Amurehna

Here I go. =/ Maybe I should have prefaced this with something: This is one of the most awful nightmares I have ever had. The first part seemed normal, and then my subconscious decided to twist it into something disgusting. I'm almost impressed. -.-

We are in a long wide dining hall, the walls and floor are worn wood. There are long tables with plank seating. I'm wearing a billowy

white blouse with khaki riding pants and knee high boots. I am a young women with chin-length dark brown hair. I sit down next to a young man who has short medium brown hair. His features are perfectly shaped, high wide cheek bones, a constantly smiling mouth. I am seventeen, he is eighteen. I am in love with him and sometimes I am certain he knows it, as my best friend he knows me well enough to understand. Sometimes I think that he loves me too but he has always been so careful. A friend of ours named Robert has recently returned home from a long trip comes to sit with us. I don't remember where he went but it had been years since we had last seen him. Adam, the friend I am in love with, gets up to follow Robert. Watching them leave makes me feel a little sad.

"Hey, Deidre, come and look at this." Adam calls. I go to him, smiling. This part is pretty strange. He shows me a man that isn't who he

claims. Adam narrates that it is a golem controlled by magic and enchanted to look like someone we know. Somehow we see straight through it and so we see black eyes set in a bald clay-gray head, slope shouldered, wearing a faded quilted black tunic. As soon as it walks up to us we greet it like it really is the ambassador. It responds with a proper greeting, but follows that with an unintelligible scramble of words.

"See?" Adam says, we all share a secret smile as the golem walks stiffly through the crowd. It was sort of like we were on

stage and that whole scene was an aside to the audience, we ignore It and follow Robert out of the hall like we encountered nothing out of the ordinary.

There is a garden courtyard between wings of the house. It is night and a single wrought iron lamp post stands in the middle over bench on a dais. I find Adam sitting on the bench. He is obviously upset but he won't tell me why. I remind him that we used to play here as children and he nods absently, pretending he is fine.

"Hey, Addy." I say in a consoling tone, "Whatever it is, you can tell me." I drop to my knees next to the bench and slide my arms around his waist, resting my cheek on his thigh.

Here I come back to myself a little and I am no longer Deidre. Holding him is peaceful and familiar. It reminds me of Liam and for a time I put aside the character of Deidre and close my eyes to savor the moment, smiling in contentment. He's wearing a faded black button up and black pants, I notice out of the corner of my eye. I can feel Adam becoming more upset and my understanding of his character overlaps with my interpretation of him as Liam. Adam cannot reciprocate Deidre's feelings for him because he is in love with Robert, and at the same time I can feel Liam as he is trapped in the form of Adam, wanting so badly to reach me but locked in the confines of the dream, so that it is not possible. I want to tell him that it is alright, that I know about Robert, I want to tell him that I know he is not Liam, but that doesn't matter because for now he feels like him.

Adam hesitantly strokes my hair and my dual-nature snaps apart so that I am once again Deidre. I know he is trying to force himself to

feel something for me other than friendship. I sit up and give him a brief hug, I realize then that he's fantastically drunk. I help him stand and we stumble to the far side of the courtyard, by the time we reach the heavy stone threshold he is crying freely. We fall down in a tangle of limbs and he sobs pathetically that I should not help him at all. He ignores my protests to the contrary, telling me that he is in love with someone else.

"Is that someone else Robert?" I ask. That stuns him into silence. It makes me sad that he'll never fall in love with me, but I know he can't help it.

....and then the dream takes an ugly turn.

The dining hall is inside and outside at once, so that the far end has no wall and lacks a ceiling. At the enclosed end in the corner is an

ivory colored couch. We have a female friend over, she's sitting on the back of the couch and I am kneeling on the cushions with the front of my body pressed to the back of the piece. I have something gross on my hands that I get all over the top of the couch, and when I get up I realize I have left a large water stain where my body had previously leaned. A courier arrives with news from our father. ((because, you know, we're siblings, and in case you weren't paying attention that means I'm in love with my brother, who is in love with our older brother...eeeeeee)) It is a letter for us and a small wooden crate filled with nesting fiber. There is a necklace in the envelope, it has two overlapping pendants, a crescent moon and a dagger. Robert hands the necklace to me and I put it on, when I lean over the back of the couch the dagger pricks my chest and I rub at the wound absently.

The courier is not a physical person anymore. Robert is standing nearby reading aloud a letter we have received. The letter explains

what happened to our father, how he went mad then raped and murdered a woman, he says something about the contents of the crate being cursed, and that it will spread to all our family. As he is saying this, I'm holding the necklace away from my skin, looking horrified. Adam though does not believe it. He is to enthralled by the crate to pay attention and neither of us are watching him. He thrusts his hand down into the crate and comes up with a handful of sand and a tiny stone artifact. The effect is immediate. The sclera of his eyes goes black, the irises turn orange/red, like flame. Black growths force their way out his skin along his cheekbones. He holds the artifact up over his head and a mad grin splits his face grotesquely.

"Adam?" I slide off the couch and begin to back away from him. He is too distracted by this new development that he doesn't notice me.

Yet. He stalks around the room, Robert seizes his arm to stop him and becomes cursed just as quickly. I know what they will do to me because of what is in the letter. Never mind that Adam is gay and a day before would not have touched me. It no longer matters because his mind is gone and his body under the control of the rage. I run for the door in the corner that leads out to the deck stairs. He gives my shoulders a shove and I stumble. I feel his fingers slip under a gap in the back of the waist of my pants, he tugs lightly. Almost tentatively. I scramble away but he is still hovering over me.

Spoiler for One of the rape parts, if you would rather skip it.:

Now I have a choice, I have a split second of lucidity and I think "It won't be rape anymore if I stop fighting. I know he isn't Adam anymore, but this is the closest I'll ever be to him, and so what if he beats me to death after? Then I won't care anymore."
I pretend that his hands on my waist don't make me feel sick, the greedy skittering of his fingers on my hips when I unbuckle my belt.
At first it isn't so bad. I don't feel anything one way or another, I just ignore his animal-like grunting and uncomfortable stab as he moves. After a few minutes he becomes wildly violent and I decide I made a mistake, that I really can't endure this, I fight my way to the wall. There is a button there on a touch screen that I can push to stop the simulation. So I do.

I get a do-over. I see Adam pull the figurine from the crate, and his transformation. I immediately dart for the door and make it halfway down the steps before he tackles me straight to the ground. I scream and struggle out from under him, fighting around to the front of the house.
Then there's something about the golem trying to attack us, and me and the others trying to throw flashlights at it, but the things are too heavy and not good for throwing at people. (O.o) The yard we are on is clearly the front yard from the house in MA. Except the grass has a blue tint and the sky looks more like a ceiling painted blue.

Spoiler for Second rape part.:

There's a break. I am out on the yard and the end of it morphs into a wall where there's almost an enclosed pool (I don't know, my dream layouts are weird). The curb is more like the edge to a public pool. We are waiting for help, someone has called the police and fire department. There are people sleeping everywhere, mostly men. They were all naked, and when the curse takes effect they are suddenly all uh...erect. They feel like time bombs to me. That if I wake them they will all be on me and then I will have no hope of surviving. I might get raped, but I am going to live damn it. A chubby young man begins to catch the curse and changes. At first he looks confused and distracted...then he notices me. I make a run for it and he chases me, I vault over the wall at the end of the yard and try to flee to the corner of the pool where the stairs are, but he leaps down with surprising agility and slams me into the wall. My head feels like it is going to split open and and I become disoriented. He flips me over, hands clumsily fumble with my nightgown. He's too heavy to knock off of me. My best bet is to wait until he's...distracted.

I try not to focus on what he's doing, and I try not to laugh at him, because even in the thrall of the curse he is inexperienced and can't

even effectively rape me. His movements are inconsistent, but the slack jawed expression he wears disturbs me. When he shifts his weight for a better angle, briefly freeing my arms, I reach up and slam my palms against his ears. He cries out and falls backward. I stand up and knee him in the face as hard as I can. I can hear people moving around on the other side of the wall, but they are talking so I am certain that they are not cursed men made monsters. I mount the wall and see female police officers everywhere. They are cataloging evidence. The worst part is there are children laying down at the edge of the pool. Some of the more unfortunate ones have lived through the experience. One blond-haired little girl with blood-shot eyes stares at me, too injured to move. The children laying on each side of her are either dead or asleep. Olivia Dunham talks about the signs of assault and rape, pointing to various pieces of evidence before pulling a sheet over piles of battered bodies.

There's a lapse, it is some time in the far future. Because I was one of the first cursed and I am a woman I have lived ages longer than I should have. I'm in a sanctum of sorts, there are priestesses who serve the Cold, they are called Whisper Mothers and Sisters. Their garb is almost like a nuns, except the wimple is shaped differently and their robes are in layers, slashed black over robes with white underneath.
They were responsible for subduing the entity before my father unwittingly unleashed it so many generations ago. It went curiously quiet after the event at the pool, laying in wait for the proper time. Now it has begun again. I hesitate then get the Whisper Mother's attention.

"Mother..."

She continues to pace.

"Mother?"

Distractedly she stops, clutching an elaborate cross that hangs around her neck. It is silver and has a ruby at its center. "Yes, sister?"

"What caused the Emergence?" I ask.
"I don't have time for questions, Lady." She responds.
"Is it true the madness began with a stone artifact?" I ask.

Then she truly looks at me. The servants of the Cold value truth and clarity above all things. They may seem harsh, but they are a product of the world in which they were raised. Her eyes sharpen and she purses her lips in worry.

"Yes. A stone artifact fed by the fire of shame."
"Please, I am only curious if there is a way to stop It from happening again?" I ask.

She paces the width of the sanctum. There is a heavy weathered wood railing and something like a decorative bulkhead bisecting the end of the room. "Truth may be enough to stop it, and the blood of the repentant. So, tell me." Her eyes flick to me, cold with recognition and accusation. "Are you repentant for laying with your brother Adam?"

"I never lay with Adam." I say, dropping my eyes. I suppose that allowing him to rape me counts.
She narrows her eyes at me. "You are a liar, Deidre."
"Yes." I agree, feeling the weight of my shame. "Yes."
"Still, there is something we can accomplish, the others are on their way here."

My view pulls out a little, viewing the scene from overhead. From here I can see the walkway outside, and the great circular stained glass gate where a Whisper Sister waits and an assassin in black and red leather armor is stealthed by the entry way. No one will get by, the Servants of the Cold must be protected.

I see a distortion in the air, a heat wave. A spark and a cruel laughing mouth inside a cooling lava face, horns curling back over its

head. Its flame tongue licks the air. Silent in its passing it steals in through the door, scorches on the wood mark its path across the floor, it slips in like a ghost and alights a touch upon her brow, and when the creature passes she has turned to ashes on the ground. Screams from inside filter out to where I stand, all within have died before they could lift a hand. I can hear the Whisper Mother inside, screaming wild negations and questions, "Why this, why now after all this time?", It has saved her for last.
The sister outside shrieks in a desperate forlorn way when she realizes that all the women inside are dead, the assassin at the door wrestles her away and they flee together.

And so I get a sense of the Flame. A vast, calculating mind that cares for nothing at all, its singular dream is to burn the world to

cinders and scatter the ashes in the wind. It wants only to consume, take, until everything is gone. And it will. It will.

False Awakening: I rise to another layer of sleep and think that I am awake. After all, my boyfriend is playing Skyrim on his computer just like when I fell asleep. He notices I am awake and comes to kneel on the bed. He kisses me but the idea of doing anything like that after a dream about rape is not at all appealing. I tell him to stop and I mention the rape dream, but he keeps touching me anyway not realizing that it is uncomfortable and unpleasant.

Then I really wake up. Thank God.

Fragment 1: Creepy
I'm on the edge of sleep. I feel heavy and the room feels off like there's someone in it with me.
"I hope she isn't here again." I think. So of course when I drift off I see a picture of a girl with chin length dark hair. At the time I didn't think she looked familiar, but she looks a little like Sailor Saturn. ((Completely freakin' random, but whatever. It's less random than strangling a bear and harvesting happy clams from it..)) She's standing in some version of my room, she's got a long-handle mace, it looks like bone and there's an evil grinning face painted on it with blood.
NOPE I think and force myself awake, but begin to drift immediately. When I fall back asleep she isn't there.

Sharks
I'm an eleven year old boy with pale skin and dark hair. I'm in the water with my older brother, he's only a couple of years my senior. We're clinging to some sort of wreckage. The water feels enclosed like a lake, but is behaving like the ocean. I get the feeling it's supposed to be part of a resort but all I ever see is the water. We never intended to be out this far. Something has happened that forced us into the middle of the lake. We look around for other people, over by the side of a boat there's another boy, that one is younger. Seven maybe. I grab at my brother's shoulder as I try to catch my breath.
"Do you see that kid over there?"
"Yeah--"
"We have to help him!"
We see movement in the water and see a dull nose bump the body, searching. It's a shark. It's...nibbling, searching, until it finds one of the boy's feet.
"Adam." I say, my brother just watches, horrified. "ADAM."
"Why are there SHARKS here? Why would they do that?"
I shake my head in frustration and I let go of the wreckage and swim furiously toward the little boy and the shark. Somehow my movement startles the shark and he lets go. I get a hold on him and kick to the surface. Someone leans out of the boat and gestures to me.
"Hand him up!"

There's a lapse and I'm treading water where I rescued the boy. I'd been unconscious. My head hurts. I feel something bump against the small of my back, then my shoulder.
no, no, no I think, trying to right myself so I can figure out what's going on. Teeth start to close around my hand and I jerk my hand free. If I keep moving it won't be able to grab me. A wave smacks me hard, rolling me under the water. I get a terrifying visual of the shark's head and jagged teeth through the hazy water.
Then Adam is there and pulling me to the surface. An old man leans out of the boat and drags me onto the deck before giving Adam a hand. I lay there and quiver violently. There are patches of skin missing where the shark had nibbled at me, and the flesh on my hand is a mess but to my immense relief I can still move my fingers and it doesn't even hurt too much.
"You're lucky, that other boy lost his foot." Adam says.
The old man grimaces and hobbles away. I see that all that remains of his feet are the heel and he's put metal caps over the bones so he can walk. Other people have similar injuries. One woman is missing her whole left arm.

Fragment 2
In a narrow kitchen. Everything looks like a dim yellow. A short, hunch-shoulder Mexican man, hands in his hoodie pockets. At first he looks normal, he casts a frightened look over his shoulder. I approach him. When I get a little closer he drops his head and grins a little. The expression is really unsettling.
I'm tired of being creeped out, I swat his shoulder.
"STOP THAT."
He looks startled, then afraid.
"Sorry." but he can't help it. He does it again and I force myself awake, roll over.

Fragment 3:
Sitting in a booth in a diner. There's someone across from me but I can't remember his face. It was like we were on a date.