Visions in the Dark

I am young than I look now and wearing a grey and red poncho. I am in some sort of museum or cultural center focusing on North American Aborigonal Societies. I am there to participate in a vision quest and arrive late in the afternoon to recieve instruction on what to do. I am told by some Elders that this vision quest is more like a savenger hunt because I have to obtain seven various items from safes that are hidden around the facility. The safes are locked with complex systems that require finding the right item to open them, and not all of the items are plain keys, which are also hidden from plain view.

I see that there are several other young people in the meeting room, some I know in real life and some I know in the dream. They have already completed their vision quests and are just visiting the facility. One of the coditions of the vision quest is that I must find and do everything alone and cannot ask for help from anyone. I go over and say hello to some of the people I know but many of them outright ignore me or are reluctant to talk to me.

Evening comes and many people leave but I want to stay as late as I can and get as much of my vision quest done as I can. I walk through the facility and looks along all the walls and corners for hidden safes. I find one but it is locked and I do not yet have the key to open it. At first I am closely observed by some Elders who follow me around and take notes on my progress and discuss it amoungst themselves, but I lose track of them at some point and left to explore on my own.

I find by self on the second floor of the building and come to an area that is open to the floors below and is crisscrossed with wooded suspention bridges. The only way to the other side is across the bridges and as I start to cross I notice two Tolkien inspired elves standing in the middle of one, observing my movements and loudly discussing me. One elf looks like Peter Jackson's version of Elrond and the other is a dark haired elf with a stern look on his face.

I cross the bridge and explore some of the rooms that have many indegenous artifacts on display and see two of my friends who are First Nations peoples. One of them I know completed their vision quest years before and the other says that he is just starting his, which confuses me because I thought I was the only one. It dawn on me that this is now a race because if he obstains the items before I do than I will obviously be unable to collect those items. I do not tell him that I am also on my vision quest. They move on and I continue searching the display cases until I find a gold token, which I hope can be used to open a safe.

Finding nothing more of unterest in the remaining rooms of that area I head back towards the wooden suspension bridges where the two elves are there and still watching me. They are having an argument about something and as I cross the bridge and walk past them, the Elrond looking elf grabs my arm, leans in and tells me tells me where to find the next safe and how to open it. I pull away, plug my ears and run because I am not supposed to recieve help from others and I don't want to get in trouble.

Back on the ground floor though I go straight to the safe he told me about but it will not open. Nearby in a potted plant I find another gold token. I wander around some more and find an arts and crafts room that has a safe sitting on a table. Down the hall from this room is a women's bathroom and another safe. The safe on the table contains a coin operated locking system but which I put my two gold coins in, they are immediately spit out. Ayoung boy working on a craft in the room tells me that I need three tokens to open that safe and the the item and key inside will open the safe down the hall.

Just then my friend who is also doing his vision quest walks in the room and inserts his three gold tokens into the safe which pops open and reveals a green jadestone medallion and another key. He then uses that key to open the safe down the hall and loudly declares that he has completed his vision quest. Several Elders and other people enter the room and congradulate him and they all walk out to celebrate somewhere. Just then the public announcment system plays a message that the facility is closing. I watch everyone in the building leave via the main exit, but I am crushed by my failure of the vision quest and I hide in a women's washroom that contains a lounge and cry.

I suddenly have a backpack with me and I open it and find several key chains with lots of keys on it, some stones and shells, a picture of my first cat and various other random crap that seems pointless and meaningless to me because they would not have helped me on my quest anyway. Many hours pass and a cleaning man discovers me sleeping in the bathroom and alerts security. A friendly brown haired security man wakes me up and offers to drive me home. We hop into is light blue 1956 Ford pickup and drive through the country. I don't talk to him because I am very despondant and depressed. We approach some train tracks and despite the warning lights that a train is coming the security man just keeps on driving. I fear that we will be hit by the train but cross just before it does and it misses the truck by just a few feet.