dream fragment

I'm working on the prototype for a video game I intend to create with a good friend of mine.
The game will require fast AI pathfinding over dynamic terrain for a large amount ( >1000 ) of enemies.
My current navmesh/A* approach is working fine, but I'm a little worried that it's not going to scale well if we want to add even more enemies.
I remember that one of my friends did her masters thesis on swarm AI,
so I decide to call her on Skype to get her opinion on my situation.
Unfortunately I'm having trouble navigating my contact list.
The names don't seem to be sorted alphabetically...

I hear the door bell go off, so I go downstairs to check who's at the door.
A man in his early 20's offers me a package addressed to "Hyu".
Huh? Did I order anything using my nickname? Why would I do that?
I accept the package and the man just leaves without asking me to sign anything.
What the hell?

I go back upstairs and open the package.
OH MY GOD. It's the Oculus DK2 I ordered!

I am so excited!
I unpack everything as quickly as I can, tossing the empty package into a corner of my room.

Once I've plugged everything in I notice that my computer is now running Elite: Dangerous.
That's not right, I was working with Unity3D before...
hmm....
I try to increase my awareness, going through the last few minutes in my mind.
Yup, I'm definitely dreaming.

I'm so disappointed. I got all excited for nothing.
Then again... I wonder what happens if I...
I sit down and hold the device in front of my eyes, trying to see if the displays in it are showing anything.
The device just straight up vanishes from my hands as soon as the screens cover my entire field of view.
I'm left completely immersed in the game, sitting inside the cockpit of a Sidewinder, which is the ship you start out in in the game.
Huh, that's kind of a neat trick.


Also I'm in a spaceship. Did I mention I'm in a spaceship?
I'm super excited and get going immediately.
Fortunately the controls are identical to the joystick setup I use in waking life, so I have no trouble maneuvering the ship.
I use the lateral thrusters to lift off and to get to the center of the station.
The moment I let go I immediately feel the weightlessness, which makes me feel a little sick initially,
but the feeling quickly subsides.

As I maneuver out of the station, I notice for the first time how tight the entrance actually is.
You don't really get a sense for it on a computer screen.

Unfortunately I don't really remember much else.
I faintly remember feeling the heat of a sun radiating into my cockpit as I dropped out of frameshift, but that's about it.


The experience got me thinking about how virtual reality is going to affect dreams though.
I wonder if it'll make it easier to incubate dreams about video games.
I imagine it could also make such dreams more immersive.
Usually when I have video game dreams, it feels like I'm merely an observer.
I'm not really in the dream, it's more like I'm viewing it on a monitor that happens to cover my entire field of view.
Perhaps this is going to change with regular usage of VR.

I'm a bit disappointed in myself for managing my time so poorly lately.
Somehow I have picked up a really bad habit of procrastinating.
And because of this I end up spending much less time on LD activities than I intend to.
I'm seriously considering to block reddit/youtube like sites for a few days a week...



I find myself on a beach. It is quite late, the sun is going down.
I should probably walk back to the hotel before it gets too dark...
Unfortunately I don't recognize any of the buildings alongside the beach.
Am I lost? How does that even happen?

Realizing that the situation is somewhat out of the ordinary I try to increase my awareness.
However, my thoughts feel scrambled. I am unable to come to a conclusion.
Now what? Am I dreaming or not? This does feel pretty real...
I decide to fall back on a more robust technique, the nose plug RC.

I can breathe normally through my plugged nose. This is a dream.
Wait really? I look at my hands and they seem perfectly normal.
I walk over to the first person I find, which is an elderly man, whom I assume is walking back to his hotel.

"Excuse me."
"Yes?"
"Am I dreaming?"

The man seems rather confused by my question.
In retrospect, that was probably not the most intelligent thing to do.
I decide that the answer to my question should be behind myself.
I turn back towards the ocean.

This is no longer the beach I was on previously on. This is my beach!
I must have changed scenes during the short moment when I was turning.
Sweet!

I try to remember my dream goals, and for once I actually manage to remember them!
My only dream goal at the moment is to "calm the fuck down".

(Lately I often forget to properly stabilize my dreams when I become lucid.
And then to make up for it, I rush through the dreams out of fear that they might end prematurely,
which is of course the worst possible thing to do.)

I slowly walk towards the ocean, taking all the time in the world.
The sound of the water is very relaxing, and I love the contrast between the warm sand and the refreshingly cold ocean breeze.
Eventually I take a few steps into the ocean, getting my feet wet. The water is very cold.

As I look at the stars, I feel a familiar presence.
It's Yuya! This is going to be a great night.

Ever since I found this picture and felt that it reminded me of her,
she's been playing around with hair colors a lot.
Today it's mostly orange and blue.
She can change it simply by shaking her head.
She's smiling at me the way she always does.

"Come out and play?"

At first I find it a little amusing that she phrases her question this way.
But then it reminds me of when I was very young, and I'd go knocking on the neighbours door to ask them to come out and play in the street.
Back then there was nothing to worry about, no important decisions to make.
I'd ask my friends to come out with the sole goal of having a good time.
Perhaps what I initially found a little odd, was after all the perfect way to phrase it.

This starts off a series of DEILDs.
I've written down the fragments I remember.
Unfortunately I don't remember them very well.
The last few moments before I woke up are quite clear, but everything before that is a bit of a blur.

Fragment 1:
I help Yuya prepare dinner at her place.
I'm not of much help though, given that I don't know any of the herbs and spices she has, nor the meat that she wants to prepare.
She is very patient with me, and explains how to prepare everything,
even though she knows that I probably won't remember any of it.
It takes us a good hour to prepare everything.
Liv joins us for dinner. (And there was someone else as well I think.)
Everything tastes absolutely wonderfully.
Later, I help Yuya to do the dishes.
She knows that my dream time is limited, and I can feel that it makes her really happy that I spend it with her,
even if it means doing something as mundane as doing the dishes.

Fragment 2:
In my scribble DJ I wrote "Dance" "Leaf in the wind" and "Happy".
I don't remember anything about this fragment though, and I don't recall taking these notes.

Fragment 3:
We're at a Café, sitting outside, enjoying the good weather and some amazing drinks.

Crow joins us. He felt my presence so he came by to say hi.
Since there's drinks and Yuya and Liv are here, he obviously decides to stay.
He ends up ordering something that isn't on the menu.

They bring us a plate with very small pipettes on it, all containing a small amount of a yellow liquid.
It's quite fun really, you use the pipette to place a single drop of the liquid onto your tongue.
It immediately gives you that cold chill / frisson feeling all over your body.
It also tastes rather sour. Perhaps a little like lemon juice.

Fragment 4:

Crow, Yuya and I are on some sort of airship.
It looks more like an old sail ship though, nothing like an actual airship.
Does fly rather well though, even though I'm sure this violates a few laws of physics.
According to Crow, there are very few of these, and it is very difficult to get a ride on one.
It is quite late and we all sit on the front deck watching the sun go down.
Yuya leans against me because she is really tired.

Crow is telling a very captivating story about love and betrayal.
It is quite an emotional story.
Usually his stories are about himself, and he exaggerates... a lot, I'm pretty sure he even makes stuff up on occasion.
His stories are quite amazing though, I'll give him that. Plus, he's a fantastic story teller.
I don't mind that he does this, we all know that it's for entertainment.
But this time around he claims that it is a fictional story about another person.
And then there's the way he narrates it. It is quite different. More serious, and seemingly less exaggerated.
I'm convinced that this time, he's actually telling a genuine story from his past.
The story eventually comes to an end. (It was a little sad, but I recall that there was a silver lining)

"Say, aren't you supposed to wake up or something? You've been staying for an awfully long time."
"Oh Crow... you're not supposed to remind dreamers about that."
"Why not?"
"Waking up is not something you want to think about."
"Why?"
"It could make you wake up."
"It can?"
"Unfortunately, yeah."
"That is rather inconvenient."
"It is."
"Seriously though, isn't it bad for you to spend entire days asleep so that you can be here?"
"Haha, I appreciate your concern Crow, I really do, but fortunately it doesn't work quite like that."
"I assure you, on the other side I've been asleep for a few hours at most."
"Huh, that is quite fascinating. It is good to know that I don't have to worry then."
"I'll make sure not to mention anything about waking up in the future."
"Thanks mate. I appreciate it."
"Sure... mate."

(There was a joke earlier in the dream about saying "mate", but I cannot quite recall what it was.)

"Anyways, I'm afraid I have to get going. I'm running late."
"Take care."
"So long."

Crow charges forwards and disappears in a cloud of colorful particles.
I think that's the first time I've seen him do that.
The dream is slowly becoming unstable.
I can no longer see beyond the airship.
The airship itself has also become somewhat blurry and desaturated.

Only Yuya I can still see clearly.
She seems to have fallen asleep, resting her head on my shoulder.
I can feel her chest expand against me as she breathes.
Even if it is just for a short moment, perhaps for just a fraction of a second,
it makes me really believe that she is out there somewhere, and not a construct of my own mind.
Sometimes I wish I could entertain this thought for longer, because I find it quite beautiful...

So... I've been planning on posting new entries to my DJ here on DV, but I'm not quite sure where to start.
My dreams are one hell of a mess at the moment, and they're probably not much fun to read.
It seems like many of them are centered around hurting me one way or another.
Usually this is done through Faye, a recurring DC.
They're not nightmares though. Well, at least most of them aren't.
I usually catch those when they start and become lucid, allowing me either change or stop them.

Here's an example of what I'm talking about:

I'm hanging out with some waking-life friends.
We're at V's place, up in his attic, where he has set up a bar and a large couch to relax.
Overall I'm having a good time, but there's something making me somewhat uncomfortable.
There's a woman with us that I don't think I have seen before.
But everyone is acting as if we've all known each other for years.
In fact, at one point, she is telling a story about her and I getting into trouble
when we were on vacation together.

What? I don't remember this woman, and we were supposedly spending out holidays together?
What is going on?

We have a few drinks, discuss some things that I cannot recall, and end up talking about what everyone
is currently doing in their lives. It's mostly a discussion about what our expectations were a few years back,
about what we would be doing now, and how everything actually turned out.
It's my turn, and I walk about making video games, and that I am not quite certain how I am going to transition
from university life to working. I haven't fully decided exactly what I want to do yet, but I do know
roughly which direction I want to go.

The woman I do not know interrupts me, and starts saying hurtful things.
I don't remember exactly how she said it, but she was basically stating that I will never amount to anything.
I am shocked. I do not understand how one of my friends would ever say anything like that.
I have a good relationship with all of my friends, nobody would ever do this.
But for some reason it really hurts. To the point where I actually consider whether or not I am a failure as a person.

Fortunately, I slowly become aware of what is actually happening.
I am dreaming.
This is a dream.

I attempt to look at the facial expression of everyone, to see if they agreed with what the woman said.
But they are all gone. I find myself alone with this woman now.
She looks pleased with herself. She has accomplished what she wanted.

I try to elevate my level of awareness by thinking about my current situation.
There is some improvement. Enough to realize that the woman is Faye.

"Wipe that grin off your face"

I am pissed.
She keeps doing this lately and I absolutely hate it.
I decide to confront her about it.

"Why do you keep doing this?"
"You are doing this to yourself. Remember, I am a part of yourself"

I remember having confronted her before, and she said the exact same thing.
Why is she my dream guide again? Lately her influence on my dreams has been purely negative...



Here's another example, where she attempts to distract me (from lucidity):

I am walking through the city together with a friend of mine.
She's rushing from shop to shop, looking at all the things.
Despite the situation being so hectic, I become lucid.
I also quickly realize that the woman I'm with is Faye.
I immediately decide that I want to leave. There is nothing of interest in this dream scene.

I concentrate, trying to leave the current scene behind and go to Riven instead.
But Faye interrupts me. She grabs my hand and drags me away.
I tell her to leave me alone, but she won't listen.

I feel anger building up inside of myself.
She's done this a few times now, trying to break my lucidity.
And usually she succeeds...

"You're not going anywhere!"

My muscles tense up from anger.
Suddenly the buildings around me begin to collapse, seemingly as a reacting to tensing up my muscles.
It's an odd feeling.
First there is some guilt from destroying the buildings by accident.
But that quickly disappears once I understand that nobody was in these buildings.
After all this is a dream.

Unfortunately Faye is having none of it.
She takes control of the surrounding DC's and makes them yell at me.

"Why did you do this? Why did you kill those people?"

Things like that.
I eventually loose lucidity...


These dreams are quite frustrating.
But I think that I can fix this mess if I manage to reach a high level of lucidity.
By that I mean, if manage to think clearly within a lucid dream, and be aware of this goal,
which is difficult with this level of interference and distraction.
Still, I'm confident that I'll manage to fix it... hopefully soon.

I am really frustrated with my dream recall right now.
I'm not even stressed or anything, which would explain the lack of recall.
Usually when I get adequate sleep, do the occasional wbtb, and try to remember my dreams when I wake up, my dream recall gets pretty decent.
When I'm doing well I often remember 5 or more dreams per night.


Looking at my recent dj notes though:

17.03.2012
No recall.

18.03.2012
No recall.

19.03.2012
No recall.

20.03.2012
No recall.

21.03.2012
No recall.

22.03.2012
In the U.S. walking through a pet shop. I find bearded dragons which I like.
One of them has a really strong green skin color, must be a rare mutation.
I then spot at least 15 pairs of eyes on him. Huh? How weird.

23.03.2012
No recall.

24.03.2012
No recall.

25.03.2012
No recall.

26.03.2012
I hear my father coming into my room to wake me up whilst still dreaming.
I cannot recall the dream though, only that I heard him come in...

Brain, why u no recall dreams? >_<

I wasn't really able to write these down until now, I just had lots of things to do.
I have noticed that my dream recall has been acting a bit weird over the past few days.
I just seem to remember a ton of dreams, though most of them are very vague and fragmented.
My dreams don't seem to be more vivid or any longer though, so I'm not really sure if it's "better".
Nevertheless it feels weird remembering like ~10 different fragments a day.
These are a few interesting ones.



Totm Attempt #1: Butterfly
I WILD during an afternoon nap, trying to complete the Totm.
I'm quite confident that I'll manage to succeed on the first try.

My dream starts on "the beach".
For some reason some of my WILD's randomly seem to start out on this beach.
It always looks the same, and it is always dusk.
I remember the Totm and approach the water in order to walk on it.
This is going to be easy I have done this many times before.

But as I approach the beach I suddenly spot a butterfly.
It is extremely colorful, with very colorful and vivid patterns on its wings.
It's emitting glowing particles.
I follow it, intrigued as to where it is going and completely forget about the Totm.


Totm Attempt #2:
I have another dream of being lost in an unknown hotel.
I become lucid and remember the Totm.
The dream is unstable and I'm not thinking very clearly.
Instead of stabilizing, I start running around aimlessly, attempting to find a water surface.
The dream quickly fades to black and ends.


The hibiscus girl:
I had another dream about the hibiscus girl: Another mysterious woman / Emotional and sensory overload - Dream Journals - Lucid Dreaming - Dream Views
Unfortunately my recall of it is quite bad.

This time we are on the surface of another planet.
She has a red hibiscus attached to her left ear, looking very similar to the one drawn on her bikini last time.
We're having a discussion, I demand to know who she is.
She refuses to tell me though.
It seems clear by now that she is reading my DJ, I'm considering that she might be a DV member.
I make the comment that she has an "unfair advantage" over me, because she's able to read my DJ, yet I know nothing about her.

But she keeps denying my requests, and says that she likes being in control.
I remember that last time she was able to drag me to another place by simply looking into my eyes.
I attempt to do the same thing to her, and manage to drag her to the beach.

This surprises her quite a bit, but it also seems to amuse her.
I say that I never stated that I write everything down in my online DJ, she might be in for a few surprises.
She makes a comment that makes me believe that this is some sort of game to her.
I somehow understand this reasoning though and begin to share it.


Totm Attempt #3:
I decide to attempt the Totm yet again. I'm determined to complete both tasks.
I do it during an afternoon nap yet again since I had some success last time, except that I got distracted.

Surprisingly, I enter the dream on the beach yet again.
This time I decide to stabilize the dream though, and calm my mind.
I rub my hands and slowly approach the sea.
I feel the sand beneath my toes. It's still moderately warm.

For some reason I'm a bit nervous as I start walking on the water surface.
Oddly enough I seem to be afraid to fail, even though I've done it many times before.
Fortunately, it works flawlessly.
I walk on the water, deeper into the sea with my arms stretched out for additional balance.

Alright, so far so good, controlling elements is next.
I look at my right hand and make it catch on fire.
This is quite straightforwards as I have manipulated fire many times before.
But what other element could I possibly manipulate?
Water...? No. That's probably too hard.

I create an arc of lightning between two of my fingers.
I think that I have completed the Totm for a moment, but then realize that lighting isn't exactly one of the 4 elements.
What were the other ones again?
Fire, Water... Earth? I wouldn't know what to do with earth...
Wind it is.

I compress some of the air around me into my right fist and release it forwards.
This creates a shock and air is propelled forwards.
The pressure upsets the water surface.

I'm not really satisfied with the result though.
I do the same thing again, this time compressing much more air.
This time it creates a small tornado, that runs flat over the water surface.
It lifts some of it up and sprays it all over the place.

I'm quite satisfied, and happy that I managed to complete both tasks within a single dream.
I decide to dive into the sea to see if I'll find something interesting, but it doesn't take long until I wake up.


Destiny:
After a long time, I've started having dream fragments of "Destiny" yet again: Recurring dream about a spaceship mission to find extraterrestrial life. - Dream Journals - Lucid Dreaming - Dream Views
None of them drove "the plot" forward though.
I was always on board the Destiny completing a random task.
My memories of the dream fragments are quite vague.

I wake up after about 9 hours of sleep. (weekends ftw)
I remember a mess of short and unstable dream fragments, but none of them seem interesting...
For some reason I feel like if I try to fall back asleep I might have an awesome dream though,
plus I'm not in the mood to get up yet whatsoever.
It doesn't take long until I fall asleep.


I'm at some kind of hotel, searching for my room, but I'm a bit lost.
I wander around hoping to randomly find it. I cannot even seem to recall what it looks like. (This is a recurring dream scenario)
The only way to a new corridor is to walk through a gym shower room which I find a bit odd.
I enter it but accidentally hit a lever on one of the walls.
All the showers turn on at once... oops?
I turn the lever back down but it won't stop... shit.

I start to become confused and slightly scared, why does this not work? Why can't I turn it off?
I try other levers at random, but it just makes things worse.
A few people are starting to notice, and are staring at me from the corridor.
There's that scary sensation you get when a nightmare is about to start...

But this gets me thinking. Lost in a hotel... searching for my room, this is a dream sign!
I RC and sure enough, I'm dreaming.
I casually walk out of the room, not really caring about it or the looks on the DC's faces anymore.
They all look very confused at what they're seeing, except for one girl.
She seems happy, even excited? Like she's about to engage me in conversation?
But she doesn't, and I walk right past her... weird...

... I'm outside of the hotel. I sit down at the last free table to have dinner.
I look at the menu and order something.
Whilst I hand the menu back to the waiter, I see that it was hiding the fact that another person had joined me at the table.
It's the girl I've seen earlier when I was exiting the showers.

"Can I join you?"

Her having seen the shower thing makes me uncomfortable, but there's something about her that intrigues me...

"Sure... I'm Hyu, nice to meet you."

Wait... Hyu? Did I just tell her I'm called Hyu? ...
Oh well, let's just leave it at that.
But then suddenly the realization comes that I was lucid at the end of the shower scene.
I'm still at the same hotel, which means I must still be dreaming.

I look at the girl carefully, trying to find... something out of the ordinary I guess?
But the scene is darkening... shit. Stabilize!
It's too late, the scene vanishes...


... I'm at my hotel room with 3 friends. We want to go out.
I open the door to leave the room but I am greeted by a... grizzly bear?
I casually close the door again, seeing as I must still be dreaming...
A bear? ... Seriously?
My friends are freaking out screaming things like: "It's a bear!!! We're all going to die!!!"
How annoying... I unsummon them with a wave of my hand.
Much better!

The room is quite dark... not good.
I start rubbing my hands, hoping to stabilize the dream, but it's not working.
I rub them more vigorously, but then they nearly catch fire and I burn myself.
What the heck? Well... this is obviously not working.
I try to summon the small phoenix wings on my left arm to teleport myself to Teraluna...
... But all I get are a few sparkles shooting out of my arm, like the wing summoning procedure is sort of broken.
I've had this happen before, I can't teleport if my dreams are unstable...
I don't know what to do and I'm afraid I'm going to loose the dream.

"Booh!"

That startled me. I turn around. It's the same girl yet again.

"Who are you?"

Maybe it's Faye playing another of her pranks?
I probe her aura... nope... there's no way this is Faye.
But it's not the aura of a DC either, it's way too strong and vibrant for that.

She holds out her hand to me.
I feel adventurous and grab it.
I look into her eyes and I am dragged into them...

Suddenly I'm blinded by intense light.
As my vision normalizes I see that I'm in... a rather special room?
It's a very big apartment room, with glass walls.
I must be in a skyscraper considering how high I am.
It's night outside, I can overlook a rather big city.

The room itself is very weird. It's like an insanely huge bath/pool room?
There are pools, everywhere, connected by small waterfalls.
Water is flowing pretty much from everywhere, showers integrated in the walls / ceiling, waterfalls somehow starting at the top of the room.

"You like it?"
"Yeah..."

The girl is now wearing a white bikini with a red flower drawn on it.
She's beautiful... She has brown curly hair and bright white eyes. She's about my age.
I'm still holding her hand and she's dragging me towards one of the smaller waterfalls.
It smells great in here, and that watery breeze is just amazing.
She takes a quick dive under the waterfall and comes back out.
She clearly enjoys the water, you can easily see the passion in her eyes.

"You haven't answered my question..."
"I won't... I thought you had a thing for mysterious women?"
"I do... but that doesn't change the fact that my curiosity is endless. But how would you know that?"
"Hmm... isn't it obvious? I read about it."

Hold on... did she read my DJ? Is she real?
I'm not going to ask her, that would just be awkward, clearly she knows exactly what's going on.

"I'm assuming your name is top secret as well?"
"Haha, it totally is!"

She runs one of her hands up my arm.
Suddenly I get goose bumps. The feeling is EXTREME.
What is this? It feels so insanely good.
I brush over her cheek with two of my fingers and I see arcs of electricity moving between my fingers and her cheek.
It feels so good, and I can clearly see that she's enjoying it was well.
I can hear music playing... something electronic, ambient and calm.

(something a bit like this)


She hugs me and starts running her fingers down my back.
I get a complete sensory overload.
I can feel her fingers with every single skin cell in my back.
I can see every single fiber in the iris of her eyes.
The colors are so strong and vivid that they would burn out my eyes in a split second in waking life.
It's like looking straight into the sun, except you are not blinded.
I can hear every single drop of water in the room, I could pinpoint where exactly each one is, even if I was blind.
I can even hear both of our heartbeats, our breathing, even her hair brushing over her shoulders.

I have no idea what's happening, but I don't care. I'm enjoying this way too much.
I can clearly feel the arcs of lightning everywhere our bodies touch.
I mimic what she's doing and run my fingers down her back.
She shivers with pleasure. It really turns me on.
This is so intense... I can't believe we're doing nothing but touch each other.

She's moving in for a kiss.
I wonder what it's going to feel like...
We're really close now...

But then of course... I wake up... -_-

This was rather overwhelming...

My recall for this night is rather fragmented.


I am in Italy on vacation. For some reason I am trying to rent some kind of special room to hold a big dinner and invite a lot of friends.
Then I remember that I'm on vacation, so my friends are actually far away, but somehow I don't consider this an issue...

... I'm having said dinner, however I'm on some kind of cruise ship.
After the dinner I'm walking through the corridors of the ship, trying to find my room.
Somehow I don't know where my room is at all, but I seem to believe that I'll find it by just randomly walking around anyways...

I wake up and attempt to WILD but I fall asleep too quickly.

I am with other people in an unknown location. There is some sort of meeting.
Why am I here again? It feels like I was drawn to this place by a higher force.
I gradually become moderately lucid.
The people I'm meeting with claim to be dreamers. I must have somehow stumbled into a shared dreaming experiment...

... Some of the people, including myself, have gone on some sort of quest.
We're walking a path which supposedly leads towards our goal, though I have no idea what it is.

There's a guy in armor leading the way.
Then there's a girl who caught my attention because she's wearing a rather revealing outfit.
Another guy is walking with us. He's very talkative and seems to be very interested in me.
He keeps bugging me about Yuya, which I find sort of annoying.
There's two more guys, but I can't remember anything about them.

The girl is trying to show me how she can create ice crystals at will, but the annoying guy is heating up the spot where she tries to create ice crystals
with fire magic every time she attempts to show me.
I find this somewhat amusing.

The guy in armor is acting quite weird.
He has long black curly hair, and has a tendency to come very close to you when he's talking with you, opening his eyes widely.
At one point I tell him:

"You're weirding me the fuck out mate"

He just laughs...

... We reach a tower on top of a cliff and climb all the way up.
Apparently the goal was to come here, I don't really get why.
Everyone but the guy in armor, the girl and me have disappeared by now.

The guy in armor starts swinging his arms around wildly making magical noises and finally vanishes.

"Right... now that was properly weird."
"Yes..."

I look at the landscape. It is very beautiful.

"Hey. Wanna fly?"
"Oh... no. I can't fly."
"What? Bollocks, all dreamers can fly."
"Well maybe, but I can't fly yet."
"Sure you can, it's easy."
"For you maybe..."
"Well listen, with that attitude it's no wonder you have trouble flying."
"..."
"Come here, I'll show you."

We approach the edge of the tower. It's a very long way down from here.

"Now what... don't tell me you want me to jump!"
"Free your mind."
"What?"
"Free your mind!"
"Okay..."
"It's safe... it's all safe"
"Right."

I gently push her off the edge and as she realizes she's going to fall she starts screaming.
Somehow I find this funny. I know she isn't in any real danger.
I jump after her and catch up.

"You fucking asshole!"
"Haha, calm down"
"I HATE FALLING!"
"Then fly?"
"Fuck you!"
"Aww come on. I'm not gonna let you fall all the way down."
"Now what?"
"Fly!"
"HOW?"
"What did I tell you?"
"Free my mind..."

The air surrounding her suddenly becomes turbulent and she starts slowing down.
She's very occupied with slowing down, and we come to a full stop about a meter over a lake.

"See, that wasn't so bad!"
"You could have said something instead of pushing me..."
"Maybe..."

I drop down onto the lake and walk on the water.
That clearly makes her curious and she stops flying assuming she'll be able to walk on the water as well.
But she drops right into the lake, which I find quite funny.
She flies back out and gives me a very accusing look.
I say laughingly:

"What? You asked me how to fly, now how to walk on water!"

I'm properly sick. I have a massive lung infection combined with a cold and some other stuff I won't go into.
This greatly affects my dreams.
My recall is remarkably good though. I suppose this is because I wake up about every 10 minutes because I have to clear my lungs.
My dreams are quite random, they usually combine multiple different scenarios that clearly do not belong together.
Pretty much all my dreams are about my sickness, it is always represented in some rather clear way.
I often return to the same dream after waking up, especially this one:

I'm in a tall building, sort of like a skyscraper.
Somehow I know that this building represents my body.
The building is being infested by some sort of bio-goo with tentacles and other biomass/insect kind of stuff. (think deadspace / alien etc)
Eggs grow in the goo, hatching all sorts of monsters which try to further spread the goo over my body.

I'm not really sure what to do at first, I feel a bit helpless, but then suddenly I realize that I am (the one and only) Duke! (Duke Nukem)
I grab some Devastators (Dual rocket launchers) and start going to town on the monsters in the room I'm currently in.
Whilst doing this I use typical Duke phrases such as "Hail to the king baby" etc.

I quickly realize that there seems to be a near infinite supply of monsters though.
I can't possibly take them on all on my own.

I have double vision at this point. I can see first person, pretty much like in a first person shooter,
but at the same time I can also see the current room in a top down view, much like a real-time strategy game.
I move the top down view all the way to the top floor, trying to find my main base.
I find a (starcraft2) Hatchery with a few mineral patches next to it.
I decide that I should build some Infestors, because they are very cost effective, and since my body is being
infested, I'm obviously pretty low on resources.
(This makes perfect sense, right?)

I control the Infestors from the top down view, casting fungal growth for crowd control and to keep those nasty monsters in place,
whilst at the same time causing havoc in first person with all sorts of guns, but mostly the Devastators.

On each floor, there is some sort of queen, which I have to defeat in order for the infestation to clear on that floor.
The queens look like infested women. (Not like in Duke Nukem... more like Infested Kerrigan in Starcraft, except more infested and less human.)
I spot the queen for this room and fire my Devastators in the approximate direction.
Not exactly precision weaponary.
The smoke trails from the rockets quickly block out most of my vision.
Suddenly, I notice that the queen is now behind me.
What the fuck? can that bitch teleport?

She spits some kind of green liquid onto me, eww!
She's too close to fire rockets at her, so I quickly change to a pump-action shotgun.
(I do this just like in a first person shooter. I move my current weapon to the bottom left, out of my vision,
and when I move my hands back up I'm holding the new weapon.)
I keep shooting straight into her chest, but she doesn't appear to be taking much damage,
even though every time I hit her she has to take a few steps back.

*click* What the fuck? Empty?
The queen slaps me in the face, and I am thrown across the room against a wall.
What is this shit? I have to reload the shotgun?
I'm the fucking Duke! The Duke does not need to reload!
I drop the shotgun, replacing it with double-barreled shotguns. Two of them!
Knowing that I no longer have to reload because... well, I am the Duke, I start shooting relentlessly at the queen saying:

"Eat shit and die!"

After emptying a good 50+ shells into the Queen she finally drops to the ground, with green goo leaking from all sorts of holes.
Meanwhile I've cleaned up most of the monsters with my Infestors, this is working out rather well.

I suddenly hear a voice, as if I was on skype:

"Dude, you micro like a Grand Masters, but your macro is fucking Silver at best."

What is he on about? I change my top down vision back to my hatchery, and notice I'm now completely mined out.

"I'm fucking mined out you idiot, how do you want me to macro? there are no more minerals!"
"Eh, I guess you're fucked then, just remake."
"Remake? Are you fucking stupid? This is my body! I can't just remake!"

What an idiot.
I drag his Skype window into my vision and end the call.
I also set myself to busy, I can't afford distractions right now.

I pet one of my Infestors and we start marching downstairs to the next floor.
As we walk down the stairs I start humming the Duke Nukem theme.
The Infestors seem to enjoy it...


I wake up plenty of times, but I usually fall back asleep very quickly and I end up back in the dream, usually where I left off.
Sometimes I get a bit scared, feeling like this dream is going to turn into a nightmare.
But when that happens I become lucid for a very brief period of time, and I can prevent that from happening.
I never stay lucid for more than one or two seconds though.

Dream recall has been quite bad over the past few days.

Whores & Meditation
I find myself in what I can only describe as a whore house.
I quickly realize that this is a scene from Game of Thrones and become lucid.
Even though I decide to go to Teraluna, having naked whores dancing around me is somewhat distracting.
I start thinking about how they probably wouldn't look as hot if this really was the middle ages and not some sort of fantasy world.
I contemplate staying and having some fun, but I know I would regret it afterwards, so I teleport to Teraluna...

... Yuya and I are meditating outdoors.
I try to get back into a similar state as last time: Spirit World - Life - Dream Journals - Dreamviews Lucid Dreaming Community & Resource
Unfortunately I can't get into the same state though, but I am able to hover out of my dream body and float around in proximity of my body.

Starcraft 2 - MLG
I'm at MLG Columbus, playing sc2.
I brought my "Das Keyboard" and the rather loud clicking noise it makes seems to slightly piss the guy playing next to me off.
Why isn't he using headphones anyways? It's stupid to play without hearing game sounds, what if someone nukes / nyduses him?
I play alright, but sometimes notice that the laws of the game are broken (I have both Zerg and Protoss units, some games are 1v2)
There's a group of people standing right behind me watching me play which is somewhat unnerving.

Vampires
A friend takes me to a mansion. There is some sort of higher purpose for coming here, but I don't know what it is.
I'm also somewhat aware that I am not entirely human, though I'm not entirely sure what I am.
As we enter the place I immediately notice that everyone is wearing goth / dark clothing.
I on the other hand am wearing white pants and a white shirt.
Great, guess who's not standing out at all?
I'm getting a few weird looks, and my friend starts talking to the person who seems to be in charge.
I look around and see some people feasting on humans. They are Vampires! We're in a vampire mansion! Holy shit!
For some reason it doesn't make me feel too uncomfortable though, I feel like I knew vampires exist.
We get a tour of the house... everything looks a bit Victorian era like.
I am offered a human to feast upon. I can't remember whether I'm a vampire or not, so I decline.
It seems like they only asked me as a joke anyways. Yeah, I'm definitely not a vampire!

non dream - lucid - non lucid

Ugh, what a busy week. I remember a lot of dreams, but for some messed up reason most of the good ones were on days
where I had to leave my house immediately after waking up, preventing me from writing them down properly.
This is what I remember from these dreams:


Destiny
I'm on board the Destiny, getting quite excited.
We're close to our destination, just one day to go.
My co-pilot aka first officer enters the cockpit.
We exchange looks and I feel quite weird.
I think we had sex earlier today. We've both been in this spacecraft for over 2 weeks,
so the sexual tension was strong in both of us and it must have just happened.
I remember that we decided that no-one should have sex during the mission to avoid potential issues within the team.
I feel bad for breaking a rule I was originally in favor of, but I'm pretty sure we're not the only ones who have done so.


Training with Liv
I'm on Teraluna teaching Liv how to fight more effectively with the help of Yuya and Faye.
Liv is stronger than I originally thought, but she's clearly nowhere close to Yuya or myself.
Liv's main problem is that she isn't very confident in her own abilities, and somewhat shy to use some of them.
Some of her abilities require her to dance in what I can only describe as a "sexy way".
This seems to be very uncomfortable for her.


What is a Dream Guide?
I'm hanging out with Faye. I'm having a rather interesting conversation with her about Dream Guides.
She's saying many quite complex things, but the basics I can gather is that according to her,
a Dream Guide is someone who's main role it is to help me achieve goals in my dreams.
She also explains that she is very different from Yuya.
She is mostly a projection of my subconscious and a little bit of something else.


Ice cream with Yuya
I'm on Teraluna with Yuya, at some kind of ice cream bar I guess.
I order the biggest chocolate sundae they have, and it is huge. o_o
It's served in a glass bowl shaped like a blossom.
We're sharing it, but I have no idea how we're supposed to finish this.

I eat too fast, like I always do, and get a massive brain freeze.
I am amazed that I am able to experience this pain so powerfully in the dream, so I deliberately resume eating too fast.
I get another brain freeze and say "Amazing!"
Yuya laughs and tells me that I am absolutely insane.
I say "I never claimed otherwise"


Oracle
I am in the past, in Greece I think, in some sort of temple.
Some women dressed in white tunics escort me through the temple to a surreal looking room.
There's a crack in the floor with colorful fumes streaming out of it.
I sit in my designated spot noticing that I am a women myself.
I become semi-lucid and call out to Faye asking her for help.
She appears disguised in a similar Tunic and tells me that I am an Oracle, and I need to help someone take an important decision.
I tell her I don't know how to do that, but she insists it's ok, because the fumes in this room will cause me to get high, which will help.
I indeed start to get quite high.

A women enters the room, with an extremely fancy dress. She must be very important.
She asks me something and I give an answer that feels right, but doesn't make any sense whatsoever to me, and sounds completely out of context.
For some reason she knows exactly what to do now though and leaves happily.
Then I get distracted by my own boobs and start fondling them. *cough*


False awakening
I get up, go to the bathroom, brush my teeth etc.
After getting dressed I get into my car, drive to university, and get stuck in a traffic jam on my way there for maybe half an hour...
I end up at university and hold a lecture for about an hour until I notice that something is off.
I wonder if I might be dreaming and think back and am easily capable of retracing my steps.
Nope, must be awake.
Then I notice Faye is sitting in my classroom.
I say "You've got to be fucking kidding me", realizing that I just had an insanely long FA.
Some students laugh at me. I'm pissed, and I ask Faye if I just got trolled by my own subconscious.

This was quite an intense night.
I had 3 non-lucid dreams prior to this.
Unfortunately those were followed by a FA in whom I took notes in my DJ and went back to sleep.
I can't remember any specifics about them.

Then I had these 2 dreams and took notes in my DJ again.
When I woke up I checked my notes to see if this was a FA as well. The page in my DJ was blank and I was pissed.
It turns out I must have flipped the page after taking notes though, because when I got home from uni,
I was quite happy to find I actually did take the notes when I flipped one page back.

I am hovering over some clouds. Cool, I'm dreaming again!
I try to land on the cloud below me which works.
I look around trying to spot something interesting whilst yelling out to see if someone is there.
Then I spot some kind of structure to my left and approach it.
It seems like someone build a few wooden houses ontop of these clouds.
A person approaches me and says hi.
He introduces me to two of his friends, once of them is named Kiwi.

"Kiwi is a cool name, I like it!"

The other person jumps ontop of me and makes spider noises (like the ones in minecraft).

"I'm a minecraft spider!"
"That's... great I guess?"

I am now with Kiwi on top of his wooden house.
He points into a direction and mumbles something about a city.

"Do you want to fight?"
"Huh?"
"A friendly fight, just for fun."
"Are you a dreamer?"
...
"What are you doing here anyways?"
"I started out here."
"I see."

He looks at me.

"Laters."

and disappears. That was weird.
My vision fades. I decide to focus on not moving and wait it out.


I wake up but manage not to move and even keep my eyes closed.
Nice! I'm confident I'll enter another LD within a few seconds.


I'm back in the clouds, but everything from my previous dream is gone.
There are no more structures and no more people.
I hover around a bit, rubbing my hands against eachother, and suddenly I think clearly.
What the hell am I doing hovering around? I should make use of this DEILD!
I summon my wings, which I decide to call phoenix wings from now on and lock onto Yuya's aura.

I feel like she's not on Teraluna so I try to communicate with her using my thoughts.
For some reason I feel like it would be rude to just teleport to her when she isn't home.

"Yuya? Can you hear me?"
"Yes!"
"Can I visit you?"
"Of course! ... Actually... wait!"

I guess I'll just wait.
Can I wait in a dream? just like that?
I notice an air pocket next to me that seems distorted.
It looks like half of a bubble.
Is that a portal...?

Right as I try to investigate it, the bubble bursts and Yuya falls out of it, straight into my direction.
I catch her mid-air.
She starts laughing. I can feel that she feels a bit stupid for falling out of a portal like that even though
she is very experienced with portals.

Her hair is brushing against my body. She's so beautiful.
She looks into my eyes... endless blue...
I suddenly realize I'm still holding her... awkward...
I gently let her go. She is amused that I feel awkward about stuff like this.

Yuya looks around.

"How did you get here?"
"Uuh, my last dream started here I guess. Where are we?"
"On the frontier of the Dream Plane... I've never been here."
"I met a person called Kiwi before, I think he might be a dreamer."
"Maybe..."
"You're forgetting something!"
"I am?"

Right! KristaNicole!

"She's looking for a Dream Guide. Do you think we can help her find one?"
"Hmm, I'm not sure, but it's worth a try."
"Let's go meet her!"

I notice I still have my wings summoned.
I hold my left hand out and close my eyes.

"How do I find her aura?"
"How have you found mine?"
"Uuh..."
"Just think about her, how you feel when you think about her. That's what her aura will feel like."

I search through the void, or maybe the dream plane, I'm not really sure where I'm searching when I do this.
I think of KristaNicole's Forum Avatar, about the first DJ entries that pop into my head.
It takes a few seconds, I notice we're really far out.
Then suddenly I find her. I'm sure it's her.
For some reason I'm really calm. Last time I tried sharing a dream I was extremely nervous and it caused a lot of problems.

Yuya holds onto me. Off we go!
We step through the fabric of space...

(I can only barely remember the next fragment)

... I'm on a road I think?
... Something is happening around me.
I spot KristaNicole walking past us. Can she see me?
... I approach her to say hi.
I wonder whether I should call her Krista or Nicole...

non dream - lucid - non lucid

I've had a lot of dream fragments related to this lately.
I dream them completely out of order, but they clearly belong together.
They're all non-lucid and play a few years in the future.
This is a try to connect them and fit them into chronological order, now that I feel I have enough fragments for everything to make sense.

• Working for NASA
  I own a company specializing in all kinds of modern computer toys.
  We mostly develop futuristic user interface hardware, but recently we've gotten into the development of air plane cockpits.
  Most companies want more modern hardware than what is currently used.
  It's not like our stuff is insanely more user friendly, but it looks much more futuristic and it isn't really more expensive than the traditional stuff.
  
  NASA hired us to design all user interface devices on a new experimental spacecraft.
  It's supposed to achieve high speeds using a small nuclear reactor powering experimental Magnetoplasmadynamic thrusters.
  This would allow traveling to close planets such as Mars in much more reasonable time frames.
  We're supposed to design everything in the cockpit, and all other interfaces all over the ship.
  We're also in charge of creating a simulator where pilots can train flying the spacecraft and to figure out what the most user friendly control to operate this thing are.
  
  NASA doesn't agree with some of my ideas. They prefer designs where the pilot has little control over the spacecraft for some reason.
  I don't understand this and most of my designs feature direct user input, such as a joystick to freely maneuver the ship.
  
  Although I'm not working for NASA directly, I still get to play with their stuff and I spend many hours in the simulator I'm designing.
  After some time we get the bad news.
  The government has canceled all funding for NASA, so the project is scrapped.
  This doesn't directly affect us since we get paid on a monthly basis, not on project success.
  I feel very sad though, I never understood why most people lost interest in space exploration after the first few Apollo missions, and now
  they're scrapping the whole program.
  ______
• Back to Europe
  I get a very interesting phone call from a company in Europe.
  They specialize in the development of nuclear fusion.
  The technology is solid, and produces clean renewable energy at an extremely efficient rate.
  However for some reason there exists nearly zero funding for this.
  I'm not sure if this is because it gets grouped in the "nuclear energy" category by the media and politics, which is stupid,
  or if there is some sort of conspiracy going on.
  The energy is clean, and the reaction doesn't produce hazardous radiation or any other dangerous by-product.
  
  Anyways, they want us to design the whole reactor controls and everything.
  They want a super futuristic look to help them finally convince the media that this is indeed the future of energy generation.
  This comes in handy because I was planning to move the company to Europe all along.
  The US military is pressuring me to work on fighter jets and similar things all the time, and it makes me very uncomfortable.
  
  After relocating to Switzerland I am working with said company on their reactor.
  They finally got the permission to build it. I also work on a supersonic airplane project.
  I enjoy working with everyone, they are not as secretive as the guys in America.
  They like explaining how all their stuff works and I get an immense insight into fusion reactions and supersonic airplane designs.
  ______
• Taking things into my own hands
  The fusion reactor is a huge success. Some people are still skeptic, but most governments are buying the green and renewable energy.
  I make a ridiculous amount of money on this project and also quite a bit on the supersonic airplane.
  I talk to the guys responsible for the airplane a lot because they also work for the ESA.
  I ask them how reasonable it would be to put a small fusion reactor onto a spaceship to power Magnetoplasmadynamic thrusters.
  They confirm that it would be much more reasonable than a nuclear reactor, and would save an insane amount of weight because you don't need
  the very heavy contamination to protect the crew from radiation.
  
  I tell him jokingly that I worked for NASA before and still have all the computer, simulator and user interface designs, we should get some sort of
  new project going.
  A few days later he comes into my office and acts quite secretive.
  He asks me if I was serious about those designs.
  I tell him we never officially sold them to NASA, so I still own all of them.
  He says I absolutely need to come to some sort of ESA meeting.
  
  I have to sign the biggest NDA I have seen in my entire life to enter the ESA meeting.
  It's over 200 pages long, I jokingly say that signing this feels like selling my soul.
  In the meeting I learn that the ESA isn't messing about.
  They have developed a technology that allows traveling faster than light, or rather work around the problems associated with approaching the speed of light.
  It's very technical and I don't understand most of it.
  It involves forming a bubble around the ship, it reminds me of Star Trek.
  
  Finally most people besides some company heads and ESA directors leave.
  I am requested to stay in the room.
  More technology is presented, and it is clear that the presentation is going towards a space ship project.
  It all sounds oddly reasonable, even though most involved technologies are somewhat experimental.
  
  The final problem that is mentioned is financing, ESA does not receive enough of it for a project of this magnitude.
  They want to do some small tests with drones followed by a manned mission into another solar system, using the FTL drive.
  I say that given my recent acquirements I'd be willing to develop all computer systems for free and even invest some money into the mission.
  A few more company heads follow this movement...
  ______
• FTL
  I am now working full time at a special facility used for this mission alone.
  It is absolutely huge.
  We launch the first FTL testing drone into space.
  I am sitting in mission control overlooking most of the technical systems.
  The drone is ready to test the FTL system.
  Everyone in mission control is extremely excited as we wait for the FTL countdown to run out.
  As the drone accelerates, our information becomes more and more delayed as it approaches the speed of light.
  All connections are quickly lost.
  But this was to be expected, we don't have technology to transmit information faster than light.
  The drone is supposed to fly ~1 light day within a few minutes, then stop and transmit a signal.
  If we have a position signal tomorrow we know it worked.
  ______
• Hyperdrive
  We've tested 3 drones now, each one with a better FTL system. The 3rd one worked absolutely flawlessly.
  The engineers have dubbed the system "Warp Drive".
  I have adopted this into the user interface for the spacecraft.
  The director is complaining about it, he says Warp Drive would be very appropriate due to the connection to Star Trek.
  I suggest calling it Hyperdrive instead. He seems pleased with that.
  ______
• Destiny
  All details of the project are clear now, and the ship is being built inside our facility.
  It uses a small but very powerful fusion reactor to power a new form of Magnetoplasmadynamic thrusters.
  It can generate an artificial gravity field, making life on board much easier, and enabling us to cancel out the extreme acceleration forces of the engine.
  Without this the passengers would be crushed by the g-forces during acceleration.
  It is also capable of atmospheric flight. It will fly into space by itself.
  This is actually necessary because it is way too big and heavy for a payload delivery system.
  It is also very solid, with a thick hull. This ship is not build around value for money.
  It looks very different than anything else we've send into space so far, compared to it everything looks extremely fragile.
  ESA plans a crew of 8 people for this mission.
  
  We're discussing the name of the ship.
  Someone suggests calling it "Ikarus", something about challenging destiny.
  I ask why not call it "Destiny" then? "Ikarus" has a bit of a negative vibe.
  ______
• Pilot
  I am playing around in the simulator.
  I often go into the simulator claiming to test stuff, but I'm actually picturing myself being a pilot on the mission.
  I bet everyone knows about it, but I don't care, it's way too much fun. I'm also quite good at it.
  
  The director intercepts me as I leave the simulator. He says we need to talk.
  We talk about how I know every detail about the ship, how I designed most of it.
  Then he says I have by far the best simulator scores, which surprises me a bit.
  He suddenly acts extremely serious.
  
  He offers me the position of captain on the mission, he wants me to fly the Destiny.
  My mind is blown, I immediately reply with "Yes!"
  He asks me if I'm sure, if I don't need to consider the risks.
  I tell him that this is absolutely not necessary, my decision is final and there isn't a doubt on my mind.
  ______
• Trouble
  The Destiny is nearing completion.
  All vital systems are installed, it's basically just missing the outer hull.
  But there is trouble. Some governments are voicing concern.
  The media throws some unreasonable accusations at us, that going faster than light might end the universe and whatnot.
  Telling them that we've already done it 3 times and the universe still exists does not calm them.
  I'm on some TV show defending against other random accusations, explaining why they make so sense.
  ______
• The Signal
  The director informs me that they have received a signal a few years ago, from an unknown source flying by earth.
  He shows me the data... it doesn't make any sense.
  According to the positioning of the source of the data it must have moved faster than light.
  It was broadcasting a specific position nonstop.
  The director tells me that it is assumed the signal was of alien origin.
  I finally understand why some governments are concerned with the mission, we are going to the location broadcasted by this most likely alien object.
  ______
• Lying
  Destiny is ready, so is the crew. The official launch is in 2 months, however we are actually going to launch in 2 days.
  I understand how governments are afraid of a mission that could potentially make contact with another species, but
  I really want to do this, and so does everyone else on the project.
  By faking a late launch date, and claiming that the construction of the Destiny isn't finished yet, we try to avoid the inevitable shutdown by the governments.
  ______
• Launch
  Launching the Destiny is incredibly easy.
  You just open the hangars of the construction facility and fly it out to space.
  This is why we were able to keep the launch date a secret until now.
  We haven't received any official "no-go" from any government, so technically launching isn't entirely illegal.
  We are going to get into trouble though, that much is clear.
  
  I'm sitting in the Destiny with my crew.
  I am the main Pilot, Nicole is my Co-Pilot. She had very good simulator scores and is a trained astronaut.
  She's never been to space though.
  There is an engineer on the crew to maintain the thrusters.
  The 5 remaining people are 4 scientists and a language/culture specialist.
  
  The hangar doors are open, everyone pointing a camera at the facility can now see that the construction is finished.
  We are fully fueled, ready to go, just waiting for the signal from mission command.
  The hangar is right at the end of a very long runway, so we can just roll out and launch.
  
  I'm very nervous when I get the signal to launch. Thankfully the process is entirely automated.
  We're slowly rolling out, after about 100m the MPDT engage.
  They are absolutely brutal, you can really feel how much power those things have even though they're operating below 0.1% of their capacity right now.
  They need to be though, the Destiny weights over 400 tons with fuel.
  I am really nervous as the Destiny finally takes off. It's not like I'm worried that something would go wrong, it's just the excitement.
  The ship climbs at a progressively faster rate and the thrusters become stronger and stronger.
  
  The beauty of starting to see the stars during the middle of the day calms me down though.
  I verify if everything is in order. Everything is perfect.
  We enter orbit and bring the ship into the correct position for the acceleration maneuver for FTL.
  ______
• Decision
  We're in orbit and in position.
  We have a video conversation open with mission control.
  They have just been told that we have to cancel the launch.
  We are ordered to come back down immediately. He obviously isn't pleased to announce this.
  Some official government type figure is with him demanding to comply immediately.
  They have voted a few minutes ago that the project is too dangerous... right...
  The mission director tells me to "try to cancel the acceleration maneuver".
  
  It is very clear what he's doing. The acceleration maneuver hasn't begun yet.
  He gives us the opportunity to say we cannot cancel it and continue on with the mission.
  I block communications and ask the rest of the crew if we should just go for it.
  Everyone agrees that we should.
  
  I enable the coms and tell the director that I am terribly sorry, but it is too late to cancel the acceleration sequence.
  The gov. guy gets really angry and demands that mission control remotely cancels the sequence.
  The director explains that this is impossible.
  Due to the nature of the mission, remote control would make no sense because we're out of reach most of the time anyways.
  The gov. guy is furious but accepts that he can't do anything.
  
  I activate the acceleration sequence. It is quite dramatic.
  Even though the artificial gravity field compensates most of the vibrations and the acceleration forces, it still feels extreme.
  We're being shaken violently and even though the ship indicates we are experiencing 3g of acceleration, it feels like much more, but it doesn't hurt the way more g's would.
  The acceleration maneuver lasts multiple hours. It is extremely tiring feeling such forces for so long.
  Finally, as we reach our wanted speed, the engines quiet down and the vibrations stop.
  We are now cruising about at many times the speed of light; the ship feels perfectly stable.
  Without looking outside you wouldn't be able to tell that we are racing at a mind-boggling speed.
  The outside looks very beautiful. The vision is distorted but very colorful.
  You just hear the gentle humming of the fusion reactor and the MPDT's working at very low power.
  We will arrive at our destination within approximately 2 weeks.
  Everyone is happy that everything worked out so far, and that we managed to actually pull it off.
  ______
• Travel
  I have had multiple dreams about the next 2 weeks.
  I'm either piloting the ship, which is basically just staring at instruments or doing some maintenance work on some ship components.
  So far everything is working fine, a few hiccups in diagnostics but that's about it.
  Nicole and I take shifts staring at instruments, even though if something goes wrong navigation wise, there's nothing we can do.
  You can't exactly make a course correction going many times the speed of light.
  I'm trying not to think about what would happen if the hyperdrive fails. The truth is no one knows, but it most likely wouldn't end well.
  We're all wondering what waits for us at the rendezvous point, or if there is anything at all.
  I think I'm the only one fully expecting something or someone to wait for us at the rendezvous point.
  I'm convinced that signal a few years ago was form an alien probe designed to catch the attention of species capable of FTL travel.
  
  I'm usually just sitting in my seat staring at what seems to be stars rushing by, wondering what's going to happen next.
  I occasionally glimpse at the instruments. They always display that everything is alright and that we're on the correct course.
  It's oddly boring, but the excitement of what waits for us keeps me entertained.
  I sometimes wonder what's currently happening back home.

non dream - lucid - non lucid

What the hell? O_o
I have no idea what was going on last night, I didn't take any dream related vitamins / supplements or anything. (I never have)
I did have a few drinks, but I can't remember this ever having an effect like this.
I can recall so many dreams and most of them were very vivid.
These are the non-lucid ones, I'll post the lucid ones later.

1. Minecraft
   I'm in minecraft. My vision is the same as what you see on your screen while playing it.
   I've built a huge castle and I'm currently fiddling about with some double doors.
   I want stone doors which I can only open with redstone, so I need to create a hidden
   underground circuit with pressure plates. I have trouble figuring out how to invert one circuit
   but not the other one, without getting them to touch.
   
2. Climbing the Tower
   
   I must make it to the top of the tower as quickly as possible.
   The antenna on the top of the tower needs to be replaced with a subspace transceiver.
   An alien ship is in orbit trying to send us the cure for all sicknesses in existence and this is the only way to go about it.
   There is some conspiracy going on where the governments don't want us to know about it.
   
3. Air Gear
   I haven't read Air Gear for ages...
   It's the middle of the night, I'm sitting in front of my house.
   I'm holding inline skates in my hands, I'm about to put them on.
   They only have 2 wheels each, with an engine installed between them and disc brakes inside the wheels.
   The words "Air Gear" are engraved into them next to a wing symbol.
   I put them on and start riding towards the main road...
   ... I'm at the top of a mountain, on an awesome road leading all the way down.
   There are other people wearing "Air Gear". We're going to race down.
   The race is immensely fast paced, the engines are powerful and the brakes are strong.
   Taking shortcuts by jumping over cliffs is thrilling and the short time you are "flying" feels absolutely awesome.
   
4. Spaceship
   It's the future. I'm in the search and rescue business.
   We just got a distress call from some mining ship in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter.
   I'm entering the cockpit of "my" spaceship, which is currently docked at the second international space station. (The ship is about twice the size of a nasa space shuttle)
   
   
   I know what all of the buttons do, even though there's a lot of them.
   I power the main reactor, start the heating sequence for the engines and start a routine pre-flight check whilst verifying the coordinates of the distress call.
   I'm joined by a women, my co-pilot. She says she's sorry for taking so long, puts on her seat-belts and powers up her consoles.
   I tell her it's no problem, we need to wait for the system check anyways.
   After it completes I request permission to dock off, which is immediately given.
   I use directional thrusters to move the ship a few meters away from the station before powering the main engines.
   After accelerating towards our destination I activate the FTL drive console and enter the coordinates.
   I ask my co-pilot if she's ready for FTL. She presses herself into the seat and confirms that she's ready.
   I press myself all the way back as well and hit the FTL leaver.
   The g-forces pushing me into the seat are barely bearable...
   
5. Vampire
   I'm at university, leaving my classroom.
   I'm heading through the corridor and A. a classmate from last year is following me.
   She's following me because I'm luring her towards me with my powers.
   I enter a currently unoccupied room, after a few seconds she enters as well.
   I close the door and lock it.
   I approach her, she's moving backwards until she hits a wall.
   She comes to her senses and asks me what I am doing.
   The urge for blood takes over and I bite her in the neck... I'm a vampire!
   Some blood spills out and messes up her white shirt.
   She moans and shivers in pleasure... what the hell am I doing?

non dream - lucid - non lucid

I’m playing golf with a famous person for some reason.
It’s the first time I play golf, but I’m ridiculously skilled at it and win easily…

(false memories, never seen the place nor the women)
… I’m back “home”.
I live with my girlfriend in a rather weird house. We cuddle on our bed a bit but suddenly remember that we forgot to get something important from the city…

… We’re in the city now, riding on a train. The train starts braking for no reason. We look outside and see missiles falling from the sky.
We’re scared; it appears a war has just started. Explosions start going off everywhere, one missile hits our track right in front of the train and it starts derailing.
We quickly open our window and jump out before the train falls into the hole left by the missile.
I look up. So this is what the end of the world looks like. The sky is red from all the explosions and fire. Missiles everywhere and fighter jets shooting each other and falling off the sky burning.
We run into the city, trying to make it into the subway system, hoping that we may be safe there. (I've never lived close to a big city or a place with a subway)
As we run through the city, some skyscrapers start falling over and a fighter jet crashes right in front of us. The heat of the explosion hurts and forces us to run into a building.
We leave it on the other side, but another jet crashes straight through the street right in front of us.
We’re both on the very edge of the hole left by the plane,starting to fall in.
I turn myself around and push my girlfriend back up and she barely manages not to fall into the hole… but I do…

… I wake up in some sort of futuristic hospital. There are two nurses attending to me, both wearing something that resembles a hooters outfit more than that of a nurse…

… I’m being told it’s the year 2046. After my fall I was in stasis because they couldn’t fix me up with the current technology.
What I witnessed was the beginning of world war 3. The newly elected president of America was a fanatic Christian and ordered all non-Christians including all Atheists to be killed all over the world.
Now, over 30 years later, everyone is at peace and religious disputes no longer exist, the governments are transparent and censorship no longer exists.
But we’ve paid the price, the current world population is only approaching 1 billion at the moment…

…I’m being interviewed... they ask me about the golf game which confuses me because I don't think it's important.
Next I am asked what my plans are now, considering that all of my knowledge is outdated, yet I haven't aged a bit. I’ll probably have to learn a new job.
I ask the interviewer what the current situation with space exploration is, because I've seen a recruitment poster somewhere.
He says they recently discovered ways to create FTL drives, and an exploration project will start any moment now, they’re actually searching for peoples willing to be trained for space travel.
I tell him that I’ll try to join the program then, in hopes of becoming a pilot…

non dream - lucid - non lucid

I set myself a WBTB alarm to go off after 6 hours of sleep before going to bed.
I have also started reading "Exploring the world of lucid dreaming".
I remembered a lot of dreams this night, but none of them were very vivid, and my recall wasn't very good either.

1. False Awakening (before the WBTB alarm)
   I wake up, my mobile is ringing. I turn the alarm off thinking it's the WBTB alarm I set earlier and decide to try one of those mp3’s which help you become lucid.
   However, my headphones are stuck behind the mattress, I can't get them out...
   -
2. (This is after the real WBTB alarm)
   I can’t seem to fall asleep after the WBTB. (I'm actually already dreaming at this point)
   I touch my shorts while turning around. Wait… I never wear shorts in bed. I RC.
   Cool, I quickly get up, but realize the dream is unstable and a mess.
   I try spinning to fix it, which partially solves the problem.
   I jump downstairs, go to a window, and push myself through it without opening it and fly away… not very far though.
   There’s a girl at my neighbors house waving to me. I land next to her…
   -
3. Fragmented
   I’m in high school. I realize I don’t belong here, but I only become half lucid for some reason. I get the urge to investigate my surroundings, but I don’t understand that I am dreaming.
   We leave our classroom. Everyone goes right, a single girl goes left.
   I follow the girl (obviously, right? *cough*)
   We get to the chemistry lab. It requires a retinal scan to open it up. She provides it and we get in. There’s a teacher and another student inside…
   
   … The girl hands me a “potion of power”.
   I’m intrigued and drink it in a single go. It heats my body up quite a bit, I feel really strong…
   
   … The potion had some adverse effects, there’s something growing on my belly…
   -
4. (This was clearly the most vivid one)
   I follow a very athletic girl in 3rd person view.
   She’s a rather sexy treasure hunter. (think Tomb Raider)
   She’s at a sea, diving down very deep without any scuba gear.
   Having dived before, I realize this is physically impossible, but I don’t become lucid.
   She enters an underwater temple from the bottom. She accelerates upwards, jumps out of the water, to grab onto a thick cord about 4 meters above the water surface.
   Impressive!
   There are more cords all over the room.
   She starts jumping from cord to cord. She is incredibly skilled.
   She’s wearing some sort of climbing aid, a belt with a hook, which she can use to secure herself on some of the cords, but she rarely uses it.
   She suddenly turns towards me as she reaches the highest cord.
   She looks me right in the eyes.
   I no longer feel like I’m observing her like a game character, I now feel like I’m floating next to her.
   She takes a red slightly transparent yoyo out of a pocket and hands it to me.
   
   “For you!”
   I take it.
   “Thank you!”
   The dream ends.
   -
5. False Awakening
   I immediately realize I'm dreaming and go to my window to jump out.
   I’m being attacked by an oversized (human size) parrot. WTF?
   I start kicking him to go away. Suddenly I become aware that I can use much stronger powers than kicking. But I don’t want to kill him, so I quickly draw a portal as he approaches.
   He flies into the portal and disappears. I have no idea where I just sent him, I find this quite amusing.
   -
6. False Awakening
   I wake up again. I remember to RC every time I wake up.
   Ha, still dreaming.
   I walk out of my room; my mother is in the next room. I don’t like having my parents in my dreams, I unsummon her...
   -
7. False Awakening
   I wake up again and succeed with another RC.
   This time another girl is in the room. She’s wearing a very sexy black dress. I go say hi, ask her why she’s in my house. She can’t remember.
   I ask her name, she doesn't know that either...
   -
8. False Awakening
   I wake up again. I RC.
   I note that this is quite a FA chain I got going on here…
   Someone’s standing next to my bed and yelling at me. I try to fall through the bed and floor of my room just to see if I’ll manage.
   It works and I land in the next floor, on my ass since I forgot to turn myself around mid air…
   -
9. False Awakening
   I wake up in bed yet again, perform another RC and become lucid.
   This time my cousins children are in my bathroom. I talk to them in my native language rather than English, which I usually do in dreams.
   “What are you guys doing here?”
   They jump around super happy.
   “We’re dreaming! We’re dreaming!
   I remember that both have told me that they have lucid dreams.
   I wonder if it's really them.
   I think that dream sharing would be easier for children, because they don't over-think what they experience.
   
   (They have told me not long ago that they have lucid dreams occasionally
   One of them has actually described to me how she ends unpleasant dreams, or changes the scene.
   She told me she closes her eyes and visualizes a new scene. I was impressed that she had such a level of dream control.)