lucid

I'm in water, dog-paddling, and it's dark. Someone lifts up the lid, and I shrink back from the light. He doesn't see me, but he puts down the blade of the propeller inches from my head, and I curse. I swim around the boat and climb on, quickly dispatching the three guards with strikes to their temples. I go about tying them up with the single length of rope I have, using slip-knots. I look for my allies in the other boats.

Something goes wrong, and I'm captured. I'm tied up, but slip free of the rope almost immediately. They take me to their leader, who looks suspiciously similar to me.

I'm with a class of young people, led by a teacher who might be from a university or college. We're shovelling rocks over the cracks in a hollow, rocky hill. The hill is shuddering as the monsters inside ram themselves against the rock, trying to break through and kill us all. We avoid these spots, trying not to antagonize them as we bury them alive. There have been attacks lately; we're trying to strengthen our defenses.

We finish that edge and go around the corner. The wall is missing. Our group freezes, coming face to face with dozens of the creatures.

They look like penguins. Misshapen, evil penguins with claws and teeth, but still. They're kind of comical, but they're still trying to eat us.

Most of the group takes off at a sprint. I hang back, along with one other student, for the first charge. Two of the little monsters come straight at me. I swing the shovel at one, knocking it away. I pull my weapon back, swing it through the second one until the shovel hits sand, impaling the penguin on the blade edge.

We've given the others some time to escape, and we take off before the rest can charge. I run fast, catching up to the others and greying my vision at the edges, when it finally clicks. I'm being chased by mutant penguins. I turn around, blasting our pursuers with telekinetic energy, scattering them into the lake/ocean behind their hills.

I've still got to find Walms, but I'm not trusting my abilities with portals lately, so I try to find one that's already active. I walk right past what might be a stargate, and look out through the windows built into the walls of the hill building I'm in.

When I look back, I see Marge Cartwright and her youngest daughter, sitting in chairs that have appeared around the room. Cartwright's eldest was in my graduating class. I say something to the effect of "Another Other Mother?" and claw my way out through the plastic-covered window.

I try to imagine a great fall out of the window, so I can get into another setting, maybe a skyscraper, but I fall four feet into the sand and land hard. I can feel the impact. Ow. I keep exploring the dream-setting.

I escape from a prison using a tazer and a group of accomplices, pick a car in the parking lot and drive it through an iron fence, and have to drive it away with an invisible hand because it won't take much more damage. While we wait for the car to get repaired, I explore an underground fairy hutch and almost get trapped inside.

Penguins. Scare Factor: 3.[/QUOTE]

My team saves a little girl's life while we steal something from her father.

I'm cycling away from Vancouver, eastwards. There are people shuffling down the road on foot, heading into the city. One of them makes a grab at my bike, and I punch him, knocking him over. A few people pass me, on bikes themselves, and an older woman tells me I shouldn't hesitate to take them out if they try to grab me. A skinny bald man further up the road is moving into my path, and I hold out an arm to clothesline him, but he stumbles away at the last second.

People are still shuffling around, but they're a little more zombie-like now. Two people are holed up in a lab, a guy with shoulder-length black hair wearing a leather jacket, and the main character from Zombieland. We have a few frantic fight scenes. I end up throwing hard punches at the zombies and wishing I had a shotgun, but punching them tends to stun them for a few seconds, so that's something. A zombie with tangled curly hair, a bigger guy, rushes us, and I accidentally tear off the bandages covering his mouth. He tries to bite me, and I swing a computer moniter into his head repeatedly, until he stops twitching.

We have to get something from the control room, so I'm rappelling down a wide chute, in circles around the wires coming from the centre. I realize too late that going in circles means that I have less rope, and I'm several metres from the ground when I run out. Climbing out the vertical hole, about twenty metres, would be practically impossible, so I untangle myself from the harness and drop to the floor. I land easily. I see a flash of what's on the other side of the exit, a conveyor belt leading to the zombie from before.

I hurtle out of the chute at full speed, launching myself at the zombie and aiming a punch at his jaw. My punch barely connects, and I realize too late that it's too weak to do anything. The zombie looks at me, and I've used up all my momentum; I panic. I push back at the zombie, telekinetically blasting it into the wall, splattering its brains over the metallic surface.

Abruptly, I realize that I'm dreaming, and I walk to the control room, throwing zombies through the walls as they try to approach. I'm having so much fun, and the remaining zombies scatter like leaves, though their landings are bloodier. I reach my destination and find a zombie!GIR and zombie!Yoda standing there waiting for me. They've gotten bigger. I try to toss them away with TK, but the move barely pushes them a few centimetres. The pair stalks menacingly toward me.

I'm lucid, though, and decide this is a complete waste of time. I decide to ignore the pair and go look for Walms. I look away from the bizarre zombies and make for the exit. Zombie!GIR is a green couch bumping up against my leg.

I'm waking up. I try to stabilize, but fail.

New dream. We're survivors in an art gallery IN SPACE while running a pet shop. We find other survivors on earth and establish an alliance. My cousins want to look at the fish.

I have the wrong prescription for contacts and I'm running away from a government conspiracy with my family. Or monsters, maybe. My brother wants to know why this is necessary.

My luggage is too heavy, after I get off the bus, but I find that if I lean a certain way, I start floating along automatically. I run into Milly's mom, Pat Green*, and we go for lunch at a vegetarian cafe.

*From high school. You realize I'm making all these names up, right?

Zombieland. Scare Factor: 3.

I take the stairs two at a time, with Angel right behind me. We reach the top floor of the Ixburg apartment building, rounding the corner so fast I slide a bit. I practically crash into the door at the end of the hallway, and start to pick the lock telekinetically.

Angel stops me with a hand on my wrist. "What if your parents are home? We could be putting them in danger."

A bit of dread creeps into my stomach, and I try to ignore it.

"They haven't lived here for years," I say dismissively. I shake free and flick the door open.

The sound of thunder in the distance. "Quick!" I say, pulling Angel by the arm. I pull him into the apartment and slam the door shut.

My mom and dad are standing in the entrance, looking surprised. My brother is there, and Sam and Dean Winchester are off in the background.

"Mom. Dad." I say, "This is... great."

Silence.

"I want you to meet my boyfriend!" I say, threading my hand through with Angel's. "This is Angel. Angel, this is my mom and dad. Who are really not supposed to be here."

Angel is rolling his eyes toward the ceiling, but at least he's saving the "I told you so" moment for later. Ben, my brother, looks completely shocked, and the other Sam's face is melting.

In fact, everyone's faces seem to be shifting at random. Angel briefly flickers into Dexter, who flickers into... some random person I don't know, and Dean's not nearly as pretty as he usually is. Ben's someone completely unrecognizable, and I push through my parents into my room, waiting for the dream to stabilize.

I'm trying to figure out how to fit both a desk and a double-sized bed into my childhood bedroom when Angel walks in. He's looking somewhat normal again. At this point, we decide, we have to stay here. The Wild Hunt will tear their way through my family whether we're here or not, so we might as well stay to protect them.

I'm having a shower when, through the window, I see a group of my brother's friends running over the lawn. Apparently I'm in the basement. I run outside, fully clothed, and look back at the building I was just in. It's an approximation of my parents' duplex, though it's currently worn down and the entire back yard is yellow and covered in weeds and vines.

I spot the group running through the back yard and I give chase, catching up and tackling the one that's supposed to be Ben. I pin him to the ground, yelling that this is a dream, and the rest of the group stands to the side, eerily still.

"Could you give us a minute?" I say, hauling my brother to his feet. "I have some questions for my brother."

I'm pretty sure this DC isn't my brother, but rather an impostor sent by Mab.

And apparently I was right, because a second later, the group of teenagers shift into unearthly horsemen and hellhounds. Mab herself appears from nowhere, wearing red and riding a horse that just might be an animated skeleton.

Mab demands my surrender. I decline.

Half a dozen faeries rush me at once. I hit the first two with a rush of pure kinetic energy, liquefying their organs and taking them out of the fight. I disarm number three and stab him in the gut with his own green dagger, letting the body drop to the ground as I pull the weapon free and look to my next opponent.

And I see, again, a trail of bright blue energy following my movements, latching onto the Fae and pulling their energy toward me. One of the fairies' power is surprisingly in tune with my own, and I hear a voice telling me to use it.

At first, I think it means the dagger, but as I focus on the energy I'd just absorbed, I realize that this isn't the power of a foot soldier. This is bigger, and I feel myself drop away from the dream, ascending higher and higher until I can see all of the stars and the Queen of the Wild Hunt is just a speck I can only barely see, and I suddenly understand why she thinks so little of those around her, because everything is so small...

When I come to awareness, Angel is next to my bed.

I groan, shielding my eyes from the light pouring in the window. "Some help you were." I grumble.

He snorts. "While you and Mab were unconscious, most of the Fae just wanted to chop off your head and be done with it. I had a hell of a time getting you out of there alive."

"I woulda been fine."

"Right." He looks dubious. "And the Dreaming?"

I look up, pulling myself into a sitting position. "This is a dream, that was a dream." I sigh, "When I wake up, I'll be reality checking all day."

The Hunt. Scare Factor: 3.5. Low-level lucidity[/QUOTE]

I feel a steady pull somewhere, like I'm being summoned. Images of an immense stone cavern, alive with a bright blue energy.

I seem to be on a road trip with my family. We get mixed up with the local vampires, and I have half of the population out to kill me. I'm standing in a hotel room with off-white walls and a duvet on the bed, talking to a woman with short blonde hair. She's an important figure to the vampires, and she's giving me information that might help me survive. We're planning something.

Memory of a red metal door and what might be a gymnasium. Being chased by the vampires, slamming the door into the face/arm of one of them as I run outside. It's daylight, but I'm not sure if that bothers them. Outside a brick building, patches of green grass growing weed-like in the gravel.

Space dream. Mentions of Kyle Katarn. I'm in a ship, dark metal interior. A DC thinks he's intimidating, but I don't feel the least bit threatened. Semi-lucid, I'm thinking about writing things down later. Sex dream.

Weird FA. I still feel half-stuck in the dreamworld, but not immersed in it. I think about waiting at the Twin Towers that Walms mentioned as a possible meeting place, pull up an image of what used to be there. I'm standing on top of the north tower, beside the antenna. I think about the Task of the Month, jumping off a skyscraper. I watch my dream avatar jump from the building and land on her feet, as if I'm watching a video clip. The scale is all wrong; the DA is too tall in comparison to the building beside her.

I'm Neal Caffrey from White Collar, helping to catch people. The dream-plot is nonsensical, and my surroundings are wavy coloured lines over white. I talk to Peter Burke about the people we caught by running into them with more wavy coloured lines that might have been a car.

"OMFG A CAT!" I shout, pointing. A cat walks along the driveway. I have no idea what context could turn this into a momentous event. Maybe all the animals are dead?

A CAT! Scare Factor: 3.

I'm river rafting with a group on the backs of whales/fish/squid/leeches. The creatures swim down the river with one side of their bodies facing up, which turns from pink to silver in the sunlight. They turn over after a while, so we have to stay on top of them.

My creature is about to turn over, so I jump onto the shore and let it. I throw one smaller creature back into the river where it got caught somewhere. I watch a kid's creature turn over and throw him into the water. He comes up on the other side, laughing.

I'm back in the water, swimming on my own. I'm wearing running shoes, which really limits my swimming ability. We'll be hiking later though, so I can't go barefoot.

An enemy is on the shore, aiming something at our group. I'm swimming through fairly deep water, but I jump up and land a flying kick on the henchmen, knocking the gadget aside. There's another one farther into the forest, and I rush at him -

shift

I'm driving through one of the main intersections in Quickton. The stoplights facing me are blinking orange, the adjacent stoplights are blinking red. I drive through the intersection, thinking about the DC I'm trying to help / is helping me.

I'm biking down one of the pathways near my house. I wonder how I'm going to meet up with her again. On impulse, I pull out a blaster and shoot two Star Wars-esque red laser blasts into the sky. I consider that we should have used that as a signal. I shoot a couple more just to see what the range of visibility is.

The signal starts coming up elsewhere in the city. Sirens go off. Uh oh. I stow my blaster under my jacket (it's too long to sling across my back; the barrel pokes up under my collar) and quickly pedal home. I do have to wonder how video game characters manage this.

I end up in an oh so messed up version of my backyard. I'm setting my bike against a fence and am about to haul it over into my half of the back yard (it's a duplex), when, for no apparent reason, I realize that I'm dreaming.

I don't see a reason not to leave the bike where it is. I decide to play along with the dream and get rid of the gun, so I walk into the garden shed and hold the blaster up along the wooden wall. The wall folds out and clamps onto the gun, and when it folds back you wouldn't even know that we were stockpiling an armory. Then I stare at the inside of the shed for a moment, marvelling at the detail and how real this all seems. I can feel my body, the scratch of the jean jacket I'm wearing, my feet on the ground.

I shake myself out of it. I had plans for a lucid, right? I was going to... meet Walms. Right. Now, how am I supposed to get there?

Stepping out into the bright sunlight, I extend my right hand, intent on peeling through the layers of the dream. Something goes wrong; I can't feel them.

"What are you doing?"

There's a guy my age standing on the lawn in the back yard. Short blond-ish hair. Let's call him Derek (I haven't used that name yet, have I?). He doesn't look much different than I do in dreams. Similar clothing, too.

"You know what?" He says, when I don't answer, "I don't care. See ya."

Derek jumps through a hole in the lawn. It's shimmery, like a puddle, but it doesn't reflect the blue sky above. It reflects a different sky with a setting or rising sun, shot through with pink.

I jump through the puddle.

I hit sand on the other side, startling Derek. "Um, hi." I say.

"I wasn't expecting you to follow me," he admits.

"Yeah, well..." I look around, taking in the view. We're standing on a beach, looking out over a sunset. "Huh. I think I have a [desktop wallpaper] like this."



We spot another puddle in the sand. "You coming?" he asks me.

I nod.

We jump. The other side is more blue-tinged. It's still sandy, but everything is underwater.

"So, you've gotta be looking for something, right?"

I try to answer, but the words come out garbled.

Derek rolls his eyes. "You know this is a dream, right? You wouldn't have been able to follow me otherwise. You can still talk."

I take a breath, feel cool air enter my lungs. Breathe out, breathe in. I try again. "I'm looking for a guy who calls himself 'Walms'".

Derek looks at me, incredulous. "You don't even know where you're meeting him? Jesus. I could take you to a place, but I don't think I can help you find someone you don't even know."

False awakening. I feel the dream fall apart around me, and become aware of my body lying on the bed. There is bright white light everywhere, and I can still feel the remnants of the previous dream around me.

I fade back into the dream. I'm back in the dream-warped backyard, sitting on the lawn. Derek is standing beside me. I swear, if he rolls his eyes any more, they'll stick like that. I go over where I left my bike and lift it over the fence. Derek says something.

[I]Puddles. Scare Factor: 2. Reaction: Okay, Mr. Negativity.

I'm Harry Potter, in what's sort of a pre-2005 video game environment. We've shifted into a circular hall in some sort of grand manor - an inheritance from my family. I've been using it as a base, as I'm on the run from a million and one different organizations. The hall runs in a circle, and the inner doors are decorated by massive arches that jut out from the stone walls.

I meet with my friends on the second floor, outlining a plan to get back at our opponents.

I choose Hermione from a list of avatars and I'm jumping around on the landings above the doors.

shift, and I'm at my childhood elementary school, looking up at the big brick building and vaulting over dark blue fences. I know that I'm dreaming. The entranceway is one story tall, an impossible leap. I'm concerned that I won't be able to make it, as I've been having trouble defying gravity lately. However, I call up the will, and effortlessly make the jump onto the roof. When I land, I can still feel the upward momentum. I feel like I should be floating, but I have both feet on the ground.

Back to being Harry, as a child, I talk to a woman who's coming out of a house. The entrance is lit up brightly behind her, and everything is blurry. The house is where a clump of bushes should be. I talk to her, and she invites me in. I think she's Lily.

Zoom out to view a fleet of battleships approaching Earth.

Gravity. Scare Factor: 2.

A dream occurs on two levels of reality. In one, the cast and crew of Supernatural go about their daily business of making an awesome TV show. In another, I go about my daily business of building houses. This gets confusing when suddenly I'm Misha Collins, calmly vacuuming up sawdust in the basement while a highly amusing PA briefs me on whatever they're doing next. Also, a suspended ceiling puts itself together in the writer's room and the baseboards I've been staring at for the last few days drift in and out of existence at eye-level.

shift

I'm in a den, or a living room, and I think this was a mall a second ago. Everything is in dark shades of brown and black. I'm sitting on a brown leather couch facing a wide-screen TV, and along the opposite wall is a set of dark-stained table and chairs. Beyond the table is another room, which is completely white. Right now, it might be a kitchen, but it's about to turn into a slaughterhouse.

I have my laptop open on the couch, though I'm not paying much attention to what I'm looking at. I move over to the table when a ten-year-old boy wants to flip through the channels on the TV, looking for his favorite cartoon. When I look back, he's pulling up a page on another laptop, which is a list of his favorite cartoons, put together by his dad. A static image of one of the characters shows up on a projector behind the couch, and I start drawing it.

It's later. A team of vigilantes/ex-minions have found out what's really going into the meat made by this factory. They/we are standing around the owner, backing him into the white room. The boy* is wearing some kind of Kickass-style costume like the others in the room, and is staring at his father with an incredibly detached expression.

*I wouldn't worry about the little sociopath. I get the feeling that the vigilantes are all puppets on a string to him.


Practically the Antichrist.

Two men grab the owner and force him toward the wall. He's shouting at them and struggling to get away, but when his back hits the wall, it latches onto him and forces him down a tube. I drift through the wall, and I can see the human sized plastic tunnel he's trapped in. Pistons are forcing the right side of his body, as he's alive and screaming, against the meat grinder. His right arm, part of his leg, and the edge of his scalp have been torn apart by the machine when I see his expression shift, angry but resigned, and the machine eats into his brain.

He probably wishes he'd designed the machine to kill its victims less horrifically, I muse. A straight-razor, perhaps? The machine rearranges itself on my whim, and I wonder if cutting the throat upside-down or right-side-up would be more effective.

Three women are standing in the same room, which, maybe, is supposed to be a different place entirely? They talk about the dead owner's eldest daughter, who has sworn revenge on us/them for killing her father, his right hand man, his lieutenants, the captain who exported the shipments, the cleaning lady, and possibly me, considering I'm short of a body at the moment. Also, for kidnapping her little brother, who I'm half-sure started the coup anyway.

They laugh a little and say they have to get back to camp, so they jump out of the building and land on the ice of a half-frozen river, and start speeding down it as if they're on a slide. I have to keep nudging them closer to shore so their momentum won't carry them out onto the middle of the river, which is slushy and wouldn't hold their weight.

One person crashes into the slush anyway. No one pays attention, and I have no idea if s/he gets out alive.

The women arrive at a rocky shore where a bunch of colourful tents are set up. No one brought chairs, so someone fetches pillows for the half-frozen trio to sit on, and blankets to keep them warm. I, still incorporeal, follow the guy who gets them and see a whole pile of pillows lying on the ground.

Oh, and someone's getting married.

Soylent Green. Scare Factor: 3.5. Reaction: Lucidity, you escape me. And the meat grinder thing was pretty fucked up, too.

ETA: Oh! I know! I know! It was green, and had a giant lizard's head and sharp teeth that changed direction to spiral inwards and then fan out, and I knew I was dreaming because all of my dreams are just that fucking insane.

I can feel it nudge up against me, feel its scales and warm breath as it bumps its nose against my shoulder, and I'm not afraid because I know this is a dream...

And that's all I remember.

There's a wedding or a funeral in the family, and we (the "kids") are getting ready. I'm in a store, wondering if I dare to wear a tie. I do, deciding on a light blue dress shirt. I go over to the mirror to try it on, but I can't pull it closed over my breasts. Damn it, I think, annoyed, I shouldn't have to deal with this in my own dreams.

I'm in the Ixburg apartment, doing a hand RC. Everything is slightly blurry. It's hard to move. The RC worked, and "I'm lucid," I repeat to myself, "I'm lucid, I'm lucid, I'm lucid." I look in the mirror of my bedroom door, and see a dark grey blob standing where I am. I peer to the side, and the blob doesn't move. I see myself, currently male. I have dark brown hair, longer than it is now. I'm wearing dark clothes, a black dress shirt unbuttoned over a t-shirt. No ties, apparently. Thank God. I see strange things in the background, and open the door before I get freaked out and this turns into a nightmare.

I walk out of the apartment, fighting to stay grounded as everything blurs around me. I keep RCing and muttering that I'm lucid, until I'm halfway down the stairs and looking out of an east-facing window.

The town has transformed itself once again, this time into what looks like a creepy green-tinged matte painting. The entrance to the building, which juts out into the gravel parking lot, is in ruins, and the entire field beyond is covered in water. About fifty yards away are a set of stone steps, leading up to a square stone arch. Someone is hanging from it, arms stretched into either corner, feet hanging above the ground.

At first, I think it's a woman, but the scene shifts into someone I'm pretty convinced is Walms. At this point, Walms is down from the arch, probably having escaped the bonds (or rescued someone else from them). I have to hurry if I want to catch up to him.

I look down at the uneven ground and sigh. I don't suppose this will count as a skyscraper? But no. Maybe I'll do the flower thing later. I throw myself off the building, feel my speed building -

Pause, as I consider where to land.

Full-speed, I crash into the remains of the entrance, numbly feeling my ankle bend at an impossible angle. I stand up, feeling no pain, and head east toward the blurry archway.

There's no one here, unfortunately. I sigh, and look beyond the arch. There's a whole bunch of people milling around on the lawn beyond it, so I consider trying the flower task. I pick up a flowering piece of the clover weed that runs rampant around Ixburg, and scan the area for someone my age - most of the people here are elderly.

I focus on the piece of clover in my hand and it turns into a violet. The colours shift and blur and it becomes a rageddy, fushia thing. The flower shifts into a perfect bunch of green and I concentrate, pulling a pink rose-bud from the centre.

I spot a woman my age exiting the Quickton college. She couldn't be a supermodel, but she has long, blonde hair, and something else draws me to her. I hand her the rose, smiling. "This is for you," I say, and turn away.

"Wait!" she says. She looks like she's about to say something important. "Are you Israel."

I don't know what she means, and I answer honestly. "I don't know." I say, and walk away.

I'm play fighting with a dog, probably a Great Dane. I realize that I'm losing lucidity, so I concentrate and RC and start saying, "I'm lucid."

Everything is blurry as I walk into a building and do a hand RC. I can see all five fingers, but they're all attached between the index and middle knuckles. I see a guard, and -

shift

People are talking about animals in pairs. Apparently, there are two such animals that signify love. What about dogs, I want to ask snidely, but I'm not actually there. Jackson thinks the sign might apply to him, but O-Neill scoffs and starts making fun of him.

shift

FA, I scramble for my dream journal, but there's a bunch of different notebooks beside my bed and I can't find the right one. I'm lying on the bed when I realize that I'm dreaming. I push into the waking world (for the first time) so I don't forget the dream.

Dream Goals. Scare Factor: 2.[/QUOTE]

I'm in a familiar place, messing with the controls on a high-tech piece of equipment (possibly the Stargate). My partner is a girl named Susan.

The building is a small house with fake-wooden paneling on the walls. There's old and worn furniture scattered throughout, mismatched and comfortable. There are a huge number of people in the house, milling about and chatting, but the atmosphere is mournful. Apparently this is a funeral or a wake.

I'm trailing beside Susan as she moves through the room talking to people. Suddenly, she half collapses, sobbing. I turn to our boss and tell him I'll take her away from the crowd.

I tell Susan that we're going into the lounge. I support her weight as we walk into the room and I have a strong feeling of familiarity with the location. I help her over to a couch and she lies down. I go over to sit on a recliner.

When I look up, I see that Susan has come to stand beside my chair. She asks if she can sit with me. I move over, and she sits down with me. I imagine the chair laying back and the footrest coming up. Susan and I lay down together, and I drift off to sleep.

I wake up, curled on my side in the chair. Susan is gone. I get up and pad through the living room that was full of people last night. I pop into my head into the den, and ask my dad (who's watching TV) where Susan is. He says she's probably sleeping in one of the bedrooms.

I stare at all of the people in the room, whose faces I can't really see. I notice that some of the people seem to be disembodied heads under various blankets all over the room. I dismiss the phenomenon as being normal for a dream, and go to find Susan.

Susan is, in fact, sleeping in one of the bedrooms. I close the door quietly, trying not to wake her.

When I step away from the door, I decide it's time to double-check my suspicions. I do a hand RC for the first time in a dream, staring at my left hand until the fingers move separately from my will and thick red blood begins to foam over the knuckles of my ring and middle fingers.

I'm somewhat disturbed, but I decide it doesn't really matter. I look at the digital clock on a VCR, which reads 1:45 PM. I decide that the time isn't unreasonable, since it was around 11:00 AM when I last woke up, and I had time to sleep in today.* I will the time on the clock to change, and it flickers. I repeat the hand RC.

I stretch out a hand in front of me, willing open a portal to a skyscraper. Instead of a portal opening in front of me, the door across the room to my left opens with a bang, letting the bright morning sunlight stream into the room.

I step out of the house and look around. There are mountains surrounding the town. The mountain I can see between buildings is a sloping, tree covered hill, and I'm happy to be on the mountainous west coast. The buildings are probably a couple centuries old. The church I can see has a spire reaching up toward the blue sky.


St. Paul's Church, the oldest building in Halifax, NS.

I repeat the hand RC, hoping to extend the dream. The ring finger on my right hand is missing, but when I look closer, I realize it's still there. The light seems to bend around it so that it's just barely visible, like the non-existent puddles on the highway in the middle of the summer.

There's nothing resembling a skyscraper nearby, so I throw open a few doors, hoping for a portal to a bigger city. I go through one, into brighter light, but I'm still more or less in the same place.

I'm just outside of town, looking at a delapitated building. There are no doors that don't have shelving inside, so I focus on the people who are there. Selina, a girl I graduated with, and an old man who looks kinda like one of my art school professors (Mike) are the only characters who don't fade into the background. They're picking things up, working on repairs to the heritage site.



Mike and Selina greet me, and ask what I'm planning to do. Mike says that if I'm planning to go into the woods, I should avoid making deals with the beings there. They can offer a lot, so it's a hard temptation to resist - the creatures could bring back any of my relatives from the dead.

I wryly assure him that I've had a similar dream before, where someone warned me not to bring back the original Elaine. By this point, I'm well aware that anyone I try to bring to life will come back wrong.

Mike is wistful, saying that if they would come back right, all of us would be willing to live without our souls, and to hell with the consequences.

I remember to do another hand RC, but I'm waking up. Everything fades and when I wake up, I already have my eyes open. I do another digital-clock RC, but I'm really awake this time.

Girlfriends, Dead People. Scare Factor: 2.

*It was around 12:45 PM when I actually woke up.[/QUOTE]

Image of a blonde woman. She looks like Ripley Grace from Avatar.

shift

Two groups are transported to a dark and scary place, lit up with a lot of orange. The cobblestone streets are coming loose in places, and stone structures are crumbling.

The group that arrives ahead of us are poachers. There are four or five of them and three or four of us. We appear practically on top of them, which is Not A Good Thing, because we're rivals/enemies/nemeses of each other.

We start to spot tiny little insects, looking like the drops of water in the first scene of Avatar (guess what movie I finally saw last week). They're bees. Honey-bees, to be precise. The bear-man in the other group freaks out and runs down a stone flight of steps, batting at the bees as he goes. I get the feeling that he's heading toward the hive.


Run, you fools! They're trying to kill you!

The bear-man in our group (symmetry, I suppose) suggests that we run. Quietly. In the other direction.

shift

I'm in the apartment in Ixburg. I'm still trying to get away from the bees, but at this point I know I'm dreaming. The goal of the dream is to get to another floor, either up or down, and the stairs would be too easy. I move away from the door, toward the master bedroom, remembering my attempts to reach an attic through a closet in a previous dream (#49: Misogynists, Scientists, Doctors, Little Girls, Monsters, and Faeries).


Still gonna kill you.

There's a second exit from the apartment, leading down a hallway we used for storage. I pause as I move to pass it, and decide this would be a good time to practice "Open A Door, Create A Portal". I don't really want to leave this dream, for, say, the moon, but I decide to open it up for practice anyway. I concentrate on what I'd see if I made it to the moon (the image has a moon in the sky, oops) and push the door open.

The hallway has become a steep flight of steps leading two floors down. I'm thrilled, because regardless of my intent, this is exactly what I wanted. I fling myself down the stairs, not worried about the landing, because I'm well aware that there won't be any impact. At this point, I'm quickly moving through the building by skipping the stairs entirely. I peer down each level and jump as far as I can. At one point, I take care to concentrate entirely on the feeling of falling - as if the bottom is dropping out of my stomach. It's horrifying - and absolutely brilliant.

I think back to something I said yesterday, that my falling dreams usually end with me bouncing off the ground. That's not quite accurate, I decide. It's more like I've jumped a foot into the air and landed toe, ball, heel.


Or maybe it was like this!

Nope, totally grounded.

The actual building this dream is based on has four floors, including the basement. I must have extended this by several stories, as I lost track of the time that I played on the stairs. Finally, I reach the basement.

I look around and down the hallway, marvelling over how real all this feels. I feel more awake right now than I usually do while I'm conscious.

There are railings criss-crossing throughout the basement. I remember the April dreaming task (last chance!). Stand on your head, right? I go to a place where the railings meet at a 90 degree angle. I grip the railings, and pull myself up into a handstand.

I can feel the burn in my arms. Balancing isn't a problem, but I have to work to support myself in that position. Letting out a huff of exultation, I lower myself gracefully to the ground, grinning all the while.


Because I can't do this in real life. Yet.

The advanced task reads "Stand on your head", literally. I concentrate on the shadows cast by the light source behind me, put my fingers over my temples and under my jaw, and gently pull away from me and downward.

From a first person POV, I'm watching the shadows intently, seeing the shape of my head separated from my body. Suddenly, I'm brought back to the starting position. I concentrate on my reflection in a dusty mirror, and repeat the process, slowly. I see my only my silhouette. I bend my knees and try to place my head on the floor, only to find myself in a sitting position, legs bent outward, stretching toward the floor.

I'm still in the basement. My mom is folding laundry, and there are piles of clothes all over the place. I see a pink or blue t-shirt, apparently my mom's, that reads "Slytherin Mom". I start telling her about the dream I just had.

I "wake up" in my room at my parents' house. I write down my dreams for the night. I check my alarm clock, but I'm too tired to do the RC properly. I'm annoyed by my mom, because she keeps popping into the room while I'm trying to sleep.

shift

I'm chatting with some people in an imaginary gay bar. A girl tells me I ought to come out more. No pun intended.

shift

I'm doing dishes via telekinesis. The mice from Cinderella will be disappointed that they didn't get to help, but they did the dishes in the last dream. Which means they haven't done the dishes in this dream. Which means I'll still have to do the dishes when I wake up.

I bring garbage out to the dumpster behind the shed. I'm Alice in Wonderland. After falling down the rabbit hole, I meet my character's worst enemy.


AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!

And then I'm a scary-looking monster horse hissing at the singing monstrosity.[/QUOTE]

I'm in the local theatre with a group of girls. Apparently we're about to play out The Handmaid's Tale, and as I'm not a fan of that particular dystopia, I'd rather not. As soon as everyone's asleep, I wake up another girl and start running.

In retrospect, it would have been smarter to leave her behind.

We're fleeing down a gold-gilded hallway toward a mirror I plan to use as an escape. (The mirror really exists in my parents' house.) I see a shadow run through the mirror and I attempt to follow, but I smack against it and push on the glass. I give up quickly; there's someone hot on our heels.

We run into an empty-of-furniture bedroom, and begin to literally climb the walls looking for a way out. The closet is an escape route. I turn around to look at my fellow escapee. She's wearing the dream-avatar I was just using, complete with wild orange hair. I'm a brunette now.

There's a third girl in the room with us.

shift

I'm in a high-tech facility, a space station, and I'm alone. I pickpocket an Asian woman's key card as I bump into her, and slip through a guarded door. The guard on the other side of the door, and asks for ID as I come through. I hand him the card. I strike at him. I take him down quickly, before he has a chance to call for backup.

My presence has raised alarms. They don't know where I am, but I'm being chased. I need to move quickly.

There's a control panel in the next room. It's triangular, with an assortment of round buttons that don't make any sense. Since I'm dreaming, only intent is important, and it doesn't matter which buttons I push. I focus on my goal, pressing buttons at random.

This dream is exciting, so I don't abandon it. I head for the nearest set of double doors leading to a staircase.

I find a scientist/doctor who's actually on my side. I'm sequestered in her office, and nobody will know that I'm here for a while yet. She takes a sample of my skin cells and runs a test. Surprisingly, the results indicate that I'm completely human.

"Where's a scalpel?" I mutter. I take an x-acto knife off of the nearest counter and push the blade into my palm. Blood pools into my hand.

"Now look," I say to the doctor. I brush the blood away from the cut, showing completely intact skin below.

I'm trying to stay in-character as someone with a healing-factor. I move over to the sink, washing the quickly congealing blood down the drain. My logic is that you can do all sorts of nasty things to someone if you have their blood.

I'm in the cafeteria. I'm looking for a free-run sequence. I run up the wall to an upper balcony, pulling myself up into the rafters and flinging myself forward without losing momentum. I'm trying to go up and up and

shift

Sam and Dean Winchester are saving people and hunting things. I'm playing as Dean while trying not to get Sam W. mixed up with my username. A man needs help rescuing his daughter and his pregnant wife from the evil scientists several Levels down. We take the elevator from Level 7 down to one of the sub levels.

The rescue is successful, but unfortunately, both of the children are evil. We eventually convince the five-year-old not to kill us all, and she decides to be a force for good. It reminded me of the daughter of the Basanos in the Sandman spinoff, Lucifer.*



*Super-powerful being rapes its host, host becomes pregnant, tries for a magical abortion, unborn daughter tries to kill everyone, and God's granddaughter erases everyone's memory so they can live normal, happy lives.

John Winchester pops out of nowhere in order to tell his sons something important. Dean doesn't want to hear it, I really don't care, and Sam W.'s starting to wonder if his brother has dissociative identity disorder. Somehow, this devolves into a man-hug as I flip back and forth from a male character to a female one. No one else seems to notice.

shift

My character (a child) is trapped playing out endless scenarios for a... troll... or something. I'm crawling through the mud under a two-foot high bridge, eying the puddle to the centre warily. I'm pretty sure there's alligators down there, and when I think I see (sense) movement, I panic and make for dry land.

And suddenly, I'm in control instead of the child-character.

Fed up with such repetitive terror, I immediately make a break for it when I'm out in the open. I run past ramshackle machinery and jump into a red truck parked near the muddy road. As I start up the truck, ignoring the shrieking of the little goblin by the bridge, I notice it's a standard. Whatever, I drive a motorbike, I can make it work.

I put the truck into gear and drive off down the road. Now it can fit one person, and there's no cab.

Down the road, I find faeries. I'm their guest. One reminds me of Miranda, even though she looks nothing like her. This woman has long, curly brown hair, and is most definitely not Vietnamese. She looks a lot like Liv Tyler, actually.

Fae!Miranda gives me a gift. I accept it, and go off on a mental tangent about the birthday gifts Ron and Hermione may or may not have received. Also, the fact that Miranda and I still haven't gotten together to exchange Christmas '09 gifts.

I want to give a gift of my own. I pull out a box and hand it to the woman. We're part of a group now, sitting around a table. Fae!Miranda opens the box and pulls out a shimmery fabric that seems almost invisible. I explain that the fabric is a magic silk that will enhance - something. Maybe it has defensive powers, or turns the wearer invisible. I don't remember. It was awesome, though. I was wearing some, even.

The silk changes to match the green of the faerie's dress, and flows into her curly hair.

A boy across from me is angry. I receive an image of a black gown - apparently Fae!Miranda's suitor was about to give her a dress. I can feel his jealousy brimming over from across the table.

Misogynists, Scientists, Doctors, Little Girls, Monsters, and Faeries. Scare Factor: 2. Reaction: one of these days, giving powerful gifts to potential antagonists is going to come back and bite me.

Two characters are around my old apartment in Ixburg. They look like Johnny Depp and Robert Downey Jr.. I play with story lines and wonder what's about to happen. Then I'm running over rooftops and away from Sweeney Todd.

I'm on the roof and he's on the ground. I double back quickly, jumping down and landing a flying kick to his head. Then I turn around and keep running.

I'm in a playground, on top of one of the structures. There's a man with me. He has the head of an eagle, and wings. He tells me that something is out of alignment within me, that my back hurts because of it. I see tattoos dancing across skin as he presses into the pressure points on my back. I see his wings spread out above, and ask if I can touch them. He tells me not to.

I decide I liked the old tower better, even if it was less accessible. I crawl in through the window and realize that someone is lying on the floor. I ask him if he has a pulse. He says that he doesn't.

I fall into an ocean of black water. I swim to the surface, take a breath. I'm treading water for only a moment before I'm pulled under again. Everything is fuzzy, but I keep breathing, and I realize that I'm dreaming. I swim to the bottom, covered in dark grey silt, and maybe a shipwreck or two. I concentrate on dissolving the dream or opening a portal or maybe both

I'm balanced precariously on the dark surface, which is riddled with craters. Briefly, I believe that I've made it to the moon, but I see the crescent moon on the horizon. I think that I'm on an asteroid between the Earth and the moon. I walk over the crest of the asteroid (10m in diametre), and look out at the moon. I'm perched at the top of a crater. I'm pressed against the ceiling, and everything is going dark.

I'm in Ixburg. My parent's house is next to my oma's house as part of a duplex. The door is unlocked. I talk to my oma and am invited in. We make room for the group of Katimavik kids that are in town.

Outside fighting against some kind of non-human enemy. My character isn't supposed to have superpowers, but I do anyway. I see myself flying from a third person POV.

Demon Barbers, Malfunctioning Portals. Scare Factor: 3.

Non-lucidSemi-LucidLucid

I concocted a plan to confront LG, utilizing the golden bullets he left me. This is the plan:

Originally Posted by Sam's Paper Journal

Note: this is not a dream.

I'm standing by the Bar in McAnally's, the pub in Dresdenverse Chicago. The building is established neutral ground, and the place is specifically designed to break up magical energies. Its design is broken up into odd nooks and crannies perfect for a dream walk.

I order two beer from Mac and take them, handing Mac a twenty with my right hand as I hold the other two in my left. I thank him and make my way to a nearby table. I set down the beers.

I reach into the right pocket of my jeans, where I put the golden bullets LG had threatened me with. I place them on the table in front of me and look up at the ceiling while sipping on my beer. It tastes like I imagine butterbeer would: rich and sweet. Inexplicable.

"You really expect me to drink this?"

I open my eyes to find the Lunar God eying me skeptically. I relax and take another sip.

"I would have ordered a bottle of Pinot Gris again, but I'm really not in the mood for champagne."

The Lunar God leans forward over the table. "Sam." He says, "No games. What do you want?"

I'm wary of him. "I want to know who you are."

He leans back in his chair, satisfied. I watch the smirk form on his face and settle in for a round of bargaining. I don't forget that those little golden bullets on the table have been used to try to claim my life.

This is the result:

I'm with the Joker in an armoured truck in a scene eerily reminiscent of Fight Club. Now, what could that mean?


You're just a freak, like me!

I'm following two characters and a potential horror movie from a third person point of view. At one point, I accidentally possess one of the characters and take some time off from the plot to... dye my hair. So yeah.

Same location. I'm waiting for my karate class to start. I check my watch, and it's 6:90PM. I guess I'm late. No, wait, this is a dream sign. I look around, confused, because this doesn't really feel like a dream. I pay more attention to my surroundings, and realize that it actually is a dream. I stop to savour the amazing feeling of being lucid.

"I'm dreaming," I say, and I start to repeat it to myself as I move around the dream-world. I'm not feeling very well, so I go to grab something from the fridge (in a place I've never been). I'm craving rasberries. When I open the fridge door, I find clear Yop yogurt containers filled with frozen rasberries. I eat a few.

I'm moving toward the exit when Ben stops me and wants me to listen to a song. It's rap music. I'm not interested, and there was something I wanted to do tonight, so I'm busy. A brief wrestling match with my brother ensues, but I shake him off and run to the exit. A steel staircase leads to a latched window.

I will the window to be open. I crawl out and latch it behind me.

I remember that I wanted to go to McAnally's to meet with the Lunar God character. I stretch a hand out in front of me and will the dream to dissolve. I close my eyes briefly, but when I open them, the green grass and concrete and sun are still there. Energy continues to swirl around me. I close my eyes again, and push through the dream-fabric.

When I open my eyes again, I can't see anything. Everything is dark, though coloured energy swirls through the space to break up the monotony. There seems to be a slight tear in the dream, so I move toward it (zooming closer, not walking). I drop to my knees and feel for the wooden door that I'm sure should be there. I imagine the texture, feel for iron handles of the closed door. I visualize the grain of the wood that should be there, the glass that is set into it.

"Open the door," says Mac, rolling his eyes. "We keep them open while we're open."

I stand up and dust myself off, looking at the four pointed star mounted on the door, just above my eye level. Did I create that?


The dream star was more ornate.

I shake off the strange feeling and move to the bar beside the door. This isn't anything like I'd imagined the place to be. The wood is darker, glossier, and everything is more streamlined than I'd expected.

"Two beer." I say to Mac. I dig through my pockets for the twenty that should be there, but I only find a bunch of change in my right pocket, where the bullets should be. Loonies, toonies, quarters. I apologize for paying in change, and I give him the $20 pile of change, minus the six loonies I need for LG. I consider that since we're in Chicago, I should have given him American money. I let my hand hover over the pile of change, and will it into American bills. The money flickers and I see paper. I'm not sure if it worked.

Mac waves me off, and I grab the beer and my loonies, setting them both down on a round wooden table near the bar.

"Aw, you don't need to do that," says a voice, "You already paid for drinks."

"These aren't coins," I say, turning to look at what I think is the Lunar God. He's younger than any incarnation I've seen before. He grins in understanding and takes a seat.

I take a sip of the beer. It tastes like Pilsner.

There's a third person at the table, whom I never acknowledge. Her (?) presence seems shadowy, dark, barely there. I think it's Elaine.

A girl comes up to LG and asks if it's okay if she leaves with someone.

"Yes." says one of us, before LG can comment. We kind of need to talk to him.

Unfortunately, LG's very presence seems to destabilize all dreams, and I can't remember a damn thing after that. Including whether I still have the bullets.

Failed Interrogations. Scare Factor: 3. Reaction: I need a new plan.[/QUOTE]

I'm checking out a gym in the new city I've apparently moved to. It's based in a university/college/high school, and membership is affordable.

A group of (mostly female) students are being led around by their female teacher. Some of the girls need to use the bathroom, so the group is collectively looking for one. They're in subway tunnels now, and the teacher is talking to a bouncer outside some kind of establishment, who won't let them in because they're women or minors or both.

I'm talking to my brother, Ben, at some kind of family gathering on a farm, when he starts quoting The Spoony One verbatim while we're talking about a game. Movie. Book. IDEK. Anyway, I call him on it, but he has no idea what I'm talking about. My cousin Reg, who's the same age as my brother, says he got to see a screening of that once. They're online videos, I tell him. What the hell.

We're trying to watch The Daily Show, but Ben tells me that we can't watch the episode because it's only on the US version of the site. I explain to him how you can use an add-on for Firefox to - ahem. Never mind.

Running up the stairs at the farm.

Someone explains to me that the farm is in danger and we have this plot going on to save it. Jill rolls her eyes and tells me to run because I'll never hear the end of it.

"I'm dreaming." I realize at some point. I blink in surprise. "How am I lucid?" I wasn't planning on having any lucid dreams tonight.

I'm going for a quick meal in Tim Hortons, trying to decipher the menu and remember what I can eat. I really want some chicken noodle soup, but I can't eat it since I'm vegetarian. I could get a bagel, but I don't really want a bagel. When I step outside again, I continue with my dream. Apparently I'm a student in some Squamish/Halifax hybrid. There are mountains in the not-so-far-away distance, and one in particular is relevant to the plot. So are the houses I'm biking towards.

Unconscious Desires to Move to a New City. Again. Now. Scare Factor: 1.

I'm drinking. A lot. At a bar. I'm wondering if it's Saturday night and I missed the meetup with Vicki. I see Matt and Jen from High School on the other side of the bar, and debate over whether I want to talk to them. I've been drinking things like rum and coke all night, and now I've moved onto Pinot Gris. I guess. It tastes like champagne.

I'm in the backyard of the Ixburg Inn, having been ordered to clean up the scaffolding houses by my dad. I notice movement in another yard, a brief dark flash. I watch the roof of a nearby building for another sign of it. There's a dirtbiker up there. My mom and I watch him ramp from that roof an impossible distance over the highway. He lands badly, but that was supposed to happen. He's fine.

At a fair, I argue with Gus about something. I'm Shawn Spencer, and my dad (Henry) is around, too. The fair has a layout suspiciously similar to the backyard I was just in.

As myself, I put the truck in park, turn off the ignition, and raise my hands slowly. I'm turning toward the man in the passenger seat, who is happily delivering his Hannibal Lecture while pointing a gun at me. It's a revolver, I notice.



He explains to me that the time I was born can be flipped backwards to show the time it is right now. "You see," he says to me, "This time is the antithesis of your birth."

"Yes, that's very poetic."

I'm ordered out of the truck. I keep my hands up as I follow his orders, stepping onto the green grass in the backyard of my house. I know that there are kids inside the house, quite possibly my cousins. At this point in the dream, though, I think they might be mine.

I try to bargain with the man, but I know that he's going to kill me. If I resist, he says he'll kill everyone inside, but I can't be sure that he won't do that anyway. We circle each other over the grass. The man tells me that these bullets were specially made for me.

Don't I feel special.

The gun wavers for a moment, and I take my chance. I lash out with a kick to his wrist, then grab for the gun. I pick it up and aim at my tormentor. He raises his hands and grins, daring me to do it.

I can't. I empty the revolver of the gold bullets. They spill to the ground, and I scramble for the six of them. I stumble backward as the man laughs. I step inside, latching the glass patio door behind me.

"Go downstairs," I order my cousins. "Get one of the adults to call 911. Ask for police!" I shout at their retreating backs. I move through the house, locking and bolting the other two doors shut.

"So..." says my uncle, "We're safe as long as we don't go outside."

I consider the patio door, how easily the man could get in. "We're safe." I lie.

"Wait," I say after a beat, "Has anyone called 911?"

I curse and grab for the nearest black portable phone. I dial three numbers. "Hello, I need police at -" Silence on the other end. I glance at the display and read 901. Great. I'm wandering down the stairs at this point, redialling the number repeatedly to no effect. I see a flash of the man, laughing. I consider that he might have cut the phone lines.

"Does anyone have a cell phone?" I shout into the basement, frustrated and panicking. I begin redialling numbers on a blackberry no one gave me. 090. 901. 109. 119. My frustration reaches a peak -

And I realize that this is always what happens in dreams. I look up the stairs to the side door, reasoning that I fell asleep in my bedroom and there's no way I could actually be here. I walk up the stairs, touching things (the bannister, the wall), feeling the texture in order to solidify the dream. I'm worried about waking up. I unlock the door, open it. When I step outside, it's dark, and there's a layer of snow on the damp ground.

I move toward the street, making footprints as I go. I look up to the night sky, which is clear and filled with stars.

"Go to the moon," I whisper aloud. "Go to the moon."

I stretch a hand out in front of me, willing a portal to open, for something to happen. A pulse radiates outward from my hand, blurring everything briefly and circling behind me. I can still see the stars. The dream dissolves.

I'm in some kind of afterlife realm, filled with ribbons and people and flying. I'm attached to the colour yellow, which I hate. I try flying, but can only achieve a delayed falling effect.

LG's Got a Gun. Scare Facter: 4.5. Reaction: Lucidity!

I did the faux-math LG was trying to tell me about. Apparently I'm supposed to die next week. Saturday-ish.[/QUOTE]