent was incinerated. It disappeared.

Brunei was trembling. "What happened, Lazar?" he said. "That's not the
same stupid little dragon."

"Hah ... hah...." squeaked Lazar. "He's ... uh ... grown...."

Brunei suddenly noticed that Lazar was ashen. He also noticed that the
dragon was turning in their direction.

"Get it out of here, Lazar! Get it out of here!"

Lazar nodded. The dragon flickered and went pale, but it was over a
minute before it disappeared entirely.

* * * * *

_Six months out_:

_Things_ wandered the passageways and haunted the cabins. Marsha's
snake was back. There was Lazar's dragon, which seemed to grow larger
every day. There was also a basilisk, a pterodactyl, a vampire bat
with a five-foot wingspread, an old-f