Mist moaned faintly in her sleep.

“She’s having a bad dream,” thought Roan as he crept quietly into the bedroom. His young wife was sleeping uneasily, her lip quivering. Roan sat on the edge of the bed hoping that his presence might be comforting, but the movement woke her.

“You alright love?” Roan asked.

“Oh, I dreamt I was about to be attacked by someone; a poke in the eye, a pin, only that ‘someone’ turned out to be me. Do you have dreams like that Roan? Do you?”

“I often don’t remember what…”

“But then I woke up in the dream, you know - a dream within a dream...” Roan was used to his wife retelling her dreams within dreams. He patted her hand and Mistletoe turned over sleepily, the emotion of her dream lingering like early morning clouds.

“What did it all mean?” she wondered as she drifted back down into slumber.

“Someone doesn't like me. Someone like me. Oh, why can't I just have a pleasant dream about good things or being somewhere nice?” She sighed. “Maybe that kind of fantasising isn’t good for you. Might as well just try to re-dream my horrid dream.”

She had about dozed off when Roan glanced at his mobile, realising that someone had left a voicemail. He reached for the phone, dialled in and heard an anxious voice.

“Hi Roan, it's me. I can't really talk now. I've only got a moment, but I think we've been compromised. I'm not imagining it this time. I don't know how and I don't know why, I can't contain it any longer though. I've been having those dreams again. I feel trapped and I can't shake the feeling that someone is going to ‘get’ me. Rim gum baldy...”

The voicemail came to an end and Roan slowly brought his hand down from his ear, pausing, deep in thought.

“Who was it Roan?” breathed Mist, without opening her eyes.

"Elmo," Roan replied, sounding distracted as though his thoughts were far away. Finally, he whispered under his breath, "Rimgumbaldy."

“Rim who?” asked Mist, absently noting the light playing upon the walls as she blinked - was that what she had seen earlier? Was sleep playing with reality again? No wait, she was awake now. What was Elmo’s imagination running away with now?

*****

As Holi stood at the edge of the trees, she saw a ball of light dancing deep among the silhouettes of tall pines and straggly sycamores, like the light of a torch or phone or some other glowing device. Edging forward gingerly, Holi could discern a pale pool of light, cast by the device, weaving amid the dripping black twigs and tangled ivies. There, cavorting about within the luminance was Elmo, waving his arms wildly and hopping about on the spot - and what was that on his head? Throwing caution to the wind, Holi dashed forward shouting, “Elmo - what are you doing out here? What’s going...?”

As she got closer, she was able to make out a small, bearded figure swinging from Elmo’s hair, whilst Elmo was trying to keep the bright object out of its reach. Stopping sharply, Holi froze at the sight. Elmo’s hopping was getting more jerky and agitated and now Holi could see another small figure apparently attempting to shove stinging nettles and other things up Elmo’s trouser leg. A third little person stood a metre or so to the side, appearing to shout instructions to the other two.

“That’s it! If you stick your foot in his ear you’ll reach it! Argh! Get it, get it!” The ear-treading, hair-puller made a last, frantic lunge for the light source clutched by Elmo at about the same time as the trouser-feeder introduced a damp rat up Elmo’s ankle. The small instruction-shouter leapt gleefully as Elmo lost his grip on the glowing object and tumbled to the ground, slapping manically at his own knee.

Suddenly, everything went dark and quiet - the struggle stopped without any warning; the small assailants just seemed to have vanished along with the glowing device. Elmo sat up, peering around him in the gloom, panting in frustration.

“Elmo?” came Holi's tremulous voice. As she ventured forward, she could just make him out, sitting in the gloom. He was clearly shaken and he had his hand up his trouser-leg, trying to reach something that was distressing him.

“They disappeared as quickly as they came!” he muttered, struggling with the rat clinging tenaciously to his knee. As he sat up, they could both see a small, green body, half crushed into the soil where it had fallen beneath him. It moaned and clutched its forehead - some sort of midget, quite human-like.

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“You took the device,” Elmo groaned despondently at the small figure.

“What device? Who did? What's going on and what on earth is that?” blurted Holi, flicking a dripping strand of hair from her cheek and pointing at the peculiar creature swooning on the wet ground where Elmo had fallen on him.

“What device... ‘What device?’ she says. What device do you think, Holi? Ow!” shouted Elmo, jumping at the feel of a really meaty rat bite on the knee cap.

His expression conveyed the fact that he hated rats, along with a growing realisation that removing this rat in a way that would preserve his dignity would be no easy matter.

“I'm sorry. That thing was important. I found it Holi. Why did I find it?” Then he added, almost as an afterthought, "As for this green thing - I don't know what it is." Holi gawked at the midget.

Elmo pointed then, with a pained expression, to his knee. Holi knew what he was getting at. She closed her eyes and thrust her hand at the rat, but it was stubborn and not budging an inch.

“Look I can't get him off and...” she faltered before reaching a decision, “And I'm not going to help you any further unless you start telling me what's going on. I thought we were coming here to... to...”

“OK, I'll explain on the way.” Elmo was now hobbling along on his feet, flexing his knee wildly against the unpleasant furry warmth lodged there. The clawing he received in return made him give that up. He dragged the disorientated midget by the ear.

“I'm holding him by the ear Holi. It needs to know who's boss. They can't have just disappeared."

“What? Who?” Holi followed Elmo, feeling increasingly confused in the darkness and the relentless rain. He clearly considered his deranged explanation to be sufficient.

The wood was far from quiet. The wind heaved through the trees and the little midget was groaning and muttering in a strange language that Holi had not heard before. Elmo was searching around the trees, frantically circling the broader trunks and looking up into the branches. He was even muttering back at the crumpled midget.

“I don't think you'll catch them now. Those kids have long gone. Elmo! Please tell me what's going on. I'm really confused. Shouldn’t you get that rat off your knee? He's really moving around now!” Holi was trying to find anything that made sense.

“Kids? Do you think this thing is a kid? We mustn't just stay where we are. It's not safe. I think they might have used my device to create a portal. I can just feel it. That's where they've likely gone and this thing knows it. He's no kid and he's not going anywhere until I get my precious device back. I feel I could finally face myself if… Ouch!” The rat dug its claws further into the knee in an attempt to scale the overhang. Elmo twisted the ear of the midget some more. The rain kept falling.

“Portals allow you to travel to different places. You've read about them, haven't you? Rock caverns, abandoned castles, wardrobes,” gasped out Elmo as he paced urgently through the dripping trees. He seemed unconscious of how ridiculous all of this sounded. “But it all depends,” he went on, “You can't make a portal out of anything. Not every wardrobe or cavern or, or... tree is a passage that leads to another realm in our world or in another... obviously. The device has to be the key.” He lingered, collecting his thoughts. “You’re wondering how I know all of this, aren’t you? The truth is I don’t know how I know. This midget; use the device; create a portal - it's all in my head. But they have to have a portal, near here, somewhere. Somewhere near. Somewhere.”

Holi groaned; this holiday had been intended to soothe Elmo's peace of mind, not smash it to smithereens.

It appeared that Elmo had now taken to hugging trees. With his body pressed against the bark, he ran his hands across the rough, twisted surfaces of a number of the larger oaks growing in the woods, moving from one to another, leaving the bewildered, green midget watching with a melancholy scowl.

“Elmo, maybe you need to see a doctor.” She stopped trailing behind him, flailing mentally for some kind of foothold. “I don’t mean your knee!” At that point Holi lost all sight of Elmo though, as he disappeared around the bole of an especially gnarled and ancient tree.

“I just know it's around here somewhere,” came his voice.

Uncomfortable being left with the weird midget, Holi clambered reluctantly after Elmo around

the enormous twisted trunk, feet unsteady on the snaking roots. Elmo was up to his elbow in a deep knothole, feeling inside.

“Watch out for the roots, they are really quite slippery. No - it’s not here.” He thought for a moment and then turned his attention to a dense veil of ivy that draped the old tree.

“Elmo no!” Holi pleaded as he disappeared completely from view beneath the dripping leaves.

Seconds later, fine shafts of blue light stabbed out from the ivy. Elmo’s voice could be heard grunting in frustration amid his rustling. “Where is it?” he complained, emerging with his mobile torch phone highlighting the disappointment pulling at his face.

“Elly?” Holi queried, but her restless husband was already on the move again, circling back around to the front of the tree.

“Wait!” Holi called as the faint reassurance of illumination went with him. Elmo’s head reappeared, his mobile beaming blue onto his questing features. “We don’t have time,” he sighed, “What if it's past the fixed time? What if they've already used the portal? What if I can’t fix it?” Again, he was gone.

When Holi stumbled after him, she jumped at the sight of the midget, still standing like a wilted pot plant, right where Elmo had left it. “Maybe I need to look closer to the roots,” came Elmo’s cryptic voice; he was on his knees near the midget, feeling around the base of the tree, but he paused as his phone light glinted off something in the grass. He lifted a small, shiny object and held it close to his eye. It was a pin.

“Hold on, wait a minute. I... Oh no! Someone has been here - we’re too late.”

“What are you talking about?” begged Holi, desperately lost, “I’m frightened Elmo! Can’t we just go back? I don’t like all this! Please!”

Elmo looked up, his shoulders slumped, the energy of the past few minutes draining away, leaving his face a mask of failure and abject weariness. The wet rat in his trouser leg took the opportunity to ascend to the security of his underpants.