The Green Man

For as long as Cassandra could remember, she had been plagued by a recurring dream. It was one that always left her feeling restless, scared and uncertain. In this dream, she found herself on an airplane sitting next to a girl who talked about her training in martial arts. She said she learned karate as a child to defend herself from bullies, and it wasn’t her fault she was socially awkward. She told Cassandra she was diagnosed with autism, and while her IQ was off the charts, she still couldn’t figure out how to socialize with humans. She had always felt like an alien.

“It’s nice to meet you, Sarah. I’m Cassandra,” Cassandra said. Shortly after their handshake is when the trouble began.

Cassandra and Sarah noticed an odd man sitting next to them, and when the man turned to face them his eyes glowed red. He removed his hood and had a green face covered in gross green bumps.

Cassandra typed his description into her cell phone and asked the search engine if there were any wanted criminals matching his description. A man matching her description of him popped up, and it listed him on the F.B.I.’s most wanted list and the leader of a biker gang called ‘Galactic Gang Green,” and it was known for robberies and the quick execution of their hostages before making their exit. His real name was unknown, but the FBI’s nickname for him was ‘The Green Man.’

Cassandra showed Sarah her phone.

“What a creep,” Sarah whispered.

Cassandra woke up from her dream, rinsed out her eyes, went back to sleep and then had ten more dreams where she tried to stop the demon known as ‘The Green Man’ from getting off the plane and causing more trouble. Each dream she had failed to stop The Green Man from escaping.

Cassandra almost succeeded in the last dream she had. She used a magic knife that could kill demons. She approached the demon and told him she was going to take him to the police and flashed the knife, but he pushed her out of the way, went to the planes door, ripped it off the hinges and jumped out, getting away.

“Maybe I should have blocked the door,” Sarah said.

“That would have been smart,” Cassandra said and smiled, then woke up. If Cassandra ever encountered this demon, she knew what to do. She just hoped she’d find the knife before then.

Cassandra went back to sleep and hadn’t had the dream again.

A few weeks later, she had bought a ticket to Orlando. She had saved up enough time to take a week off from work, and decided to spend her trip in Florida. She always wanted to visit Disney World. She invited her parents to come, but they spent so much time complaining about how hard travel was with their back problems and joint problems and sweating problems and bending problems that she bid them adieu and hung up.

She packed her bags the night before, called a cab in the morning, and headed to the airport.

She got on the plane, sat down and took a breath. Someone took their seat next to her, and she looked at the person and it was Sarah.

Crap, Cassandra thought. If Sarah’s here, so is The Green Man.

Cassandra looked at the seat in the isle next to hers and she saw the demons face. It was the same green face with little green bumps on it and he had leather fingerless biker gloves exposing his green bumpy fingers and long, dirty fingernails. The Green Man was wearing a medieval looking monks robe with a hood.

Where was her knife, she wondered? How was she supposed to stop this villain without her magic knife. She quickly introduced herself to Sarah and googled The Green Man to show to her.

“What a creep,” Sarah said, just like in Cassandra’s dream.

The plane took off. When it reached its peak, one of the flight attendants started rolling a snack tray and bumped into Cassandra and dropped a knife in her lap. It looked just like the knife from her dream.

She waved at The Green Man across from her, smiled and acted like she didn’t know who he was. Then Cassandra gave him a thumbs up.

Cassandra showed her phone to the passenger sitting on the other side of her and told him The Green Man was attempting to sabotage the plane somehow and was going to jump out of the plane and it was going to crash into something, destroying everything around it and leading to the destruction of the world. The plane crash would trigger a domino effect where all countries blamed each other for the crash, triggering a third world war.

“I need you to block the closest exit, sir, and Sarah, block the back exit. Whatever you guys do, don’t let The Green Man off the plane,” Cassandra said.

“Hey, Green Man” Cassandra shouted, hoping that would cause the demon to attack the plane early before he had time to make any more plans.

“I knew I was important to you. You keep looking over at me,” The Green man said and tried to run to the exit.

Sarah and the man blocked their assigned exits, but The Green Man shoved Sarah partially out of the way and managed to get the door open but Sarah knocked The Green Man over and grabbed on to the back of a seat so she wouldn’t get sucked out.

Cassandra rushed to the door to close it before anyone got sucked out.

The Green Man started attacking the passengers on the plane, so Cassandra and Sarah began to chase him.

The Green Man ran to a private room where they saw him messing with the planes wires and ripping them out of the wall.

Cassandra shouted “You’re the demon trying to end the world.”

“Demon lies. I’m a saint doing the work of God and the church,” The Green man shouted then laughed.

“Stop hijacking the plane or I’ll have no choice but to defend myself and the passengers and kill you with my magical knife,” Cassandra said and waved her knife at The Green Man.

“You don’t scare me,” The Green Man Growled.

The Green Man grabbed at the wires again and Cassandra cut his throat.

The Green Man started screaming and green smoke came out of his neck hole. The Green Man fell to the ground and briefly burst into flames, burning The Green Man’s corpse quickly. Nothing was left behind but a pile of sparkling green ashes, and the world was saved.

Cassandra and Sarah were breathing heavy.

“So, what are you going to do in Florida?” Cassandra asked Sarah.

“Going to Disney World,” Sarah said.

“Me too,” Cassandra said.

“Me as well,” the third man said.

“I don’t think we introduced ourselves. I’m Cassandra,” Cassandra said.

“I’m John,” the man said.

“Well, John, let’s go to Disney World together,” Sarah said.

The three new friends all went to Disney World where they learned they all lived in the same city and decided to all move in together in case the world ever needed saving from another demon. And oddly, they had all decided to become chefs and work at the same restaurant, where Cassandra repurposed her magic knife for cooking magically good tasting food.