Mzzkc's Mind Games

Catching up on a few days worth of notes.

Still gonna try to keep this under the ~30 minute limit writing constraint.

BARE-BONES ENTRY OF MEDIOCRITY

Aliens

Staying in a bed and breakfast, an alien podship smashes into the window, docking similarly to Halo 2's first mission. A severed head speaks the intentions of the immature xenomorphs that spill from the small ship, into the room. They seek only our love, adoration, and worship. Only if necessary will they subsume control of our brains and bodies. Euphoria awaits those who submit.

I make up some excuse and nope the fuck out the front door.

Agricola

Running down the town's main road at super-speeds, I'm stuck behind a bicyclist. I'm pretty sure he's a coworker. I don't want to be rude and pass him, so I make the first available turn between a row of houses, and continue on my path by taking a turn on a road parallel to the main one. I slow as I approach the market. It's really more of a bazaar with open-air shops and colorful awnings lit solely by starlight, all set atop grey cobblestone.

Samael's there, attending to one of the shops. I head into Samael's shop and pull out a copy of Agricola for inspection, since the shop specializes in fixing issues with board games or something. I don't quite remember. As I'm lifting the cover, Samael hastily warns me, but it's too late. A bunch of cardboard meeples scatter across the floor as other patrons crowd around. Graciously, Samael helps me pick them up and place them back in the box, the contents of which look more like Five Tribes than Agricola.

Cafe

After leaving the mall, K and I walk into a golden and brown hued cafe alongside the street. A bunch of people from high school and college are there. They're glaring, murder in their eyes. K is unsurprisingly oblivious to the mood in the room. He takes a seat, and I follow suit.

Hotel

Someone's dead, and I think I might be involved. At the very least, the CEO suspects me. I'm sure that's why I passed hotel security on my way to the stairs. And it's definitely why I jumped down the little square hole between the spiraling stairwell, letting gravity pull me down the hundred or so stories to the ground floor. That should buy me some time.

Vista

Walking through the hotel's grand hall, I take in the extravagance. Around me austere columns stand amidst dark oak tables. Whilst underfoot, a lush carpet with elegant gold inlays cushions my every step. It's not as vivid as it could be. In fact, I notice the dream wavering a bit and muse to myself about the false notion that all lucid dreams are vividly realistically. Vividness is a choice, I remind myself with a smirk, stabilizing the dream around me to life-like realism and stepping out onto the deck, where many of the guests have already gathered. The view is breathtaking. A number of curved, ancient buildings hug the glittering lake below. Towering high above, all perfectly illuminated by varying gradients of blue, pink, purple, and red. To my left, a waterfall spills lazily from the window of one of the stone marvels. I fly to it, cresting over the falling water and landing on the grassy overlook above.

Punks

Some punks are acting up in the parking lot. I can tell they've targeted me, so I untarget myself and pass through without incident.

I think it's finally time for a proper entry!

Nah, just kidding.

BARE-BONES ENTRY OF MEDIOCRITY

Stock Market

The compound door hisses shut behind metal, circular steel sliding into place. I reflect briefly on the progression of the war taking place on the battlefield just beyond. Verizon was making headway in its ploy to undervalue Lipton's stock prices. Releasing all the ants in the facilities. You know, the ones whose sticky sap helps seal the teabags. My viewpoint flashes to an image of the ants in question sealing up a teabag. They move along the thread attached to the paper nub, entering the teabag one-by-one, vomiting up a little goopy mess as a worker presses the seal with his gloved fingers.

My view flashes back to inside the compound, I've just poured myself some tea. I take a mouthful...and there's chunky ants in it. I really don't know what I was expecting, I think to myself as I'm spitting the burnt ant remains from my mouth.

Driving

Lying on the hotel bed, my fiance's coworker, J, enters the room from the balcony door, which leads onto the roof. She's picked out a dress she'd like me try on, but I just want to relax on the bed for a bit. She insists, basically forcing me into the dress as I'm lying there. To her credit, it looks decent, but it's definitely a tad long, and the lavender color doesn't look great with the pseudo-knitted style. But hey, at least it got her out of my hair.

My fiance comes into the hotel room from the hallway, soon after her coworker has left through the balcony. She's visibly upset. "What's wrong?" I ask, worried.

"J just stole my car." I sigh.

That all must have been a distraction. I muse to myself. "Don't worry. I'll go get it."

I make my way onto the roof, toggling invisibility as I go, and see J pulling out of the rooftop parkingspace with my finace's car. She's off before I can close the gap, driving onto the roofs of other nearby building via conveniently placed ramps. I take to the air, maneuvering myself in front of the car, still unseen as I fly between the rooftops. As the car makes another jump, I position myself in the trajectory, phasing through the windshield and plopping down next to J. I drop invisibility, startling her.

"Really?" I ask.

She gives some half-hearted excuse that I don't recall.

Sighing, yet again, I swap our positions, teleporting her to my seat and myself to hers simultaneously. As I turn the car around, she asks "How are you going to get back? You can't exactly drive to higher locations."

"Guess I'll have to fly it back then."

"Huh?" she asks as I take the car up and over a ramp, applying flying vehicle properties to it. The car now handles extremely similarly to a Hornet, with a bit of BF Helicopter mixed in. Very soon, I've landed the car back onto the hotel rooftop, and all is right with the world.

Theorycraft

This was it, the breakthrough we were waiting for. I push on the show curtains and step into the shower, a haunting giggle coming from the corner of the tub, behind the shower curtain. Ghost children. They're the key to universal lucidity! "Now, how best to put this into practice," I ponder aloud, just as my alarm wakes me.

Have been out of state on vacation this weekend. Picked up a cute little pocket-booklet that I can easily bring to work and jot down quick notes about my dreams. Had notes for a couple, but I didn't feel like trying to type them out on a phone, because ew. Am home now, which means it's time for another....

BARE-BONES ENTRY OF MEDIOCRITY

Nightmare

Ugh, this always happens when I need to do it in real life. In and out of bathrooms I go, unable to find relief. My anxiety over using restrooms in public doesn't help matters. Neither does finding that all stalls in one of the bathrooms are weird plastic pod things with seats that are pretty much totally exposed. Even when I finally score a suitable stall--a nice roomy one against the wall--and lock it, somehow another girl barges in right as I'm sitting down. I consider waking up, but decide trying to scrounge up a shirt to use the actual bathroom isn't worth the trouble, and instead head back into the theatre.

Guns

This can't be happening. No. No fucking way.

I hurry out of the car, reaching for my phone, as the man who just shot my father notices me and steps around the vehicle. Black jacket, spiky white hair, he's obviously a punk. A punk with a gun leveled at my head. I manage to get the police on the line and quickly relay the fact that my dad has been shot, but realizing it's going to be several minutes before any help arrives I hastily toss the phone to the tiled ground.

For my dad's sake, I take matters into my own hands.

Dipping behind a triangular structure, I bait the punk, pointing my finger at him like a gun and saying "bang!"--like a damn child. Nothing's happening, so I consider switching to a sword, but decide No, I can make this work. At this point, the punk has fallen for the bait, following after me as I swing around the freestanding obstacle. He's on the other side now, expecting to catch up to me around the corner, but he's also an idiot, so it's only natural he looks so dumbfounded as I seemingly defy gravity and vault over the barrier. As I descend in a long arc, I pull from my Modern Warfare 2 and Halo Archetypes and fire a few rounds from my finger gun, which has taken on the properties of both a Desert Eagle and M6G Pistol. One of the shots connects with his shoulder and I hear that trademark soundclip signaling I've made a hit, but he's still standing.

Running even.

Leaping down, into an atrium.

I leap after him, but he's landed and already taking aim.

He shoots...it's a perfect shot.

I'd be dead to rights, the bullet taking me between the eyes, but this is me we're talking about.

My perception slows as I track the searing lead. Moving at inhuman speeds, I dart my head to the side, avoiding the shot completely. Again, the punk seems surprised. Landing on one foot, I immediately push off towards the walls, dashing and gliding along them whilst unleashing a flurry of bullets. Most find their mark and punk finally goes down...

Later, at the police station, I embrace my father. He's alive and healthy, and I couldn't be more relieved.

Inspired by Samael's return and a slight nudge from Dreamer, I bring you something totally lame! No color coding, no fanciness, no pictures! It's everything you could want from the first...

BARE-BONES ENTRY OF MEDIOCRITY

Escape

I catch wind through the Internet that a bald, psycho, murderface, nut-job is coming to kill me in awful and terrible ways. Acting immediately, I move through my parents' house checking all doors and windows are properly locked. Fortunately, I manage to lock the one unlocked door--leading into the garage--right as I hear the tell-tale grinding of the garage door opening. As the killer on the other side begins grinding away at the handle with some sort of angle grinder, my parents calmly remark "That must be him," and continue watching television. Deciding I'll have none of that, I hurry my fiance downstairs, out the back entrance and into the snow--bare feet and all. I propel us over the fence, and we're off.

Running for our lives.

In the police station, one of the officers goes over my name and remarks I've been making the rounds on the news lately. I tell him, "Yeah, I've noticed." There's a line to get help, but that seems boring, so I leave with my fiance, deciding I'll come back later.

I check my phone and find a subreddit created by the guy trying to kill me. As you'd expect, it's creepy as all fuck, and I'm horrified by some of his past "work" and detailed designs for what he planned for me. As it turns out, my death wasn't part of those designs. Just horrible body "upgrade" procedures straight out of a proper nightmare. Stuff like mechanical tetrachromatic eyes, replaceable intestines, metal plating in place of skin--all installed while I'm conscious mind you.

I decide to go back into the police station.

As I'm rounding the corner, a bunch of bald guys who look just the killer begin walking towards me. Shit. I call out, "Help! Officer!" But no one comes as they swarm around me and...just pass me by?

Con

Watching some mid-level players duke it out in a Super Smash Bros Melee mod I'm unfamiliar with. Lacking my glasses and a controller, I step into the convention-room's hallway. I outstretch my hand, and pull my glasses to me. They shoot from my hotel room and are in my hand in less than a second. Then I do the same for my Gamecube Controller. A few rounds of play later I head out into the convention. Wandering around the hotel, I find myself in a totally separate convention--this one dedicated to board games. Oddly, both conventions are sorely lacking in attendance.

Bored.

Time to explore Vegas...

I fly (hover, really) around Vegas for a bit. There's some gross celebrities getting doted on by hotel staff. Unrelated to that mess is some nonsense about avoiding the pool because I don't actually have a bathing suit because reasons.

Alternate Dimensions

One moment I'm at my parent's place, the next I'm still at my parent's house...but it's moved to the end of the cul-de-sac . I had felt the shift as reality folded in on itself, maybe that's why I'm the only one who seems to know anything is amiss...

Outside now, I check the garage, and there's a canoe in it. We never had a canoe before. A neighbor walks up and nods to the boat, "Perks of alternate dimensions," he says with an approving tone.

I shrug; I don't even like boating that much.