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Hidden in a tiny nook inside the metal walls of the space station, I feel Darth Vader sweep by my hiding place. His footsteps rattle the walls, and I can vaguely hear him giving orders to subordinates.

I am the space station, I chant, blending further into the background. The stark walls are etched by suffering. The station belongs to the Empire—although it masquerades as a lawless refuelling station—and if the Empire's agents make demands, the station management will fall all over itself to capitulate.

"Find her."

I smile.

Then I'm walking through corridors until I reach the outside of the station. The rooms that I walk through are open to vacuum, but I don't bother with a spacesuit. Opening an airlock would be logged on the station's computer, as would removing a spacesuit from storage, and that would tip my hand. Unnecessary, when I can just walk through space under my own power.

It's fucking cold, though. My skin is literally freezing in chunks, but that will go away once I re-enter the living areas of the station.

I can see the stars stretched out in front of me through the transparisteel window, and I step through the glass—

And fall.

I catch myself with a thought. I glide towards the station, where I can see in through the windows and spy upon my quarry. (I wrap myself up in thick blankets as I do so.)

---

The Exile—and administrator of the station—looks enraged.

"These are our people!" he shouts at the officer. "I will NOT allow them to be put in harms way because of political machinations."

---

We're on the surface of a rocky planet, under an orange sky. The other darksider has his lightsaber out, taunting me.

You can't kill me, he says, not bothered by the lightsaber wound jutting through his abdomen. I've upgraded my body: these machines make me invincible.

I charge at him and plunge my red lightsaber into his stomach, psychically forcing lines of corrupted code into his body through the blade. He falls.

★★★☆☆

SOLO SENTENCE ESPRESSO

It takes fifteen minutes of standing on the train tracks and yelling before the chupacabra shows up and dies and is recorded onto a tape so that its soul is sufficiently trapped for eternity (or until the sequel); I'm late for work and Dean's hit by a train, but we get better.

Chupacabra. Chupacabras? Scare Factor: 3.

★★★★☆

12/29/10

The shop is open to the street, choked with dust kicked up by the people and horses bustling by on the busy dirt road. A woman with short, strawberry blonde hair arranges the merchandise at the front of the stall. Her movements are quick, angry, but she looks tired. The heat and the dust and the people and the fact that she's working for nothing for someone else are wearing at her patience and her sanity. I am that woman.

A man walks by. I have time to register that he's tall and handsome, with longish dark brown hair, before he's brushing by me. He stops long enough to whisper, "I'm taking the harmonica back. Are you with me?" I've never met the man, but I'm nodding and setting things down, moving away into the street, my movements perfectly synchronized with his.

The mark is looking at silverware two stalls down. I'm threading through the crowd as he shows off the silver harmonica. I'm tapping him on the shoulder, smiling as he turns around and we chat about the silverware on display. He's waving the harmonica over his shoulder, and the first man, the thief, snatches it from his hand. The mark turns to shout, and I'm brushing by, cutting the strings on his purse.

We run. Through the countryside, on the uneven ground of the foothills. I thought we were safe, thought we'd outrun our pursuers hours ago, but arrows are raining down on us and the horses are hot on our heels.

I'm hit. The arrow pierces through just below my ribcage, and I feel the blood soak through my shirt. I fall behind, am left stumbling through the brush. The dogs are quieter now, and I take refuge beneath the roots of a giant tree.

At the bottom of the hollow are three doors, each small enough to crawl through. I pull out the small leather pouch I stole earlier and turn it over. A key falls into my hand. This key will open any lock in the dreamworld, a voice whispers in my mind. Smiling, calm, heedless of the wound on my side (suddenly much, much younger) I drop to the moss-covered ground and slide the key into the lock.

Thievery. Scare Factor: 3.

Isn't that the perfect amount of obvious symbolism for the guys in the Dream Interpretation forum?