memorable

I'm walking along a path by the river in Quickton. There are a large number of orangutan/dog/otter hybrids about, and the locals have been warned to stay away from them. One that looks like a great dane approaches me and jumps up, trying to lick at my face. I laugh.

Shift.

I practically fall out of the truck when we reach the police station. "It's okay", says Kate Beckett, "You're safe here."

My POV switches to Beckett, who's trying to solve the mystery of the invisible animalistic murderer. I'm now interacting with myself ("Sam") as the character Kate Beckett. I note that we don't have much ammo.

An Asian woman stumbles toward the safety of the police station. Already, she's bleeding from numerous slashes to her torso, which look almost like claw marks. The monster must have followed us here.

Sam mysteriously disappears, and we assume the worst.

I interrogate people who are the collective head of an international company. Someone sabotages the elevator, almost killing one of them.

They upgrade security.

The elevator is sabotaged again. I almost catch the culprit, but I have to stay in order to save the people inside. I catch the chain of the machine used for sabotage, and pull it up to a floor where they'll be able to get out.

The Chairman of the company is killed. The CEO chooses to reveal his identity.

The murderer decides to talk to me. It's Sam, complete with all my lucid superpowers. Apparently, I was the murderer all along. I'm watching myself give a villainous monologue. From a third person perspective apart from Beckett's character, I'm very surprised.

Murder Mysteries. Scare Factor: 2. Reaction: Did not see that coming.

I'm working on a short-story adaptation of this dream, minus the identity confusion. It was actually a lot of fun.[/QUOTE]

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 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]

Originally Posted by Samael

I really haven't been lucid much since I've joined DV. Odd.

I'm in an afterlife version of downtown Quickton, wandering is separately from a group of people. There are at least four people here, but only one that I'm dealing with directly. I'm my female Lucifer character, and a female character is my main focus. I am, quite benevolently, her guide.

I look at the United Church. Cross streets on crosswalks. Generally being a smartass. There's a slight orange filter over everything.

Driving with the group, trying to retrieve something. The ground turns to water. Trying to swim out with buckets. There's a girl with long, blonde curly hair and her boyfriend there, trying to stay afloat with the bucket they're carrying together. Quite a bit of leather between them.

I'm myself, near an approximation of Quickton's high school. There's a lot of concrete. I'm dropping off something for my brother, Ben. I'm driving away down a dirt road when my car stalls, and won't start again. I put it in neutral and coast it down a dip in the road, out of the way. I get out of the car, take a shortcut through someone's house, nervous that the owner might catch me. Back yard, hallway, kitchen. Enter from the west, leave through the south. I have been here before.

I'm an old woman sitting in the third or fourth car of a train. I have the car all to myself. It's cozy, and I'm sipping tea. Bored now. I climb out of a window on the side of the car and haul myself onto the roof. Jump over the other two cars, after curiously investigating the occupants, and greet the driver in the engine. She's looking off to the side, staring at something out of a window. I demand to know what she's looking at, because it might be important. She points, and I guess she's talking about my car.


Ninja Grandma!

I jump from the train without waiting for it to stop and walk through the dark green grass to the orange-lit streets. Traffic is backed up, though people are surprisingly patient. I walk to the very front of the traffic jam, and climb into my car.

I'm a little girl, Alice, and I'm being forced to drive the car by my father/uncle/evil stepfather. I keep adjusting the seat so I can see properly. Driving down a highway, then down a hill under a tunnel in a city.

Wandering through a grand manor full of rich red and orange hues to find my character sitting on the balcony. She looks extremely depressed, but it might actually be a spell. The other characters are concerned.

We're in a cute little house on a hill, all pastels and green grass. I'm either the male or the female main character. Both are magic-users/witches/wizards. The family is almost identical to the Dursleys. Petunia has immaculately permed hair, Dudley looks like Harry, and so does Vernon, really. Except older. I'm aware that Vernon has been making deals with a minor demon/god who, in his true form, looks suspiciously like the Cheschire Cat.

A conversation with the family ends with us being locked in the cellar. I'm a Mia Wasikowska version of Alice, unrelated to the Dursleys. I doubt I've ever met them before. Harry and I plot our escape.



Later, I'm trapped at the kitchen table with Petunia and raspberry jam. Petunia's put on a veneer of politeness (while Harry is still in the cellar), using teatime as an excuse for an interrogation. Petunia doesn't think it's fair that our people keep secrets from her and her family* when the Dursleys are very obviously involved and in danger. Dudley lets us know from the door that Vernon is coming up the hill.

Vernon isn't alone. He steps into the house, perfectly blank in every way. An old man in a bowler hat walks calmly up the trail. He's a dead ringer for the man from a previous nightmare. Or God.



Petunia rushes to Vernon, asking what's wrong as Vernon stands motionlessly as a doll. I keep my attention on the man in the bowler hat, and nod slowly.

"The Lunar God," I say.

The man laughs and says yes, that's him, and Vernon's been dealing with him for quite some time.

He's given up control to you, I say quietly. For everything.

Well of course, but he didn't tell Vernon that beforehand. That would be a poor way to attract followers.

And then I wake up.

Alternate Perspective Disorientation. Scare Factor: 3.

I always wake up when I meet that character.

*She has a point.

I think I used to have better dream control than I do now. More frequent lucidity, as well.

September 2007

Why walk when you can fly? I have an impression of stone steps and pathways. They cling to the steep, grassy hilltop, jutting out into the wet, grey sky. The pathway seems to be large enough for only one person, but the pair of us climb the steps side by side.

I am looking ahead of us as the path ends at an alcove made of stone and concrete, similar to the one that used to be behind our apartment building in Ixburg, but it doesn't smell like mushrooms. If there is a smell, it's sharp, soft, clean. The smell of rain or of mountain air. On either side of the alcove, a trail begins, forking out from the steps. There the trail barely clings to the steep slope.

I can feel everything around me, imagining the texture of a surface as my eyes glance over it. The pebbles in the pathway, the grass and moss... everything tingles with the prospect of rain.

I let go of the ground, and drift upwards slowly until I am floating about a foot above the path. I am being pulled upward and pushed downward, and I hold on to the feeling. This is effortless.

Like a ghost - a painfully, ecstatically alive ghost - I drift alongside my companion. We discuss this phenomenon. I can still feel the ground, the sky, the grass. I simply didn't want to walk anymore, I explain.

The breeze doesn't occur to me. I am not bothered by rippling air currents. All that exists is the humming force which keeps me suspended in my dreamworld.

Gravity Hack. Scare Factor: 1. I wonder who my guide was in that dream. I think he was part-animal in the mythological sense, somewhat similar to a minotaur. Except more friendly.

I was going through some old dream journals and thought I'd type up a couple for reference. The first dream occurred shortly after I heard that my family had been in a minor car accident. Everyone was fine. Well, except for the wildlife involved.

August 2009

I'm rock climbing at the local crag (but in a different city) when I get the call. Mom hands the phone off to a grief counsellor or something. She tells me that my dad has passed away, but do I want to see my huge birthday cake? Hey, do I want to have the phone held up to the body's ear so I can talk to him? I'm watching the head get cut off of the body, presumably having to do with cremation. I close my eyes, nauseous.

Scrambling down a steep trail now, made of granite and overgrown with tree roots. I'm thrown into what seems like a very vivid memory on top of the dream I'm in. I'm a black man in South Africa, and I'm brandishing a knife, trying to fend off two men who attacked my wife.


Except with roots.

My dream-ego, still looking on from the first dream, hopes that I'm not going to hurt anyone.

My strike goes wide, and I injure my wife instead, watching with horror as her blood spills to the red ground. She's dead so, so quickly. Our local equivalent of a doctor appears, and she tries to slice my wife's body down from the roots that are binding her, thinking she might still be able to save her. She won't. Our son! Our son us still here. I take him and run.

Mortality. Scare Factor: 8. I remember chalking up this one as "The Nightmare of 2009".

I didn't remember the dream until I read about it though. It's not quite so scary when I remember "Dad's fine; I saw him yesterday."

Within the dream, the dream-within-the-dream was a memory of a previous life. It was so vivid, I practically felt the same way when I woke up.

Go to the moon was kind of my madness mantra last night. Attempted to remember that I wanted to do this.



I'm in the basement of a building my grandparents used to own. In the dream, it had been extensively remodeled since then. I try to apply the actual blueprints to the dreamscape, but it's too confusing. I hear newborn kittens. I see a few heads of bread-mice scattered around. The mice here are made of bread. I pick up a half-eaten copy of a book by Neil Gaiman, and decide that this is all his fault somehow.

Shift.

I'm in a love story, switching between two of the three main characters' points of view. I leave down the stream with the guy who's not me? This is confusing.

Shift.

I'm in a forest, hearing a Voice that gives me instructions. I'm happily running through, surrounded by green, green grass and trees, when I come to a stream. I jump straight over it, but land awkwardly on the other side, not having gone as far as I thought I would.

Water saps your power away, The Voice explains, That makes rivers difficult to cross.

I'm frustrated, because dreams should be doing whatever I tell them to, but the dream-logic makes sense for now. I consider another, wider, river nearby.

I'm near where the forest was, but now I'm surrounded by stone: banisters and stairways and what could make for some very fun parkour sequences. I glide up onto the banister, ready to jump, when I suddenly realize that because this is a dream, I really can go anywhere.

Go to the moon.

Oh, yeah, I was gonna try to do that tonight. I hop off the banister, landing easily on the stone floor. I hold a hand out as I had visualized, feeling through the dream-fabric. I feel and hear a buzzing, and watch in amazement as the dream within stone building abruptly disintegrates, leaving only the night sky. I look down, fully aware that I made it and I'm on the moon and -

Too much surprise.

I'm lying face down on the bed, just like when I last went to sleep. Everything is dark and I keep my eyes shut, trying for another shot at the dream. I feel plastic beneath my hands*, but I aim to kneel down and feel the moon rocks that must be at my feet.

Shift.

"How the hell are we going to stop that thing?"

"I'll take care of it."

"How?"

"I'll take care of it."

I'm using a fellow officer as bait, but I don't have any strong feelings on the matter. The monster is approaching from down the hallway, turning a corner toward me. It spots me, and I retreat into the room, leaving the door open behind me. I'm standing just around a corner, out of sight from the door. The monster steps into the room, and spots the injured officer lying on the bed. I remind myself that this is a dream and I will be able to do this.

The monster rounds the corner, snarling, and I grab it by the scruff of the neck and somewhere along the back (it might have been wearing clothes) and I throw it - hard - toward the window. It goes flying as if it weighed a pound, crashing either through the mirrored door of the closet and the wall behind it. It didn't land as if it weighed a pound.

I'm outside, on the red, ceramic tile rooftops, no longer worried about the monster. I consider taking another shot at getting to the moon. I hold up another hand, trying to feel the dream fabric. I little bit of deep blue bleeds through where my hand is. I put up the other hand, trying to force myself through. It doesn't work. New method.

I'm standing at the edge of a rooftop, unable to see into the abyss that lies before me. I jump, only concerned that this might make me wake up. I land. Without looking, I can tell I'm still in the same dream-scape, so I jump again.

This time I fall and fall and fall, visualizing the black tower that Nomad described. I land, easily, and I can tell that I am, in fact, on the top of a black tower. When I open my eyes, though, I consider that this might not have been the one I was looking for. This one is only three or four stories high, and it's surrounded by brick buildings on all sides. A watchtower. I sigh.

I hop down onto the dirt and paving stones, and look around at the DCs in the area. There's a cute blonde with long, wavy hair, chatting with some friends at the edge of the courtyard. I consider that I might be half in the moon-dream somehow and these might be real people, but I dismiss the thought as unlikely and walk toward the girls.

I step through her friends, smiling at the blonde girl and holding out a hand. She takes it, and I spin her around and kiss her. Oddly, I have the sudden ability to smell and taste (morning breath) and I quickly block it out. And suddenly I'm playing a game of the Sims, and there are a bunch of options on the screen. Now I'm talking to family members on the other side of the courtyard and looking for the girl so I can actually talk to her?

Voices Trying to Limit Your Dream-Control. Scare Factor: 2. Though the bread-mice were somehow creepy.

*So very much a false awakening.

February, 2010

It's been a long night. I'm standing in a creepy, unfinished basement and a group of college student survivalists have been spouting horror movie cliches at every opportunity.

"You can't touch the jelly sandwich," the de-facto leader explains. "It keeps all the other food good. Do you understand?"

"Perfectly," I say cheerily. I'm stealing from Spongebob Squarepants' logic. "Makes sense."

"No," he says, with a long-suffering sigh, "It really, really doesn't." He wanders away, morosely, muttering about crazy people. I briefly consider being a character that this guy is dreaming.

I go looking for food. I sit in the kitchen with my mom, even if she is upset about the potted plant sitting in the corner that looks like a tiger lily and is apparently called a "papyrus". At this point, I begin to tell her about the metaphors and symbolism in our current environment.

"The jellybean sandwich in the storage room is, apparently, there to keep all the other food from going bad, and the 'papyrus' is there because... you have really bad taste in fonts in real life."

"In real life?"

"Well, obviously this is a dream."

"You think so?"

"If it's not, tell me where these objects," I gesture at the flower, "Are located in your real house. Everything keeps shifting here."

The woman sitting across the table from me looks down, fighting to keep a grin off her face. She starts to laugh, and then to cackle madly. Shift. I'm standing near the door and she faces me from a few feet away. Her empty eye sockets are stuffed with bandages.

"Let me guess," I say, "You're my Other Mother."

She doesn't reply, but steps toward me. I wind back my left hand for a punch, but I'm moving so slowly.

The woman is moving in real time, and she takes another step, relaxed and confident. The punch doesn't connect. As she reaches for my throat, I desperately dig my fingers into her eye-sockets. There are teeth.

Everything is going black, facial features are twisting, and the only thing I can distinguish anymore is pain.

Shift.

I'm sitting on a deck, petting a stray cat that's wandered into the yard. Can I wake up now?

Shift.

"That rice is leftover from last night. And it's in front," Oma says helpfully, as I rummage through her fridge. I blink.

"Really?" I say, holding the plastic container. "You want me to eat this? Specifically?" I poke at the overabundance of soy sauce with a spoon. "I'm still dreaming, aren't I?"

March 9, 2010

My name is Lucifer, and I'm busy.

"But you have to stay here! You're the Lord of Hell!" says the ex-cherub, who seems to have been recast as my secretary.

"I don't, actually. I've left this job once, and I'll leave again once I have this place reorganized." I'm standing up at a desk, looking at blueprints.

I turn toward the ominous wooden door at the other end of the (hellish) office-space. The door leads to a dimension where damned souls are trapped. As they make their way to the door, they inch closer to the end of their torment. At which point, welcome to bureaucratic hell.

He continues to pester me, "But God wants you to-"

"Okay, look," I interrupt, "I don't care what God wants. In the actual comic book, Lucifer didn't care what God wanted. Every version of the devil, ever, actively resisted doing anything that God wanted him to do. So what makes you think that I care?"

I realize that I've broken out of character at this point, but the demon seems to actively resist the idea that this is a dream and I'm not really Lucifer. I decide to be amused instead of summoning up a gale of fire with which to burn him alive. Because, as the devil, I could totally do that.

Instead, I throw my hands up in the air, metaphorically, and walk through the now-open doorway to the realm of the damned. The door swings shut behind me, cutting off the shrill ranting of my unfortunate secretary.

I take the form of a woman with short, blonde hair as I take the first steps into the realm usually thought of as Hell. This area is closest to the exit, and as such, is actually fairly pleasant in comparison to the rest of hell. This, of course, means that it's a boring approximation of a cave that slopes slowly downward. The cave curves away in the distance, and I know that it's an infinite spiral to the bottom.

The soul nearest the door looks like a boy in his young teens, although he probably lived to be older than that. The boy is building a fence up the sloping ground, not noticing as it collapses into inexistance behind him. He is intensely focused on the task, trapped, as all the damned are, in a nightmare of his own creation. I approach, and as I do, I hear deep, threatening barking. The boy reacts in a panic, looking about wildly for the source of the noise, not seeing me.

Part of the fence has been shaped into a basket-like form, with half-rotten plywood as the bottom. A rottweiler puppy comes into existence as I look at the space, and it barks at the boy. When the boy sees it, he starts to back away from the puppy, and away from the door.

I'm standing directly beside the puppy, so I pick it up. The dog starts barking and the noise in the boy's nightmare lessens. I look at him, and he sees me for the first time. Finally, his eyes land on the door behind me...

End.

Bureaucratic Hell. Scare Factor: 3.

Spring 2008

I'm in my grandmother's old office. Shift. It's dark, and I'm surrounded by beautiful, frightening living statues made of shadow... twisted, slender, lethal. I want to remember them when I wake up, because they're mine.

The office space gives way, and I'm in the basement of my old house. I'm waking up, still surrounded by the last traces of my shadow-creatures. I'm trying to remember them, listing their traits aloud. Onyx. Jet. Shadow. Cat-like, bat-like, tribal, sharp, angular. They wouldn't have been out of place on a tattoo, if they weren't so real, so dynamic.

I hear a scream.

From upstairs. My mother? Why am I in the basement? Everything is hazy and dream, and my reactions are sluggish. I stumble through the basement and away from my dream-room. I reach the base of the stairs, which, oddly, are not located where they should be. The only light is coming from upstairs. I look up. There is a man standing there.

He's old, unremarkable. I wouldn't recognize his features if I saw him now. He's small, but not in any particular way. Not overly short, not overly skinny.

There was a scream from upstairs, but now, it's all about me. Because the man is stepping down stairs toward me, and I'm just standing there. There's no screaming - it's so quiet - and I couldn't move if I wanted to. And I want to move.

I'm rooted to the spot, affixed by an unbreakable bond to the dreamscape. I can't flex my muscles or flail, because it's not about my feet. I am stuck, immobile, immovable.

And the old man is walking down the stairs, unremarkably. Not sinister or threatening, but I need to get away. Because something horrible is about to happen.

And he reaches the base of the stairs and I haven't moved because I can't, although this is my last chance to rush him, to push past him onto the bare wooden steps.

He's standing in front of me, and of all my will, the only thing I can do is push two words past my lips, "No, please" and it's barely more than a whisper, because nothing's moving, and I haven't thought about drawing breath.

And the old man looks at me, his expression unremarkably pleasant. He places his hand on my forearm -

End.

First Appearances. Scare Factor: 9.

I'm not sure what it was about the dream that freaked me out so much. But I couldn't be alone in my apartment once I woke up. Not in the dark. It was something like five in the morning, and the Tim Hortons beside the building was open. I threw on clothes and nearly flew down the stairs. I ordered a hot chocolate, and a bagel, and sat with my back to a wall where I could see every exit, I and waited for the sun to come up.