Nocturn Core (Abridged)

I was chasing Austin around our parents’ old house in North Carolina. I lost sight of him upstairs, so I started checking hiding places – our bedrooms, closets, under beds and desks… I saw that it was oppressively dark in the hallway bathroom. Where else could he be but in there? I approached the shower curtain to draw it back. I knew what would probably happen, though… I would find some kind of shadow creature instead of Austin because this was a dream. My mind enjoys those kinds of cheap thrills, I thought to myself. I braced myself for the shock and pulled aside the curtain. I heard Austin’s laugh echo all around me. I couldn’t see anything in the shower except a twirling puff of smoke. Right… I walked out of the room.

I was reading something on my computer screen when I realized quite abruptly that I was dreaming. I moved my hands via thought alone. A moment later, everything became fuzzy. I reminded myself that it would come back if I focused and relaxed my thoughts. I got hazy visuals of the computer screen fading back in (I was no longer on the same website), then my dorm room. I was sitting at my computer desk again.

“Increase lucidity!” I shouted inside my head. Surprisingly, this didn’t work. My dream control’s usually pretty good… I tried morphing my bedroom into a lush rainforest full of sights and sounds to engage my senses. It worked! I got about halfway through the transformation before I lost the dream.